Dry Cracker Road Test #2
Fail. Fail. Fail. Fail.
That is all I really need to say about it, but I will explain, 'cause I'm vaguely masochistic.
Yeah, so I wasted a reasonable amount of precious gaming time and the time of my group while trying to test out more combat situations, this time with non-minions on the PCs. I had suggested other activities for the evening, but Casey was eager to try out the system and bash some mooks. Perfectly reasonable.
Fail #1: getting all lego-happy about playing with dungeon tiles for this little exercise. I think I brought down everyone's energy level doing that. I just wanted something a little more varied than the Old BattleMat.
So, the general idea was that ProAll puts the PCs into a Holotheater in order to test their combat abilities. Of course, being the Players/PCs that they are, two of them say that the best way to beat the challenge is to shoot the machine making the mooks or to hack the hologram generator to materialize the mooks in the control room.
This tells you a LOT about the people I play with. It is impossible to design a goddamned game with any level of freaking precognition in regard to their actions. Not to mention that this was explicitly set up in the metagame as a disposable combat session to further test rulesets and threat levels vis a vis the PCs.
I point out that disabling the holosystem will NOT mean they win the simulation, as it is an IC test of their combat abilities and in the field, there is no "shoot the guys running the sim". At least I hope there isn't 'cause that person is me, and I'm gonna be PISSED OFF if Special Agent Q shows up and puts a bullet in me.
ALL CAPS PISSED OFF. That's how pissed off.
Anyway.
So, I set up a needlessly complex battlefield, the PCs place themselves at random points in the field, and I ask what people want to try messing around with. Casey states that he wants to smash some robots, so I set up some of the Battery Bots from the last session that the PCs chewed through like RiceChex. I figure considering how easily they handled them, three per PC wouldn't be bad.
Fail #2: Battery Bots are not Minions. They are Lts, with Autofire blast, and +8 TUFF (which I quickly dropped to +6) and +5 ATT. Minimal defense, as I recall.
So, I pretty much destroyed Feather, despite the fact that SAQ was helping her. Even Coltrane, our ersatz Paragon-Tank, is barely denting these guys due to their damage saves. Since they are not Minions, what damage they are taking does not really register much beyond a bruised/injured level. With 12 NPCs to deal with, Combat baaawwwwwwwgs down considerably.
I'm not sure how the hell the PCs blew through the Battery Bots originally, unless I totally forgot to apply damage saves or whatever during their initial encounter. Although, as I recall, they were perched on top of a building - which means that any significant knockback meant that they would end up flying off of the building and out of action for the most part. And, also, the Bots were outnumbered 5:3 during that encounter.
At this point, we are slogging through combat in a laborious way, particularly as I am having to check the rules often (although not as bad as Dry Cracker #1 or even session One) with long pauses between the PC's individual turns. It's WoD Celerity Combat all over again and I'm starting to panic about interest.
Fail #3: Panic.
Anyway, Cassie ends up being pretty tired and retires from the session, which brings a lull to the session as people break for smokey treats. I declare that the experiment was a failure and we'll start over with something else, maybe a bit better balanced. Casey is already back at his computer and puttering about on the internet and Morgan is discussing Pathfinder and the potential for having Casey run a bit of that.
Fail #4: Can't keep players attention, players start talking about other things they would rather be doing.
I'm setting up another run of the combat session using a few heroic NPCs on an even 1:1 basis with the remaining players, gracefully (IMO) allowing some of the others to continue talking about potential future games. I ask if people want to still continue.
"I'm good for whatever" is the general response. Of course, no one really seems interested in coming back to the table, so...well, it's nearly 1:00AM and I've already gotten a call to return home from The Lady, so, well, fuck it.
Results: Well, I still have no idea on how to balance the combat threats against the PCs. The PCs have still really not fought an even battle between themselves and an NPC team, and I don't think Casey got a reasonable view of what the systems are like. All in all, complete waste of time. My time, players time, time away from home.
Other Notes: Also found out that Mike will be dropping his ninja character as, quite reasonably, it did not feel like a heroic character. This works reasonably well since it provides a freebie on the consequences of having killed the NPC like he did. Although, as I just now consider it, you could argue that its a bit cheap that the player will not have to deal with the character's consequences of those actions. That sort of pisses me off, but whatever.
In any case, apparently he will be returning with a new PC, "The Windtalker", a native american superhero type who is apparently somehow aligned with wind powers or something and has been operating since WW2. This is #2 on the list of Great Cliches of Mike's Characters: Magical Native American (martial artist types being #1). He's a nice guy, but damn is he predictable.
All I know about the PC at this point is some convoluted history and the fact that he has Air control and a blast that has the Area: Trail Extra - which will cause me no end of headaches as I try to figure out how to work that (since I'm sure he has to travel through a enemy's position - which would seem to place the PC at a disadvantage, but I'm not using opportunity attacks, so why worry about it? Why? 'cause I'm sure that there will be an exploit, that's why).
The character also has the problem that the setting history explicitly states that the US did not have any super-powered heroes on the payroll until the creation of ProAll in 2000-2001. Having him active WW2, Korea, and possibly some of Vietnam doesn't jive with the setting. There's also the fact that he's apparently eternally young (which to me just is dissonant with native american mysticism which I think has less of a hangup on youth than European culture)
Meh. I should get some work done today.
That is all I really need to say about it, but I will explain, 'cause I'm vaguely masochistic.
Yeah, so I wasted a reasonable amount of precious gaming time and the time of my group while trying to test out more combat situations, this time with non-minions on the PCs. I had suggested other activities for the evening, but Casey was eager to try out the system and bash some mooks. Perfectly reasonable.
Fail #1: getting all lego-happy about playing with dungeon tiles for this little exercise. I think I brought down everyone's energy level doing that. I just wanted something a little more varied than the Old BattleMat.
So, the general idea was that ProAll puts the PCs into a Holotheater in order to test their combat abilities. Of course, being the Players/PCs that they are, two of them say that the best way to beat the challenge is to shoot the machine making the mooks or to hack the hologram generator to materialize the mooks in the control room.
This tells you a LOT about the people I play with. It is impossible to design a goddamned game with any level of freaking precognition in regard to their actions. Not to mention that this was explicitly set up in the metagame as a disposable combat session to further test rulesets and threat levels vis a vis the PCs.
I point out that disabling the holosystem will NOT mean they win the simulation, as it is an IC test of their combat abilities and in the field, there is no "shoot the guys running the sim". At least I hope there isn't 'cause that person is me, and I'm gonna be PISSED OFF if Special Agent Q shows up and puts a bullet in me.
ALL CAPS PISSED OFF. That's how pissed off.
Anyway.
So, I set up a needlessly complex battlefield, the PCs place themselves at random points in the field, and I ask what people want to try messing around with. Casey states that he wants to smash some robots, so I set up some of the Battery Bots from the last session that the PCs chewed through like RiceChex. I figure considering how easily they handled them, three per PC wouldn't be bad.
Fail #2: Battery Bots are not Minions. They are Lts, with Autofire blast, and +8 TUFF (which I quickly dropped to +6) and +5 ATT. Minimal defense, as I recall.
So, I pretty much destroyed Feather, despite the fact that SAQ was helping her. Even Coltrane, our ersatz Paragon-Tank, is barely denting these guys due to their damage saves. Since they are not Minions, what damage they are taking does not really register much beyond a bruised/injured level. With 12 NPCs to deal with, Combat baaawwwwwwwgs down considerably.
I'm not sure how the hell the PCs blew through the Battery Bots originally, unless I totally forgot to apply damage saves or whatever during their initial encounter. Although, as I recall, they were perched on top of a building - which means that any significant knockback meant that they would end up flying off of the building and out of action for the most part. And, also, the Bots were outnumbered 5:3 during that encounter.
At this point, we are slogging through combat in a laborious way, particularly as I am having to check the rules often (although not as bad as Dry Cracker #1 or even session One) with long pauses between the PC's individual turns. It's WoD Celerity Combat all over again and I'm starting to panic about interest.
Fail #3: Panic.
Anyway, Cassie ends up being pretty tired and retires from the session, which brings a lull to the session as people break for smokey treats. I declare that the experiment was a failure and we'll start over with something else, maybe a bit better balanced. Casey is already back at his computer and puttering about on the internet and Morgan is discussing Pathfinder and the potential for having Casey run a bit of that.
Fail #4: Can't keep players attention, players start talking about other things they would rather be doing.
I'm setting up another run of the combat session using a few heroic NPCs on an even 1:1 basis with the remaining players, gracefully (IMO) allowing some of the others to continue talking about potential future games. I ask if people want to still continue.
"I'm good for whatever" is the general response. Of course, no one really seems interested in coming back to the table, so...well, it's nearly 1:00AM and I've already gotten a call to return home from The Lady, so, well, fuck it.
Results: Well, I still have no idea on how to balance the combat threats against the PCs. The PCs have still really not fought an even battle between themselves and an NPC team, and I don't think Casey got a reasonable view of what the systems are like. All in all, complete waste of time. My time, players time, time away from home.
Other Notes: Also found out that Mike will be dropping his ninja character as, quite reasonably, it did not feel like a heroic character. This works reasonably well since it provides a freebie on the consequences of having killed the NPC like he did. Although, as I just now consider it, you could argue that its a bit cheap that the player will not have to deal with the character's consequences of those actions. That sort of pisses me off, but whatever.
In any case, apparently he will be returning with a new PC, "The Windtalker", a native american superhero type who is apparently somehow aligned with wind powers or something and has been operating since WW2. This is #2 on the list of Great Cliches of Mike's Characters: Magical Native American (martial artist types being #1). He's a nice guy, but damn is he predictable.
All I know about the PC at this point is some convoluted history and the fact that he has Air control and a blast that has the Area: Trail Extra - which will cause me no end of headaches as I try to figure out how to work that (since I'm sure he has to travel through a enemy's position - which would seem to place the PC at a disadvantage, but I'm not using opportunity attacks, so why worry about it? Why? 'cause I'm sure that there will be an exploit, that's why).
The character also has the problem that the setting history explicitly states that the US did not have any super-powered heroes on the payroll until the creation of ProAll in 2000-2001. Having him active WW2, Korea, and possibly some of Vietnam doesn't jive with the setting. There's also the fact that he's apparently eternally young (which to me just is dissonant with native american mysticism which I think has less of a hangup on youth than European culture)
Meh. I should get some work done today.