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Continuity and Ego Hunter

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Sun, 2014-04-06 03:34

Kassil

Continuity and Ego Hunter

So - I'm planning to try running these two adventures at Paizocon in July. Has anyone around here run them previously, and if so, any suggestions on what may or may not need tweaking in these scenarios? I'm not expecting experienced EP players at the table, just curious gamers who ran out of Pathfinder events.

—

"Don't eat the jelly, that's a protoplasm someone sleeved into."

Mon, 2014-04-07 08:58

nezumi.hebereke nezumi.hebereke's picture

There's a great 'cheat sheet'

There's a great 'cheat sheet' for Ego Hunter floating around here somewhere. I'm sure someone will jump in soon. I do a lot of con games, so I'll just post up my standard 'con package' and you can pick and choose what you like. Continuity 'Cheat Sheet': https://docs.google.com/document/d/1gCUERBSHXbQnOu2AgigTuTMcYjNGYSSuyZ3v... Continuity pre-gen characters: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1QGaRF7yJWWt_Mje4DJhEv4t5Tq6sI9LMNWSC... More general ... EP Introduction spiel: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1w1eWISEepQ6AIcFXmykfXBUfoVcgmmmub3kA... Mechanics cheat sheet: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1KUx2evG89TuZnbms3eHkIhhrBp5I5Uva-gzZ... 10 things you should know about Eclipse Phase: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1Qnrh0w7H0Jl2_CSsySRxcs4ugw27xsBIk5MY... Tell me how Continuity goes. I try to keep a running fatality tab with other GMs. It's normally around 90-95%.

Mon, 2014-04-07 16:58

Kassil

Awesome, these should be

Awesome, these should be useful. Thank you. The con isn't until July, but I'm making sure to be familiar with it and have all my ducks in a row beforehand.

—

"Don't eat the jelly, that's a protoplasm someone sleeved into."

Thu, 2014-04-24 18:24

hyades

I GMd Continuity twice for

I GMd Continuity twice for two of my local groups. These were also my first and only (by lack of interested players) attempts at running Eclipse Phase, so I don't know how useful this will be to other GMs. As I plan to run Continuity a third time at a Con here in Germany (also in July), I too would be interested in any tips, tweaks and comments regarding the scenario. Some tweaks:

Spoiler: Highlight to view

Every time the players tried to access any type of device on the station I let them roll on a table I prepared to decide whether it had been shut down by Hans early enough or was infected. There was also a slight chance that it had somehow malfunctioned (and could not be used) or that just the wifi had been disabled. I decided to change the whole air-loss setup a bit. I might be wrong, but I pictured that with the outer airlock in the machineshop and all of the inner airlocks open, the station would decompress very fast. Instead my players could figure out that Hans had tampered with the ventilation system, so that even with all inner airlocks closed there would still be a slight and steady air-loss. The greenhouse can be quite creepy with all the lights off, ripe with the smell of mold and rotting algae and some gurgling noises from the hydroponics. I wanted to emphasize zero-G, so I made a rather crude 3D Version of the station with my limited Sketchup skills.

And for the things I noticed:

Spoiler: Highlight to view

As the players were new to Eclipse Phase, they had some difficulties with all the information on the sample character sheets I provided. I had to explain much and told them to disregard stuff like networking skills, traits, sleights, rep etc., but I'm thinking about making a simpler, less stuffy version of the sample characters for the Con Game. I also think I overdid it with the pitch at the first game and tried to explain more of the setting than strictly necessary for Continuity. In both games I was reluctant to really turn Hans against the players, although they weren't very active before the docking of the Istari and more Action would've probably been a good thing then. Does anyone have any cool ideas on how Hans could trouble the players, aside from sending robots to attack them? In general the players in both groups didn't explore much, neither on the station nor on the Istari. I later felt that this was partly my fault and that I should have just pitched ideas like "you could go there/ you could use the fabbers and prepare" or something like that directly to them. After the Istari docked, both groups went straight for the shuttle (that seems to be a deathtrap) to get out. The outcome for the first group were 2 players killed and the other four (some infected) taking off with the shuttle, later killing themselves. The outcome for the second group were 2 players fleeing with the shuttle and killing themselves. The third one stayed after realizing she was infected and blew up the Istari with one of the rockets dying in the process. Player feedback was mixed. Although in general they liked the setting and the scenario, both groups felt that they didn't really know what to do with the characters and the setup provided. I guess that's mostly because they had very little experience with scifi. Any thoughts on how a GM could help there? On the other hand one player said that she liked being able to freely decide how to deal with the situation (she didn't want to use deadly violence and kept freeze-foaming the exsurgents;-).

Altogether I really enjoyed both games. Continuity is a very cool scenario (if you don't mind killing off PCs that is)

—

[...] vidi ingentis portenta ruinae, vidi hominum divumque metus hilaremque Megaeram et Lachesin putri vacuantem saecula penso. Stat. Theb. 3, 640-42.

Fri, 2014-04-25 07:13

nezumi.hebereke nezumi.hebereke's picture

The EP introduction has to be

The EP introduction has to be cut down. So for Continuity, I don't mention Firewall unless there's a firewall character (I don't believe there is in my sample set). I also don't recall, but yes, I have a list of 'weird skills' I bring up; reputation, networking, kinesics. Forget if there were any others. My opening spiel is normally 20-30 minutes with some level of glassy eyes. But, I don't normally get a lot of questions on that stuff during gameplay. In Continuity specifically, I mention none of that equipment on their sheet is there, they have to refer to the second page (linked above). Rolling for devices is a cool idea. I frequently forget to play up the wireless being infected (because I frequently forget my papers in the hotel room, like a doof). Since everything is disabled though, the players need to actively turn it on to use it, and normally Hans's warning is enough to scare them straight. I've had one player forget the warning and do it anyway, and then I roll based on how long it's on for. It's been a few years since I calculated the rate of air loss for this one, but I seem to recall it worked out, on the assumption it was opened only very recently, and the door isn't all the way open. I'd shy away from the ventilation. The open door gives players a very immediate threat they find immediately (and proceed to get sucked into space by). Ventilation may be a little too well hidden for players new to sci-fi, although I'm curious what hyades's experience with it. Double plus on the greenhouse. I love turning on little things there, like the sprinklers turning on on their timer, and the water is brown (with rust, but they don't know). Hyades: Did you use the sample characters from the book, or the ones I posted above? If you have thoughts on how mine should be stripped down, I'm happy to hear them. Regarding Hans, remember he can't directly shoot them. He has to use the station against them (while keeping the station basically intact). One of my favorite tricks is he tells everyone there's a *** in the medbay (either something really good, if your players are driven by profit, or something really bad if they're driven by adventure). Once they're all in, he seals the medbay and ejects the module. 100% kill rate on both. Not bad, Hyades. I've never run it for a group of people who are all fairly new to sci-fi. Normally most are sci-fi buffs, with at least one hard-core EP fan in the group, which helps because that guy takes the lead and everyone else sorts of figures it out. In general the order of priorities are normally: clothes (except for that one guy, who likes cloth gowns), weapons, not getting sucked into vacuum, with one smart person making a beeline for Hans.

Sun, 2014-04-27 15:57

hyades

I used the sample chars from

I used the sample chars from the books.

Quote:
Ventilation may be a little too well hidden for players new to sci-fi, although I'm curious what hyades's experience with it.

The outer airlock in the machineshop was still open. So the clues my players got, weren't that different from the original setup. Through the warning lights they realized that something was wrong with air pressure. Despite their lack in experience they figured that there had to be a leak somewhere. As the internal airlocks in the greenhouse were all closed and they couldn't find a leak there, they took the risk of infection and activated the stations video surveillance system. Through the cameras they saw the open airlock in the machineshop and the steelframe. They concluded that someone had sabotaged the ventilation system so that -even though the internal airlocks were closed- the whole station was still losing air through the open outer airlock in the machineshop, just not in one rush. Is that plausible?

Quote:
Once they're all in, he seals the medbay and ejects the module.

Neat. I'll definitely try that at the Con game.

—

[...] vidi ingentis portenta ruinae, vidi hominum divumque metus hilaremque Megaeram et Lachesin putri vacuantem saecula penso. Stat. Theb. 3, 640-42.

Sun, 2014-04-27 16:50

Noble Pigeon Noble Pigeon's picture

nezumi.hebereke wrote:

nezumi.hebereke wrote:
Double plus on the greenhouse. I love turning on little things there, like the sprinklers turning on on their timer, and the water is brown (with rust, but they don't know).

Yeah I remember our group freaking out about that in the Continuity game you ran at Templecon. Tanaka remembers!

Quote:
I've never run it for a group of people who are all fairly new to sci-fi. Normally most are sci-fi buffs, with at least one hard-core EP fan in the group, which helps because that guy takes the lead and everyone else sorts of figures it out. In general the order of priorities are normally: clothes (except for that one guy, who likes cloth gowns), weapons, not getting sucked into vacuum, with one smart person making a beeline for Hans.

Yeah, if I recall, our group was either familiar with sci-fi or already knew a lot about EP (me and the other two dudes, wish I remembered their names), so that definitely helped. Eclipse Phase isn't a setting I'd run for people who only mostly have experience with heroic fantasy, and as I imagine Paizocon will be full of people who mostly play Pathfinder, you might run into some snafus. But I wouldn't worry about it too much. As long as people are having fun, then go crazy!

—

"Don't believe everything you read on the Internet.” -Abraham Lincoln, State of the Union address

Mon, 2014-04-28 09:51

nezumi.hebereke nezumi.hebereke's picture

Quote:The outer airlock in

Quote:
The outer airlock in the machineshop was still open. So the clues my players got, weren't that different from the original setup. Through the warning lights they realized that something was wrong with air pressure. Despite their lack in experience they figured that there had to be a leak somewhere. As the internal airlocks in the greenhouse were all closed and they couldn't find a leak there, they took the risk of infection and activated the stations video surveillance system. Through the cameras they saw the open airlock in the machineshop and the steelframe. They concluded that someone had sabotaged the ventilation system so that -even though the internal airlocks were closed- the whole station was still losing air through the open outer airlock in the machineshop, just not in one rush. Is that plausible?

Oh, I like that! I have issues with players locking themselves up in one room as a life boat. The vents really bring the threat to them.