Building a quick and dirty savage worlds conversion for Eclipse Phase. 75% done! Participate directly on the wave or just kibbutz!
Mission:
Creating a lightweight conversion of savage worlds that lets you play in the eclipse phase world in a dynamic and fast style that (hopefully) will emphasize decision making and action (physical, social and otherwise) instead of number crunching.
Progress:
About 25-75% done. If you think 100% is playable alpha test that covers all the rules we're 75% (psionics, probably a few more guidelines about wealth, some more professional edges); if you're thinking it's nicely wordsmithed document we're 25% (or less).
(and if you're expecting something like the glorious fate conversion then I think the answer is probably never… :( … at least I'm realistic….)
Process:
There is a private wave on google wave so everyone can edit it. PM me for an invite. (forums are terrible for this, your ugly first draft sits on the front page and keeps people from seeing where you are now, if you edit it the forum itself becomes unreadable). Also, open source creation = good.
So PM me and I will invite you! Or you can email tokyodnd at the mail service run by google with the sub: Eclipse Phase Invite. I'm happy to have people fork or post stuff elsewhere (provided they fulfill all the CC expectations of the EP license).
Other Savage Conversions:
Seem to have died in the embryonic stage. Since they all basically seem to have died at the "balancing morphs against each other" stage I am pretty disinterested in using any of their stuff (because you can't balance morphs against each other…. the whole idea is absurd and misses one of the big points of the setting).
To be honest I could -really- use some help.
(The savage forums were unfortunately disinterested in EP or in helping much, so I'm out of other options).
Welcome! These forums will be deactivated by the end of this year. The conversation continues in a new morph over on Discord! Please join us there for a more active conversation and the occasional opportunity to ask developers questions directly! Go to the PS+ Discord Server.
Savaging Eclipse Phase (focused on translating setting not mechanics)
Wed, 2011-01-26 22:39
#1
Graf
Savaging Eclipse Phase (focused on translating setting not mechanics)
Thu, 2011-01-27 12:30
#2
nezumi.hebereke
Re: Savaging Eclipse Phase (focused on translating setting ...
Never used Savage Worlds, but the idea of EP requiring 'number crunching' is a bit of a shock to me...
You may want to take this over to the EP Wikipedia. No invite required, everything is tracked, and you can leverage their existing user base and internet rep to get more hits. They have a whole section just for fan-created material.
http://www.firewall-darkcast.com/
Tue, 2011-02-22 03:51
#3
Graf
Re: Savaging Eclipse Phase (focused on translating setting ...
The actual die mechanic for EP is admirably simple.
It's not intuitive but a simple way to explain it is that EP (the game mechanics) are Simulationist (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GNS_Theory).
Example:
The designers felt that having a lot of different skills (deception, impersonation, protocol, etc etc) that all overlap made sense in describing the game world. They then added extra systems (defaulting, complimentary skills, etc) to try to have that make sense in the context of a specific character (so a character with a high deception can get a bonus when impersonating, or they could default from another related skill). Then they layered on different morphs, and individual pieces of cyberware, muses, etc.
The result is a wonderfully detailed setting... and a huge mass of rules that groups either have to memorize before play, painstakingly research and cross reference during play or just ignore in favor of a) making decisions based on drama/story or b) "wing it" in exchange for fast action-focused play.
People who fall into a) will probably be very happy with the excellent Fate rules adaption.
People who fall into b) and want a quick way to create characters and get into the action (and who are willing to play fast and loose with some of the details of the setting like exactly how "piece of cyberware zrq" works) will probably want to play using Savage Worlds (or something similar).
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If you are naturally a Simulationist (and love really complex rules-sets) or buy EP for the excellent content but don't actually play much then this may seem to be a bit academic. If you've played a few sessions non-technical gamers and watched as people groan and massage their temples as they debate exactly what roles their characters should make to take a shot in a zero-g environment or what number they should be ultimately rolling against to try to make a fake Scum ID on the fly then it will probably seem like a serious, practical issue.
Personally I think that EP is complex enough, and different enough from a typical game, that translating it into Savage Worlds is non-trivial; judging from the swath of started-then-abandoned conversions out there for SW I think there is strong evidence to support it.
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I will post on Firewall (unless I already did when I originally saw your post and have forgotten about it). Appreciate the input.