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we could play APOCALYPSE WORLD


Sudanna

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Session complete! Party gets healed from their wounds last session, and takes more wounds to compensate. Old cliffhanger, meet new cliffhanger. Video will be up eventually. Calendar: http://whenisgood.net/yr2h5i7

 

Sarachim left early, and it was maybe a lot, so here's the homework I gave to you all, my lovely players, stolen straight from other, better GMs and Burning Wheel:

 

You the players are to give your characters

2 Goals. They can be short or long-term, petty or ambitious, reasonable or insane, material or ephemeral, mundane or weird. They can be as supposedly game-breaking as you like, and while I won't give you what you want, I will do my best to present you with opportunities to work towards what you want. "Kill Foster and take over the Mill" is a valid goal, and I will absolutely allow you to work towards earning it. "Find a working DVD player and a copy of Die Hard" is also a perfectly valid goal. I am very willing to let you the players take your own initiative. However, your goals should be specific and actionable, and leave you with somewhere to start - rather than "Get a gang", consider "I want Twice to join my gang".

 

2 Beliefs. These are things that your character believes about the world, other characters, or themselves. They can be ideological in nature, if your character has something approaching an ideology - "Power over men is inherently evil" could be a good belief. They can also be personal or interpersonal - "Batty is dangerous and I need to be very careful around him", "I won't die in my bed", and "I will find my true love someday" are all good beliefs. They should describe your character in some way, but in order to benefit from them, they should be something that can and will influence your characters' actions in some dramatic way.

 

2 Instincts. These are things that your character does habitually. They are best, though not necessarily, approached as if/then or always/never statements - "If I find anything valuable, then I hide it and come back for it when I know it's safe" or "I never sit with my back to a wall" are both good instincts. Again, these are both descriptive and prescriptive qualities - ideally, they will say something about your character and provide your character with interesting ways to act in the future.

 

Those of you who have been my GMs in the past know that I like to go a little overboard with character backstories, and while you can do that, it's not really what I'm looking for here. What I want from you is ways that your characters are connected to and intertwined with the world.

 

If you complete a goal or make significant progress on a long-term goal, you can mark experience. If your beliefs dramatically influence the way your character responds to something, you can mark experience. If your instincts negatively effect your character, you can mark experience - otherwise, the benefit is the thing your instinct tells you to do.

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Session 6 video: https://www.youtube....h?v=ImGVVtA5dJY at the time of posting, it's still processing, but it will eventually not be.

 

We meet some nuns! I'm sure they're nice. Batty is a father now.

 

Session 7 calendar: http://whenisgood.net/sk8n3wy

 

One thing I forgot to mention re: homework - you can change your goals, beliefs, and instincts at session starts. If your beliefs or instincts develop in interesting and relevant ways, XP! Like, if your belief is "THESE EYEBALLS AUGH" but the eyeballs do something dramatic to save you, so you change it to "I love these eyeballs, they're some rad pets", and roleplay that, you done good and I like you. I hope and expect your characters to change over time, and one way to express that explicitly and keep it in mind during play is with your G/B/I. Thanks, Burning Wheel and other, better GMs, for these great ideas!

 

Speaking of G/B/I, since we shared them all anyways, we might as well share with anyone else who may or may not be following the campaign. I'm pretty sure Dintiradan is the only one. :p

 

 

Humvee

 

Goal 1: Cheat death. Humvee lost three children to the psycho wards for experiments, all of which died. She wants to find a way to revive them and end her grief.

Goal 2: A white picket fence. Humvee wants to find a country where she can live in peace and stability, meaning she won't have to fight or be in constant danger of combat and she can live comfortably without fear of starvation or other scarcity-induced death.

Instinct 1: Bilk 'em, Danno! Humvee is a chronic liar, which she uses as a defense mechanism to try to protect herself and keep from dying, rather than get into fights.

Instinct 2: Soccer mom. Humvee is used to carrying the precious cargo of children in Slugger, and so she instinctively adjusts her driving to break, turn slower, etc. when she's carrying anyone with any sort of delicate condition (injuries, children, w/e).

Belief 1: All doctors are crooks. Related to her own trauma with doctors and the death of her children, Humvee believes in natural remedies, healthy diet, and distrusts anyone with more medical experience than a medic.

Belief 2: Communism. What that means in her post-apocalyptic vision is that no one should have to starve just because some warlord wants more jewels on his rings.

 

 

 

Sundown

 

Goals:

* Track down the guy who used to run that [censored]ing lab and kill him

* Find a bottle of real French champagne from back when there was a France and drink it, all by myself

 

Instincts:

* I never let anybody see my face

* If something is important to me, I keep it within arm's reach

 

Beliefs:

* Nobody helps anybody for free

* No matter where I go, I won't be welcome for long

 

 

 

Batty

 

Goals:

-Find a stable source of income

-Defeat a famous fighter

 

Beliefs:

-Fear is the best way to get people to do what you want

-If I ran the Mill, it wouldn’t pay tribute to every [censored] with a motorcycle

 

Instincts:

-I’ll never sleep in a confined space if I can avoid it

-If there’s a threat nearby, I’ll move toward it

 

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huh, whenisgood doesn't have time zone selection options any more i guess? that's inconvenient.

 

anyway good news is i'm no longer at risk of having to drop everything at a moment's notice for that family member who's been having health problems. bad news is i have a funeral coming up some time in the next couple of weeks and i don't know exactly when yet. i'll update my answer as soon as i know

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  • 2 weeks later...

arg

 

OK. So. That time didn't work either. That's fiiiiiiine. Important personal [censored] happened. Important personal [censored] happens sometimes. We're gonna try this again. This may well be the last time I try and schedule a Session 7 before giving up, sooo let's not have that happen please. I'm having fun, you guys are fun, I hope you guys are having fun, there's a ton of (i hope) neat stuff I've left around for you guys to uncover no matter where you go, we're just getting into the swing of things, etc. But if I'm gonna be spending my 2-minutes-at-a-time free time at work brainstorming stuff for a campaign, I kinda want it to be one people actually play. :p

 

CALENDAR: http://whenisgood.net/gs93iky

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  • 2 weeks later...

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