City of Pen and Paper
By
AzureSkyCiel,
Posted on: 2009-09-22 19:36 in CoH and CoV General Discussions
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No it didn't. Eden studios, though a producer of well thought out RPGs, is not particularly well run as a business. From all indications the game book was pretty much all designed and waiting for the printers, and then Eden Studios ran into financial trouble. (due in part to the licensing costs associated with some of their other product lines such as the Buffy RPG)|
Originally Posted by Sargatanas
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By the time Eden studios was back to the point of being able to release the game, (two years later, I think?) NCSoft had bought out Cryptic's share of CoH and didn't re-approve the licensing.
"I reject your reality and substitute my own!" Adam Savage from Mythbusters
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I'm aware thank you. I played it years and years ago. My point was that there's no point in translating CoH, which has all sorts of awkwardness inherent to it because it was designed to fit the MMO mechanics, when there are already games like Champions which do not have those ridiculous elements in their settings/game mechanics because they were designed for the vastly more flexible realm of pencil and paper and imagination.
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Originally Posted by Fleeting Whisper
pssst... Champions is a PnP game, and has been for years
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Making a CoH setting for an existing PnP game, on the other hand...
I don't think it would work. There's too many weird things in the setting. The hospital teleporters that make it so no one can die, ubiquitous healers, ressurection powers... The list goes on and on.
Not to mention that there's very little point in designing a setting to accomodate thousands and thousands of heroes when you're running a game for 4-10 people. That just makes them less special.
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I'm not sure what you are getting at here. All of the above (script immunity, ubiquitous healing, resurrection) have been done successfully in existing roleplaying games.|
Originally Posted by Paladin_Musashi
I don't think it would work. There's too many weird things in the setting. The hospital teleporters that make it so no one can die, ubiquitous healers, ressurection powers... The list goes on and on.
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| Not to mention that there's very little point in designing a setting to accomodate thousands and thousands of heroes when you're running a game for 4-10 people. That just makes them less special. |
Not to mention that some players already DO roleplay in City of Heroes, so saying that "it wouldn't work" is probably too strong a statement.
So.. There might be some interest in my ongoing project to convert CoX into an M&M campaign setting... Maybe?
The wisdom of Shadowe: Ghostraptor: The Shadowe is wise ...; FFM: Shadowe is no longer wise.
; Techbot_Alpha: Also, what Shadowe said. It seems he is still somewhat wise 
; Bull Throttle: Shadowe was unwise in this instance...; Rock_Powerfist: in this instance Shadowe is wise.; Techbot_Alpha: Shadowe is very wise *nods*; Zortel: *Quotable line about Shadowe being wise goes here.* There always has been.
Something I read once with regards to roleplaying in tabletop games and computer games: for computers, math is easy and story is hard. For tabletop, it's the other way around.
Considering it's much easier to create a character in the HERO system if you have a calculator than if you're doing it in your head, I can kind of see that.
Current main:
Schrodinger's Gun, Dual Pistols/Mental Blaster, Virtue
Avatar: Becky Miyamoto from Pani Poni Dash. Roulette roulette~
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Well, I know what I'm doing some more of in my fortnight off the week after next...
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Originally Posted by Cass_
There always has been.
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The wisdom of Shadowe: Ghostraptor: The Shadowe is wise ...; FFM: Shadowe is no longer wise.
; Techbot_Alpha: Also, what Shadowe said. It seems he is still somewhat wise ; Bull Throttle: Shadowe was unwise in this instance...; Rock_Powerfist: in this instance Shadowe is wise.; Techbot_Alpha: Shadowe is very wise *nods*; Zortel: *Quotable line about Shadowe being wise goes here.*
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Thanks for clarifying what happened Zengar. Looks like the game got pretty close to being launched. I've since discovered that Amazon were listing the Registration Manual (http://www.amazon.com/Registration-M...=pd_rhf_shvl_1) and Paragon City Operating Manual (http://www.amazon.com/Paragon-City-O.../dp/1933105127) as pre-orders.
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Originally Posted by Zengar
No it didn't. Eden studios, though a producer of well thought out RPGs, is not particularly well run as a business. From all indications the game book was pretty much all designed and waiting for the printers, and then Eden Studios ran into financial trouble. (due in part to the licensing costs associated with some of their other product lines such as the Buffy RPG)
By the time Eden studios was back to the point of being able to release the game, (two years later, I think?) NCSoft had bought out Cryptic's share of CoH and didn't re-approve the licensing. |
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Oh please. All the math needed to make a Champions character is 4th to 5th grade stuff. A piece of paper to keep track of point costs and totals helps, though.
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Originally Posted by DKellis
Considering it's much easier to create a character in the HERO system if you have a calculator than if you're doing it in your head, I can kind of see that.
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"If you're going through hell, keep going."
Winston Churchill
Winston Churchill
When I was in my teen years my buddies and I would play a free-form roleplaying game I called "You Wake Up"... It required no dice, no papers, no character sheets.
My friends played themselves or at least a close approximation there-of... They were either in the "real" world or the Marvel universe depending on how much that person knew about comic books. The concept was they were actually mutants and had reached the point at which their powers started to manifest.
Strangely enough... the powers always seemed to manifest at night... hence a roleplay might start like this:
"You wake up... your bedroom is well lit even though you distinctly remember having turned off the light before trying to fall asleep... blinking the sleep from your eyes you notice that the light is not coming from a bulb.. but from YOU... more specifically from your bones which are glowing SO brightly they actually shine through your very flesh. What do you do?"
The whole game was basically them discovering what they had for powers and then deciding what to do with them. For a silly little game it was rather entertaining.
My mind wanders so often you've probably seen its picture on milk cartons. - Me... the first person version of the third person Steelclaw
My group's take on more freeform PnP RP with a very silly bent was the "d1000 table", it did involve dice rolling, sure, but the results were usually hilarious.
Entries on the table included;
- Summon Covert Assault Paciderms
- Summon religious icon
- Gender inversion
- Apply lovecraftian attributes to all small cute things in a 30km radius
- Vampire cupcakes
- Coin Flip: Heads destroys the universe, tails fizzles
Great way to spend time on a dull afternoon.
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If you need any minions running up, I did get the hero Labs.
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Originally Posted by Shadowe
Well, I know what I'm doing some more of in my fortnight off the week after next...
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Oddly enough, Mutants and Masterminds is dungeons and dragons for superhero's - its an adapation of the d20 system. So yea, technically it isn't (A)D&D but it is DnD 3.5, sorta.
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Originally Posted by Sorciere
Well, the solution is simple: Don't use (A)D&D rules for superhero games. That's like trying to use motor oil for cooking instead of olive oil. Don't be surprised at getting inedible results.
There are plenty of fine Superhero tabletop RPGs (Champions, Mutants & Masterminds, Capes, With Great Power) or you can adapt existing rulesets that are suitable for superpowered characters (Amber Diceless, HeroQuest, Everway). |
Globals: @Midnight Mystique/@Magik13
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Don't forget the fab http://squadronuk.co.uk/ (which was formerly known as Golden Heroes, published by Games Workshop) which is well worth playing and also a free download!
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Originally Posted by Sorciere
Well, the solution is simple: Don't use (A)D&D rules for superhero games. That's like trying to use motor oil for cooking instead of olive oil. Don't be surprised at getting inedible results.
There are plenty of fine Superhero tabletop RPGs (Champions, Mutants & Masterminds, Capes, With Great Power) or you can adapt existing rulesets that are suitable for superpowered characters (Amber Diceless, HeroQuest, Everway). |
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Well, except that the game mechanics of Mutants & Masterminds had precious little to do with those of D&D 3/3.5 except in a very superficial manner (starting, very sensibly, with scrapping the leveling system of D&D).
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Originally Posted by EricHough
Oddly enough, Mutants and Masterminds is dungeons and dragons for superhero's - its an adapation of the d20 system. So yea, technically it isn't (A)D&D but it is DnD 3.5, sorta.
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The Game Mechanics are (mostly) d20. But character creation is nothing like.
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Originally Posted by Sorciere
Well, except that the game mechanics of Mutants & Masterminds had precious little to do with those of D&D 3/3.5 except in a very superficial manner (starting, very sensibly, with scrapping the leveling system of D&D).
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The wisdom of Shadowe: Ghostraptor: The Shadowe is wise ...; FFM: Shadowe is no longer wise.
; Techbot_Alpha: Also, what Shadowe said. It seems he is still somewhat wise ; Bull Throttle: Shadowe was unwise in this instance...; Rock_Powerfist: in this instance Shadowe is wise.; Techbot_Alpha: Shadowe is very wise *nods*; Zortel: *Quotable line about Shadowe being wise goes here.*
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They are d20 mechanics insofar as they involve rolling a d20 and retain certain core elements in a mostly superficial fashion. I mean, it's D&D, except it doesn't have classes and levels? It's D&D combat except that it doesn't have hit points and damage rolls?
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Originally Posted by Shadowe
The Game Mechanics are (mostly) d20. But character creation is nothing like.
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While I love the idea of getting together with a group of friends (if I had any) to play my favorite video game in AD&D style;
There are plenty of fine Superhero tabletop RPGs (Champions, Mutants & Masterminds, Capes, With Great Power) or you can adapt existing rulesets that are suitable for superpowered characters (Amber Diceless, HeroQuest, Everway).