Pages: [1] 2
Author Topic: Alt (Dash) Blur  (Read 7317 times)
Gelatinous Cube

View Profile
« on: August 07, 2009, 12:41:49 PM »

ALT -- b.l.u.r.[/i]
(Catch the Net)


Note: I am not certain where this is going. I am trying to make a modern game here that is like Shadowrun, or Hunter... but which is not necessarily dark. I am trying to feel out the conflicts still. There may be aliens, there may be corporate themes, there may be alienation themes, paranormal, or more. We will see where this goes...

Gameplay: This is a game best done with two people; a game master and a player ; It can also be played successfully with more players in a play by post or a play by chat game.

"1 to the 0
And 4 to the score
3 in the middle
and 3 in the middle
7 is teh heaven
And I will show you how
1-3-3-7-er than thou."
- 1337 K43w (Leet Krew)

Temporary Statistics "On the Net"
Energy 10
Intelligence 1
Charm 0

Temporary Statistics are all in binary. You can have a 10, 1, or 0 in the statistic of your choice, and can switch it every hour. It's a zero sum game on the internet. You had best learn how to game the system before it games you.

Example Play

6 AM wake up. Log on. Order statistics 10/1/0.

Set Goal: At 5:55 AM Peter sent you an email that someone on the Anti-Terror listserv with an IP address originating from Cuba was talking about the bribed release of a terrorist from Guantanamo (around 5:15 AM); but then his messages were backwards-scrubbed by a virus in Gmail's servers and the words disappeared-- but Peter still had the original message downloaded into his POP3 email client.

When the guy's computer was pinged, everything checked out- he really was where he said he was- and he was posting from a government computer -- stupid if the other side finds out. Peter wants you to research who this guy in Cuba is and what his motivations are.
Time Limit: You have probably four hours before the terrorist gets wherever he's going; likely less.
1. Figure out who uses the government Computer;
(Player considers)
SOLUTION A. Ping the IP address and try to hack into the server's records. See what sites this guy visits.
SOLUTION B. Find out the Google queries made from the address. Maybe the guy googled his own name, or the name of someone close to him.

2a. Contact the guy- he may already be on the run. Try to figure out his cellphone number... something.
2b. Get into the Bay's security system.

The player decides to take 1B... it seems to be the easiest solution.
So he adds ENERGY to his HACKING skill, then rolls a d10 to figure out his competence. he rolls a 3 and has a total of 18.; the opposed roll is the server's STRENGTH and INTEGRITY plus a d10. Google is pretty well defended, but it has some porous points since so many people need to interact with it on a daily basis. Its strength is about 8, but its integity is only a 6, slightly above normal. Google, however, rolls a 6- to give it a 20 opposition roll.

Since the player only differs from google by 2 points, he isn't detected or tracked, but neither does he succeed. If the player had differed from google by 5 points or more, google could try a SECURITY TRACKING roll (with a bonus equal to the amount the player fails) and try to hunt him down and bring him to the notice of authorities.

For this hour, the player is SOL (---- out of luck) and so he might want to reconsider his course of action.

The player thankfully has a 1 in INTELLIGENCE, however. That can be used in two ways. The one in intelligence can be used to purchase an extra d10 to use in a roll for a round. or it can be used by the GM to give the player a hint on a better course of action. [If the player had a d10 in intelligence, the player would have access to an automatic roll of 10 rather than an extra d10).

The player should just add the d10 roll, but he doesn't yet know what Google rolled- they could have rolled almost anything. So he invests the 1 intelligence point into asking the GM for an idea. The GM ponders and then he suggests that if the player succeeds on a GEEK roll, he might be able to figure out a sure-fire solution.

7AM 10/1/0 (same as before)

The player takes the risk and adds his ENERGY to his GEEK score and a d10 roll. He ends up with an 22- enough to succeed here.

The player now has two options. He can, if he thinks he is POLITIC enough, try to convince a hacker on the net to help him out. He has some respect on the net, so he might be able to get someone to lend him some aid, but he's going to owe the guy a pretty big favor.

Or the player can take advantage of some little-known internet lore. Some techies at Google resell IP addresses tied to search results to an advertising company based in China. In return, Google is largely left alone by the government. The player can then add his NEWSINESS score to a HACKING and ENERGY score in trying to overcome a d100 challenge to knock aside some weak protections on the Chinese Company's server and extract the data.

The only problem with that solution is that the player doesn't speak the Chinese LANGUAGE. But all he needs is some relatively simple translation. This is an easy task. He rolls his energy plus his COMPUTING score to try to figure out if he gets the information extracted properly. He ends up with a 18- good enough for a simple task. He manages to figure out the general gist of the Chinese site.

7:45AM: Near the end of hour two, the player manages to figure out a few names, one of which might be the guy who wrote the note. Jorge Dios; Stefan Pablos; and Jose Olvidares are three names that were google queried more than once in the past 10 days. The names might be job applicants, but based on the follow-up links clicked, he rolls a QUALITY roll and manages to figure out that Stefan Pablos is definitely a worker, and so is Jose Olvidares. They probably share the same computer.

8 AM (Hour 3)- 1/10/0

So it is now time to check the telephone numbers of the two. This would be relatively easy anywhere other than Cuba, but even in Cuba there is a telephone directory- one just has to know how to get into it. HACKING+GEEK+ROLL manages to get him into the directory. And then he extracts several names that are similar. D--- this is getting complicated and time is running out.

You call up Peter and asks for more time- tells him what he got, sees if Peter can help him out. Peter is tied up, says that he had to bolt because some people came knocking on his door about fifteen minutes ago. He suggests that you bug out too- just in case they can trace the cellphone call. He said he's ripping out his sim card in 5 minutes and he'll be out of contact. He said he grabbed his USB and his Computer, but there might still be evidence in the house-  You roll a POLTIC+QUALITY+Roll and try to convince Peter to do something for you. Even though you manage a good roll- a 39- Peter's under a lot of stress and doesn't have a lot of resources. This is a very difficult problem and you needed to roll under a 75 to get him to help. Peter says "Bye." Then ditches the phone and runs.

8:15AM. Should you continue on? You are getting nervous. Roll a COURAGE+ENERGY+ROLL to see if you can keep working. You roll an 8 because you sacrificed most of your energy to be more intelligent. You cannot beat the 15 needed. You sweat profusely, and start to give up searching. But you add a natural 10 to your roll from Intelligence and have an 18. You sit back down and keep searching.

You decide to cross reference the phone numbers with a list of occupations in Cuba's national identity registry which thankfully is online- but now you have to hack into that system. And that is going to take time. ...

Minutes later, you hear a knock at your door.

You grab your laptop, USB, and run to your bathroom, knocking over a Terracotta Warrior statue as you flee. The statute crashes on the ground and cracks into two pieces. You jump on top of your toilet seat and grab at the window, and unfasten the lock. DEXTERITY+ENERGY+ROLL to see if you can yank yourself up and fit yourself through the window. With a roll of 6 you fail to get up on your first try, but you decide to try again. Taking twenty, you waste precious minutes, but eventually squeeze through the window as the knocking grows louder.

You flee through the neighborhood and ditch your iPhone. You are not going to be taken this time. You failed to expose the escape-- for now-- and for now you have a bigger problem at hand. You need to figure out who is after you and Peter, and how to stop them and throw them off your trail.

Are You IN the Net?

The Net


Blinking Time on the digital clock of the Mac - Gizmo Bar red and vibrant flashes across the screen. 2012, August 7th.

IM Flashes on MSN. "It's The End of the World As We Know It" is playing on the ITunes-- set to play with wakeup mode. REM sleep fades as REM listening becomes obtrusive.


No need for coffee when I am feeling this jittery.

Something isn't right with the system. The traffic on the net is all askew. Everything is routed through Dubai and that shouldn't happen- usually.

TechnoGeek has nothing about it on their page. The servers for Wired are down. What about other American sites- can't access. Did the cable get cut? Did the Emirates decide to take down access to the outside world?

I read the email. It's about "The Next Big Thing."

Damn. This scam could net Yuri a couple billion- but Interpol will be all over him if he does that.

Email is dated five hours ago.

His plan is what's going on- it's all routed through Dubai... but Yuri's full of crap. You know. But how did he know that the network was going down? And the cellphones too- you had picked yours out to give Yuri a ring, but found it "Out of Service". Everything overloaded. At least you still have electricity.

Yuri works for internet security- what could they have known about? He's based near the Caspian Sea... so it's not like I can just go down the street and contact him...

wait a second. I turn on the television.

The CDC and the Russian Hazardous Diseases Lab lost power earlier this morning; both were turned off the grid... and their backup generators died too- wait a second- you know who made the CDC's backup generator- that was James' company- Haverfield-

Ten minutes later the net query comes back.
Yeah. Haverfield- they were the ones who built the backdoor into that program for the US Military six years ago- one of their techs found the backdoor and the other guy was fired, no harm no foul...

What if this is a foul?

And who did the Russian thing.

And why?
The Labs had smallpox you know.
Lots of people could use that. But was this connected to the internet crash?
I'm going to boot up chat on the IRC (Internet Relay) channel and figure this out.


Main Statistics
* 10 points. Distribute. Point buy. 1=1, 2=2, 3=2, 4=3, 5=3
* Standard Characters have 20 in all categories to begin with. The ten points are then added to the character.
* These statistics can be leveled up. They are used in the real world; they are rarely used on the Net, but they can determine skill ratings that are used on the net.
* Every ten points in a category above 20 can be used to add one point to a related skill in the list below.

Quality d100
 -How good are you at what you do?
 -Used to determine Strength, Dexterity, Aim/Attack, and Constitution in a traditional setting

Politic d100
 -How well do you know manners?
 -Charisma (Used online- do you know how to interact with the different sub-groups) also used off-line in chatting with people on the phone.

Newsiness d100
 -How informed are you?
 -Do Y3w Kn3w teh Interwebs and can you find teh crucial data?


Out of Character

1. Cracker - You haXX0r systems for fun. You used to phone phreak back in the 80s, or you set up P2P back in 1997. You got teh skillz and you spend your time bot-netting zombie networks to hit JP Morgan's servers, or take out Morgan Stanley's investment advice.

+1 Computer and Hacking

2. Hacker - You write programs. Sometimes they have viruses, usually they don't. You know computers inside and out, you can get into networks and extract what you need.

+2 Hacking

3. Net Nanny - You hunt Crackers and rogue Hackers. You might be a suit, or you might be a "Concerned Citizen". You might monitor the network and give warnings to abusers of the system- you could hunt child pornography posters, or people interested in infidelity. You know how to get into networks, extract data, and get out.

+1 Courage and Hacking

4. Security - You're not into all that "technology" jazz. You do jobs for those people though- you guard data centers, you beat up rival gangs, you get into firefights with the police. Without Real-Worlder's like you, the techies who sneer at you would all be a bunch of dead meat. Maybe one day though you'll pick up some of their tricks and they would stop snickering at you behind your back making Unix jokes... but probably not- it'd be easier just to bash their heads in when an alliance with them stops being politically expedient.

+1 (choose 2: Aim, Dexterity, Strength)

5. Techie - You know hardware. You can repair cables, rewire data, recover lost data and fried systems.

+1 (choose 2: Computing, Hacking, Hardware)

6. Yellow Journalist - You know strange things are happening and you intend to figure out the links. You may be a paranormalist, a political blogger,

+1 (choose 2: Courage, Geek, Street) ; or +2 Geek.

You Won't B*E*L*I*E*V*E the things that are on HomelandSec's d@t@ files.

*.*exe runs local

Out of Character

1. Agit-Prop - You are an anarchist. You like taking things down, screwing things up, for its own sake.

2. Coordinator - You lead a team that is trying to defend internet security, or assault others, or spy on others. You need to be charismatic, to know what is going on, and to manage unruly people.

3. Criminal - You hack to get credit card numbers, you manipulate stock markets. You may work independently or for a larger organization. Generally you are "bad news."

4. Cyber-Nationalist - You follow a philosophy or a country to the bitter end. If someone in Russia insults, say Estonia, you are on the servers bashing Russians, or cracking Russian computers, or frying Russian crackers within 24 hours.

5. Geek - You know everything about technology, and all the latest Geek Trends on the internet. You are the first to know when something is up on the web.

6. Lamb - You are one of the millions of innocent net users who browse without a clue what's going on.

7. Paranoid - You have all the network security software, you write your own, and you measure DOS attacks across teh Interwebs.

8. Pirate - You like to get the newest movies, music, and more; and you distribute it. Your larceny makes PirateBay, KaZaa, and Napster look like clean-cut kids who just decided to pocket a Mars Bar from a grocery store and who sheepishly got stopped at the door.

9. Suit - You follow all the laws, all the rules and all the regulations, always.

10. Vigilante - You are Judge Dread of the internet. What you see as immoral is destroyed. You hit popular hackers who take down government sites, you go after criminals, and more. You dish it out and punish them tit-for-tat with your own debilitating viruses that destroy million-dollar systems.

« Last Edit: August 25, 2009, 12:07:41 AM by Light Dragon » Logged

Gelatinous Cube

View Profile
« Reply #1 on: August 07, 2009, 01:21:35 PM »

Skill Spheres
* 1-10 ratings in each skill
* Rarely, players may have ratings above 10.
* Players start with 3-6 skills and 12 points to distribute between them.

 With a weapon, slingshot, bottle, etc.
1-3 : Can't hit the Broad Side of the Barn
4-6 : Decent
7-8 : Expert Shot
9 : Made Quite A Name For Yourself
10 : You Never Miss, Right?

-Attack (Hand-to-Hand)
 Do you know Judo? Are you a street fighter?

 Using a computer and the internet. This is about basic computing tasks.

 Are you going to cut and run when the going gets tough?

 Can you bend, twist, and climb?

 What do you know about net culture;

 Manipulating a computer and the internet in often-illegal ways. Reverse-engineering.

 You know how to build a computer and to rewire hardware. You can build physical things.

 Languages work slightly different from other skills. A player may purchase a language at different levels of fluency. For example: Chinese (Mandarin/Simplified) [1 point=Conversational, 2 points= Can Read a Little, 3 points= fluent] Languages can reach an unlimited point total if a player keeps taking additional languages.
 * Recommended Languages include: Arabic, Chinese, Farsi, Indonesian, Russian, Spanish, Turkish.
 * English is automatic (see below), and one bonus language may be chosen from the following list: Creole, Dutch, Finnish, French, Gaelic, Georgian, German, Hindi, Ibo, Kazakh, Norwegian, Portuguese, Serbo-Croatian, Swedish, Vietnamese.  
 * If the player wishes to play as a national of one of the recommended languages, then that language becomes automatic, and full English fluency costs only 2 language points. No additional Bonus languages are given.

 What do you know about real-world situations; how to get into fights, and out of them.

 What can you lift, what can you jury-rig open.

 Can you resist going too far, doing too much; can you withstand pain?


Adventure Types
1. Cat and Mouse
- Hacking and messing with sites. Computer security or computer cracker.
- Cyber-Nationalist battles. DOS attack battles, and more.

2. Spies Like Us
- International governments fighting each other
- International Crime pulling off heists of bank account numbers and avoiding Interpol.

3. Paranomal
- The Men in Black are trying to keep the existence of monsters and aliens from normal people. Play as the MiB or as people on the outside trying to get in. You want to believe.

4. Interstellar
- You have figured out a way to hack into aliens' computers and to communicate with them. You are the only contact with earth. And you have discovered some terrible truths. Try to communicate with the aliens and dissuade them from destroying the earth, and/or try to convince others and build a following to prepare the world to defend themselves from the aliens. Lead the resistance, join the resistance, or fight the cult of crazed internet cultists who believe that the end-of-times is at hand.

Gelatinous Cube

View Profile
« Reply #2 on: August 07, 2009, 01:21:45 PM »

Actions to Do!

Being A Hero
13:26 Kilo-India-AlphaSo you want to be a hero, bitrunner? Pshewk. You've got a lot to learn. You don't just come in here and get to be a hero by takin' apart a logic puzzle or hackin' into DoD and downloadin' a couple of files and giftin' them to WikiLeaks. Naw, to be a hero, you gotta be like that dude in Daemon, Sobol, yeah, you gotta be like him.
13:27 13373s7k1d Aw shit, I get to be a hero by killing people?
13:31 Kilo-India-Alpha Sh**t man, no. You get to be a hero by doin' som'tin that's not been done. Watch this.
13:37 1337s7k1d has left the chat room
13:47 1337s7k1d Did you just f11k11ng remotely r00x0r the juice in my pad?

In the computer World
Crunch Code - Code viruses, antivirus software, games, anything.
Find Spooks - Track trails of people on the internet back to their homes and lairs. Figure out IP Tracing and overcome Firewalls, and false leads.
Take Down BotNets - Mess with massive interworked computers that are tied by virus software and can be coordinated to query massive amounts of data from distant computers.

In The Real World
Repair Internet Cable - Undersea or on the land.

What You Want

What You Want
Gaining certain levels in each provides you character points which you can use to level up.
When the game starts, declare a Major and a Minor want. When you achieve something in one, then you gain Traits you can use to improve your skills.

(Gain in a Major Achievement = 2 Traits ;
(Gain in a Minor Achievement = 1 Trait)

If you continuously lose from your major and minor trait, then you actually may lose some skills as you grow depressed and become less effective.

-Money. You like making it.

-Ah, the free natural opiate that is tough to understand.

-Hard work at studying or listening gives you this.

-Gain followers, gain listeners, gain influence and generally effect the world.

-You are famous, or infamous. People hold you in high regard even if they do not like you or what you do.

Things to Confront


Out of Character

1. Discovery It's masking it's presence in the sky... But our scientist buddy here can de-cloak anything by shooting a bunch of gamma ray radiation back at the sky. And if that doesn't work, then he's going to fire up his amateur radio and see where the propogation waves bounce back. If there's anything hanging up there, above the swamp, then we're going to know just how big it is. Then the problem's going to be how to get inside.

2. War It's war with the aliens on the Net. They're here and they figured out a way to send electrical currents out of computers- shocking the recipients of their virus-laden emails. The electrical blips fry computers at best, and at worst they kill- people have heart attacks, they are burned, they are scarred, they are humiliated. Morale among humans is at an all time low. We need you- the best cryptographer in the world to help crack the aliens' systems, get in, upload a virus and get out. When their spaceships collapse or suddenly become vacuums and fill their interiors with the vacuum of space, then they'll learn not to mess with earth.


"See, it's like this- not everything here's on the up and up and normal and like." Tebow took a long puff from his pipe-- then immediately started coughing. When he was done, he looked up, and wiped an elbow across his face. "Smoke gets in yer eyes, ya know." He stood up and walked to the computer. "Sometimes you can't see what's going on." He twisted the monitor to face me. "But I can. And you will." He typed an address into the Browser.

What the Browser spat back blew my mind.

"That's just some Flash shit?" I asked.

Tebow shook his head. "Naw. It's an EPG in a webcam... monitors the waves in the room-"

"So like cellphone and x-rays?"

"Sorta. See how that one looks like a person- Damn." Tebow reached for his lighter. "Gotta keep this place warmer."

The EPG showed a form, like that of a man, six foot seven, standing beside me. I looked over, felt a chill, and a sudden sense of dread.

"The 'normals can only be tracked by digital." Tebow said, as he waved the lighter. The chill ceased and the form fled the screen. "Heat keeps them away."

"Really, heat?" I asked, turning around to see where the form had gone.

"Yeah. Ever wonder why they have so many suicides in Scandanavia?" Tebow asked. "These things prey on fear and doubt- they make you do things that you may not want." He shook his head. "And they don't usually take notice of you, but when they do- they're relentless."

I looked at him, shocked. "What- What makes them take notice of you?" I asked.

"Oh." He coughed. "Yeah. About that." He shook his head. "They only start taking notice of you when you take notice of them. Once you've seen one, they're gonna keep coming back."

My face must have gone white.

Tebow cackled. "Sorry 'bout that, but I need someone to carry on my work when I finally-" he hacked "join them on the other side."


1. Hacking
-An End to Hunger (China Mieville) [Short Story]
-Old world of Darkness: Hunter
-2001 China Hacks US; 2004? Estonia/Russia; 2009 Twittergate (Georgia); General net warfare

2. Paranormal/Conspiracy
-3E's Shadow Chasers
-Evolution/Men in Black

Gelatinous Cube

View Profile
« Reply #3 on: August 07, 2009, 01:22:16 PM »

Game Types
See above for short descriptions.

1. Cat and Mouse

Feel: Light hearted. This is a game. No one really gets hurt other than in a computer sense or in the sense of wounded pride. But there is a lot of finding and seeking in this game since real damage can be done. This game is the most computer-only centric even though some technician work may be involved.

2. Spies Like Us
- International governments fighting each other

-Feel Hot, Intense, Coffee-chugging and sweat dripping coding at 5 in the morning setting up firewalls and hunting down the enemies. Throwing up code blocks, designing logic bombs, and twitching Trojan Horses. Higher stakes than Cat and Mouse. A net cable may get blown up. You may have to pick up your gun and continue the coding war outside in the real world. People can and will get hurt.

The Lowdown
- Governments spy on each other.
- Governments probe each other's military and government office defenses.
- Governments probe each others' energy grids for weaknesses (the advent of the SmartGrid makes this type of espionage all the more dangerous.)
- Spy satellites, GPSes, and more can be commandeered.
- Hack into security cameras.
- Get into places, get stuff, and get out.

- Steal credit card numbers.
- Alter data.
- Delete google trails
- Track anyone, anywhere.

3. Paranormal

Feel: It's a strange world. Either you are a seeker or you are a keeper. If you are a seeker, you exist in a world of possibility and mysteries. If you are a keeper, you live in a stifling world of secrets and lies- ones you keep and ones your associates keep from you. It's a tense game on the inside; it's a wild ride and adventure on the outside. Stakes are low for those on the Out- but high for those on the In- they have a hard job to do and they cannot let others get inside.

On The Outside (and General Info)

What's True

What's True
"Nothing's True, except what the GodMan, the GM says is true." Yuri folded his hands and spat into the crackling fire. His hands were red, from gripping tight. Outside it was twenty below Fahrenheit- damn cold.

"And who is the GM?" I leaned forward and felt the growing heat of the building flame. Charred ash settled on my face, and I flinched, and drew away.

Yuri unpacked a cell phone from inside his parka. Taking a deep breath, he closed his good eye and jammed the phone in my palm. "I cannot say. You call him. Perhaps he will answer?"

I took the phone. It was queued up, and I pressed the green button to call. The phone rang but once-

Generally the GM (GameMaster) can decide what-ever is true. But here are a few guidelines.

1. Few Strange Things - Don't overdo the strangeness. The world is more Scooby Do with men dressed as ghosts rather than a place where real Banshees wail across the world.
2. Pick a Feel - There are two general feels appropriate for this setting: Feywild, and ET. A successful story will generally keep the two isolated-- it may be too much to have both. Feywild focuses on monsters, ghosts, faeries, and demons. ET focuses on aliens, strange phenomena, and unexplainable events.
3. Lovecraftian - These strange things... they aren't easily killed, and aren't easily manipulated. You can interact with them- but you come away with more questions than answers.
4. Manipulation - Everyone is being manipulated. Even the monsters themselves. The purpose is vague, left to the GM, but every clue is left for a designed reason. Think of the dance of the monsters as a gigantic game of chess, and of the player as a pawn- perhaps a knight at best.

Feywild Feel
- Will-o-the-wisp, vengeful ghosts, lost ghosts, evil faeries, blind seers, frog-folk, spring-heeled-jack, jack the ripper, yeti, mothman, loch ness monster, talking dolphins, underground races.
- The Hidden, the Lost, the ephemeral.

ET Feel
- Crop circles, Bermuda Triangle, Mutilated cattle, Northern lights, Eclipse of the Sun, Cigar-shaped aeroplanes, saucers, strange lights in the sky or on the land, abductions, first contact, hidden caverns.
- The Stalking, manipulating, preying.

On the Inside

The Men in Black

I had my assignment handed to me by a man who stood six foot seven. I often cringed when the man approached-- his visage was almost too horrible to stand. His face was half-paralyzed by a poison that was injected into him during a raid on a stinger habitat out in the middle of Idaho several years back.

I opened the folder which contained the assignment, and I cringed. It was another cattle mutilation down in southern Oklahoma. We needed to get a hand on stopping that stuff- or else the news was going to get too crazy about this. My job was to check out the site, make contact, do some diplomacy with the Greys, and then (if time permitted), to get on the news sites, post up a few misleading info on the blogs- manage a few contacts and pass off the cattle mutilation as something else other than alien dissections.

Thank God that this time the Grey's weren't messing around with people. That Elvis thing had been a pain to cover-up. And the Jackson debacle back in '09-- don't see why the Greys wanted to learn the moonwalk so badly-- but thank God they hadn't struck again since. If they did then the whole Section would be a mess. If they were going to strike, I've got my money on them going after Tom Cruise (20%) or Justin Timberlake (45%), or maybe Lindsay Lohan (35%)- just for a change of pace from the usual male abductions.

Black Attitude - The Men in Black are elite and are most certainly elitists. They are more selective than the CIA, more secretive than the NSA. They get jobs done and get access to all the cool gadgets and gizmos. They have an invention and reverse-engineering department and they hire all the best scientists who don't even know they are being patronized by the MIB.

Lies - The MIB are all about lies, manufacturing them and telling them. The public SHOULD NOT KNOW is their attitude. "What the people don't know can't hurt them." They constantly say.

Cover-Up - The MIB may go on site and make sure no one knows anything was changed. They set things up to look like a car explosion or a release of swamp gas. They have a playbook of set pieces and words to tell the news. They manipulate politicians, newspeople, sailors and more as they bribe and wheedle and hide the truth.

Diplomacy - The MIB sometimes have to work out complicated diplomatic deals with aliens, trying to keep them from messing with earth.

Kicking @ss - The MIB, from time to time, need to break out the big guns and take action against dangerous monsters and aliens like the Spring Heeled Jack, the Stingers and The Oozy Raselfarians.

4. Interstellar

Feel: High Stakes. You are a diplomat and a warrior for Earth in space and on the land. You can organize a resistance, or save everyone on the planet. The scope for this game is narrow (only really aliens; or perhaps some monsters hidden in the deepest depths of the ocean) but the stakes are very high. This game is perhaps best for 1-4 sessions that can be heavily plotted with lots of logical trees. It is a puzzle-setting that is meant to challenge players' and GM's logical, political, and reasoning abilities. The player should feel an impending sense of pressure and a heightening sense of impending doom if they fail. Even when the player succeeds, and the player should fail a lot in the beginning (or only succeed in part), the stakes should continually rise- the action must always continue to build as the possibility of success keeps getting yanked away farther and farther and what once seemed simple to solve is revealed to be more complicated than anyone could imagine.

Gelatinous Cube

View Profile
« Reply #4 on: August 07, 2009, 01:22:27 PM »

Taking Damage

Damage is simplified in this world. You have several body parts that are either a 1, a 0, or a 10.
1 is healthy; 10 is wounded; 0 is practically inoperable.
[Note: In Binary 10=2. Consider 1 to be the Ace or the High Card and 0 to be worthless; thus the progression of power is 0-2-ACE(1)]

The 10 Body Parts, each associated with a die roll.
head (1), r. arm (2), l. arm (3), r./l. hand (4-5), torso (6), r. leg (7), l. leg (8), r./l. foot (9-10)

* Aim or Strength hits v. an opposed Dexterity roll as modified by any body armor currently being worn on that part of the body.
* Once you have been hit, then there is a roll to determine which part of the body has been hit.
* Weapons generally need to be fired twice to kill or disable. Some weapons however, can splatter damage (Machine Guns, Shrapnel from Mines) which can in the same round damage multiple parts of a body.
* Generally, characters are fragile and should not be getting into too many brawls. However, they can generally escape from any dangerous situation since it often will take several rounds to effectively disable someone.


Gelatinous Cube

View Profile
« Reply #5 on: August 07, 2009, 01:22:38 PM »


0. Computer
- You need it. It's your portal to the internet.

1. Amateur Radio
- Useful for making communication "off the grid"; it's difficult to track unless someone triangulates your signal... but it's all public unless you talk in code-- and I'm not talking morse code here.

2. Laser-Pointer
- Amazingly good for making a point.


Gelatinous Cube

View Profile
« Reply #6 on: August 07, 2009, 01:22:47 PM »

Reserved #6

Spawn of Ungoliant

View Profile WWW
« Reply #7 on: August 07, 2009, 06:55:29 PM »

An End to Hunger meets X-Files or something.  I like it.  The system looks interesting, and I like the idea of binary stats; form tied to function.  I get a very conspiracy theory feel to the whole thing.

Digital wizard

View Profile
« Reply #8 on: August 07, 2009, 09:55:00 PM »

I can definitely see the WoD inspiration in this. X-Files too. Sounds pretty badass.

Gelatinous Cube

View Profile
« Reply #9 on: August 08, 2009, 03:44:36 AM »

What is "An End to Hunger"?

Thanks for mentioning X-Files, that actually is along the lines of what I am trying to convey... some Men in Black as well.

I agree very much with the recent discussion here on the CBG regarding how the system should reflect the setting. I feel that it can add to immersion if the setting is integrated into the setting. without such integration, it may be difficult to achieve the right feel for the setting or to convey the proper mood.

I think this primarily works best as a single-player game; but would be open to suggestions on how to make it work as multi-player.

I added an example of play in the in-character post above. I also tried to clean up some of the character archetypes and expanded bits here and there. Thank You.

Planar Grazer

View Profile
« Reply #10 on: August 08, 2009, 10:00:23 AM »

Light Dragon


So, keeping this in binary. 1 = healthy, 2 = wounded and 0 = inoperable?

Now I'm not an expert but isn't binary read from right to left with the left-most number being the MSB (highest power of 2) with the right-most number being the LSB (least significant bit or 2^0)?

Gelatinous Cube

View Profile
« Reply #11 on: August 08, 2009, 10:14:39 AM »

Binary only contains 1s and zeros. But from what I understand 1 would be healthy; 10=2 as wounded, and 0=inoperable.

I know some coding (VB/Dephi), but do not claim to be an expert in any of the technical aspects of this setting. Advice is welcomed, but also keep in mind that for this to be playable, things should not become too technical. smile

Are you arguing that 01 =2 rather than 10... I always thought it was 10=2.

Planar Grazer

View Profile
« Reply #12 on: August 08, 2009, 10:25:51 AM »


I'm well aware that binary only has 1s and 0s, however they do have decimal equivalents. So 10=2. That being said, what confused me was 1 = healthy, 10=2=wounded, 0 = inoperable. Wich means 1 is better then 2. That is what confused me, why is 2 worse then one? when 0 is worse then all of them?

Gelatinous Cube

View Profile
« Reply #13 on: August 08, 2009, 10:39:06 AM »

Then you understood exactly what I meant.
1 is better than 2. Think of it like an Ace in Poker. And 0 is nothing.

I think I see your point but this appears to make sense with a d10 dice; and it's only as arbitrary as poker. 0 intuitively is worthless, and 1 can be seen to as #1, the winner, rather than sequentially.

Planar Grazer

View Profile
« Reply #14 on: August 08, 2009, 10:49:13 AM »

Light Dragon

Then you understood exactly what I meant.


Fair enough, that makes sense once its been explained. However with only 3 digits (1, 2 and 0) it is a lot less obvious. It looks messed because there aren't enough variables to establish a proper sequence. Once explained it isn't much of a problem, but like I said without the extra digits it isn't particularly intuitive.

Pages: [1] 2
Jump to: