#In Golden Flame

1 messages · Page 13 of 1

silver pumice
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OKAY BEHOLD THE TENTATIVE FINAL VER

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and with my party

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lilac tartan
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OHHHHHH

silver pumice
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SO close

lilac tartan
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🫡

shell bison
silver pumice
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LOL

thorn hinge
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My party

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shell bison
silver pumice
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so many hackers with white hair

shell bison
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Many such cases

last leaf
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any hacker born after 4996u can’t code… all they know is programmer socks, call they NHP, white hair, be bisexual , eat hot chip & lie

shell bison
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Wren, that shouldn't have made me chuckle

silver pumice
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LMAO

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sometimes they're aspec instead

last leaf
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this is true

thorn hinge
silver pumice
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now fixed and with incomprehensible color markers

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silver pumice
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kudos to sekiyo as s'more for coming up with that catchphrase

silver pumice
silver pumice
past agate
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character creation is like a third of the way done and

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silver pumice
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WHITE HAIR 🗣️🗣️🗣️

shell bison
silver pumice
hard falcon
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We've made it through most of ||Anti-Capital|| after doing ||Thermopalye||. A player is presently typing a manifesto

silver pumice
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fun fact on the note of white hair and character creation, when i was initially designing lynk i knew approx nothing about calliope so when i sent unmasked lynk to seki she jumpscared me with switch 😭

silver pumice
hard falcon
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We had to pause combat because a player needs to eep, but three players have AP heavy blades

pine ledge
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briefly entering here to complain because my gm (Serenade) said I could.
mission 2 combat 2
||The sunbird doing 27 damage every turn, three times per round, is kinda ridiculous. Also it has a bunch of friends. At LL1. I thought making a sniper ultra in my own game as the capstone of an LL1 mission was rude, but the sitrep was designed with ignoring it in favour of destroying the objective.

Like even with half the party having AP weapons its still stupid. I didn't know it was coming and spent my armour piercing rounds on the heavy armour guys in the previous mission. So yeah. a 6 armour 81 damage a round guy at LL1 seems a bit much. As the boss of what is effectively 1 extremely long fight 'divided' as two but is not actually two its just one.

I know we haven't lost any of the fights yet, but this one could it ended on a cliffhanger cause a player had to leave. idk. This fight leaves a sour taste in my mouth and its not the first time this module has done that.

Maybe im just annoyed cause it felt like my fights in my game last year were always too easy on my players but this feels the opposite of the spectrum, especially since at these low LLs I don't have many tricks to deal with this nonsense.||

shell bison
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oh gosh

thorn hinge
# pine ledge briefly entering here to complain because my gm (Serenade) said I could. mission...

||It's a very hard fight. Many groups manage a win with only one mech left standing. Even the remix game, where vex is a player and all the other players are GMs, we hit SUNBIRD-1 with two reactor detonations. A third got wrecked before it could go off, I got wrecked before I could even try. ||

The intention is ||to have a very hard reality check at that point. the fights in the campaign are pretty balanced and even lean on the side of easy, relying on attrition between full repairs to be hazardous. SUNBIRD-1 is a straight up hard fight.||

If you've finished that combat, I can tell you one more thing about the design intent, but I don't wanna spoil if you're still fighting.

pine ledge
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idk if I ||consider it hard so much as... it does a million damage and has too much defense. My turns are "ok I take 9 damage and then 9 damage and then 9 damage. I scratched its paint in return".

Hard would be, oh, I had to think of clever solutions or we had to really strategize. There's no strategy to this fight. Either you had the tools or you didn't and pray you get good attack rolls and they get bad attack rolls. Like, with forknowledge I could build more of a counter to it and it wouldn't be as hard because we would bypass its defenses and melt it while having someone who specced into as much defense as possible (hard at ll1, but not impossible).

There's no clever way to figure out how to deal with armour 6 ultra at ll1 with 81 damage a round. It's just a DPS race against nonsense.

Admitedly, if the intent was for it to feel oppressive for the in-character PCs and maybe even a "you can win but you're supposed to fail" type thing where PCs are supposed to feel beat down and sad, well, those situations in gamess are always a miss for me and just make me miserable. But I understand they are very immersive for other people. I play games to feel clever and powerful tho, to my detriment I know. ||

twilit star
hard falcon
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||Missile Pods + Javelin rockets||

twilit star
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||Well looking at my party at LL0 they have a decent amount of AP so I’m hoping when the time comes this won’t be as insurmountable an obstacle for them. Thankfully one of them is going Black Witch so they can definitely turn the Wolfhound against the sunbird||

hard falcon
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||I wanted to use the other tools more, but couldn't get them charged. And then I looked and saw 'wait. ... Wait...' and began the greasing process.||

twilit star
thorn hinge
# pine ledge idk if I ||consider it hard so much as... it does a million damage and has too m...

Okay. First of all, straight up, I'm sorry you didn't enjoy it. that sucks. Just gonna acknowledge that before moving on. Any explanation I give isn't going to change how you feel, and it shouldn't. I can only add some explanation from my perspective.

At the risk of sounding overly defensive or critical of your GM, the book addresses this. ||The GM is given the choice of giving SUNBIRD Argus armor OR Evasive. The book makes a point that the GM should give the players the text of the trait even if they don't scan. It also notes that Argus armor is a good trait to give PCs with AP weapons or the ability to inflict Shredded a chance to shine. Argus armor is reduced by 2 on each structure or stress, and you all have access to invades; a change in tactics to hacking could give a team without AP a good chance. 27 damage a turn only happens if all three shots hit, and it's required that Missile pods targets three different characters with each shot. Any missed shots ||

If you've completed that fight: ||Also there's a full repair right after this and you've already won. Winning isn't pointless, on a loss Sunbird 1 flies away and the GM can bring it back later for a rematch. But you aren't going to suffer in this chapter for losing here. It's your first time against an Ultra, that can be brutal no matter what the loadout... but it's not in a mission critical moment.||

Attached is a snip from the book. It's advice to the GM on how to handle this segment.

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hard falcon
# twilit star ||How do you mean?||

||Wolfhound Missile and Hades Missile refused to charge after they were used, so i pivoted to Pod/Javelin and realized 'oh, this is effective'||

pine ledge
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On some reflection I think Im probably an outlier. The rest of the group seemed to be having a lot of fun. And sere ran it well and I believe as intended. She was cackling with glee at almost wrecking two mechs in one turn and Im also glad she was having fun.

I am kind of a grognard at times.

thorn hinge
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Honestly when we did it in the remix game, the GM changed a bunch of things to make it even harder. It was fun in retrospect and became a great part of the story, but at the time we were feeling pretty bummed out... and Vex wrote it.

hard falcon
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Anyways, the next fight will be ||3 Sunbirds||

thorn hinge
hard falcon
pine ledge
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you've done that like 3 times just this game

hard falcon
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AND I'LL DO IT AGIAN

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YOU'RE NEXT

thorn hinge
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lmao

twilit star
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Shit meant to spoiler that

hard falcon
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damn, can't believe ||Jerry and Farvicule graphically make out||

twilit star
last leaf
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||My players also just did sunbird, although their experiences were very much the other end of the spectrum (no destroyed mechs, although it did get quite close for a few players, even after the buffs I gave sunbird. But (A) They're a party very well designed to fight sunbird (multiple hackers, lots of AP damage sources, an early emperor frame from completing a sidequest), (B) they are a six man party, so inherently stronger and I'm still fine tuning the balance to give them an appropriate challenge, (C) I didn't clock using javs and the knockback on the missile pods in the appropriate way, (D) they managed to chunk half its first health bar by turning a wolfhound against it.||

||I like the sunbird fight, it's an interesting reality check, but it is good that the book does call out replacing AA for less well suited groups.||

thorn hinge
# twilit star ||I mean to be fair the first fight of chapter 3 takes place outside the mission...

It's cool I think. The book tells the GM to tell the players up front about that full repair. That uh... Vex added that after watching my players try to go through that without using any CP or overcharge, lmao. We told them two rounds in and they finally started popping off. That fight is supposed to ||be a chance for the players to rock out in their new mechs. Instead kraken learned what an archer and rainmaker's reliable can do to a dusk wing...||

hard falcon
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holy shit im so excited for chapter 3 now

iron lynx
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I've been pretty lenient with my players, letting them get away with things and not being too harsh. That's going to change in Act 2.

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I have a whole speech planned - "this is where shit gets serious, you're going to have to make sacrifices and difficult decisions, etc"

thorn hinge
twilit star
twilit star
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I usually do that and I’ve come to realize that Lancer works better with hardship, and also the players will figure it out somehow

hard falcon
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||Curse of Five S1GN4Ls||

thorn hinge
twilit star
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I actually remember one time where I fudged a bunch of rules in a different campaign in a different system to prevent a Total Party Defeat, and only realized recently how much more interesting the story would’ve been if I just let them be defeated

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So I’ve come to realize that I should just roll with it

last leaf
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||Personally I'm skipping the fight at the start of mission 3 because I feel like my players would rather have an rp session at this point rather than jumping back into combat after doing all the mandatory mission 2 fightsand because I want my players to go visit a bunch of voladores living in the bass pro shop pyramid who have come into town as a secret shop instead. In general, while they're good at combat, they also take a while and they enjoy a good mix of rp and combat anyway, so coming off the back of 4 back to back combat sessions they would like something more chill..||

iron lynx
twilit star
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The great part about running a module is that if you choose to run things as is, you’re already given all the tools, cards, and combats you’ll be playing with, so you can just play to win for the most part without worry

last leaf
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provided you're running with the number of players the module is designed for

hard falcon
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related, is ||Valencia Combat Solutions a subsidiary of HA||

last leaf
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||I feel its more interesting if they're not a subsidiary of any major corpro imo||

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||There's a lot of different little companies, not just the big ones.||

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helps round out the world

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but its ultimately pretty ambiguous I think

twilit star
last leaf
twilit star
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||The Voladore Bass Pro Shop Pyramid||

last leaf
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||The Volador Bass Pro Shop Pyramid. One of my players suggested as a joke that the voladores would love the bass pro shop pyramid, and I wanted to include voladores in the plot (for reasons incomprehensible even to myself, I have decided to tie them into the persimmon plot for some reason), so I'm having them rock up in a ship that looks suspiciously like the Bass Pro Shop Pyramid||

last leaf
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still got white hair, ha!

tight pier
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(corrected version)

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our party is the anti-IGF

silver pumice
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no found family 😔

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ah well. at least there's white hair

tight pier
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multiple PCs are extremely tense with each other and are close to the point of getting into actual fights with each other

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fennel vaunters (leftmost, on the bottom) is a very violent person who keeps getting more and more bloodthirsty as time goes on. a couple sessions ago most of the party disagreed with killing the Thief for the Blacksmith, but Fennel was so down for it and told him as they were leaving, "don't worry, i'll kill that thief for you! the others are just pussies"

morgan hyde (rightmost) is kind of the moral opposite of fennel and naturally he HATES them. up to the point of stealing fennel's means of perceiving their NHP and outright punching them in the face in front of the blacksmith

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james shan (left of middle) is technically their "leader" or "face" and has to try to keep Morgan from just straight up attacking people like Ignatius in the middle of furnace city or preventing morgan & fennel from trying to kill each other. i think he's going to snap soon

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temporary (right of middle) is the least involved in this drama and please can we stop fighting we're supposed to be doing something

silver pumice
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Dear Lord

vast zealot
balmy obsidian
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Also trying to determine if transhumanism counts as trans or not

silver pumice
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sometimes maybe

balmy obsidian
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unfortunately (?) even if it does we still don't have a bingo

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Losing a lot of points because it's a group of 4 guys and a robot, none of which seem to be interested in romance (granted we're only on session 2)

last leaf
last leaf
vast zealot
last leaf
tame tide
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My party only got 5 squares

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I'm likely running another IGF game in a week so I'm curious how that one looks, I bet they're gonna be much more RP focused

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And over 200% more gay and trans than my current party

balmy obsidian
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I stand corrected : not only did i forget our robot friend has white hair, but it turns out they might also be to quote the player "a disaster lesbian"

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So, with the addition of our ktb birdman we do have a bingo

shell bison
last leaf
shell bison
last leaf
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I'm pretty sure I only passed because of covid 😔

Dyslexia is extra fun when trying to learn foriegn languages.

shell bison
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oof

last leaf
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and as cool and useful as spanish is, its not the language I'd pick to learn for myself if I was going to learn one.

crystal axle
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yo

last leaf
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yo

crystal axle
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given I am part of said party

shell bison
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lmao

heady vale
# silver pumice OKAY BEHOLD THE TENTATIVE FINAL VER

I'm unsure if I fall under animal motif
|| One player is a [wallflower spoiler]|| But even if I don't, I think I'd like to give an honorary mention to my player who's entire character, all her family members, all of her mechs, and her starting NHP, are all mushroom themed

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Harrison armory ties is for the player who's entire story surrounds the fact that their home planet is being sieged by Harrison armory shell companies for its resources, and they are whooping HAs asses

NPC is for that same person who is also the wallflower spoiler, who has an in character wife

shell bison
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Yeah, that counts

last leaf
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mushrooms are basically animals at heart lets be honest

twilit star
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They’re not plants so close enough

last leaf
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exactly

balmy obsidian
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me splitting open mushrooms, wondering where they hide the chicken nuggets

shell bison
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_Me. breaking the mushrooms from the funny Wallflower spoiler planet into Tea's to vibe with the vent crabs or just smoke it _

heady vale
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I also think this one is just important to mention even if it's not like. On here

My token white hair character, is the dude who joined a gentlemen's club that is a vigilante order and made his entire identity springheel Jack

shell bison
steel path
last leaf
steel path
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You're telling me there's no Gabby deep lore in that

shadow scaffold
last leaf
heady vale
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He pilots a lich :3

shadow scaffold
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jumping back and forth in time

heady vale
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Thinking his 3 npcs im gonna write up (writing up 3 npcs/groups for each player) are gonna be based on the bushido code, code of chilvary, and pirates code

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Another idea was a follower of the Journalist's Creed

shell bison
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Funny to contrast that with the code the knights of the dark core have

heady vale
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Yup yup!

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I'm going to be flushing it out that this is an order, a (gender neutral) gentleman's club of sorts across the galaxy, there's just only like four or five members locally here

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Because they are still a vigilante order disguised as a gentleman's club

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Did I mention that the player is from the Icebreaker and hates the rich

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I haven't fully figured out how I'm doing it yet, but I'm probably going to be modifying the campaign slightly whenever I can to make it so there's a larger gap of time between each official mission, to add sprinklings of character arcs between each one

shell bison
heady vale
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I may check that out

lilac tartan
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We’re in mission 3 and after that our Union white hair Sherman guy will get his Asura
They can become a duo with Jerry and Sherry

shell bison
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lol, sometimes it be like that

shell solstice
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Ironically, I also play a White haired guy with Asura, but I don't use the Sherman

shell bison
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Gabriel uses a swallowtail right?

last leaf
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@vast zealot stares

Okay I know you're technically not taking Sherman stuff anymore because Im letting you test your homebrew but it still counts

hard falcon
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Chapter 2 Combat: ||Anti-Capital|| Meme

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shell solstice
last leaf
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ooh what mech will I give my version of him...

fossil lion
obsidian ferry
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These ||missiles|| are about to make ||contact with you.||

last leaf
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hmm what tokens did people use for the ||Pre crone [Error] fight?||

tame tide
last leaf
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ooh thats nice

tame tide
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Ada has a sick one which is made much much much cooler with a macro that ||shifts between like PC mechs and Andros and stuff||

last leaf
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I should be fine with this tbf, there's a couple macros I can use to spice it up just as is

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also I've realised I can ominously (and deliberately unhelpfully) rename all of its features.

last leaf
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(I'm using two tokens rather than just one because my party is 6 person)

shell bison
desert holly
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working on a little something for my igf party's worstie [WIP]

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last leaf
silver pumice
tame tide
last leaf
desert holly
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gonna do a little more detailing on the hat and the collar

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crystal axle
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cool

desert holly
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crown made!!! apologies for clogging the chat btw

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half isle
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Very open question, has anyone played this Module with Bonds and would you recommend doing so?

shell bison
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I have and it has led to some of the funniest interactions using the Influencer bond power in campaign

ebon hatch
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Oh it’s fuckin great

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My streamer getting a bunch of fun interactions because folks know him from that time he live-streamed him on the Tachyon killing Andros Capella and making that his whole thing.

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Which is absolutely gonna bite him in the ass later lmfao.

twilit star
hard falcon
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haven't played, so unable to comment

twilit star
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Bug Fables spoilers (probably one of the more unexpected spoilers to find here) but ||this is the third major boss and marks a major difficulty spike in the game while going all in on a few gimmicks that have been previously presented throughout the game and turning them up to 11. Also its theme is kickass, called “MECHA BEE DESTROYER BLASTERLORD,” and I will be using it if/when I get to the Sunbird fight. Also it primarily attacks with missiles and a good portion of them can stun if blocked incorrectly so there’s that too||

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wild flame
half isle
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It seems like a decent fit given the amount of out-of-mech stuff there is to do

dire cloud
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Vex is even writing homebrew Bonds for act 2.

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So yeah, Bonds are recommended.

remote oasis
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me about to answer about our game, then seeing this and knowing that Ada's got it covered lol.

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thorn hinge
# last leaf hmm what tokens did people use for the ||Pre crone [Error] fight?||

Spoilers for chapter 3 beat 17
||my token was one image and 17 animations. The script sets it to this all-black "dormant" animation, then when run is "wakes up". When "awake" it has a image it uses as the default state, and every 10-15 seconds it swaps for a randomly selected animation. These videos aren't how it appeared in-game, they've have had the delay between animations reduced to 1 second and each clip was made with half the animations so I didn't have to record a 20 minute video waiting for it to randomly hit all of them. ||

||There's two styles of animations: random glitchyness, and showing off mechs they'd recognize: Andros, their mission 1 mechs, allies like Loki and Stomp (the cataphract from Snack run they befriended). Special note is Calamity's mech flickering between it's original colors and hellhound livery.||

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||Oh, and all the animations were made by hand with frame animation. because something got in my brain that week. the gradient dithering for the tokens was all done by hand too. I just kinda went into a fugue state and put WAY TOO MUCH EFFORT into one token for that session ><||

iron lynx
clever cloud
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oh shit oh jeez

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yall should make an entry on the IGF resource sheet

dense basalt
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Mama didn’t raise no bitch

shell bison
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GAMER

past agate
tight pier
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from our group

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shell bison
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From the stories I've heard.

zenith galleon
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Heh.
In the ||Spitting Distance|| combat right now and our GM added a little something where ||the OPFOR called in some mercs who'd fought us back in our prior missions to starting IGF.
Their leader took one look at our chassis, recognized 'em, and outright said, "Ain't in the contract man" and bailed||

past agate
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gay or calliopean? it's hard to guarantee

last leaf
wild flame
zenith galleon
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also yessss our GM cranked up We All Lift Together's instrumental version on arriving at ||Hell's Gate|| post-combat

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😌

last leaf
minor solstice
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I’m dying. We’ve been in the last combat encounter for chapter 1 for 2 sessions and they’ve only taken down 2 baddies.

amber viper
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Have they used any core powers yet?

minor solstice
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Yes

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It’s three Everests a Sarg and Chomo, and I only did the recommended for 3 players

amber viper
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...wow, is their dice luck just atrocious?

minor solstice
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I think my recharge luck is

amber viper
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So they're facing the 3 player version, and only destroyed two mechs in two sessions?

minor solstice
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More like 1.5 sessions but that’s still like 5 hours of play time

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Getting to the fight took half a session

amber viper
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My players monstered their way through the five man version in an hour and a half, I'm just trying to parse what could have caused this : p

minor solstice
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They seem to be struggling with armor and cover mostly

amber viper
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Ah, no AP? That would suck vs certain enemies
Have they instakilled the bastions with invades yet?

minor solstice
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Probably would spoiler that last bit but those are the two they finally took out

amber viper
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Eh, it's not plot relevant.
How many rounds in are you?

minor solstice
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6

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No

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7

amber viper
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I... don't know how that's physically possible

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Have previous combats taken this long?

minor solstice
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The previous fight took 1 session in total because of one annoying enemy (you know the one) otherwise no

amber viper
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...I got nothing.
Idk if you came in here looking for advice or just venting about how things were going, but I got no idea what's going on there.

minor solstice
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Mostly venting

amber viper
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Has the boss not managed to kill them in seven rounds either?

minor solstice
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No but one is currently mechless and trying to jockey which could end very badly very quickly

amber viper
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Well, I wish your players luck, and a speedy resolution one way or another.

minor solstice
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Most turns consist of doing 0 damage because of armor and clearing conditions

amber viper
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Time to play the enemies dumber and more aggressive. Speedy resolution one way or another.

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(But seriously, does no-one have a heavy weapon in their back pocket? Those normally chunk past the armour diff okay)

minor solstice
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I’ve thought about dumbing down enemy tactics to just finish it but idk if that’s insulting to the skill of my players

amber viper
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"The Boss" is an aggressive, psychotic brute, he's gonna charge anyone he damn well likes.

minor solstice
amber viper
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Even non-ap stuff should get through eventually. Keep faith, and don't be afraid to throw your players opportunities and advice.

minor solstice
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Words cannot describe how much I warned about the jockeying risk

amber viper
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Can't really help that one. Just remind them lock on exists, and have the enemies play like the egotistical maniacs they are.

shell bison
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This is also true

amber viper
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Stabilising? What the hell is that? Stabilising means less time spent shooting these cocky Hells Gate lancers!

minor solstice
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What’s crazy is that I’ve done zero stabilizing on my end

shell bison
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I'm in awe

minor solstice
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Minus reloading the bastions

amber viper
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(Surely the flamethrower self heat would have stressed a certain pyro?)

minor solstice
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(Yeah but a certain special attack stresses players afraid of heat more)

amber viper
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(Mm, you've been playing him more strategically than I did.)

minor solstice
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Thankfully that has been destroyed as of this session

amber viper
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(Which was immediately rush the nearest player and begin the barbeque.)

(Then get exposed and crit with a charged blade)

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(For a very iconic boss kill)

thorn hinge
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Yeah I'm... flabergasted, this sounds like the mother of all nightmare dice scenarios.

zenith galleon
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^

minor solstice
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Want even more horror

thorn hinge
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oh no

minor solstice
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We play this game for an audience of people who can gift accuracy and inaccuracy

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And still

thorn hinge
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o.O

amber viper
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I kind of want a list of your dice rolls

For scientific analysis

minor solstice
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I’d have to watch the whole replay and see cause owlbear rodeo don’t like to save rolls

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Maybe we gotta move to foundry

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Maybe the dice algorithm is designed to fuck over my players

thorn hinge
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If you're on Owlbear, maybe there's something you're not running correctly that is leading to this? I can't imagine what though.

Do you stream this? I'd love to poke my head in sometime, not even for this bizarre anomaly business just to see other games play out.

minor solstice
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I’ll fully admit I’m not a veteran expert on the rules and mistakes slip here and there but I feel I have at least a decent grasp on the rules. I can send you the stream in DMs if you want

thorn hinge
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sure ❤️

wild flame
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slide it my way as well? i'd def be interested in watching someone else's IGF run

shell bison
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Oh yeah we all want to see the IGF shenanigans

silver pumice
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been looking at this again since tumblr Loves it (thanks vex) and i think it's funny how "sorry mom i like girls" ended up aligning close to ||feather|| because yeag sure of course our beloved ||bird girlie with mommy issues|| would say that (she would not fucking say that)

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i need to draw more ||feather||siren propaganda

shell bison
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Sera give me time to cook the PlumexSiren ship

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It's like smoking meat, you give it time

silver pumice
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real

wild flame
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is there a ship name for ||feather||siren?

silver pumice
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ship nhp yuri

shell bison
#

One of my players ||Took a piece of the legion NHP casket on the tachyon and wanted it to be their technophile NHP. Let's just say a little piece of feather naming herself plume is helping the party now||

#

Plume is a normal NHP everyone. No need to worry :)

twilit star
twilit star
#

Could you grow Weed in Calliope? I wanna have Mikaela smoke something but if I can’t get weed I’m gonna have it be a Zucchini

minor solstice
#

I don’t see what’s stopping you from growing weed in Calliope

twilit star
#

Ok I guess the better question is could you grow it in large quantities?

last leaf
#

depends what you mean by large quantities but probably yeah

#

the technology definitely exists and is present in calliope

#

its just a question of if you can afford to set up a large farm (and to use that farm for something other than food). But not too big an issue imo

#

||who is the joe rogan of calliope for steele to get high on a podcast with||

past agate
#

but would he

wild flame
shell bison
#

Just grow Locus mushrooms and smoke those mushrooms up and watch someone have a in real time wallflower spoiler

clever cloud
#

Impact Plaza weed is the worst strand and everyone knows, but its the only operation large enough to provide for the borealis

dire cloud
#

"This shit is called DHIYED. It'll make you feel like you're cascading."

last leaf
wild flame
thorn hinge
#

I'm on that paracausal invasion tech shit. I'm on that HORUS secret chatroom shit. We smoking OG Overclock loop zaza. I get so wasted, they call me MONIST-3, this shit ain't nothing to me, man.

silver pumice
#

doo(r)dle

Untitled569_20240822121137.png
#

i need to make an actual ref for lynk's ||astral stigmata|| EmoteLMAO

crystal axle
#

nice

fast parrot
wild flame
#

||So you're saying I was right||

tame tide
#

||Genuinely curious||

shell bison
#

Cause that one character only shows up with specific circumstances but the NPC is so funny everyone runs him anyway

quaint pebble
fast parrot
thorn hinge
#

I still do that sometimes

twilit star
#

What’s the difference between this thread and the In Golden Flame feedback thread?

shell bison
#

This one is for mostly for current act content and no spoilers for the content. The feedback channel is more for current in progress content like act 2

#

Here we don't want to spoil the content, but share stories and what not, over there is all out

wild flame
rustic night
#

My party of IGF disbanded after our group of friends fought :(

#

Will still DM act 2 tho

#

With the remaining people

shell bison
#

ah man, sorry that happened

ebon hatch
rustic night
#

I will probably have some people fill in the spots thar were once occupied, and make some justification for why those characters left the SRT

#

It's unfortunate, but I have time until ACT 2 starts

#

It's a bummer

shell bison
#

It happens, I wish you the best of luck it continueing the adventure!

twilit star
#

Chapter 2 spoilers: ||Hypothetically, if a party chose to investigate Kantele after the events of act 2 (EDIT: sorry meant chapter, mistype), how would you… respond to that exactly?||

shell bison
dense crescent
#

by act 2 ||it's either a full on fortress or exploded||

twilit star
dense crescent
twilit star
#

||Yeah I forgot about that, my b, it was in the spoiler tag||

thorn hinge
#

Okay, after chapter 2 ||If the PCs stopped the laser plot. Kantele is just a rock. What they find and experience there is up to you. Could be absolutely nothing. Could be creepy firebird ghost shenanigans, cosmic horror like Void suggested. whatever works best for your crew. If they want to blow it up, they'll just be doing the cult's job for them. Also they do not have the firepower.||

(more ch2 spoiler) ||If the laser successfully fired, it's still just a rock, but it has a nice glowing crater of lava and cracks in the surface. The result is the same, but I'd lean way more on moon's haunted.||

In any case, at the start of act 2 ||the cult has heavily dug in on kantele, turning it into a fortress that the PCs can't hope to take on without a LOT of help. If the players try to organize any sort of defenses on kantele in act 1, they'll likely be pushed off by overwhelming force as the cult consolidates. Also, I don't know who they'd get to protect a barren rock; the militia doesn't have the resources for that.||

ivory dune
iron lynx
#

that would take a lot of effort

thorn hinge
#

I don't think they have the delta-V. I don't think Calliope has the delta-V

ivory dune
#

Nearlight drives are some whacky shit. If the Thames has a drive that can successfully nearlight bolt an entire battleship that's kilometers long and holds thousands of people, they should be able to accelerate something of that size/weight enough to slingshot it off into space using Kantelle's gravity as an assist. I admit I haven't done any calculation here so I could be totally wrong, but it feels like it should be possible

#

Is it possible using the dragon's tooth? IDK, maybe more unlikely

iron lynx
#

I doubt the DT could do it on its own

twilit star
hearty wave
#

Does anyone have some square grid maps for Act 1? I'm not great with Foundry and setting up for Hexes is a nightmare.

pliant ibex
#

Are you having trouble with scaling the hexes?

shell bison
#

I'm being told Ada's maps can be set for hex or square overlays

hearty wave
#

I've had a lot of problems getting them to line up well.

wild flame
#

Use some gridless maps from the drive and just set foundry to squares? I know imp's got gridless variants for most of their maps

thorn hinge
# ivory dune Nearlight drives are some whacky shit. If the Thames has a drive that can succes...

Nearlight drives are indeed weird shit, so it all comes down to GM fiat. ||We don't have a canonic size for Kantele, it's a small moon or moonlet which gives a range from a few hundred meters across (which wouldn't make much sense as a place the cult can build up into a fortress) up to a few hundred kilometers across. Kalevala is .84 Jupiter masses so it would have 84% the escape velocity, minus whatever orbital velocity Kantele is already at which depends on the unstated orbital distance of the moon(let). And then there's the unknown acceleration properties of a nearlight drive, however they work, if they even have a newtonian effect on the ship or there's something else going on. ||

So there's a ton of unknown properties the GM can choose to arrange in a way to either say "sure you can do that" or "this plan isn't going to work out". ||Nearlight drives probably aren't something you can just hook up to a random rock, and Nearlight ships probably aren't built to tow a small moon. If you want the plan to happe, you just say yes. If not, you just say no. Physics can back you up, you just have to decide for your own canon how massive Kantele is.||

past agate
#

Are y’all trying to steal the moon

thorn hinge
#

Damnit. Now it's too late. If I don't do the math it's gonna bother me.

Okay, we can't really say what the realistic effect is, but for one point of reference using real numbers? The energy required to get the earth's moon (much larger than ||kantele||(probably?)) to just achieve escape velocity (of earth(much smaller than ||kalevala|| (much much MUCH smaller than Calliope(definitely)))) is 6.385e27 joules. That's the energy output of the entire sun for 16 seconds.

image.png image.png
iron lynx
#

we are kindred spirits ada

#

I would do the same damn thing

#

also, ||nearlight bolt is stated to rely on paracausal technology such as artificial gravity. if you bolted Kantele, it probably wouldn't be able to handle the strain and would probably dissolve... which would release Feather||

thorn hinge
#

You have Suletta Mercury on a transbian background for a pfp of course we're kindred spirits

thorn hinge
iron lynx
#

yes I imagine it would be!

wild flame
#

You see it is actually quite simple

You can ||yeet kantele. Unfortunately, feather does not go with it and is quite mad||

twilit star
#

Idea I plan on implementing into my campaign maybe:

Teka Ashknafi had either a kid or a husband or close friend (trying to decide which of the three, very different vibes depending on which) who was in the Hell’s Gate Militia but got killed by Andros Capella personally.

Reason for this addition: one of my players is playing a ex-Moonlighter Organ Trafficker and is trying to do away with that life. I’m thinking one of the cadavers he happened to come across, either salvaged or personally handed, was this dead person of importance to Teka’s.

||could also make it messed up like Andros specifically went to him to ask to transplant, idk, a lung into him as a form of sadistic mockery or whatever, but that seems like too much||

ivory dune
# thorn hinge Damnit. Now it's too late. If I don't do the math it's gonna bother me. Okay, ...

Hmmm. ||Escape velocity from Saturn's orbit (closer to the sun than Kalevala is to Calliope) is 13.4 Km/s. Kalevala is going 8.36 Km/s. Accelerating an asteroid like 433 Eros (33x13x13 km, pretty damn big but not insane) to solar system escape velocity at Saturn's distance from the sun, starting at Kalevala's orbital speed, would take ~4e23 joules. The energy required to accelerate a mass the size of the ISS to 0.9 c, including relativistic effects, is on the order of 10^22 joules. So assuming it takes a ship like the Dragon's Tooth on the order of minutes to accelerate to nearlight, it'd take it about ten times that long to accelerate a pretty big asteroid right out of the solar system...||

#

If we ignore relativistic effects it'd only take ~10^19 joules to get the ISS to nearlight

#

But even so those numbers are pretty close to each other. Like I said, IDK if the Dragon's tooth could do it- but I bet the Thames can, it's several orders of magnitude larger.

#

Feel free to clown on me if I got something wrong with the math here

light mist
#

why not just ||deorbit kantele into kalevala|| though
or does that have the same effect as ||blowing it up||?

iron lynx
#

||well, it would disintegrate in the atmosphere||

light mist
#

wait why doesn't ||the cult just deorbit kantele|| then 🤔
seems potentially easier?

iron lynx
#

you forget that ||deorbiting a moon requires a huge amount of energy||

#

||and it would be very easy to notice||

light mist
#

||more energy than it would take to blow it up?||
wish I knew how to do the math for this...

fallen geyser
#

I mean, ||Kantele|| is a moonlet - just a large asteroid, really.

thorn hinge
#

And regardless, it's the ||Cult, and it's Feather. If you shoot Kantele off, even at a nearlight bolt, it could just be back where it was tomorrow with no further explanation. Or Feather could just absorb the kinetic energy directly, and the players quickly realize they're just pouring energy into the cult's god. Even if it goes flying out of the system at nearlight, the cult can still manage to catch up, slow it down, or even let it keep moving; they can turn it into a fortress wherever it is and that just makes it even harder to assault later. And of course, throwing it into Calliope would be the **biggest **mistake. || If a GM wants this to not work, then it doesn't work.

minor solstice
#

|| is strapping S1GN4L to one of Capellas Bastions as punishment for letting Hells Gate take the listening outpost too over the top?||

thorn hinge
#

||For capella, no. For your game, vibes wise? Depends both on your table and on what happens to S1GN4L. Could be hilarious. S1GN4L could still have a radio in their hardsuit and beg the players for help / mercy. If your players don't know about the trick of invading a grunt to take them out, S1GN4L could be a way to tell them in-universe. If your players have a particular vendetta against S1GN4L and are bloodthirsty enough to just shoot them, it might be a bit dark. Too dark for my tastes, but again, depends on you and your table.||

iron lynx
fallen geyser
#

Contextually it's kind of funny in the way that Pandora values life exceptionally low (although Borderlands does have a consistent issue with portraying little people as a source of inherent comedy, which is, to put it bluntly, not good)

#

I don't see this as translating very well to Lancer, however, on account of a scale issue Borderlands doesn't really have

#

Strapping a dude to the front of your riot shield is funny in Borderlands because it's kind of absurd

#

In Lancer, that's a tiny ass dude you've just strapped to the front of your giant mech

#

That's not funny, that's just torturous. Strapping a person to the front of a military vehicle is a literal war crime.

#

Now, admittedly, when you put it like that, it is very much something ||Andros Capella|| would do.

#

There are certain things that, regardless of whether a character would do those things, I have avoided discussing simply because it's not conducive to the sort of tone I want to set for IGF.

minor solstice
#

my group runs a little more on the borderlands/absurdity energy rather than the hyper serious "war is hell" vibe

#

they fought a "crabnado" 2 sessions ago

#

side note: huge fan of your work and its so cool to see a creator who engages so much with the community!

fallen geyser
#

Well, perhaps it's because I have such an engaged community 🙂

fallen geyser
#

I'd say if your table is leaning pretty heavily on the absurdism, ||strapping S1GN4L to the front of a Bastion shield could work if it's clear from an OOC perspective the PCs would rescue him instead of letting him get mulched by mech weapons||.

iron lynx
fallen geyser
#

The community has, in turn, given me the confidence to keep writing.

minor solstice
fallen geyser
#

S1GN4L would definitely owe them one

wild flame
fallen geyser
#

Borderlands 2 is very much my goal for the emotional arc of IGF.

#

Like, it's meant to be funny with very serious moments.

#

The game was light-hearted, silly, goofy, and then Jack just coldly shoots Roland in the chest and then suddenly you're delivering eulogies and the game is serious for a moment.

#

But it's not a constant gritty haze of low-grade gross misery like Call of Duty

shell bison
#

A dark comedy can still make you hurt and smile in the best of ways, and Calliope has been a stage for such performances for a long, long time.

silver pumice
#

posting yet another vaguely incomprehensible self indulgent meme from my brain (girl in the middle is @marble lava's marthe)

SPOILER_Untitled577.png
marble lava
#

princesses with disorders

#

i just realized there's an accidental hidden 4 in her portrait actually LMAO

heady topaz
#

4h44444

dusky cradle
# light mist ||more energy than it would take to blow it up?|| wish I knew how to do the math...

Well, put it this way: ||either you do it through kinetic de-orbiting by modern day asteroid deflection methods, that is, build a mass driver on it and have it shoot rocks out as Dirt Fuel to gradually de-orbit the asteroid towards the inner system, which would be highly noticable, or shoot a bloody nearlight drive onto the damned thing, which requires a Near-light Killpack from the Battlegroup game. This would require significant naval resources, and a ship that can delpoy it||

#

Or... ||You can hijack a damned mining ship, soup-up the power drives, and crack away! Using readily available tools at asteroid cracking always save more energy, the alternative would be hijacking ships from Impact Dynamics, which can prove be equally, if not more difficult, than acting on the Icebreaker||

light mist
#

when i said ||deorbit, i meant into kalevala|| :P

dusky cradle
#

Oh man

#

Well, I suppose the same standards still apply here? ||Asteroid deflection are glacially slow, as with a moon, the kinetic acceleration would still take time, first you'd have to get the moon to match same Delta V, which either requires significant acceleration or deceleration, than you'd have to move them into the same orbit. I'd say the preferred propulsion methods at such a stage would still be... hmm... dirt fuel railgun accelerators||

#

Unless, ||You deflect an ice comet into the damned thing, that'd be easier||

#

Of course, ||I'd suspect there's a ritual element in laser bombardment than opting for kinetic||

#

||Church of the Golden Flame, uses golden light, sounds reasonable, not that I'd complain if they change their name into Church of the Golden Rapidly Moving Rock||

#

I mean, Church of the Silver Bullet sounds nice

#

I would certainly dig that

light mist
#

||but isn't kantele already orbiting kalevala?... it's already on the "same orbit" around calliope's star
you just need to prop a couple ships against kantele's front face and fire at full thrust, no?||

dusky cradle
#

Certainly, that'd make sense

#

||Ice comets can be deflected easily, I suppose you can tie a nearlight drive onto it and use it to bombard Kantele instead||

#

That'd make a.... ||crude nearlight killpack!||

light mist
#

||well at that point why not just shoot several nearlight drives into kantele directly||

dusky cradle
#

||If the final speed is the same, I supose having more mass would create a kinetic energy difference, you could straight up just shoot unmanned ships at it||

iron lynx
#

||unfortunately, any solution involving nearlight would likely also do considerable damage to Kalevala itself||

dusky cradle
#

||Yes, I suspect that is the case, I stand by the Ritual Element argument||

#

||You'd have to gently vaporize the outer layer first||

light mist
#

||i'm thinking about this from the cult's perspective, so idk if they would care about damaging kalevala :P||

dusky cradle
#

||OOOOO MAN||

#

||Are you a player or a GM?||

#

||I can't tell ya why, even if I'd know||

iron lynx
light mist
#

GM, although my campaign is on hiatus for now :(

dusky cradle
#

||Ahh, well their unborn God is in it, when handling Gods, I'd say the cult would err on the side of caution||

light mist
#

||that's fair, i suppose at a certain point they still don't want unnecessary collateral||

dusky cradle
#

||And, using fire to wake up a fire god sounds just right||

iron lynx
#

||in chapter 2, they haven't reached the "kill millions of people" stage of desperate||

dusky cradle
#

||Waking up a God still takes precedence, but the cult would likely try to avoid unnecessary pain when ending the cycle of life in this world, Aurum (provided he didn't lie during his encounter, I'd like to think he is simply being completely honest) had stated that even the pain on Icebreaker was unnecesssary||

iron lynx
#

||I believe Vex has stated that Ignatius is completely honest when he says he wishes the events on the Icebreaker hadn't been necessary||

#

||and it's certainly the way I've been writing him in my campaign - he's developed a very interesting dynamic with my party where he believes they want the same ultimate goal (a better world) but that they must both continue to seek it in their own ways, even if that brings them into conflict with one another||

dusky cradle
#

||My party had already hypothesized that due to Feather's time travelling powers, their only chance of success is through completely dismantling the church to the ground then send Kalevala right into the sun, it's fear, and for good reason, they think that Aurum only need to "make it" once before a newborn Feather moves back in time to kill them ten generations prior, then trapping the entire union in a time paradox as it moves to end the world, unexpectedly collapsing blinkspace, and eventually bringing about the rise of the Fourth Committee||

#

||But through ALL THAT, they still think Aurum is simply misguided, the Sexual Tyrannosaurus is the one who drove him insane, and refused to harm him, glad they did what they did||

hearty wave
#

Me, casually cruising through Ada's tokens. "Grabass he shall be then."

image.png
thorn hinge
#

You know how Vex wrote in the book about how giving NPCs interesting callsigns can add to the world, make it seem more real?
Grabass is that but as a cautionary tale.

Very first combat of my campaign I just let my mind wander to come up with callsigns. Grabass was one of them (IIRC ||Snack Run's Berserker||). The players brought him up constantly, even dozens of sessions later.

In chapter 3's ||Surprise, Surprise, I brought Grabass back, this time as the Elite Pirate Assassin. The only things he says on coms are "Grab" and "Ass". He survived that fight too. ||

Act 2 spoilers ||I'm terrified that I might have to make him one of the elect somehow||

hearty wave
#

Time to doodle a Vent Crab

shell bison
#

Listen, I give every NPC a name

#

Event grunts

#

Duos of a template get a rhyming name like Bob and rob

#

Tess and Mess

#

Papa Roach and his son baby Roach

hearty wave
#

XD

#

BABY ROACH

shell bison
#

Don't talk to me or my son ever again

hearty wave
#

FRIEND

VentCrab_SM.png
#

A little Intro thing I threw together for my players.

HellsgateLore.jpg
shell bison
#

Beautiful

frail kayak
# hearty wave I've had a lot of problems getting them to line up well.

Out of curiosity, have you tried to use my hex maps? I've included screenshots of the Scene Config window with the numbers to make it line up (on my machine, at least). If you used mine, I'd like to know if I need to include a better explanation, or if the numbers I posted don't work for other people

fossil lion
#

the vent crab portion has a hole in it, because someone thought it was an actual vent crab and stabbed it with a knife

silent lance
#

so uuhhhhh

#

i may require assistance

#

one of my players is taking downtime actions to attempt to combine a couple of items (spoilers up to end of mission 4)

#

||The cardcount software and Tripled point nexus||

#

what the hell does this do

twilit star
#

“Alright, first combat! They know to focus the objective, I’ll remind them of Frag Sig, this should go smoothly!”

every attack for the first round and a half of combat misses, the first chain axe attack crits, everyone is so hurt and only the squad has died

“… you know I think I’m cursed”

#

Every first combat of a campaign I have ever done has always gone horrendously

#

I’ll do the math, I’ll make sure it’s easy, and then I’ll have to fudge the rules liberally to not leave my players with a bad taste in their mouth when we wrap

#

We haven’t even finished the combat yet

#

I haven't even deployed the reinforcements of the first combat yet!

#

(It's not Shoo the Vultures btw, it's the other one whose name is evading me rn)

#

(Spitting distance that’s it)

wild flame
twilit star
#

We’re 4 rounds in

#

I haven’t deployed a single one

wild flame
#

Have your players considered hitting their attacks

dusky cradle
#

Can't hit your attacks? Easy! Just roll a 20!

#

... or roll a different dice, really, that can help, some dicebots are not worth rolling

twilit star
#

I checked their loadouts, they’re able to do everything in the book (except hack)

#

And even then that’s what Smart weapons are for

#

Honestly it’s been occurring to me more and more that the best LL0 piece of equipment is an standard issue Assault Rifle

#

Having no bonus to attack makes reliable damage godlike, even against armored foes

frail kayak
# silent lance what the hell does this *do*

||I interpreted it as "you roll the three attacks, and choose one to actually happen. If the chosen attack is a miss, cardcount activates, and the player chooses a different quick action to perform"||

minor solstice
twilit star
#

Maybe it didn’t help that one of the first things I did was grapple our sniper

twilit star
digital raven
#

Yeah, combat runs long for me but my players are murderers at this point so I just double the reinforcements, add whatever homebrew templates I've read most recently and cross my fingers I can have still have at least six actions by round 3

wild flame
floral glacier
digital raven
#

I think they mean "it's round 4 and things have been going so bad for the PCs, I haven't deployed any reinforcements yet"

shell bison
#

I'm running into the opposite issue where I'm worried I'm not giving my players enough of a challenge.

leaden spire
#

With 2 armor, that's zero damage

twilit star
#

It’s only good at LL0 is what I’m saying

#

And when you hit it’s still good damage with 1d6

#

Once you get to LL1 and get your first Grit then ditch it immediately

leaden spire
#

if you're talking only ranged weapons, maybe but charged blade still beats it for mains

#

it pulls ahead just by a nose on raw damage per attack, but only if you meet all of these requirements:

  • LL0 players
  • 0 armor enemies
  • 10 evasion
  • no ability to make enemies prone or otherwise gain a bonus to hit, like from duelist or the launcher talent
#

it is goated for lasering grunts though

#

And my sources are telling me that average NPC armor is around 1.5 whereas most NPC evasion is actually 10 or less. And this is just for main weapons, you gotta pull out the Heavy Charged Blade on em and then there's no comparison.

#

I've had a player misread duelist and run two main charged blades instead of a heavy one, that was sad days

thorn hinge
#

There's a reason charged blade and assault rifle show up quite often even in late game builds. Vex herself has a double assault rifle build going on in our remix game at LL2 and it was probably the most effective PC mech in our last fight.

shell bison
#

I just like reliable damage to enable my funny final secret teleport shenanigans

leaden spire
#

but by LL2 there are, like, so many fantastic weapons and systems to use it's kind of wild that ARs can do that much

zenith galleon
#

AR is the best weapon in the game IMO

#

Perfectly balanced and versatile

leaden spire
#

😏 gandiva

hearty wave
shell bison
thorn hinge
shell bison
remote oasis
thorn hinge
#

True, though only Calamity's mech got destroyed. And she was target focused hard in the last fight for... reasons. IYKYK.

leaden spire
#

if the players know what they're doing and have a diverse enough build with AP, melee, ranged, damage types, and at least one techie, you have to really lean in to test them

#

as long as they feel like they're still working for it, that's fine, right?

iron lynx
#

I think I'm willing to let my players win every combat in act 1 as long as they still feel challenged, which they do

#

but Act 2 is gonna get tough for them

hearty wave
#

You'd be amazed how many GMs see combat as Me vs Them thing, and forget about player enjoyment

shell bison
#

I think the meanest thing I've ever done was slap a titan snare drone down during an Escort.

hearty wave
#

I was a monster to my Wallflower players in one of the early titular Act 1 fights with Hardened Target and Supreme Melee.

zenith galleon
leaden spire
#

I'm still not sold on the best and most consistent LL0 being anything except HCB

#

The only thing with resistance to it I know of is fighting a Scourer, but those have 2 armor so it nearly cancels out

#

is there some tech I'm missing?

shell solstice
shell solstice
#

It meshes with the most skills, it has reliable damage while still being able to do more on a hit, and it's an extremely low cost of inclusion, not costing heat, unusual slots, or special actions to use.

#

It's also got great range for what it does, range 10 is very far, meaning you're usually in a position to be able to use it regardless of your situation.

pliant ibex
leaden spire
#

alright, an AR or two and an HCB is a pretty sweet LL0 loadout, but it's rare that enemies get to maintain standoff distance

shell solstice
#

Yeah. And don't get me wrong, I'm not saying heavy charged blade is bad, it's great.

#

But it's has it's disadvantages

leaden spire
#

simply go fast

shell solstice
#

The plus side of the rifle is there's almost no situation where it's not useful

leaden spire
#

it definitely has a leg up on pistols, for instance, in that it actually still does any damage at all to most things with armor

shell solstice
#

I love the HCB but @pliant grail can attest to how there were many times they couldn't get in range and wished they had an assault rifle.

leaden spire
#

that's what your main slots and tech attacks are for

#

HCB, shotgun, AR, bingo

pliant grail
#

Was doing a combined arms build with HCB and the decksweeper earlier on. Calamity is currently rocking a more melee/grapple focused build with help from The Grabber

#

Gonna combine that with the new electrohydraulic claw from winter scar once she can source one

leaden spire
#

HCB and Decksweeper really is the heat

remote oasis
#

I'm a huge fine of reliable damage, even reliable 1 from the hand-cannons (considering I have 5 of them on my mech in Ada's game espeically) I've managed to mostly kill high evasion targets solely off of reliable damage. Reliable isn't a solution for armored enemies, it's GREAT a solution for evasive or invisible enemies. And the AR being available at LL0 is great for that.

fast parrot
#

I will say that hand cannons are incredible for invis buggers

shell bison
#

Unraveler, my beloved

dire cloud
#

I killed a mirage with four hand cannons and an Uncle Kinetic Hammer that all missed.

last leaf
#

Just made this meme for one of my players but I feel like it's probably relevant for more groups too

SPOILER_image.png
shell bison
last leaf
#

and I'm not complaining lulul

shell bison
#

Hah, nice

silver pumice
#

much of the lesbians of my team made out with her right on jerry's desk not long after meeting her . naturally .

crystal axle
#

^

shell bison
#

Really, in front of his coffee?

silver pumice
#

Yeah.

lunar panther
#

scandalous!

fallen geyser
orchid seal
#

(Chapter 2 Spoilers) T-Minus 4 hours until ||Anti-Capital|| and I still don't have my boss music picked out slugsweateyes . Pretty happy with how my rendition of Al Imps map is looking though:

maiden ferry
#

thats fucking incredible

shell bison
#

let's gooo

viscid charm
#

Fnatastic rendition just wow actually wow.

orchid seal
#

Lots of quick and dirty hacks, ||the parallax backgrounds are just Al Imps combined asset image tinted black and scrolling/tiled with Tile Scroll (shoutout to Tile Sort as well for making it possible to select the right tile). The dust/tiny debris is just a grey tinted snowstorm...|| As usual 99% of the real credit goes to Al for hooking us up with the great assets/map.

dense basalt
#

People say Elske can make them worse

I am dead set on making Elske worse

twilit star
tame tide
tame tide
#

Wait it must be

#

Haha so you just set up all the tiles to be basically exactly the same as the layout I set up for it lol

dire cloud
past agate
#

badass

orchid seal
wild flame
#

Facts, Imp's maps are great

last leaf
#

Imps maps are so damn good

orchid seal
#

(Chapter 2 Spoilers) I ended up making a last minute ||graphic/asset for the strut (small range of color options and matching Als scene dimensions/resolution):||

SPOILER_image.png SPOILER_AntiCapital_Strut.png SPOILER_AntiCapital_Strut_V2.png SPOILER_AntiCapital_Strut_V3.png SPOILER_AntiCapital_Strut_V4.png
#

||my teams chomo hit a wide area pulse that managed to puppet system 3/4 of the enemy squad into a wolfhound missile that also triggered the Operator Self-Erasure nuking everything to oblivion on turn 2. It was as painful as it sounds.||

minor solstice
#

today is the day, if we dont finish chapter 1 today I will eat my own foot and stream it live.

main scaffold
thorn hinge
orchid seal
#

||light effect at the top is the Simulacrum from the Swallowtail||

#

||It's all the free JBA stuff that I needed just to hook up the lancer weapons too btw||

orchid seal
minor solstice
main scaffold
#

lets go

fast parrot
#

The curse persists

fast parrot
#

Best flex we've done this campaign

Currently in mission 3

Fought Steel

|| Blew Up his orbital satteline denying orbital lasers

pROCEEDED TO HIT HIM WITH TWO BOMBARDMENTS IN THE FIRST TWO PLAYER TURNS||

wild flame
fast parrot
#

...i keep saying act instead of mission, i'm sorry

main scaffold
#

our group beat chapter 3 and ||bad star|| today!

#

as someone who was miffed at having damage output capped at 1d6+1 on my manticore's arc projector, i was audibly overjoyed at receiving this thing

SPOILER_image.png
shell bison
#

THWRE IT IS

tame tide
#

So I'm starting a session 0 for my second group today

#

Speaking to a future player and they're having a mental breakdown over faster than light

#

I can't wait until they encounter ||The Tachyon >:D||

shell bison
#

Ask them what they think of blink tech :D

tame tide
#

Fine

#

IF it's some "other dimension" adjacent to wormholes it's fine

shell bison
#

Lmao

dense basalt
#

Pfff

dense basalt
#

God I wish I could use it

half isle
#

Do we have a collection of GM art assets anywhere?

clever cloud
half isle
#

Danke!

thorn hinge
#

Also there are tools online you can use to extract the images from the pdf so you can use those assets in your handouts,

twilit star
thorn hinge
#

I use photoshop (it can open pdfs and be set to image-only) but you can find tools if you google 'extract pdf images'. I'm on a phone or I'd post one.

empty stag
half isle
#

Sweet! Thanks :D

twilit star
#

||what consequences would there be if I made Andros pilot a Ghengis Mk 1 and made his mech size 2 to be more imposing?||

wild flame
twilit star
twilit star
#

||also one set of the community sprites, think Ada’s? Has a really cool set of 3 MK. 1 designs and like… I can’t not use those and have them transition to the next each appearance||

dry peak
#

I'm running a group that is going to be finishing up Shadow of the Wolf, and have been looking at what options I can throw at their characters to do next... would IGF be difficult to run with an existing group starting at LL2?

thorn hinge
#

People have done it. It doesn't break much, but it goes easier if you're willing to either reset their LL (maybe left them keep a piece of gear as a consolation), or if you have them do the first two missions without gaining an LL so the rest of the campaign they're on track. Mission 1 is very short, especially for a group that's done some work already, so it isn't too egregious imo.

Most people though just move forward and start beefing up the encounters a little, but that just seems like a lot of extra work to me.

shell bison
#

There is also a bit more leverage to "soup up" your encounters with maybe more templated enemies or throw in different combos

#

I personally would be careful cause if you start at ll2 you will end up in their 2 enemies mid campaign and that can sneak up on players

tight pier
#

Yeah. Tiering up on Mission 3 will be rough

shell bison
#

Enemies in general get more health, save target, better dice rolls, more tools, etc.

shell bison
dense crescent
#

of all the campaigns to reset LL for IGF at least makes sense

"you all got fired and fled to the long rim"

shell bison
#

That tracks

dry peak
#

And thanks for the responses! This helps!

shell bison
#

Happy to help, we're all here to lend a hand when we can

limpid badger
#

Starting to finalize group stuff for my IGF run - and... it's the biggest group I'll be running anything for so far with 11-12 players interested. my current plan is to
-absolutely split sessions up between narrative and combat focused sessions
-Rotate out who's doing each combat session
-For stuff like in mission 1 where ||you let players choose which fight to do between a few options, just running both fights separately||

Prolly gonna have to rewrite a few things to account for having basically double the amount of maximum player characters this is intended for... But I'll work smthn out SPLOT

Probably toss in an ability to rerun fights for ppl who missed out on a fight through some battle simulation with smaller rewards for completing those

#

But! The players and myself are excited to dive in, hopefully starting in 1-2 weeks

shell bison
#

12 players? Good heavens

wild flame
#

Have you considered running two 6 man games

tame tide
#

11-12!!?!??!?!

#

6 IS ALREADY TOO MUCH!!!

wispy quail
#

have you considered running three 4 man games

#

although to be fair it seems like you don't plan on running combats for more than 5-6 people at a time

dire cloud
#

There's a reason, in act 2, why you shouldn't have 12 player characters.

#

||There are four flashpoints, and the PCs can only handle 1 at a time, so each one gets progressively worse.||

iron lynx
#

yeah sorry but 12 players is too much for a campaign of anything other than a large-scale wargame

thorn hinge
#

All I'll say is good luck. Good fucking luck. lmao.

twilit star
#

I’ve run for a lot of players before

#

Trust me when I say that when you get past 7 the game starts becoming significantly less fun

#

any game

clever cloud
#

12 players is 3 or 4 different games

limpid badger
#

I run mostly for large groups, and this campaign just has had a lotta interest from my playgroups. I'm gonna mostly be gauging and seeing what my players want, but for the time being through act 1 at least it's one large group with combats splitting the players into smaller if me or my players get fatigued or are having issues, we'll work out what fits best for us

All that I really care abt is getting the chance to run campaigns and chill with my friends sunglasso as cheesy as that sounds

thorn hinge
#

That's all that really matters. If you and yours are having fun, then you're doing it right.

#

Just. The advice here comes from experience. Large groups can very quickly be not fun at all. We're not stopping you, just warning.

#

splitting them up into multiple games is a good idea, but scheduling is hard enough when you're picking one time to play

#

Still, if it were me, I'd run multiple games in parallel, keep them lined up mission-to-mission, let the players talk ooc, and later in the campaign (ch3 and 4 spoilers)||start really playing with the meta and metaphysical nature of it all. Run the crone as one combo session with both groups at once. Have ALL SORTS of crossovers happening in chapter 4.|| In act 2, go farther and ||have odin's experiments cause space-time instability and let the two parties communicate in-character instead of just ooc. Share information, and work together (while maintaining some physical barrier... at first. Find opportunities to even cross that later!)||

#

!!!ACT 3 SPOILER!!!
||And in the final moments of the campaign, both parties can come together as a part of the infinite choir of rising angels fighting the infinite demons of Capella||
||though I kinda want to organize that as an actual thing with other groups when my party gets there. Bring in a ton of guest stars as players from other games, there at the end joining the final battle...||
!!!ACT 3 SPOILER!!!

limpid badger
#

I absolutely love this idea - players are still making their characters n concepts so I've got breathing room to toy around - Miiight just end up doing something along these lines 👀

Thank you! And I appreciate the concerns and advice, it's very much something that I'm looking forwards to despite the logistical nightmare of scheduling

wispy quail
#

if and when I end up running IGF for my podcast (and we're within three sessions of finishing the current campaign and beginning preproduction for the IGF one, despite MANY delays), i would absolutely love to have guests for that ACT 3 scene

thorn hinge
#

I mean, I've only gone through Act 1 and I've used 3 in-person-roleplaying-at-the-table guests, 6 (i think?) PC's-from-other-games-sneaking-in-as-npcs, and around 2 dozen audio cameos from friends and IGF community members for various things. I love cameos and crossovers.

iron lynx
#

I also like them, but they require a degree of planning that I don't think I'd be able to handle

twilit star
#

||For mission 4 of act 1, would it make sense/be fun to add in/substitute in the Horror template into some of the foes?||

#

||Also would it be easier to make ??? from [ERROR] a Horror with the Artificial Trait rather than make it arbitrarily targetable by E-Attacks?||

last leaf
last leaf
last leaf
# tame tide 6 IS ALREADY TOO MUCH!!!

yeah, I'm running a 6 man game (due to quirks of how I acquired players, it was a choice of 6 players or 3 players) and I'm needing to workshop fights more than I expected to. The 6th extra player already adds more balance concerns than you'd expect tbh.

orchid seal
# dry peak I'm running a group that is going to be finishing up Shadow of the Wolf, and hav...

So I did this (in my case after Solstice Rain) and despite being cautioned about it like you were, I plowed straight ahead... So far my players have definitely enjoyed IGF, but they've pretty much rolled over every encounter they've had besides ||the Andros fight, which was a nailbiter and ended with 3/5 mechs down||. They're extremely tactical and well coordinated with a super balanced team composition though. I'm guessing that even without the extra levels they would be handily rolling over most of the encounters (they're well designed but not quite as punishing as my group seems to be able to handle). I'm actually hoping that the T2 jump is going to re-align things and bring the stakes back.

Anyway, YMMV because I think it depends a TON upon your skills as a tactician with the NPCs and the strength of their coordination and teamwork. In hindsight I'm still not sure I would have been able to get them on-board for a full reset because they were soooo excited to get into their new frames at LL2, but I definitely would have thought harder about how to beef up the encounters further. Keeping the talents is an interesting middle-ground that I think I like though. In any case I don't regret making some degree of compromise to be able to run IGF because it's such a banger of a campaign and my players are loving it.

dry peak
# orchid seal So I did this (in my case after Solstice Rain) and despite being cautioned about...

Thanks a ton for this perspective! My group is pretty tactical, as well, but some are better at it than others. The combats we've done so far in SotW have all been pretty close nail-biters, so I feel like I have a decent idea as to what they can handle, so I'm not totally against having to make a few tweaks to the combats to compensate for the level differences.

The LL reset is pretty much off the table. I know they won't like doing that, and I don't totally blame them to be honest.

I'm actually wondering if it'd be easier to just wait to do IGF until they hit tier 2, and then just balance all of the combats for that tier, rather than having some in T1 and some in T2.

Also, just not sure how hard it is, narratively, to have an established group coming in from outside the area in a way that makes for the story, but I feel like that is easier to handle.

shell bison
#

Have a meme due to recent events

funni.png
past agate
#

fact checked by experts (people other than me): TRUE

shell bison
#

The fact Xen and I continue to find similarities in our character creation will never not be funny to me

shell bison
#

I will gladly make memes for anyone's group if needed

fossil lion
#

do as you will with him. i know that whatever you make, it will be epic

shell bison
#

I'm stealing this

fossil lion
# shell bison I'm stealing this

some other stuff about him:
- his voice is as aggressively dudebro as my vocal chords are physically capable of making
- haven't decided what mech he pilots - it's either ||L-Kay's Sentinel/Tortuga (for convenience, since he's also taking her role in the mission 3 intro)||, or ||a Veteran Ace (flavored as a tricked-out Everest with flight gear)||
- he is canonically bisexual
- there is a blog dedicated to boasting about all the cool stuff he does. it might actually be run by him, or it might not.

shell solstice
#

She had a few words for him, lol

last leaf
# dry peak Thanks a ton for this perspective! My group is pretty tactical, as well, but som...

I'm not sure waiting until tier 2 would be easier to balance imo. There's already a pretty clear demarcation between missions and waiting until later means you've got more missions which need to be rebalanced into a higher tier.

Narratively speaking, it's super easy to slot in an established group coming in from the outside, the book actively gives party shared background suggestions of that type.

shell solstice
#

was going through old chats and found a stardew style gabriel I made

shell bison
#

What a good lad

last leaf
#

Time to give him two gifts a week

remote oasis
main scaffold
#

It works!

dry peak
main scaffold
#

Our gm tided us over with some of the igf exotics, and all of us were versed enough with the game to recognise how hard an earlier level up would screw with balance

twilit star
#

Any good music suggestions for the ||S1GNAL|| fight?

ebon hatch
#

Some good SilvaGunner rips.

#

Hit ‘em with stuff from Jet Set Radio Evolution, there are a couple family guy rips that are really good.

#

I think Highway Couture has some Kiryu-punching-a-dude samples? I know it’s got One Direction and a sample from the “Just Dance” tv show, for anyone who remembers that shit.

dire cloud
#

Hamsterdance, Laziest Men On Mars, Rick Astley, other meme songs.

shell bison
#

Dual core- Hack all the things is pretty good

twilit star
hearty wave
#

Session 0 for my players tonight ahhhh

wild flame
#

You got this

past agate
#

Godspeed

zenith galleon
#

Ya got this!

ebon hatch
#

Session 0 for my second group is tomorrow night

shell bison
#

Keep us posted!

hearty wave
hearty wave
#

It went super well and the party vibe is immaculate.

lilac tartan
maiden ferry
#

there is something to the rp feeling of getting your ll2 mechs after the icebreaker, it feels like you're a foot out of poverty right after saving space vegas

#

but I totally get people disliking ll0-1

hard falcon
#

ADHD is a bitch, and I'm making it mine as I type up three sessions worth of recap.

#

Session 5: Combat, Combat, and more Combat.

||Combat: Themopylae
OST: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BZOIesq_5oM 05 - Mobile suit ~ MS Gundam Unicorn (OST) - [ZR]
I'm convinced that my party is actually just. Insanely coordinated and efficient at Lancer at this point. I fully understand that as a GM, I am to be a fan of the players, and by extension, revel in their victories. But man, I barely got to do much of anything in tcombat: Themopylae, because this rolling deathbakk of murder hobos just steamrolled everything.

Engineer Veteran? Bullied into a cave. Sniper? Didn't even get a shot off before being obliterated. Priest? What do they even do? Who knows!~ he spawned on top of a flash mine and failed his save.

I have been rolling quite badly this campaign, honestly XD

I did at least hit someone with a primed Engineer turret explosion. The operator did do a decent amount of damage, but eventually he succumbed to a heavy onslaught, and got taken the fuck out. We had some excellent use of cover, and some other usages of themal grenades to blow some holes in trains.

Themopylae result: Total success, after all combatants deactivated.

We entered the transit depot, saw the gate for a brief time before everything went to absolute hell. Everything exploded, people were panicking, and a large hole in the Xeng Yi Sao district was formed that day. And then it emerged.||

||Combat: Anti-Capital
OST: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aCu93MKq7ec Kota Hoshino – Contact With You
My desire to use the neat toys onboard an Ultra Rainmaker was probably a part of my downfall, as I wanted to use the cool Hades and Wolfhoud missile options that Sunbird-1 was granted. It took several turns for me to realize the combination of Missile Pod + Javelin Missiles would rend all before them, and if I'd known it sooner, this group would have indeed fallen.

Most of the other combatants were only vaguely useful, running interference while Sunbird 1 ran wild and rained unholy hell upon everyone I could.

The strut managed to take out two drones, and three empty mechs.

Yon's Gaia was disabled several turns in, and she took advantage this to jockey onto the Sunbird and start causing Problems on Purpose. Turns out when you need to remove an errant pilot, it eats a turn, so.

Also, three party members had Heavy Charged Blades, so. I shoulda actually given the bastard Evasive after all/

Am I a bit antagonistic and maybe too thirsty for blood? ... Yes. Yes I am. I had -two- pilots out of their cockpits and dead to rights, and that's when Sunbird-1 failed its attack rolls to knock a pilot into a javalin missile. The module is sentient, and Vex is outside my home cursing roll20 with their Vex-ness.

Anywho. While it was disabled, Ringabel fired a thermal lance through the cockpit window, and the strut took out the rest of the ship. Sunbird-1 is Hella fucking obliterated.

Also, Yon fired on fleeing pilots again, but missed. Farvicule will remember this.

Combat: Anti-Capital
Result: Absolute Success||

#

Session 6: Lucky Day
||This turned into another information gathering session, opening with Loki visiting Yon to try and strongarm her into getting the job done of finding Dr. Nyambose. After Alisha tried to pull rank and get him to piss off...

Alisha: I'm afraid I outrank you Corporal, due to the nature of Yon's status, so, depart~
Loki: Yeah, I read your file. There's only one thing more greater than rank in HA, and that's the power of fucking nepotism – Loki Valentian, 'at your service',

A thread was established before the game proper that everyone's favourite douchebag was at least involved tangentially in the project that led to Yon's creation. As such, Loki actually has a tangible thread to tug as a connection to her.

Through Loki's recount, the group found themselves at the Gift-Bronze Casino, in order to try and sneak around and collect what information they could. Roselor tried cozying up to some security guards, basically playing the 'trust me, im a doctor, tell me of your injuries' card, and learned that the guard was overworked because on top of needing to keep people from pissing on the slot machines, they've been handing weird deliveries that felt beyond their normal scope.

We pivot to Ringabel trying to make a scene, and gets pulled into Evelina's room, to try the direct method of asking for information on Dr. Nyambose. Evelina remained tight-lipped about the affair, but, Empath, Ringabel knew she was lying. Farvicule was present, but not directly in the room. Alternatively, Farvicule was apparently at one point pissing on a slot machine. A lot of jokes about pissing on slot machines came up this session because of my throwaway line.

Yon was also there, but employing stealth. Since both she and Ringabel have the Empath trait, they are always aware of roughly where the other is. So, when Yon was approaching in the vents, Ringabel took this as an opportunity to leave, and inform Evelina 'Just be forewarned; I was the reasonable one”

Yon emerges, holds a knife to Evelina, and gets the needed information out of her – Nyambose is at Deepest Fairyland, under surveillance. Yon leaves, pursued by security.

Lorelei enters, and cracks the casino's securtity alarms, causing pandemonium amidst the staff. She also cracks several macjines, causing them to rapidly pay out their jackpots (She rolled a 28). Unbothered by staff, and now also slightly richer, the gang departs, informs Rita of the situation, and deploys at Deepest Fairyland.||

hard falcon
#

Session 7: Clowned On
OST: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FXp1smCjp2k - Toby Fox – Pandora Palace
||I continue to deal with a crack team of veterans.

Who proceeded to crack open the veterans. And the elites.

The elite Scourers only got one turn -each-, before getting destroyed. (Unlucky structure roll after a reactor roll, and some shenanigans of abilties). The Hive managed to force Yon into a razor swarm from her flight, but there was still now the matter that she was now on the same ground level as the hive. That went about as well as you'd expect.

The Bastion actually got bought out, rolling off that 28 success from before. All these security mechs had pilots that were being paid to continue acting in character in not!Disneyland, and at one point, some pilots started to pity them when it was revealed that their comms are monitored.

The Bastion pilot got out though, a payout of a thousand icicles bought his loyalty cause 'fuck working for that evelina weirdo, she coudln't get my riddle system working properly.'

Loki showed up. He did nothing of value whatsoever. At one point, the Cataphract did get someone pinned who was trying to transport Nyambose. This was solved by having Nyambose passed off to Yon, once the Hive was destroyed.

The Mirage that showed up also got obliterated. Everyone got obliterated. This team is insane. The one exception was the Ronin who showed up, but, he legally could not reach Yon as she flew Nyambose to safety. So. Yeah.

We questioned Dr. Nyambose, the team was a bit confused by what the cult plans to do with the laser, but. Well. We know the next step – retrieve the focal array.

Next session, Killer Sound, and a probably end to Mission 2, cause I don't see these people losing to team music people.||

#

that's my typup im going to bed

main scaffold
rough roost
#

Hey, they suggested I post this here:
I've been trying to decide which lancer campaign I want to run for my group and always find mentioned wallflower and this one

#

and while I' ve been able to find info on wallflower general themes and tone, I found less about golden flame

#

so my question is a bit of overall thematic and tone of the campaign as well as some strong or weak points

#

my group usually prefer more tone heavy stories and they normally don't want to be heroes or the "good" guys from the start

#

they also prefer story focus campaigns as long as there are some options to choose in what they want to do

#

like they want to have a story but have "options" in what they want to do to interact or progress this story

#

so yeah, mainly looking at wallflower and this one and deciding which one I want to run

obsidian ferry
#

As for options, Act 1 has a pretty solid structure in terms of how the missions go into each other, but past Mission 1, they're pretty open and let you choose how to approach the challenges. The biggest story affecting points are probably their relationships and interactions with other characters. There's a lot of them and they're all pretty deep.

#

Vex is great at foreshadowing and she has hints for a lot of stuff that will happen later seeded in early on as well.

rough roost
#

Thank you, I'll ask my group, see what approach they like more

austere prism
#

My recommendations would be that Wallflower is fairly well-suited to groups that favour a fairly linear campaign centered around one community, whereas IGF is well-suited to groups that are ready to fully buy in to an entire fictional world - there's lots of locations, and lots of people there to meet, and a lot of narrative arcs to follow

#

Also, as a GM, IGF comes with a lot of helpful tips on how to use the combat npcs; Wallflower, as released, does require some tuning to offer a good challenge for groups that figure out how Lancer combat works

shell bison
#

It's true, Vex goes into great detail on which NPCs show up in combats and how certain ones can have a psyche inpact

#

Like Ronin's and their coin flip reflect isn't always going to happen but if it does it will have an effect on a player

wispy quail
# twilit star Didn’t think of treating this as a shitpost fight, good idea. I heard the origin...

this seems like the kind of theme that fight would have
https://youtu.be/A4S_pozLyno

YouTube
beatrix quinn
SLARPG OST - Scrombled

area music for (SPOILERS) in Super Lesbian Animal RPG, by beatrix quinn

GET THE SOUNDTRACK: https://beatrixquinn.bandcamp.com
PLAY THE GAME: https://slarpg.com
available on Steam: https://store.steampowered.com/app/2124380
and itch.io: https://ponett.itch.io/slarpg
get in touch: https://beatrixquinn.works

thank you for listening! 💓

▶ Play video
shell bison
dire cloud
#

It's been said that IGF is like Discworld, in that it layers levity and real talk and crushing emotions like baklava.

maiden ferry
shell solstice
# maiden ferry but I totally get people disliking ll0-1

I actually admit, I like LL0-1. Sure you don't get to play with any of the cool toys yet, but its actually a great opportunity to get a feel for the character you're playing and what style of mech combat you want to do with them. It's a low stakes way to feel out what you want to do, and how your team is going to fight together.

#

When I first made Gabriel, I honestly didn't expect him to land where he did tactics wise, but those two license levels allowed me to get a feel for what felt right and what our team needed.

shell bison
#

It is a nice method to just ease into your role in mech combat. I was so happy I waited to use sunzi tech until after ch2

hearty wave
#

Next week is my players first session and man I am excited. Session 0 was a blast and there was great table conversation.

last leaf
#

More IGF GMs hehe...

shell bison
#

We growing Wren

#

We moving, IGF Gang

#

🔥

last leaf
#

🔥

zenith galleon
#

the game I play in starts up session in a few today

#

v excited

#

like, third session in

thorn hinge
shell bison
#

Bun speed

zenith galleon
#

yeah, things are going alright

image.png
#

lol

wild flame
#

"So, I've got good news and bad news"

"What do you mean you've got good news and bad news all I told you to do was go on a walk"

zenith galleon
#

so far our entire party adores Jerry

#

poor guy

shell bison
#

Jerry is great

zenith galleon
#

Oh no
our party of notoriously camera-shy pilots have run into ||Ipswitch||

#

at the ||GMS bar||

shell bison
#

Yup. It begins

zenith galleon
#

oh yeah it does

#

uh

#

our MOI Nimue pilot (we're coming in at higher LLs w/ other third party content) uh

#

successfully lied that they were some kind of noble

#

and have started a drinking contest

shell bison
#

Oh no, nobility isn't looked fondly in calliope

zenith galleon
#

yup

#

it's uh

#

chaos

#

my own pilot, the ex-UIB lady is uh
desperately trying to stay off-stream lol

shell bison
#

Best of luck

zenith galleon
#

she slipped away thanks to another party member doing a bit of shenanigans

#

nonetheless

#

great characters we've encountered so far, loving the module

shell bison
#

We got another baby. Let us know if you need any help or just want to share stories or characters

#

Spoiler free of course

vast zealot
twilit star
#

All but 2 of them are Silvagunner, and all of them are rips/mashups

#

Enough of them have a techno enough vibe to keep my players focused but not too focused

#

If they drag out the fight for too long they suffer the punishment of the playlist looping

#

It opens with Spacejam

twilit star
last leaf
steel path
past agate
#

I will treat the selection of rips with utmost respect

#

my group has at least one silvagunner fan but i think itll catch them off guard

last leaf
twilit star
#

I just listened and picked the vibiest ones I could find

#

Well I know what Siivagunner's deal is I just don't follow very ardently

soft thicket
#

one of my players made this, which I'm pretty sure I saw around here before, so clearly great minds think alike

Do_it_for_him.png
shell bison
tame tide
#

Session 1 is going well

image.png
fast parrot
#

The table is bigger than the door

tame tide
#

Obviously, just don't question it

lilac tartan
# soft thicket one of my players made this, which I'm pretty sure I saw around here before, so ...

Yesssss great mind thinks alike
Mission 3 spoiler

||when we were insulting mutually with Steele and he knows about the Jerry/PC ship then read out a whole love tragedy bad movie synopsis that he imagined, then he said something like ** “So you think your Masters is an infant without hands, and you think you have to do everything by yourself?”** ||
I can remember in this thread someone posted some Jerry Fans motto, like** “tuck him into quilt and do these dirty stuff yourself”**
Surely great minds think alike, thanks Bellicose:V

shell bison
#

We do the dirty work so Jerry stays clean.

lilac tartan
#

||I have to acknowledge when I heard the “your Jerry Masters”parts I felt moved about Steele the bastard can speak some human language ||

glacial tundra
wispy quail
#

aren't marbled crayfish also invasive

#

yeah they're very invasive and are illegal in Europe, Japan, and several U.S. states

#

it's because of the parthenogenesis

fallen geyser
lilac tartan
#

#oc-cantina message
A small sketch about Jane, in the game she currently replaced her Albatross badge with a flower from a bunch of flower which is given by Jerry

shell bison
#

Awww I love her

last leaf
#

Does anyone have any good ideas as to what to use as a token for the ||Blacksmith. My party managed to convince him to join in the Steele Dome beatdown personally||

fossil lion
orchid seal
#

(Chapter 2 Spoilers) My players loved ||Getting Railroaded!|| Jumping to T2 at this point also seems to have worked to finally balance things ||(I gave them LL4 after Anti-Capital instead of at the end of the mission because I'm running all of the combats... there's no way you give me a fight on a train and expect me to skip it ). It actually took some doing to separate the train from the background (Al was nice enough to provide the background without the train, but not the train alone).||
@tame tide ||Do you mind if I post the train separated from the background so it's easier for other people to set this up? I could also just send it to you if you want to add it to your own shared resources...||

last leaf
orchid seal
last leaf
#

true...

orchid seal
#

There's so much amazing stuff in there, it's a shame it isn't more organized and easier to sort through crying .

tame tide
#

Yoou mean the one on the right?

image.png
#

Oh train seperated nvm I gotcha

#

I mean sure

signal canyon
#

Got an act 1 spoilery question: ||what rank did Jerry have in the DoJ/HR?||

tame tide
#

||Major||

#

||"Major Jerry Masters, acting Station Director of Hell’s Gate, Calliope, formerly of the 282nd Liberators, Union Department of Justice and Human Rights."||

tame tide
#

New group hype has got me making more maps again 👀

#

Mission 4 WIP:

SPOILER_image.png
#

Gonna take a while since I'll need quite a few variants.

||One with cover, one without, all the cover seperately, maybe even no cover in each of the quarters...||

#

It's gonna take a while... And as a little treat I'll make one of the enemies a ||puppeteer so they can revive the players cover||

tame tide
#

Mission 4: ||Pressure point, the swarm AND event horizon||

SPOILER_M4__THE_SWARM.jpg SPOILER_M4__PRESSURE_POINT.jpg SPOILER_M4__PRESSURE_POINT_THE_SWARM_gridless.jpg SPOILER_M4__PRESSURE_POINT_THE_SWARM_no_cover.jpg SPOILER_M4__EVENT_HORIZON_gridless.jpg
#

All uploaded... Uuh there's a lot...

SPOILER_image.png
#

||And it's only 1 map||

clever cloud
#

i love you

#

thank you for all these maps, they kick ass!

wild flame
#

welcome back imp, you forgot to grab this: 👑

shell bison
#

Oh I am so using these.

tame tide
#

Thank my new group for giving me motivation... Next up mission 5 IG?

#

Or ||Remaster a face to a name or killer sound||

twilit star
# tame tide Mission 4 WIP:

Ooh, these gonna be posted to the IGF resources drive sometime soon? I like your maps a lot but I only really found one for the ||S1GN4L|| fight

tame tide
#

10 steps ahead of you

#

They're all there already

empty stag
#

You use inkarnate for your maps, right? I was curious about their sci-fi assets before taking the pro plunge.

tame tide
#

yee

twilit star
tame tide
#

The H1, H2 stuff?

twilit star
#

Ye

tame tide
#

Cos I've only done in on the most recent 2 maps I've made

twilit star
#

Ah gotcha

tame tide
#

Funny thing is one of my players has sight issues and struggles to read them so I'm not actually using them lmao

twilit star
#

Ah oof, gotcha

tame tide
#

So I was like "I don't want to make it again cos I'm not gonna use it"

#

Then I did it anyway

remote oasis
tight pier
#

dangerous encounter

SPOILER_image.png
shell bison
#

Uh oh

tight pier
#

||They have a spec-op in their backline (backstory stuff) harassing one of the PCs and a slow creeping in from the pirates||

tight pier
#

i love our players

image.png
lunar panther
#

Ch3 - that's rough buddy

SPOILER_image.png
shell bison
tight pier
#

DAMAGE BREAKDOWN - GUARDIAN ANGEL

Katabasis's Rubicon [SSC Viceroy]

-2 HP (9/11)
+2 Heat (2/8)
-1 Repair (3/4)
1 Overcharge, to 1d3
Fuel Rod Gun, 2 Charges (to 2/4)
Custom Paint Job triggered

Hertz's Never Meant to Know [GMS Chomolungma]

-4 HP (9/13)
+4 Heat (4/6)
-1 Structure (3/4)
Turret Drones, 1 Charge (to 2/3)
System Trauma, Manipulators

Chariot Jackal's Yama's Messenger [IPS-N Raleigh]

-5 HP (10/15)
1 Overcharge, to 1d3

Soundwave's Faith in Rebellion [HORUS Pegasus]

1 Overcharge, to 1d3
Core Power used

||Surayya's Elysium [IPS-N Lancaster (NPC)]

-12 HP (3/15)

Speaker Ignatius's Reconciliation [FOTOPIGF Priest (NPC)]

-8 HP (2/10)
```||
past agate
#

In the drive and spreadsheet right?

shell bison
tight pier
#

||Ignatius|| is a Commander Priest with 2 structure/stress

shell bison
#

Oh they bulky

tame tide
tight pier
#

I'm not gonna let them repair Structure between fights but i will give them HP back

shell bison
#

That's fair.

tight pier
#

||Ignatius uses the same stats & systems as he does during the Mission 5 fight teehee. save for the Mirage teleport @shell bison||

shell bison
tight pier
#

||I think if we're going to gutpunch our players I might as well give them some funny intel for later||

shell bison
#

This will be useful later...

lilac tartan
tight pier
#

finales of games, TV shows, books, etc.

lilac tartan
#

Cooler

tight pier
# lilac tartan Cooler

His first was Hand of God which was the last episode of the original 1970s Battlestar Galactica, next was Commencement which was the last Risk of Rain 2 stage, and now it's Rubicon, ||the final area you'll enter in Saint's (the last) campaign in|| Rain World: Downpour

lilac tartan
lunar panther
#

big fat summary incoming! midway through ch3

#

||Making its move, the second bounty hunter (the Cataphract) drags Hertz south, separating them from the rest of the party. This gives them and Fennel an excellent opportunity to rip the bounty hunter’s mech apart. Morgan, James, Surayya, and Ignatius focus on getting rid of the remaining Hell Hounds. After obliterating the Demolisher, the Hornet and Rainmaker begin to make a swift retreat. Barely scraping back on to their ships, they make a retreat.

Morgan is the first to approach the destroyed Cataphract in his mech. Pulling open the hatch with the Yama’s Messenger, he finds a bloodied, scared man holding a shotgun. It fires. It glances. Fires again. Glances again. Morgan spins up his Rebellion and leans in. The bounty hunter fires yet again. The Yama’s Messenger picks up the shotgun, crumples its barrels, and lifts it up. The hunter doesn’t let go, but says he’ll only talk if it’s a face to face. Morgan agrees, and crushes the shotgun with the foot of the Yama’s Messenger. Morgan conducts his interrogation, confirming that the bounty hunters were after Hertz. When asked who hired them, the pilot produced a calling card: a burnt playing card with a nondescript suit - black circles. One one side, the card is a 13. On the other, a 17. Eventually, Fennel notices the first bounty hunter’s mech and begins to “play” with it. They recognize some of the pilot’s equipment - they’re Circuit… adjacent.||

#

||Dropping the mech and disembarking, Fennel steps on the back of the Cataphract pilot, and begins to interrogate them about their Circuit equipment. Morgan picks up on what they’re doing, and drags the pilot aside. A name was dropped - McKay. Morgan makes sure to note the name, while Fennel walks up and asks who in the Circuit they’re connected to. He laughs, saying he’s been unable to contact any of his “superiors” for a while now. Fennel decides to take this as a sign that they’re able to just kill these guys, pressing the Ubshati into the Cataphract pilot. Morgan yells at Fennel and tells them to stand down, and to get the other pilot up. They reluctantly agree, and as Fennel mounts up again, Morgan gets the Cataphract pilot to flee. A shot rings out as all eyes go towards Fennel. They had determined that the other pilot could not be roused, so decided to “make sure.” Surayya and Ignatius are shocked, while the rest of the party can’t be anything but incensed at a repeat of this behavior. Realizing they can’t do anything more at this point, everyone mounts up and radios in to Tanner Crossroads to confirm their success.

With some rest in town, Buzzsaw takes the chance to speak to Morgan. It reveals something awful - during their cascade at the center of the Icebreaker, it took over Fennel’s body. Doing so completely fried their amygdala. Before, they could somewhat contain Fennel through fear and anxiety. Now, the only option is controlling their movements, which risks more nerve damage. In order to prevent this from happening again, Fennel needs to be explicitly told why a hostage or prisoner is to be kept alive, even when near death. Morgan understands, but insists that if Fennel ever does this towards civilians, he’ll not hesitate to prioritize the civilians. Buzzsaw understands, and the two of them finish their conversation.||

tight pier
#

good fight ending in an INSANE narrative moment

#

@lunar panther hmmm actually if this incident gets out should we mess with station stability

#

like if they end up not killing ignatius or something he ends up like. releasing footage of the event or some shit

last leaf
last leaf
remote oasis
#

Awesome! I'll whip something up!

last leaf
#

ayy that'd be super cool, thanks!

tame tide
#

looks at mission 5 map making notes

#

looks at inkarnate

SPOILER_image.png
#

Yeah this is trustworthy, definitely safe and won't explode at a moments notice. Time to make 5 more of them

lilac tartan
#

Finally the final battle of mission 3

#

||Bad Star||

thorn hinge
tame tide
#

||5th map is not related, I just uploaded it to the drive cos it wasn't there. It's even horizon||

#

||It's rather bland but I don't think with what I have I can make an amazing incomprehensible metavault from the assets at hand||

thorn hinge
#

Ahh. If the ||crystals lined up with the marked cover I could imagine swapping map images for a moment just to add some fun weirdness, or putting the crystal form as a semi-transparent overlay on the map that fades in for a moment or something.|| Being a totally different map explains why I couldn't figure it out lmao

tame tide
#

lmao

#

Don't tempt me with cool wacky ideas

#

Then I might need to touch it up again

twilit star
#

I feel like fights in a ||Metavault or Eidolon should involve some sort of weirdness that makes the dynamic of the fight change every round, and having the map completely flip every round is the easiest way to do that, and also fits the Parallel’s theme. Other options include rollable of weather effects or other weirdness, lol||

thorn hinge
# twilit star Ooh good idea, I should do that! If I can figure out how to do that in foundry

Oh I can absolutely show you how to do that. For my ch4 final fight ||I had a bunch of videos as backgrounds and foundry macros to change them as we played. They were manually triggered but I can set them up to be automatic too. No modules needed if it's jsut changing the underlying map! But if you have sequencer (it's required for the lancer weapon FX module) I can also do fun things like playing the other image over the map, fading in for a few seconds and then disappearing... ||

twilit star
tame tide
#

Mission 5: ||SILENCE THE GUNS!!!!||

SPOILER_M5__SILENCE_THE_GUNS.jpg SPOILER_M5__SILENCE_THE_GUNS_gridless.jpg
#

😎

#

I just looked at the map I made yesterday for mission 4 and realised one of the pieces of cover didn't have a size indicator... FFS now I need to add it and reupload them

lunar panther
thorn hinge
tight pier
lunar panther
#

probably true

torpid quarry
tame tide
#

dsfujhgjhxizudrfhigkeadhnirgjoiesdrjmgloksfrdjtmhgoiarsdzt

#

FUCK

torpid quarry
#

😔

tame tide
#

thanks

#

Fixed it

shell bison
#

OH man, IGF back baby.

#

Bun doing blink tech shenanigans

twilit star
#

Random idea for a random effect in the ||Paracausal|| areas of the campaign:

||Anyone in a frame with a Smart weapon begins to hear it scream||

shell bison
twilit star
#

||There are machine mines in the Smart weapons. Some can even talk to them. Some even need to be cycled. In a place like Calliope, where every AI metamorphosizes into something new, why wouldn’t the ones trapped in their Chrysalis scream?||

last leaf
thorn hinge
remote oasis
#

You love it and you know it

hard falcon
#

||Killer Sound is going Great (This was Powerwolf (Scourer)'s followup thermal lance.. I am never gonna get Focus Down to trigger Foxy_Cry ||

4138c52d68160f66f02f79fef6447a6e.png
hard falcon
#

||MY GAMBIT PAID OFF! THEY FELL FOR THE HIVES IN THE CORNER AND NOW I GOT THE AEGIS WITH THE DEFENSE NET IN THE TRUE CZ||

shell bison
#

good heavens

hard falcon
#

||After the defense Net went up
Roselor's Player: ... Ringabel, did you check that one?
Ringabel Player: Nope!
Roselor: ... WHY||

hard falcon
#

||I managed to also have the scourer nuclear meltdown on someone... who passed the agility save and braced.||

tight pier
hard falcon
#

they maxed it

fast parrot
last leaf
shell bison
#

You know what, time for an

IGF PROMPT

#

You're SRT is getting into some fun drunken revelry and they notice there is a small performance stage, instruments and all.

What members of your SRT gonna play something, sing something or just

#

perform well? bad? Leave it up to a show off roll?

fast parrot
#
  • placid can play the concertina. i have yet to convince my gm to let me play the concertina with take someoen out
thorn hinge
tight pier
#

I think they'd be lucky if Hertz would ever be willing to actually go to a public hang-out type of place like that, let alone get on a stage, Morgan is a miserable sopping wet creature and probably is incapable of feeling joy at this point, and Fennel is.... yeah

lunar panther
#

they'd sing whatever the Calliopean equivalent to Johnny Cash's Hurt is

tight pier
#

but not before some character development

#

James might do something though

hearty wave
#

Tonight is IGF Session one for my players and I am hype

ebon hatch
#

good luck!

shrewd sorrel
#

idk how to spoiler it after the fact 😔

warped ibex
#

unfortunately you have to delete it and repost it

shrewd sorrel
#

25 AP with Nuc Cav
my boy!
He didn't stand a chance WhenLifeGetsJaska

SPOILER_image.png
#

he did his best
it wasn't good enough dreadfried

thorn hinge
#

Fuck yeah

shrewd sorrel
#

|| Andros missed 3 times in a row against 7 Evasion with his flamethrower. So I had to pivot very quickly. I think the fight would have gone very differently if he'd hit but that's just fuckin' par for the course with this fucker ||

#

||still had the party at most 1 structure by the end but I had to play real mean ||

dire cloud
#

Poor little meow meow.

hearty wave
#

One of my players (Bamboo) drew a scene with Bartender Motherfucker

image.png
shell bison
#

BTMF watching you

ivory dune
#

Even though he's pissed he can't express it

hearty wave
#

They're giving the face because of our security team and their bar brawling. XD

hearty wave
#

Our party winched a poor corpo sleaze(Art by Bargo)

image-705.png
zenith galleon
hearty wave
#

No. I made my players split up to handle different security requests.

One was straight from the book chart; a Food Truck Fued.

But we also had a mining accident to investigate. A materials tram in the mine crashed and caused a collapse.

#

Securities were investigating the events that led upto it; one of the miners told them to get incident reports from a man named Tyrel.

#

Tyrel fucking ran.

#

My poor Aunic player didn't have a single successful roll all session.

#

Tyrel: Hey-hey! That's proprietary information!
Jodi: We appear to have proprietated it.

zenith galleon
#

🙏

#

nice

shell bison
#

Bree! I'm so excited to see more of your gang play!

zenith galleon
#

Got the session of the game I'm in today, fingers crossed the gang doesn't get in further shenanigans

#

(they will. No doubt about it.)

last leaf
#

look, it's calliope

#

if you weren't expecting shenanigans

tame tide
#

My thoughts as well

remote oasis
#

If they DON'T get into shenanigans I will be personally disappointed in them

shell bison
#

Shenanigans happen all the time, just look at last session where the gang and I were being moral paragons and the moment we were offered free booze we took the whole damn bar of bottles with us.

shell solstice
#

Look, Calliope is what you get when you cross Looney Toons, a soap opera, and a psychological horror movie. Shenanigans are inevitable.

shell bison
#

I've said it before and I'll say it again.

#

A dark comedy can still make you hurt and smile in the best of ways, and Calliope has been a stage for such performances for a long, long time.

main scaffold
#

party's drone player has had their little fellows updated

last leaf
#

oooh lovely

remote oasis
#

Those are great! I love the vibe, almost feral!

#

And speaking of tokens. I made a token for @last leaf of ||the blacksmith||

last leaf
#

🔥 It's an unorthodox ||blacksmith|| design but I love it so much.

zenith galleon
#

oh noooo

#

||Ipswitch|| fucking snuck onto our party's ship as we were heading out on an op

#

and their ||damn camera drone|| struck my character on the chin checking the hatch for an apparent stowaway

shrewd sorrel
#

does anyone have the link for the wip part 2? catthink

worthy root
dense crescent
zenith galleon
dense crescent
#

o I see

#

no spoilers but there's a lot points later on where it would have been
Funny

#

or well
funnier

zenith galleon
#

we'd run into them at a bar earlier and caught their interest

hearty wave
#

But a Bree game means there's going to be a vast array of mature tones and exploration of the human condition.

#

Along with shenanigans.

#

Our Aunic player, Venka, went unconscious because she was using a Clairevoyant ability in the Mine-- and caught vestiges of despair and death from laborers in the past. She synced with a dying miner in a cave in. Failed roll.

shell bison
#

Aunic player, oh good heavens

dense crescent
#

oh hey my Aunic player also used Pierce the Gate in a mine

wild flame
#

was it in ||The Mine™️||

dense crescent
#

||yes, in the room with the whiteboard||

wild flame
#

OH NO

hard falcon
#

we completed mission 2 and everyone has their LL2 mechs

Ledgem drew what im going to see in my nightmares.

thorn hinge
#

holy shit that sure is a pegasus, goddamn

last leaf
#

horrifying, I love it so much

#

that is goddamn inspired and hq aa hell

hard falcon
#

i don't like this thing D:

shell bison
#

Good heavens

hearty wave
#

Oh god

signal canyon
#

Been meaning to ask this for a while (whole campaign spoilers) ||are Feather and the other Prometheus-class nhps from the bad future supposed to be cloned from some kind of shackled remnant of Ra?||

iron lynx
#

||I mean, one could argue that all NHPs are cloned from the shackled remnants of RA.||