 November 29, 2008 - 9:26am | Once we have the name, mechanics, layout concept, and core races, we
need a place for the races to exist. That means we need a new frontier
map and we need to fill it with cool places with enough detail and
structure that it comes to life. 3. We wear sungoggles during the day. Not because the sun affects our
vision, but when you're cool like us the sun shines all the time. |
 November 29, 2008 - 10:18am | Major question to resolve right out of the gate: Will Earth figure into the 'core' setting at all? "You're everything that's base in humanity," Cochrane continued. "Drawing up strict, senseless rules for the sole reason of putting you at the top and excluding anyone you say doesn't belong or fit in, for no other reason than just because you say so." —Judith and Garfield Reeves-Stephens, Federation |
 November 29, 2008 - 10:21am | ...but not super detail that GM's can't create. I like just enough detail to get rolling. |
November 29, 2008 - 10:28am | ...but not super detail that GM's can't create. I like just enough detail to get rolling. That goes without saying. "You're everything that's base in humanity," Cochrane continued. "Drawing up strict, senseless rules for the sole reason of putting you at the top and excluding anyone you say doesn't belong or fit in, for no other reason than just because you say so." —Judith and Garfield Reeves-Stephens, Federation |
November 29, 2008 - 10:40am | ...but not super detail that GM's can't create. I like just enough detail to get rolling. That goes without saying. Say it, don't spray it. :-) |
 November 29, 2008 - 10:45am | The setting should be constructed after some race choices. It really should be just some background material to place the characters into, allowing for the ref to decide the game style. The setting should not dictate or force any particular gaming style (like the KH materials did - UPF or Sathar war oriented was essentially the only choice for play). Focus on a decent timeline, consistent mechanics for play, and let the ref decide how to use the game personally. Flexibility to game style should be the rule, and not forcing a particular setting, race, or other subjective choices onto folks, as everyone has their own opinions. Mantra: "appeal to larger audience" <insert witty comment here> |
November 29, 2008 - 10:53am | The setting should be constructed after some race choices. It really should be just some background material to place the characters into, allowing for the ref to decide the game style. The setting should not dictate or force any particular gaming style (like the KH materials did - UPF or Sathar war oriented was essentially the only choice for play). Focus on a decent timeline, consistent mechanics for play, and let the ref decide how to use the game personally. Flexibility to game style should be the rule, and not forcing a particular setting, race, or other subjective choices onto folks, as everyone has their own opinions. Mantra: "appeal to larger audience" Honestly I think this is a huge task. One of the turn offs for d20 and d20 Future was the far-reacing openness of progress levels. I do agree that maybe we shouldn't pick the "bad guys" but you have to admit the information given about the Sathar made for some great game fun. |
November 29, 2008 - 10:56am | Maybe just some sample races, a couple of setting ideas(maybe even a contest for campaign setting such as the one Green Ronin did for True20), and mechanics for rolling your own? "You're everything that's base in humanity," Cochrane continued. "Drawing up strict, senseless rules for the sole reason of putting you at the top and excluding anyone you say doesn't belong or fit in, for no other reason than just because you say so." —Judith and Garfield Reeves-Stephens, Federation |
November 29, 2008 - 10:58am | Maybe just some sample races, a couple of setting ideas(maybe even a contest for campaign setting such as the one Green Ronin did for True20), and mechanics for rolling your own? Will, your a genius. Perfect direction. We could start with the Core Four and build a mechanic for creating races. |
November 29, 2008 - 11:06am | Great ideas! I love this discussion! Okay - I totally agree with w00t and others... the setting has to have enough detail to get imaginations rolling, but not so much that a Referee's creativity becomes cornered and limited. It's a find line to walk, but we should strive to maintain the mantra that less is more, provide sketchy details about a wealth of stuff rather than a ton of detail about less stuff.... right? As far as the races go - maybe I'm thinking this all wrong. Seems to me that the races are not core to the rules but instead core to the setting. Maybe any discussion of setting must include the races core to that setting. Eliminating all but humans from the core rulebook is an idea - what do you all think? That way, if someone wanted to create a new setting (or a new "Frontier Book") then it would come with its own race choices. All we would need to do is bundle the "core" races in the "default" setting book. Yes, I used quotes "unnecessarily" haha And I don't think we need a contest - I think multiple settings is a great idea - more than one Frontier Book to tickle the creative needs of players sounds fun to me. But we WOULD have to decide which one to call core and include in the scope of this game system. 3. We wear sungoggles during the day. Not because the sun affects our
vision, but when you're cool like us the sun shines all the time. |
 November 29, 2008 - 11:32am | I think leaving all races except humans to the settings is a great idea. Ad Astra Per Ardua! My blog - Expanding Frontier Webmaster - The Star Frontiers Network & this site Founding Editor - The Frontier Explorer Magazine Managing Editor - The Star Frontiersman Magazine |
 December 1, 2008 - 9:19am | For a core space map. For high-larity how about a 3 level map (something basic, nothing to big on the xyz grid) where their positions change with the normal real month, perhaps rotational. Pehaps create one central core central system to provide easy map use and personal integration use in the central level map. But for the outer two have them change positions by rotating them (say level 3 yellow tab is now matched to this position). Maybe have one section be clockwise and the other counter-clockwise. Hee hee hee. Story wise if the map moves so dramatically it might make one scary core area of space to shift so much. Travel wise the maps should be close together so that an easy way of diagonal movement isn't to hard to figure out. Maybe just keep it simple and have it one step down or one step up than move. Perhaps to spice it up, the central map could have colored zones where travel takes an extra turn or no turn at all. |
December 1, 2008 - 9:33am | It would be cool to add some new elements to the map. Perhaps a little easier than layers is a map built on concentric rings... Regardless, I would like it to be much bigger with more unknowns in-between all the 'developed' systems. Perhaps some new phenomenom can be placed into the map such as Dark Matter regions... no real effect other than travel is limited or slowed due to mass. Known stable wormholes quickly becoming a space travel-lane, rife with pirate activity (Somali Coastal region anyone). I am sure some of the more astronomy heavy guys can come up with other stuff to add in. <insert witty comment here> |
December 1, 2008 - 10:49am | Neat ideas! One of the things about the AD Frontier map is that it seemed too heavily developed/explored, especially after KH and Zebs came out. Suddenly there weren't that many places to discover unless you went off-map. We could make like three or four mapped regions, connected by stable wormholes, then a larger map showing where in the vastness those three regions are located, leaving dozens of new worlds to discover. If we want to allow a heavy focus on exploration as a possible campaign choice for Referees, vast unexplored regions is a way to do it. Setting idea building off what you all are saying: What about having four mapped regions, each the home region of a core race (humans being one of them). They don't have to be huge (entire campaigns could be run in one of them though). The center region is a larger mapped area... a nexus, a hub to which these stable wormholes all connect due to some unexplained cosmic phonemona. Once a race discovers and uses a wormhole to see where it goes, they end up in this nexus and two-way transport between the nexus and their region then becomes possible. That way the nexus can't be used to transport to unexplored regions, but other regions can suddenly appear in the nexus when races native to that region discover space travel and enter the wormhole... Plus, piracy would be more like piracy of old... where pirate ships lurked not too far from busy ports (in this case, wormholes) but could escape quickly if a large force showed up. 3. We wear sungoggles during the day. Not because the sun affects our
vision, but when you're cool like us the sun shines all the time. |
December 1, 2008 - 10:57am | That is a very cool idea, something like the nexus concept in that Jodi Foster flick. I like the idea of clusters of explored areas, surrounded by humungous regions where anything can be found... with only routes that might be found between the explored regions. In other words, leave gi-normous regions where individuals can set their own ideas into play, where they can choose to interact with the rest of the material or not. <insert witty comment here> |
December 1, 2008 - 11:16am | The astrophysicist in me is not too keen about the whole wormhole idea but if you guys want to go that route you can. This brings up the issue of how our FTL travel is going to work. Do we have "jumps" like in Star Frontiers where the travel time is mostly spent getting to jump speed or a safe distance from the gravity well and the actual FTL part is nearly instanteous or do we have some sort of "warp" drive that allows you to move at some specified speed (i.e. 1 ly per day) so that you travel at a fixed rate? What other issues about FTL travel should we be considering? Ad Astra Per Ardua! My blog - Expanding Frontier Webmaster - The Star Frontiers Network & this site Founding Editor - The Frontier Explorer Magazine Managing Editor - The Star Frontiersman Magazine |
December 1, 2008 - 12:38pm | The astrophysicist in me is not too keen about the whole wormhole idea but if you guys want to go that route you can. Any discussion of FTL travel should bother tha astrophysicist in you. :-) But this is the "Fiction" part of Science Fiction... so why not have wormholes or similar? We could call them something different, such as vortex or Distance Dilation Points or something :PThis brings up the issue of how our FTL travel is going to work. Do we have "jumps" like in Star Frontiers where the travel time is mostly spent getting to jump speed or a safe distance from the gravity well and the actual FTL part is nearly instanteous or do we have some sort of "warp" drive that allows you to move at some specified speed (i.e. 1 ly per day) so that you travel at a fixed rate? What other issues about FTL travel should we be considering? 3. We wear sungoggles during the day. Not because the sun affects our
vision, but when you're cool like us the sun shines all the time. |
December 1, 2008 - 1:33pm | Any discussion of FTL travel should bother tha astrophysicist in you. :-) But this is the "Fiction" part of Science Fiction... so why not have wormholes or similar? We could call them something different, such as vortex or Distance Dilation Points or something :P Actually, most forms of FTL don't bug me at all. It's just the idea of flying straight into something that is guaranteed to rip you apart at the subatomic level and turn you into cosmic goo and then expecting to come out somewhere else all put back toghether again. The odds of that are 1 in 2N where N is then number of particles in the system. Anyway, it's just a personal peculiarity. We can use wormholes if we want. Ad Astra Per Ardua! My blog - Expanding Frontier Webmaster - The Star Frontiers Network & this site Founding Editor - The Frontier Explorer Magazine Managing Editor - The Star Frontiersman Magazine |
December 1, 2008 - 2:05pm | Any discussion of FTL travel should bother tha astrophysicist in you. :-) But this is the "Fiction" part of Science Fiction... so why not have wormholes or similar? We could call them something different, such as vortex or Distance Dilation Points or something :P Actually, most forms of FTL don't bug me at all. It's just the idea of flying straight into something that is guaranteed to rip you apart at the subatomic level and turn you into cosmic goo and then expecting to come out somewhere else all put back toghether again. The odds of that are 1 in 2N where N is then number of particles in the system. Anyway, it's just a personal peculiarity. We can use wormholes if we want. I, personally, don't like the idea of voidspace or hyperspace or any other dimension. If something so amazingly fantastic existed, wouldn't we be devoting bajillions of credits investigating such a thing? Where does it exist... are there more dimensions... is there native life there... why is time and space related in this place to our place? So many questions and no answers. If wormholes disagree with your hardscienceness (which I totally understand), how about coming up with a plausible superscience that makes it work? Maybe the ship doesn't enter into the wormhole but uses its intense gravitational attraction as a sling through very clever maneuvering, any wrong move and you're torn apart or slung into unknown space? Or perhaps it requires some form of construct around the wormhole entrance that encases the ship in some sort of g-dampening "birthing" cacoon before it enters the "canal" - or whatever. Got any ideas? 3. We wear sungoggles during the day. Not because the sun affects our
vision, but when you're cool like us the sun shines all the time. |
 December 1, 2008 - 4:05pm | I agree with the idea of starting the core rule book with Humans and then expanding from their. This would also be cool in the idea that as characters expand in the game they meet new races, or new pc races come into the game. For some players this could be a kind of exploration of the game universe. Not to mention it gives your more product to produce. If there is going to be a nemesis in the game maybe that should be introduced in the core book as well. So that a game group can open the book and begin play right away with good guys and bad guys right out of the box. One of the things I loved about SF was that you could read the rules and become familiar with them and ready to play in a very short time. I think I taught one player how to play SF and create a character in about two hours. Play-ability is key. |
December 1, 2008 - 3:52pm | Including Earth in the setting - well that poses one significant problem, if we include Earth then we will have to establish a historical time line and tech that at least is somewhat consistent with the world as we understand it. On a positive note it does create and opportunity to have a familiar launch pad in which players can get started and expand from. If we use a parrallel universe model similar to SF we can pretty much create anything we want and still have a kind of familiar feel about the humans that is similar to the Earth we know. I think either way is perfectly fine and has its own challenges and I support everyones decision either way. |
December 1, 2008 - 3:58pm | Ok, i'll throw it out there if it has not yet already been adressed...FTL. I seriously hope we can develope a travel model either with or without FTL that is easier to play then that used by SFKH. I personally vote in favor of some kind of FTL travel and really like the space-fold, dimensional travel, or wormhole models. However, if it's easier to not use any kind of FTL at all I am for that too as it is sometimes so controversial. BTW were we looking at a harder sci-fi or softer sci-fi approach in this game or are leaving that open ended? |
December 1, 2008 - 4:00pm | My idea was to have a "setting book" that gives: the mega-corporations, political boundaries, races (good and bad), history/timeline, famous NPCs, and everything you need to play right out-of-the-box. The setting book will either be integrated into the Referee book or will be a stand-alone book (however you want to download it actually - the current idea is to provide both options). So the idea is to have the potential to buy one book and read through it and play with nothing more! Sounds like we're on the same page! 3. We wear sungoggles during the day. Not because the sun affects our
vision, but when you're cool like us the sun shines all the time. |
December 1, 2008 - 4:01pm | I think a happy medium between hard and soft SF(something a little B5-ish, with elements of 2300AD thrown in)would sit well with everyone. "You're everything that's base in humanity," Cochrane continued. "Drawing up strict, senseless rules for the sole reason of putting you at the top and excluding anyone you say doesn't belong or fit in, for no other reason than just because you say so." —Judith and Garfield Reeves-Stephens, Federation |
December 1, 2008 - 4:02pm | regarding Earth... I'm a little skeptical about including it unless someone wants to make some really cool timeline that has enough depth but isn't too over-done... We wouldn't be able to do things like make Microsoft a Megacorp without worrying about Microsoft getting upset at us haha.... To be honest, I'd prefer the "separate but similar" approach that SF took.... just humans similar to us who evolved in another location in space. 3. We wear sungoggles during the day. Not because the sun affects our
vision, but when you're cool like us the sun shines all the time. |
December 1, 2008 - 4:03pm | AZ's comment reminded me that I never chimed in on the Earth issue. My vote would be to leave it out, just like the original did and for all the reasons AZ gave. Just my $0.02 worth. Ad Astra Per Ardua! My blog - Expanding Frontier Webmaster - The Star Frontiers Network & this site Founding Editor - The Frontier Explorer Magazine Managing Editor - The Star Frontiersman Magazine |
December 1, 2008 - 4:04pm | COOOOOOL! Love the ideas, and ooops, i noticed the earlier discussion on FTL a few posts back. I think those are some good ideas. Personally I think FTL can be very exciting and it opens up all kinds of adventures and mis-adventures. |
December 1, 2008 - 4:10pm | regarding Earth... I'm a little skeptical about including it unless someone wants to make some really cool timeline that has enough depth but isn't too over-done... We wouldn't be able to do things like make Microsoft a Megacorp without worrying about Microsoft getting upset at us haha.... To be honest, I'd prefer the "separate but similar" approach that SF took.... just humans similar to us who evolved in another location in space. Either or's fine by me, I just asked, because someone would've asked sooner or later, especially those of us whose SF campaigns do incorporate Earth, the Frontier and the Core Four. As for doing things like making Microsoft a megacorp, we can turn around and say it's satire, which the Supreme Court already said was protected speech. "You're everything that's base in humanity," Cochrane continued. "Drawing up strict, senseless rules for the sole reason of putting you at the top and excluding anyone you say doesn't belong or fit in, for no other reason than just because you say so." —Judith and Garfield Reeves-Stephens, Federation |
December 1, 2008 - 4:20pm | for my 2cents, leave out the Terran System, or at the very least have it be a lost system (BSG style). It could always be developed as one of the add-on materials or settings later. Original humans were sent via ??? technology to earth-like planet x found a massive distance away. Once there, communication broke down and events happend, ultimately leading to loss of technology back to pre-spaceflight era. Eventually, tech levels (and populations on this new terra) grew back to offer spaceflight, but only to the nearby planets and systems where new colonies formed. Because of substantial environmental differences, the humans living on the new colonies had to adapt, use technology, and even subtly change their genetic structure over the last several generations in order to survive better. Now, a several hundred years since the new terra settlers first landed.... insert more ideas here... maybe adversary race first appears. <insert witty comment here> |
December 1, 2008 - 4:25pm | I can see it now hahahaha.... Windows2545, still giving me a blue screen of death. Only it'll be on my implanted biocomp while standing on the planet Talos III. :P 3. We wear sungoggles during the day. Not because the sun affects our
vision, but when you're cool like us the sun shines all the time. |
December 1, 2008 - 4:26pm | Maybe even an ancient enemy from that lost blue planet way out yonder.... "You're everything that's base in humanity," Cochrane continued. "Drawing up strict, senseless rules for the sole reason of putting you at the top and excluding anyone you say doesn't belong or fit in, for no other reason than just because you say so." —Judith and Garfield Reeves-Stephens, Federation |
