Broken World 2 (Recruiting Thread)

[Ion]

Have you ever looked at this forum and thought, hey, Broken World RPG, that's pretty neat, hey looks like I can't join because it's not running anymore, having finished and gone to another site! Too bad!

Well, now's your chance to prove your value and be accepted into the sequel, since the first instillation, Broken Wold, has FINISHED.

Since I got all my original players from this site, I thought I might as well see what's what around here, and extend a hand to one or two lucky winners from the site with a black background.

Or none. But hey, let's have some confidence.

Now get ready for some rampant combo posting, because the word limit on this forum is much too low for my posting requirements!! Whooo!!!

http://activerain.com/image_store/uploads/4/9/0/3/4/ar119435714143094.jpg

[Ion]

--Let’s get introduced--
The setting is modern, a dozen or so years into the future, at an international weapons conference in Birmingham, in the UK. I think that most of the characters will end up being military personnel from one nation or another, but civilians of varying professions and origins, such as doctors and lawyers, are not disallowed or discouraged.

The events in the game are meant to be taken tongue in cheek, and the game will have a 'down-to-earth' atmosphere, with a focus on role playing and the interactions between player characters, but this does not in any way preclude wild and crazy events.

--Game Mastering--
I will be the main game master.

The Hilarity will provide co-gm support, and will be running a few important NPCs as his own characters.

--Setting--
The following takes place several years in the future.

Britain is holding a military tech expo to showcase the newest in rapid deployment systems and automated combat technology, in Birmingham. The UK has invited the international community to participate in this showcase, leading many nations to send their own prototype weaponry as well as select groups of armed service members to demonstrate their technology.

Since this event is merely a ploy for prestige and so is covered heavily by the media, servicemen have been encouraged to interact with their counterparts from other nations to hopefully demonstrate how much better their particular country’s military is when compared to others. Temporary housing has been set up just inside Birmingham's city limits for these visiting military men and women. The visitors have been placed under British authority for the duration of their stay, to prevent any chaos that may be associated with having dozens of different militaries holding out in the same city.

Birmingham is Britain's new capitol after a terrorist attack destroyed a large part of London. A nuclear bomb laced with a chemical agent killed millions. After this attack, the formation of the European Union succeeded, making Europe slightly like the United States. Britain courteously abstained and started a few long term acts that would eventually bind it back to Canada. Using many loopholes in UN policy, China went on a land acquisition spree taking over many smaller Asian countries around it, such as North Korea and Vietnam.

Terrorism had been on the rise ever since the twin tower attacks on September 11, 2001. From the anthrax attacks on Beijing's buses to the weaponization of the Ebola virus to be used by White Power extremists in Africa, things had been on the downfall. They reached a climax with the bio nuclear bomb going off in the middle of London, wiping out almost the entire city. The years that followed up to this expo were ones of panic.

This exhibition of military power will show everyone who wants to fight order that it can only be done at the cost of their own lives.

One way or another, your characters find themselves in Birmingham; whether it be because they live there, they’re visiting from abroad to cover the event for the media, they’re visiting to take part in the demonstrations, they’re a part of the British MP force assigned to keep order in the city for the duration of the event, or even one of the multi-national soldiers sent to participate in or witness the exposition directly, you’re all there.

The only thing I can divulge about the story after this point, however, is that this game will be much, much more than an modern romp set ten-minutes-into-the-future.

--Applications—

Applications should look like this:

Name:
Nation of Origin:
Job Title/Rank:

Age: Characters must be twenty one or older.
Gender:
Ethnicity:
Physical Description: Three sentences maximum. You may include a picture.

Background:

Must be somewhat interesting or revealing, and detail at least one thing that matters a lot to your character, be it morality, nationalism, never leaving a man behind, family, personal honor, religion, or something else. What makes your character do the things that she does? Also needed are your character’s general education level and/or prior experiences. You can be creative as to the events in your character’s background, since this is the future. Characters won’t be very disposable, so strong backgrounds are a must.

Each of your characters is assumed to have met all of the other player characters at some point in the last week or so in which the exposition has been running. The soldiers have had a lot of free time, and so they have been allowed to do as they pleased within the city. Make sure to include the reason for your being in Birmingham at the end of your bio.


I will accept the best application(s)

[Ion]

--Making Characters and the Rules too--
I’m using a truncated d12 system based partially off of d20 srd, partially off of the game mechanics in Fallout 1 & 2, and partially off of a system created by someone with the user name of Draug to role-play the life of a group of Red soldiers in the universe of the web comic Gone With the Blastwave, in the now nonexistent forums of Gotmorr.com.

Characters have a variety of skills at their disposal that represent their physical, intellectual, vocational, and psychological prowess.

--The skills! There's less of more!!--

List of the skills and a brief explanation as to what they accomplish.

Firearms: Handguns, Assault Rifles, Shotguns, Energy Weapons

CQC: Unarmed Combat, Chainswords, Arm blades, Enchanted Maces

Throwing: Grenades, Bows, Crossbows, Rail-accelerators, Fireballs

Heavy Weapons: Large caliber machine guns, RPG Launchers, Grenade Launchers, Vehicular Mounted Weaponry, Mortars, FLAME THROWERS

Muscle: Climb, Intimidate, Jump, Swim, Carry Capacity, Damage Reduction, Resist toxin
Combat Use: Damage Reduction

Words: Bluff, Diplomacy, Gather Information, Handle animal, Perform, Speak Extra Languages

Stealth: Disguise, Hide, Move Silently, Sleight of Hand

Common Sense: Knowledge Check, Concentration, Decipher Script, Forgery, Investigate, Navigate, Research, Ride Animal, Tactics
Combat Use: Initiative

Perception: Listen, Sense Motive, Spot, Survival, Search

Finesse: Balance, Escape Artist, Drive, Tumble, Run speed
Run speed is only used for the purposes of outrunning other players. This is more important than it sounds.
Combat Use: Attack Avoidance

First Aid: Treat Injury. That's it.
First Aid heals 1 HP for every 5 rolled. First Aid can not be performed twice in the same turn. Certain items add to First Aid rolls.

Gearhead: Craft, Computer Use, Demolitions, Disable Device, Pilot, Repair, Any Gun Bigger than a Person
Gearhead is used to fix weapons should they become inoperable in the midst of combat. It is also used to figure out what mechanical objects do, if their use is not readily apparent.

Skills are locked into three separate groupings, Violence, Survival, and Know-how, which are each assigned the numbers of 2, 4, or 6. You assign the numbers to the category, which transmits its score to all the skills therein.


What the hell is Ion talking about!?

An example!


Name: Greg Gregorovich

-Skills-
-----Violence: 4
Firearms: 4
CQC: 4
Muscle: 4
Heavy Weapons: 4

-----Survival: 2
Throwing: 2
Stealth: 2
Perception: 2
Finesse: 2

-----Know-how: 6
Words: 6
Common Sense: 6
First Aid: 6
Gearhead: 6

[Ion]

--Skill Swaps--

You may make two swaps of two skills, trading their locations, and therefore, their scores. For example, on the skill chart above, you could trade the skills ‘Words’ and ‘Heavy Weapons’, moving ‘Words’ to Violence and moving ‘Heavy Weapons’ to Know-how, and then make a second swap with another two skills, if you so chose.

Skill swaps are completely optional.

--+2/-2 Combos--

You also have available to you two +2/-2 skill modifying combos. If you choose to apply a +2 to a given skill, you must accompany it with a -2 to another skill. For example, on the skill chart above, you could put a +2 on the skill ‘Firearms’, bringing its effective score to +6. However, you must also penalize another skill using the -2 that comes with the +2. In this case, you might put the -2 on ‘Finesse’, bringing its effective score to 0.

+2/-2 combos are completely optional.

--Traits--

At the end of your application, please include whether or not you’d like to have a character trait, and if so, what types of effects you’d like it to have.

Traits are extra character quirks that have both positive and negative aspects, which serve as role playing opportunities.

The following are a couple of example traits.
Trait: Family Person. (Insert name here) is so involved with impressing friends and family that she performs better when they are nearby. However, when isolated from the people she judges herself by, or when rejected by said people, she tends to become depressed, and performs poorly.

Trait: Lady’s Man. (Insert name here) will go out of his way to impress the ladies, and often does, giving him temporary bonuses to his skills and ego. Unfortunately, sometimes they are less than impressed, and it’s all this lady’s man can do to not collapse and burst into unmanly tears at the denial.[/traits]

--Edge Rules--

You will begin the game with 5 points of Edge. Edge signifies how much of a ‘hero’ or ‘crowd favorite’ you are, and allows you to do some pretty sweet stuff.

You may spend a point of edge at any time, to do one of the following:
-Make an extra attack
-Perform an extra action
-Double your skill bonus to a particular roll, and ignore wound penalties
-Move an extra distance during your combat turn

Edge may be used as a shield during combat. If you attacked in the round, and the attack is successful, you will lose the point of edge, but in the process the attack will be negated. You may only have one point of edge as a defense at any time.

Edge is gained whenever I give it, and I give it whenever you do something worthy of recognition, such as whenever you perform an action that is awesome, cool, entertaining, or very in character,[/spoiler]

--Example Application--

Name: Dwayne Campbell
Nation of Origin: Britain
Job Title/Rank: Unemployed Civilian

Age: 23
Gender: Male
Ethnicity: Caucasian
Physical Description: Dwayne is just a smidge under 6 feet, and is athletic in build. His scruffy brown hair frames his handsomely chiseled features, and is seldom ever seen without an old pair of perched on the bridge of his nose.

Background: Dwayne is a half-welsh, half-English, half-lazy guy. Dwayne grew up with his parents, working at their family owned pub. Over the years, dealing with rowdy trained Dwayne in the fine art of brawling. This, coupled with his years on the high school rugby team, whipped Dwayne into top shape, leading him out of school a few times on suspension. It was hard for the school administration to empathize with the winner of school fights, even if Dwayne was defending kids who were victims of bullying, Dwayne, though not a good socializer, is known for his corny quips and his heart of gold.

Not particularly wanting to go to a university, Dwayne moved to Birmingham at the age of eighteen in search of a job. Five years, three ‘careers’ and seven ex-girlfriends later, Dwayne is still half welsh, half-English, and half-lazy, though has some more luck than cab driving, auto repairing, and construction work in the job department. Dwayne now works for his successful businessman of a cousin, doing a variety of odd jobs using his varied skill sets for good money. His most recent assignment is photographing the upcoming Birmingham military tech expo...

-Skills-
-----Violence: 6
Firearms: 4 (-2)
CQC: 8 (+2)
Muscle: 6
Heavy Weapons: 6

-----Survival: 2
Throwing: 2
Common Sense: 6--Moved from Know-how to Survival, swapped with Stealth
Perception: 2
Finesse: 2

-----Know-how: 4
Words: 4
Stealth: 4--Moved from Survival to Know-how, swapped with Common Sense
First Aid: 2 (-2)
Gearhead: 6 (+2)

[Ion]

You need not have any knowledge of Broken World 1 to apply.

[The Hilarity]

Gee, I don't think this belongs here.

[Ion]

Hey, we need peeps. If there's any peeps here, well, then perhaps we need them.

It was just copy paste, anyway. Didn't spend 2 hours writing it all.

Besides, this forum is dead. They need some excitement.

[Qloos]

Name:Lin Yotzi
Nation of Origin: South East China.
Job Title/Rank: Restaurant Waiter / R&D Public Relations

Age: 40
Gender: Male
Ethnicity: Chinese
Physical Description: 5'4" Brown eyes and black hair. 215 Pounds. Prefers to wear impressive and expensive suits.

Background: Dropping out of High School, Lin quickly became gang affiliated. As China cracked down on the drug trade in it's new borders Lin's gang was forced to fight it out on the streets with other gangs over the remaining drugs that managed to slip through China's net.

With the bloodshed rising, Lin quickly got out of the gang life and went looking for a job. Desperate for work he introduced himself charismatically in the best suit he could buy with his remaining money and managed to get himself a job washing dishes at first. A few months later he was the top waiter at a 5 star restaurant. Lin's new outlook on life turned from gunning down the competition to simply out smiling them, "I'll never be a Brute again!" he told himself. "Dress to impress and be polite to the guests."

Late one shift, Chinese officials came in to eat and being suitably impressed with Lin's service they offered him a job in Birmingham talking to all the reporters and touring them through China's latest and greatest at the expo. Perhaps Lin's gentleman like ways will show China's deadly new weaponry in a more peacekeeping themed light.


-Skills-
-----Violence: 2
Firearms: 2
CQC: 2
Muscle: 4 (+2)
Heavy Weapons: 0 (-2)

-----Survival: 4
Throwing: 4
Stealth: 2 (-2)
Perception: 6 (+2)
Finesse: 4

-----Know-how: 6
Words: 8 (+2)
Common Sense: 6
First Aid: 6
Gearhead: 4 (-2)


Trait: Guilty Past.
When attempting anything Brutish, (aka combat) There's a 50:50 chance Lin will either do double damage or break down in tears from guilt.

[Ion]

You only get two +2/-2's, but you can achieve the same effect by switching Gearhead with Perception.
--
-----Violence: 2
Firearms: 2
CQC: 2
Muscle: 4 (+2)
Heavy Weapons: 0 (-2)

-----Survival: 4
Throwing: 4
Stealth: 2 (-2)
Gear Head: 4
Finesse: 4

-----Know-how: 6
Words: 8 (+2)
Common Sense: 6
First Aid: 6
Perception: 6

More information about the game will be made available some time Tuesday or Wednesday.

[Qloos]

I'll leave it how it is then and pretend I did that. It's more organized my way.

[Ion]

That's true.

Say, you will be able to post once a day or so, correct?

You may want to check your PMs. Don't bother replying, I have 50 already.

[Wizard]

Pushing for succuess. Will publish a char later probably.

[Ion]

Well you'd best do it soon, there's probably not many spots left.

Wait.

There is only one spot left.

[MCXL]

Community Man! Looks Like We Have A Vip!

[Ion]

We have six complete apps, and two people showing interest for that last position.

I'm so excited to see who posts their app first.

[Ion]

Gee Wizard, you sure don't post very much. I've noticed that your signature is somewhat out of date as well.

Will our intrepid game master ever hear a response from Wizard before the application period expires?

Will Wizard's as-of-yet nonexistant character ever succeed in getting written into the story?

Tune in tomorrow, dear readers, for the thrilling conclusion to this splendiferous adventure!!

[Wizard]

Well, I do have a life now :P

[Ion]

Well your life is getting in the way of your chances at playing this game. You do realize that I expect you to post almost every day, right? If you're going to be one of those "I play this game every Wednesday" people, this isn't the game for you.

For anyone else reading this thread, feel free to apply, because this will be my pool to draw from if anyone drops out during the course of the game.

[ejundersc0re]

I'll post an app later, This looks like fun :D

[Ion]

Well, Qloos is silly and isn't playing, so you can take his spot.

[Qloos]

Got bored fast. Felt like the plot was being railroaded.

[Ion]

You didn't even want to be in the same place as the other players. This isn't some silly zombie panic roleplay where everyone writes their own adventure.

And you only posted three times. You are so silly!

[ejundersc0re]

You mean I get to play??

[Wizard]

Unfortunately, real life is owning. Come summer I'll be somewhat free. Until I leave for Asia.

[The Hilarity]

You mean I get to play??

Yes. __

[Ion]

Yes. __

That means you need an application.

You can post every day, right?

[5h4d0w]

wow, so many words. Think im gonna pass out. Will take me a week just to read what rules and stuff you made Ion. Then it comes the understanding part, re-reading.

How many people have entered?

Will anyway look at the story!

[MCXL]

What? Like a good 1/3 of your post didn't make sense.

Got bored fast. Felt like the plot was being railroaded.

I think what you meant to say is that the plot wasn't determined by you and you alone. Not only did you only post 3? times, but you didnt even make it past the intro period. This is a SERIOUS role play, for SERIOUS players. Thats not to say its 100% serious in content, only in game play. Sorry if you didn't get that we have an Idea of where were going, and at least for now your getting dragged along for the ride.

There is a story outlined for this game, not just a premise. We have to get the bal rolling somehow, and we have gotten fed up with players being unable too pick up on subtle hints as to where we NEED them to go to make the RP work. I'm gonna let you in on a secret. If we didn't leave that tent when we did we would all have been killed.

We have a story for you too participate in, but we gotta start it somehow. If you think that means just doing whatever the fudge you want then you obviously don't know what a role play is. Maybe you would just like to make a character and walk around, doing random things, ALL DETERMINED BY ROLLS OF DICE? Because to me, that sounds pretty boring. I know that most DM's in the real world control the overarching story pretty rigorously, they just let players solve the problems how they wish. That's what we plan to do. But you know whatever, that's boring.

I'm so sick of stupid online players being all finicky, Qloos, gues what, sometimes, you don't have a choice as to what your doing in real life either. Actually its quite common that you have 2 options, proceed down your path, or do nothing and fail.

We are only just getting this thing started, if you want instant gratification that you and you alone determine, then being a player in a role play isn't really the avenue your looking for, try masturbating or self invented sports instead.

[Qloos]

http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/duty_calls.png

Uhhuh, that's nice.

I posted an action in the story which in no way derailed anything the GM wanted to do. I was simply playing character and could of and did follow the direction the GM and other players chose. I lost interest because the GM didn't allow me even that small freedom. Instead he blocked my actions which sent the message: Your creative side means nothing to me, I, the GM will dictate the course of the story.

I don't ignore the direction of the story when it was presented to me, I was presented with a setting, I acted in accordance to the setting and my character and my post was deleted. Ion could of easily added extra story dialog or action to stop me from doing what I was doing and move me along with the story - without deleting my post.

He also decided that it was better to simply remove me from the roleplaying group instead of asking me personally through email or pm if I could post more to meet the pace of the other roleplayers.

Furthermore, I tried this system of roleplay -for the first time- and felt it was too slow paced for me and wasn't having fun. If you're going to chew out every player in some long winded debacle every time they quit, then you're going to be posting in this uncivil way alot. I've even given you a valid excuse as to my characters death, so pipe it.

[MCXL]

Whatever. The fact of the matter is that I don't chew out all the players who quit. Only the ones who quit and then say it's because the game wasn't free enough in the opening scene.

[Qloos]

Ah It was a misconception then on my part. I'm not used to the pace of forum roleplaying after all. Regardless, I lost interest and probably won't attempt a forum roleplay session again.

P.S. I do beleave Ion is still a good GM, just honest feed back and Forum roleplaying not for everyone etc etc. Bygones be bygones.

[Ion]

Well Qloos, I'm not offended at your behavior and I don't hate you for it. It's just that you're missing out. It's like if you decide not to play Half Life 2 because the opening cut scene is too long.

And to answer that other gentleman's question, we have seven players. I'd rather have nine or so.

[Qloos]

Oh I have no doubt that it will get better. But 6 day work weeks force me to rely on instant gratification games such as this and all.

[Ion]

Have fun.

[Ion]

I'm still considering applications, if any of you get tired of the very brief rps that are going on around here. I only have 6 active players and I'd like to have 8 or 9.