Disgaea: the New World

[zerohour]

Essentially a Disgaea themed play by post.  Not planning on any elaborate systems for how things are run, unless it becomes necessary or peopel want them.

Basic Premise: A New Netherworld has formed, and a number of nobles and powerful demons mograte there in hopes of claiming it as the new Overlord.  It it a chaotic time, and the Netherworld itself is very malleable, and likely to spawn its own demons before order through tyranny can be established.    Numerous factions seek control, ranging from Overlords looking to expand their domain, to Heros seeking to stop a great evil before it can begin, to shop owners who really don't want to pay for storage space any more.  For whatever reason they have, they're moving in, and god help anyone who gets in their way!


This is meant to be a fun and slightly goofy game, though if people want it to be serious, it can go that way too.  It will be play by post, and as long as things remain reasonable, there shouldn't be any need to develop a system beyond that, though we will have a judge (probably me) to make sure the game runs smoothly.


So, anyone interested in playing?

 

[daniel_gudman]

Prinnies, dood!

Yeah count me in, as a Prinny, dood. Together we'll make this new Neitherworld a paradise for all us Prinnies, dood.

 

[Yorae Rasante]

Sure, why not?

 

[MnemoD]

I ran a Simpled6 game based on Disgaea for a few months until it was discovered Sd6 is not the friendliest to advancement. Then I tried to make a d10 WoD-esque system for it. Needless to say- it was fun while it was still goofy. Lots of character death and fucked up things later, it kind of fell apart.

Wish you guys luck!

 

[Latewave]

Who knows? Why not? I've got to wonder if I'll have the time now though.

 

[zerohour]

Alright, we've got enough to go forward, I think...  This is going to be a basic play by post game, mostly freeform, especially in the beginning.  Once things become fairly established, or people want to keep track of how powerful everyone is, we can introduce a basic system.

I was leaning towards using the Fate System, which is fairly basic and easy to adjust to our uses.
People would get stats and traits.  Stats show how powerful you are in a certain aspect.  For instant, Carl is a powerful individual (Power 4).  David, on the other hand, isn't too strong, (power 2) but has a small army to back him up (Minions 2, making it an even fight for the most part if David brings his army.)

Conflicts will be resolved by rolling fate dice.

For those unaware how this system works, you roll 4d6.  1-2 counts as minus one, 3-4 has no effect, and 5-6 isd plus one.  This is combined with relevant stats to give you your final result.
For example, if Johnny (Power 1) is leading his army (minions 3)  against Timmy (Power 3) in his under construction fortress of terror (Fortress 2)
The initial results are Johnny 4 vs Timmy 5, which means that Timmy is the likely victor.  However, once we roll the dice...
Johnny:3,5,6,3 +2
Timmy:4, 6, 6, 2 (+1)
it becomes 6 vs 6, resulting in either a tie, or a rematch.  Maybe the fortress is destroyed, and some of the soldiers are killed, maybe the conflict continues, or maybe Johnny decides to pull back and attack soem other time before too much damage can be done.

I'll talk about traits later.  Just wanted to get this out so you know I didn't abandon this.

 

[zerohour]

Traits are characteristics of your character, and can both help and hinder you.   A trait should be both positive and negative, so it can be used to your advantage, or to take advantage of your personal flaws.  If you can think of a few situations where the trait could be useful,  and a few were it could make things more complicated, it is probably a good trait.  Above all, they should be interesting, something that should inspire new and entertaining directions for the game to go.
You can use them in the following ways:
-Gain +2 to any roll you're making.
-Reroll your 4dF, choosing which of the results you want.
-Declare something to advance to story, or to alter a current situation.

Examples: 
Steve has the trait  "Always ready for a fight."  This is really useful when his rival, Carl, decides to set up an ambush, and he's alread expecting it, negating any bonuses he might get for surprising Steve, but when he meets up with Diana to discuss a ceasefire, Steve's player gets revenge by saying Steve's battle readiness makes it seem like he's going to betray Diana, and the treaty is in jeapordy.
John's "Blood Brother" trait means that he can ask for his buddy Ryan to lend him a hand, granting him a powerful ally.  However, he needs to help out Ryan too, especially when the GM declares that Ryan has been captures by flying pirahna zombies, and John needs to decide if he should press the attack against his enemy, or go save his buddy.

Wendel's "Diplomacy beyond reproach" is super useful when he's creating an alliance between warring factions, but when he takes to the battlefield, his desire to work together makes it difficult for him to lead his troops to slaughter his enemies.

Luke's "Enough Ordinance to Start Netherworld War Three" means that a lot of people don't trust him with his massive armory, and often times try to steal it from him.  However, it means that his troops are often better equipped than anyone else when he leads them into battle, and when Angels immune to demonic weapons appear to kill them, he probably has somethign lying around that he can use against them.

Fate Points:  Fate points are what you spend to invoke traits, either your own to make things better, or on your rivals to make life more difficult.  When you spend them to make things easier for yourself, it disappears, but when you use them to make life more difficult for your rivals, the Fate Point you spend goes to them!
Everyone starts with Five fate points.  You will get more periodically, and can earn even more if your traits are making your life more difficult, either because the GM or your rival players are exploiting them for their own benefit.
Using Fate Points should make the game more interesting.  It shouldn't be used out fo spite, but should make the game more fun/challenging to play, and more interesting to read.

And again, I would like to state we will be starting in free form.  These rules will only be implemented if you guys want them, or I deem it necessary to keep the game fun and fair to everyone.


Any questions, or should we get the game started?

 

[zerohour]

Story thread is up.  Merry Christmas guys.
Disgaea: The New World
While we're not using traits at the moment, I would appreciate it if you would assign five points to your character's traits, just so everyone has an idea of your power structure.  Everyone starts with Power (1) at a minimum, since this indicates you've risen above the rank and file in the infernal legions, and intend to set off on your own.  Everything else, feel free to do what you want.  If it's a problem, I'll let you know, but I really don't expect any issues from what is essentially fluff at this point.

 

[Yorae Rasante]

Do you have anywhere where I could read more about this Fate System you are using?

 

[zerohour]

http://www.faterpg.com/
Should give you some more info, and you can buy the system for yourself if you're interested.  Did my explanation need some clarification, or are yu just interested in the system?  If you need some clarification, I'll try to do a better job.

Reminder:  The FATE system is meant as a supplement for our game.  We won't use it unless we run into a situation that the GM and players feel mandates it.  Hopefully, 99% of the game will be freeform.

Hope to see some posts soon, planning on introducing some NPCs in the next post, and start developing the game.

 

[Yorae Rasante]

Well, you did say to "assign five points to your character's traits". Thought I'd need to know the system to properly do it, since from your explanation you get the points because of your trait instead of buying it with points, so now I'm a bit confused, sorry.

 

[zerohour]

Sorry, guess I should have done a better job.  Probably should have made sure I had proper names for everythign too.  Think I called both of them traits at one point.  Also doesn't help that I'm probably twisting the rules to simplify this as well.  Let's see if I can do a better job this time.

Anyways, traits are what define your character's power base.  They determine the overall quality of your demonic realm, how powerful your vassals are, how mighty your personal power, or how well connected you are.  The higher the number in a particular trait, the more potent it is.

Sample Traits:
Power: How strong you are as an individual
Minions: The size and strength of your army.
Allies: Powerful NPCs supporting you.
Fortress: How big and bad your base is.

This is meant to be a freeform game, so if you have an idea for an aspect, but it doesn't fit into any of these categories, feel free to make something up.  I wanted my guy to use magic for stuff other than blowing up his enemies, so I created the Sorcery trait to define it.  As long as your provide an explanation, and it isn't overpowered, it should be fine.

This is how we apply traits:
If two players disagree how a battle should turn out, or how an alliance meeting goes, they combine all relative traits, and each roll 4dF.  Whoever gets the higher result "wins," and dictates how the encounter goes (within reason.)

So, for an example: Billy (Power 1) personally brings his army (Minions 2) to invade Timmy's (Power 1)Base of operations. (Fortress 1)
Billy gets 3+4dF for Power and Minions, while Timmy only has 2+4dF.  Billy rolls a 3,5,4,1 which gives him a net result of +0, for a total of 3.  Timmy rolls 6, 5, 6, and 1, which is a net result of +2, giving him 4.  Timmy gets to say how the fight plays out, as the armies try and fail to conquer his invincible citadel, sending Billy running with his tail between his legs.  Of course, if Timmy said that he slaughtered Billy's army and executed him, the GM would say that was going too far, and would probably ruin

Again, this should only come into play if the players start disagreeing.  If Billy wants his attack to fail so he can swear revenge, and Timmy wants that too, we don't bother with rolling.  I only put it up so peopel would be aware of how this would be handled if we reach that point, though now I'm beginning to wonder if it was a good idea to post it in the first place.

 

[zerohour]

So... any particular reason people aren't posting?  Do you want me to develop the setting a bit more?  Need help coming up with character ideas?  Did everyone else just lose interest and I'm just talking to myself?