Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Von Ether 02-07-05, 11:36 PM	I've had the offer to take up a 6-month long Ebberon game. One of my few "mehs" of the game is that I thought WotC could have provided some more mechanics beyond Action Points to help give the game a more pulp/cinematic feel. My esteemed colleages, after some dangerous research, I can report there are some additional rules to satisfy my pulp cravings. I have provided them for you own edification and perusal. Dramatic Editing Found in d20 Adventure!, these rules allow players (not PCs) to add elements to a scene for their advantage. If the PC are in a greenhouse and being attacked by man-eating plants, the players can spend their Action Points to have the PC "notice" some overlooked weedkiller in the corner. These rules may have to be tweaked to taste since d20 A! version of Action Points are more common and are replished between sessions. Backgrounds (or more appropriately Subplots) Found in Spycraft and SG-1, these rules allow players to invest some of their skill points in a chosen subplot that gives them bonus XP if they particpate in said subplot when it arises in the game. This can be imported as is. Most of the rules for these Background define how often they show up and what happens if the players or GM ignores them for too long. Stunts Again from d20 A!, these are quick guidelines for adding a small bonus when players do something daring and cool. If you have found your own rules that add pulpy danger and excitement to Eberron, please take this as in invite to share!!!
Cloud Divider 02-08-05, 12:31 AM	I'd been tempted to twiddle with Action Points a bit more to go with something a little more like Adventure's (Storyteller version) Dramatic Editing. Want to spontaneously "Hey! I know that guy!" at the bar? That might cost you an AP. "Hey! He's my brother!" to the human leading that Sharn Watch detachment? Maybe 2 AP. Alternately, you could use an AP to automatically succeed at something, but a mishap occurs ("You manage to hit your opponent, but your sword gets snagged on his armor"). This latter usage might need a little extra effort and attention to ensure it doesn't get abused... Additionally, I think I'd also allow "Anti-AP" to be spent, either by adding a Dramatic Complication ("Hey! The Watch Captain's actually my Half Brother! It's too bad that we never got along, though...I probably shouldn't have been dating his ex behind his back..."), or just randomly dropping a complication into the scene ("Yah, I go check out the bar...and I just happen to run into one of the Black Water Triad's enforcers there..."). Maybe a better example of Anti-AP would be something like "While climbing the rope to get out of the mine and escape the angry cultists, the rope starts to fray!" Again, it'd need some HEAVY GM oversight to prevent scene-stealing (I could imagine someone dropping Complications all the time just to get spotlight time). So the right kind of players would help, too. But you could do some very cool stuff with it, I think. It'd also give a feel that's rather different from "vanilla" D&D, particularly putting some of the storytelling control into the player's section... I'm still pondering whether these "Dramatic Editing" points should be combined with standard Action Points, or if they should be another pool altogether (call them "Drama Points"). Half of me is definitely wanting to let the players spend Action Points like water, so assigning them as additional non-XP awards for doing cool stuff (or adding fun Complications) would work very nicely. However, with the mechanical applications benefits of AP, I do wonder if it'd be better to leave the Mechanical Bonuses to AP, and leave "Story Bonuses" to Drama Points.
hiryuu 02-08-05, 05:07 AM	Dramatic Editing Found in d20 Adventure!, these rules allow players (not PCs) to add elements to a scene for their advantage. If the PC are in a greenhouse and being attacked by man-eating plants, the players can spend their Action Points to have the PC "notice" some overlooked weedkiller in the corner. These rules may have to be tweaked to taste since d20 A! version of Action Points are more common and are replished between sessions. Your GM should be throwing those things in already, and you should be working with the GM to do such things, not requiring you to spend action points on it. Backgrounds (or more appropriately Subplots) Found in Spycraft and SG-1, these rules allow players to invest some of their skill points in a chosen subplot that gives them bonus XP if they particpate in said subplot when it arises in the game. This can be imported as is. Most of the rules for these Background define how often they show up and what happens if the players or GM ignores them for too long. Wait.... since when should PCs have to spend skill points to do something they ought to be doing in the first place? Stunts Again from d20 A!, these are quick guidelines for adding a small bonus when players do something daring and cool. I use action point recovery: if a PC does something brilliant and dramatically fails, then survives, I give him an action point, if he succeeds brilliantly, say, with a natural 20 with his complex plan, he gets one there, too. The best mechanic already exists: PCs have PC class levels, other people aside from villains don't around 80% of the time.
Von Ether 02-08-05, 08:40 AM	Four more facinating things were uncovered in my research last night!!! 1.) A Minion template where low Int and Wis NPCs can do a "dog pile" manuver. For Eberron, I may also include that the NPC has to be a NPC class as well. Found in d20! 2.) "Getting the schema is paramount!!" De-emphasize combat and refocus on the task at hand by using the mission based XP rules in d20 Star Wars and Spycraft. 2.) If someone doesn't like DnD's spell and psionic slot system, there are several other systems that offer a different take on pulpy powers, including Grim Tales, D20 Star Wars and d20A! 3.) For Eberron pulpy rules, d20 Adventure and Grim Tales are gold mines. In giving the Dramatic Editing rules a look over, I know that for my upcoming group there will be tweaking going on. I'll have to have up the costs of D.E. by +3 at least and enforce a 1-point AP buy minimum. Wait.... since when should PCs have to spend skill points to do something they ought to be doing in the first place? Back in my college days, my players were sending me reams of subplots and were equal partners in editing a scene for maximum cinematic action and carnage. RPG life after college has been less than .... stellar. Many of my post-college days players AVOID any complications beyond combat. Some of it is players that don't know better but most of it is players who either want a simpler experience, afraid to improve or won't do anything unless there is a defined pay off. To be fair, I've also seen GMs who force subplots on players without working it out in advance or getting input. i.e. givining a divorcee a love interest subplot or try to force a dumb fighter PC into a political situation. With D.E. and Backgrounds, I am hoping that by sweetening the pot, I can give my group baby-steps to particpating in the game pulp style. Sort of a "You can lead a horse to water, but you can't force them to drink ... unless you put some sugar in the water." And at the very least, I will also get an idea of what players don't want to deal with my style of play and not force it on them. I use action point recovery: if a PC does something brilliant and dramatically fails, then survives, I give him an action point, if he succeeds brilliantly, say, with a natural 20 with his complex plan, he gets one there, too. Excellent idea old chap!
fizzbang 02-08-05, 09:53 AM	I always enjoyed the Dramatic Editing from Adventure, and while I don't know the Subplot bit rom Spycraft, it sounds a bit like 7th Sea's wonderful "flaw" system: you paid points for these recurring problems (the more paid, the more of a problem), and everytime that you had to deal with that problem, you got that many points of bonus XP. Sort of an experience investment system that returned bonus plot. It'd need some tweaking for d20, of course, but it could be good. Of course, for folks who aren't as comfortable with adding large houserules like those, you could just go with a subtler rule: when a player attempts something particularly daring, incredible, and pulp-y, then you could instantly give them an action point to spend on the roll right then and there. Alternately, you could offer "dramatic bonuses" on rolls where people tried such things: give just enough of a bonus to make it possible to make the otherwise impossible DC. Of course, be sure that you don't give too much of a bonus, or else it'll be easier to backflip through the hail of bullets and flipkick the villain than it is to simply walk over to them and punch them! Unless you'd like to push the style towards Feng Shui, of course!
Cloud Divider 02-08-05, 09:56 AM	Your GM should be throwing those things in already, and you should be working with the GM to do such things, not requiring you to spend action points on it. Yes and no. The point is not for the GM to place these things into the scene, but for the players to do so. Drama Points offer a tangible REWARD for involving their characters to a much greater degree. For instance, let's say we've got your standard Tavern Barfight, in a coastal city (say, the sailor's district in Sharn). Player A thinks it'd be cool for his unarmed PC to swipe the swordfish off of someone's dinner platter and use the pointy end to hold off his opponents. It's not something that was in the base description, but it makes sense to be present. That's something that might go in as a freebie. Another common pulp tradition is the femme fatale (or the love interest being rescued, or whatever) to pull a hairpin out whenever the hero needs to jimmy a lock. Even if she's been help captive in a dungeon or slogging through the Amazon basin for six weeks. She's got a hairpin. And it just happens to work as an improvised lockpick. That'd be a Drama Point expenditure. The McGyver trick of always being able to find something to make his Cunning and Clever Improvised Widget happen to be just the thing to save the day is again, another good use of a Drama Point-style mechanic. Wait.... since when should PCs have to spend skill points to do something they ought to be doing in the first place? This much I definitely agree with. I personally prefer to have the players build characters with various hooks built in. However, there is something to be said for having plot hooks and disadvantages that the PLAYER is incentivized to bring up, rather than the GM doing all the work. I'm not a fan of trading Disadvantages for Feats, but I do like the concept of giving some kind of reward (XP, Drama Points, whatever) for playing up your disadvantages. For instance, a lecherous PC being distracted by a nice looking "companion" in the Firelight district, when he's really supposed to be staking out a organized crime deal. I use action point recovery: if a PC does something brilliant and dramatically fails, then survives, I give him an action point, if he succeeds brilliantly, say, with a natural 20 with his complex plan, he gets one there, too. That's pretty cool, I dig that. I think I'd also award Action Points for particularly in-genre actions, and particularly those that aren't necessarily the optimal choices (ie parlaying with the villain rather than just running him through when he gives his Evil Villain Soliloquy). The best mechanic already exists: PCs have PC class levels, other people aside from villains don't around 80% of the time. Indeed. One of the big things I like about Eberron is that low-level NPC's with NPC classes is D&D's version of "mook rules," and they don't feel horribly out of place. A 2nd level Warrior is still only going to have 8hp, and will go down in a single solid hit. It does quite a lot for making the PCs "larger than life." I'm a really big fan of using carrots to improve player involvement. The Stunt system used in Exalted was perhaps one of the most brilliant additions to the gameplay. While yes, in any game, we could have the characters doing cool stuff, just because, but Exalted's actual offer of tangible physical benefits ("Ooh! I get to roll more dice!") it improved my and my players enjoyment of gameplay immensely...
Von Ether 02-08-05, 04:11 PM	Indeed. One of the big things I like about Eberron is that low-level NPC's with NPC classes is D&D's version of "mook rules," and they don't feel horribly out of place. A 2nd level Warrior is still only going to have 8hp, and will go down in a single solid hit. It does quite a lot for making the PCs "larger than life." I stand corrected, there are pulpy rules beyond APs. GM: "Uh, No one expects the Eberron inquisitoin?" WotC: "No one expects the Eberron inqusition! We have one puply rule, Action Points and NPC classes. We have TWO puply rules ..." Sorry felt silly. :)
hiryuu 02-08-05, 04:36 PM	The action point recovery came up the other night: one character, pursuing a band of Emerald Claw members over the rooftops of Sharn, failed a jump check to make it to the other edge: he rolled a one, missing the jump by twenty feet, too far to boost himself with an action point. He fell to the ground. He reached maximum damage thanks to how high up he was and he missed every bridge on the way down. He hit bottom. I rolled the damage dice. A mass of ones and twos. I ruled he hit a trapper's cart laden with furs. The character jumped up, gazed far as he could into the heavens, and shook his fist into the air. That's an action point right there.
Charles Phipps 02-08-05, 04:53 PM	Is STORY.... Common Pulp elements that need addressing are... * New York City Sharn obviously can fit this. * Nazis * Gangsters * Ancient Ruins * Mad Scientists Artificers work here * Just exotic ENOUGH technology (Submarines, rocket packs, death lasers) * Vigilantes * off the wall magic
Urko 02-08-05, 05:05 PM	I use something similar to the Dramatic Editing rules you describe. Ages ago, some game company came out with something called Whimsy Cards, which allowed players to have input into the game other than through their characters. They were quite general - with titles like Bizarre Coincidence, Inopportune Arrival, and Something Missing; the players have to fill in the details ("By a 'Bizarre Coincidence', the customs officer is Lord Taydril's long-lost childhood playmate"). My rule is that everyone starts with one and gets a replacement everytime you play one, as long as it's not done in an aggregiously self-serving manner ("There just happens to be a +3 undead bane sword right at the entrance of the vampire's crypt"). I award a small amount of experience based on how cleverly they're played. This used to work out quite well, but I'm having a lot of trouble getting my current group to understand them ("Can I play this to have my character act in such-and-such a way?""No, you don't need to - you can just have your character act that way!"). I don't know if you can still find Whimsy Cards in any stores, but at least one website has transcribed their text. I like the action point mechanic, but I'm having a lot of trouble getting players to actually describe what they're doing when they spend them. I guess I can just totally disallow them unless accompanied by colorful description, but I would love suggestions about how to get players more in the spirit without resorting to rules-based coercion.
SoulLord 02-08-05, 05:12 PM	Following the same idea perhaps the action points can be used to "rent a feat" for the duration of the scene which could be a good startup for characters ex; Gord the warforged fighter Slashes at the lackey of eltiar who is blocking the way using all the strenght in his being he not only drops the lackey but manages to strike eltiar before he finishes his deadly conjuration. here for example gord could "rent" the cleave feat for the cost of an action point for the duration of the combat. SoulLord
Cloud Divider 02-08-05, 10:24 PM	It's funny how you happened to bring this up - I happened to watch Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow a week ago, and had thought about starting a thread on how you could take it as an ideal recipe for a pulp action campaign, and wouldn't even necessarily need much tweaking for Eberron... We have: * New York City As the starting setting, Sky Captain (henceforth "SC") did indeed start in New York. For quick translation to Eberron, it'd be just like the Forgotten Forge adventure path, beginning in Sharn, and quickly moving to more exotic locales... * Nazis SC had Unit 11, though it takes place prior to WWII. So while they're not necessarily Nazis, they're at least German... In Eberron, we can replace Nazis with a number of possible villains. Clearly, the Lord of Blades has the most obvious "Racial Superiority" drive, even unto genocide. * Gangsters SC didn't really involve gangsters. But it wouldn't take much to throw them in... [Oddball thought: on some level, Buckaroo Banzai and the 4th Dimension fits pulp tropes, particularly if you include the backstory] * Ancient Ruins SC had Totenkopf's Tibetan mines, Shangri-La, and Totenkopf's secret island even had some ancient ruins... Translated to Eberron, you've got your usual suspects: Xen'drik, Dhakaani ruins beneath Khorvaire. You could even do the more exotic ruins, like old the old dwarven holds in Frostfell. * Mad Scientists Again, Totenkopf and the rest of Einheit Elf/Unit 11. In Eberron, Merrix d'Cannith certainly fits the bill, though he's a little more subtle and less maniacal about it. And naturally, any nutty Artificer make pretty good scalable Mad Scientist villains as well... * Just exotic ENOUGH technology (Submarines, rocket packs, death lasers) SC had Airships (the Hindenburg III), P-47 convertible aircraft/submarines, the British Manta air/subs, giant robots with DEATH RAY EYE BEAMS, smoke-ring ray-guns, even rocket-packs. Eberron's got Airships, Elemental Submarines, Skycoaches (in Sharn...), the Lightning Rail...plus the normal flashy magical widgets (Wands of Spectacular Blasting). Throw in a LoB team of Warforged Titans, and you'd have a pretty good analogue for Totenkopf's killer robots. Though I think we could certainly do with more magic-gadgets... * Self-loading repeating crossbows empowered by mage hand * A magical parasail (= steerable parachute) that uses a tweaked feather fall * Snub-nosed wands of Magic Missile (or Lesser Elemental Orb), ideal for concealed-carry * An lute that uses sculpt sound to make the equivalent of either an amplifier (so more people can hear you) or synthesizer (to let you make it not sound like just a lute) * Vigilantes SC obviously starred Sky Captain, and his secret base that had at least a pair of airships plus an entire fleet of his fighter aircraft. So he'd be a particularly empowered vigilante... And of course, Eberron gets our PC heroes... :) Furthermore, SC did a very good job of doing a pulpy globetrotting campaign. We start out in the city (Sharn), moving quickly to Tibet (pick your favorite cold/mountainous environment), and finally to a jungle island (Xen'drik), chasing Totenkopf (= LoB) the whole way. Plus, SC had dinosaurs! So we can't forget to keep those in Xen'drik, too... :)
Von Ether 02-08-05, 11:19 PM	I know it's easy to write off LoB as a Nazi for his propoganda, but Baker has said that the Emerald Claw fits better. He's always envisioned LoB as more of a Dr. Doom. On that note, Dr. Doom has appeared in several steampunk or pulpy games of mine. He's a classic and his name never fails to strike fear in the hearts of players. Favorite line: "We didn't find the body of that gypsy rebel we left for dead in the fire? It seemed that he used a gadget to escape? And a eyewitness said his face was badly burned? ... oh, crap. We. are. screwed."
Mike Czaplinski 02-09-05, 08:29 AM	[Oddball thought: on some level, Buckaroo Banzai and the 4th Dimension fits pulp tropes, particularly if you include the backstory] Not odd at all: The writer of BB, Earl Mac Rauch, is a BIG pulp fan, and according to legend based Team Banzai on his like-minded friends growing up, and was inspired directly by the old DOC SAVAGE pulps for the story. So, there is quite a lot to be mined from BB for Eberron. MikeC, who will be making extensive use of the Lord of Blades in his own campaign....
Golbez57 02-09-05, 01:47 PM	I love this rule suggested by The 'Cow in an older Dragonshards article (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/ebds/20040803a) when characters take actiosn that are "colorful" and "fun": "Provide the character with one action point. In most cases this can be a temporary action point that must be used before the end of the scene. If the player was especially creative, the action point could be permanent, as long as no character ever has more than (5 + level/2) action points. An action point is a significant (potentially life-saving) reward, so reserve it for clever actions that require sacrifice or risk from the character. Never, ever allow this type of award to be taken for granted." Knowing that the danger of death was a very real thing in Eberron, my players were at first reluctant to have their characters take any pulp-y actions. Once I started giving them the use of a temporary Action Point (no more than one per character per session) to use when they undertake truly interesting/daring/foolhardy actions, those sort of choices became more appealing and our sessions became much more in tune with the spirit of high adventure and success against tough odds. It's worth noting that it's sometime just as fun when those temporariy AP's come up as 1's and the actions fail spectacularly, mostly because that makes their eventual success all the more heroic. Imagine the many blunders of Jack Sparrow in the fight scenes of Pirates of the Carribean for a hint of how this might play out.