Cthulhu's ongoing war against CthulhuTech

Few games in recent memory have had to overcome more hurdles than Wildfire's CthulhuTech. Originally published by Mongoose, that relationship ended very quickly. It was soon followed up by Catalyst Game Labs, which published the bulk of the game books until an allegation of financial wrongdoing on the part of one of CGL's owners forced Wildfire to seek out yet another publisher. That new publisher is Sandstorm. It seems, however, that the ongoing financial malaise (and the obvious ire of Great Cthulhu) is about to claim another victim. There is growing speculation on the interwebs that Sandstorm and/or CthulhuTech may be coming to the end of the road. These developments have further implications for other games as well. Although it could be argued that CthulhuTech was reaching the end of its cycle anyway with all the books that had been planned already published or in the pipeline, Wildfire's new game, The Void (aka, The Game Formerly known as Chthonian Stars) is just getting started. Will it, like CthulhuTech soon find itself orphaned (again, it was also originally going to be a Mongoose release) and looking for a new publisher? And what about Posthuman Studios and their game, Eclipse Phase, which is also published by Sandstorm? It seems to be a very bad time to be in the business of publishing tabletop rpgs with high production values that are not part of the D&D legacy. It may be that the only way for small publishers to stay afloat these days is to limit themselves to pdf and POD sales.

-Rognar-

Update: Forget speculation, here is confirmation. At least it appears The Void will see the light of day.

Paizo dominates ENnies

Pathfinder has dominated the ENnies at Gencon this year, taking home a ton of awards including Best Game and Product of the Year. The success of Pathfinder has also earned Paizo the nod for Best Publisher. I'm also glad to see some recognition for the excellence of Eclipse Phase, which won for Best Writing and was runner-up for Product of the Year. I'm happy to see that my impeccable taste in games has been validated. All the results are presented at EN World.

-Rognar-

Sunward - Eclipse Phase heats up

I'm not sure what I expected to see in the new Sunward: The Inner System sourcebook for Eclipse Phase. In hindsight, I suppose what it contains (which I will discuss below) is exactly what one would expect. Yet, somehow, I feel slightly disappointed. I bought the pdf from DriveThruRPG and have nothing negative to say about the production quality. The artwork is beautiful, the editing appears tight, it has a good ToC and index. The "hack pack" version I bought for $15 includes a printer-friendly map of the inner solar system as well as other goodies made available for use under the Creative Commons License. Really, I have nothing to complain about, so what's the problem?

Sunward: The Inner System is basically an encyclopedia of the inner solar system in the Eclipse Phase setting. It provides an exhaustive list of colonies and space stations throughout the inner system, from the hell mines of Mercury to the nomad settlements of the Martian outback to the luxurious Venusian aerostats, there are plenty of ideas and settings to exploit. I found two of these particularly inspiring and it may be a window into my soul that both are bleak and gritty. One is the "TITAN Quarantine Zone" or TQZ on Mars and the other is Earth itself. At this point, a little background may be in order. Eclipse Phase is set in the far (but not really far) future after a "war-against-the-machines" scenario. The machines, in this case, are the TITANs (Total Information Tactical Awareness Networks), military AIs, not unlike the famous Skynet, that turn on humanity. They don't simply nuke us to extinction, however. They collect our consciousnesses (usually by way of decapitation followed by download directly from the harvested brain) and store them for some unknown purpose. Most of humanity is slaughtered, but many escape offworld. The lucky ones are able to escape intact, but most are infugees, digital consciousnesses uploaded and stored in hope of one day earning the means to have a body or "morph" and becoming a functioning individual. Most never will. Anyway, the TITANs were not defeated, although the commonly held belief is that they were contained. The discovery of Pandora Gates, portals to other star systems, which have distinct TITAN design features lead most to conclude that the TITANs built them to leave the solar system completely. The problem is, even if the TITANs left for good (an open question, to be sure), they left behind most of their automated weapons. Nanoswarms and warbots patrol the scorched ruins of Earth's great cities, while dormant viruses lie in wait to infect any biomorph that encounters them. Yet, despite these horrors, small pockets of humanity remain on Earth, ten years after the Fall. Do these survivors look up to the heavens and wonder if rescue is just a few thousand kilometers away in the glittering space stations that orbit overhead or do they assume the TITANs must have pursued humanity to the very edge of the solar system and left none alive? How can one not find that compelling? In fact, the TITANs did pursue humanity beyond Earth, most notably to Luna, the near-Earth orbital habitats and Mars. The most troubling reminder of that pursuit is the TQZ on Mars. It is a little taste of what Earth is like on the most populated planet in the system. The same technological horrors inhabit the zone, yet for some reason, do not seek to expand for the moment. Imagine the role-playing possibilities. Corporate agents, separatist militants, desert nomads and TITAN technology, Mars is a pretty interesting place.

So, what about the crunch? I guess perhaps this is where I feel a bit let down. Maybe, there wasn't much left to offer after the core rulebook, but a paltry selection of new morphs, some rather silly (sun-worshipping space whales, WTF?), as well as new traits and gear. There's also a selection of new character templates. The Earth Survivor is the coolest damn thing I've seen in months, but the Martian Ranger, the Scavenger and the Siftrunner Techie are pretty sweet too. An encounter between a group of Scavengers in their flexbot morphs and Earth Survivors, looking like Tusken Raiders after ten years on a heavy diet of steroids and hate, would make for a pretty sweet evening of hardcore gaming. While Sunward is not everything I'd hoped for, it has a lot to offer and the hack pack is worth the extra few sheckels if you want to customize your game setting or maybe use some of the artwork for a blog or other website.

-Rognar-

cross-posted at Rognar's Space Horror RPG Blog

Eclipse Phase and CthulhuTech reunited

The well-publicized flameout of Catalyst Game Labs and the subsequent departure of Posthuman Studios (Eclipse Phase) and Wildfire (CthulhuTech) led to much speculation about the future of those games. Fortunately, some former employees of Catalyst have come to together to form a new publishing company called Sandstorm and it has lured back both companies. Happy days are here again.

-Rognar-

Eclipse Phase chargen - third stage

As noted in the previous post, Ravel is sleeved in an Exalt morph. Basically, he is a genetically-modified human. His morph gives him +5 COG as well as +5 in three other aptitudes chosen by the player. I will increase his SAV, REF and COO by +5 each. All skills based on the improved aptitudes are also increased by +5. As an aside, it is helpful to keep track of what aptitude and skill bonuses you received from your morph, since at a later time you may be resleeved into another morph which may provide different bonuses.

Ravel has a total of 270 Rep points (50 for free, 220 purchased with CPs) to divide up among his reputation networks. He divides them up as follows:

Hypercorps (c-Rep) 80
Autonomists (@-Rep) 80
Firewall (i-Rep) 80
Criminal (g-Rep) 30

At this point, all that remains is to purchase equipment, including upgrades to the morph.

-Rognar-

Eclipse Phase chargen - second stage

Characters get 1000 customization points (CPs) to spend on skills and other character aspects, such as morph, starting wealth and reputation. A minimum of 400 must be spent on active skills and 300 on knowledge skills, but I will spend 500 on active skills. Skills can be bought up at a cost of 1 CP per point up to 60 and 2 CP per point from 61 to 80 (the starting maximum). The base level for each skill is the relevent aptitude plus any bonuses derived from background and morph. So, from the list of active skills, 500 CPs buys the following:

Networking: Hypercorps 70
Networking: Autonomists 60
Networking: Firewall 60
Networking: Criminals 40
Persuasion 70
Infosec 65
Infiltration 65
Interfacing 60
Pilot: groundcraft 40
Fray 45
Perception 80
Freefall 30
Freerunning 30
Investigation 70
Protocol 30
Beam weapons 30
Kinetic weapons 30

From this, you can see Ravel places a high priority on interpersonal skills. In particular, his networking and persuasion skills are quite impressive. He's also quite skilled at dealing with information systems and computer security and is a very perceptive person. On the other hand, his combat skills are not impressive, so he tends to keep his head down when the bullets start flying.

From the list of knowledge skills, the following:

Language: English 85 (native speaker)
Language: Mandarin 70
Language: Russian 50
Art: writing 50
Academics: computer science 60
Academics: cryptography 50
Academics: psychology 60
Academics: mathematics 45
Profession: security ops 50

Ravel is a native English-speaker, although his Mandarin is nearly flawless and he's quite fluent in Russian. He also has a background in several fields related to his professional competencies and he dabbles in a bit of creative writing from time to time.

I spend the remaining 200 CPs as follows:

Morph:
Exalt (30 CPs)

Positive Traits:
Adaptability (20 CPs)
Fast Learner (10 CPs)
First Impression (10 CPs)
Situational Awareness (10 CPs)

220 Rep points (22 CPs)

5 Moxie points (75 CPs)

23,000 credits (23 CPs)

-Rognar-

Eclipse Phase chargen - first stage

Character generation in Eclipse Phase is no trivial undertaking, so it is fortunate that character death is rarely permanent. Throwing together a character on the fly is simply not an option. I decided to share my first chargen experience to illustrate the process.

The character's name is Ravel Pasternak, he is a spy working on behalf of Extropian interests in a Hypercorp city-state on Mars. He is also an agent of Firewall.

The first step is selection of a background. I have chosen to make Ravel a native-born Martian. This gives him a +10 Pilot: Groundcraft, +20 Networking: Hypercorps and +10 to any technical, academic or profession skill. I chose Infosec. As stated previously, Ravel serves the Extropian faction, which gives +10 Persuasion, +10 Networking: Hypercorps and +10 Networking: Autonomists.

The next step, I have 105 points to divide up among 7 aptitudes, which are cognition (COG), coordination (COO), intuition (INT), reflexes (REF), savvy (SAV), somatics (SOM) and willpower (WIL). The default for each is 15 points, but Ravel is involved in information gathering, so he needs an edge in interpersonal skills and information technology. I make his SAV and COG 20 each. As a trade off, I drop his COO and REF by 5 each. He's not quite as naturally agile and dextrous as the average transhuman, but he will be able to compensate with his skill selection and benefits derived from his morph.

My base aptitude scores are: COG 20, COO 10, INT 15, REF 10, SAV 20, SOM 15, WIL 15.

-Rognar-

Random Thoughts on Transhumanism

I recently bought a dead tree copy of Eclipse Phase and it has gotten me to thinking about the future more than any game purchase I've ever made. The basic premise of the game is the concept of transhumanism, the use of technology to advance the human mind and body. In the game, the mind (called the "ego") is decoupled from the body. The ego can be stored, uploaded and transmitted at will. The body is little more than a mobile storage device. If the body dies, it can be replaced. The body doesn't even have to be flesh and bone, it can be robotic. It can even be a nanoswarm. This concept raises a lot of questions about identity and social constructs. It is just a game, of course, so certain assumptions are made for the sake of playability, but it is thought-provoking.

One thing I have been pondering is the question of sanity. How would a human mind deal with being "resleeved" (the game term for being downloaded into a new body or "morph") into a synthetic body? Would it drive that mind insane? Is it even possible for a consciousness stored in a synthetic matrix to be afflicted by mental disorders? After all, brain chemistry is often at the root of most mental disorders. How would an ego perceive the world differently in a digital versus an organic form? I guess the designers of synthetic brains would have to recreate the human brain to a very high level, even to the point of producing electronic analogs of serotonin, dopamine and other brain chemicals that affect how the mind perceives the world.

Speaking of perception, what about human senses? Do all humans perceive a particular shade of blue the same way? Presumably, we could measure the frequency of the electrical impulses moving along the optic nerve when a person is looking at a particular colour and then reproduce it in a synthetic system, but do all human minds interpret that particular frequency the same way? Does it even matter, as long as the frequency is the same? What about more exotic morphs such as nanoswarms? It's hard to imagine being able to recreate human sensory input in such a radically different physical form.

-Rognar-

CthulhuTech or Eclipse Phase

Catalyst Game Labs feels to me like a serious up-and-coming publisher. It already had two solid properties in Shadowrun, the first big cross-genre rpg, and Classic BattleTech, the granddaddy of the mecha combat games. Recently, they added CthulhuTech, poached from Mongoose, and Eclipse Phase. The former peaked my interest early on, even before Catalyst became the distributor, but after buying the pdf for Eclipse Phase, I find myself more attracted to that game. It lacks the supernatural horror component of CthulhuTech, which is something I usually look for in my quest for the perfect sci-fi horror setting, but the game mechanics are far superior to the gimmicky CthulhuTech game engine. Also, the kitchen-sink approach of CthulhuTech left much to be desired. Though there are many play options, they don't all mesh together well. Mecha combat doesn't work with cloak-and-dagger style role-playing. The game ends up being spread too thin and there just aren't enough options once you distill the components of the game that apply to your particular choice of campaign style. The final nail in the coffin was Damnation View, which I reviewed in an earlier post. It is a beautiful book with lots of pretty pictures and well-written short fiction, but there just wasn't enough meat on the bones given the price. For these reasons and my limited gaming budget, I am making the switch to Eclipse Phase. By the time I finish reading through the core book in about six months, the next book, Sunward: The Inner System, should be on store shelves.

-Rognar-

Eclipse Phase - Game Mechanics

Eclipse Phase uses a d100 system in which a roll is made against a target number, typically generated from a character's skill with possible modifiers, with a value between 01 and 98. The result is a success if the roll is equal to or less than the number. 99 is an automatic failure while 00 is an automatic success.

In some cases, the roll is opposed, as is the case in combat. In fact, Eclipse Phase bucks the recent trend toward rules-lite combat resolution seen in many small publishers today, by creating a fairly complex combat routine. First of all, there is an opposed attack by which the defender attempts to avoid being hit. Then, if the attack is successful, damage vs. armour is determined with factors such as critical hits and armour penetration value of weapons coming into play. Finally, assuming some damage gets through the armour, a wound threshold for the morph must be overcome to inflict actual damage. This is not a game for those who like streamlined combat. Personally, I'm more of a simulationist-type gamer, so this combat resolution system doesn't discourage me at all.

-Rognar-

Eclipse Phase - First impressions

I really had no intention of purchasing Eclipse Phase by Catalyst Game Labs, despite reading some pretty intriguing things about the game. However, Catalyst, taking a page out of the Paizo playbook, offers the pdf for $16 Cdn. Good deal, so I caved. These are my first impressions. The game is incredibly hard sci-fi. Though set in the distant future where the very definition of human has been distorted beyond all recognition, none of the concepts seem to embrace any of the fanciful space opera tropes. Well, that's not entirely true, there are some examples of alien technology that verge on science fantasy, but these are peripheral and may be ignored entirely. The first thing I noticed about the game is the remarkable number of character options available, starting with "morphs". Morphs are different options the character may choose for his or her physical presence. There are biomorphs, entirely biological morphs that range from completely unmodified humans, called flats, to a dozen different types of genetically-advanced humanoids to uplifted avians, primates and cephalopods. For those unable to afford a highly sought after biomorph, there are a variety of synthetic and cybernetic alternatives, although depending on the option, some significant social stigmas may apply. Lastly, it is possible to exist entirely in digital form and this may be a playable option depending on the campaign.

Technology in Eclipse Phase incorporates many of the things we understand today and takes them to the next level. Nanotechnology, artificial intelligence and genetic modification are the primary driving technologies in the game setting and nothing in there seems fanciful.

I will go into further detail in future posts as I digest the enormous amount of material in this game. Next time, I will talk about the game engine.

-Rognar-