Looking for Players for a Chaos Earth AU game:

[jbalsle]

Hello, people. I'd like to introduce myself and make a pitch for a game I'd like to run starting in late January to early February.

I used to wander these parts back around 2001, and went by the name 'Kael' while I was here. Rifts was one of my first RPGs back in the mid 90s, only preceded by a Mechwarrior 3rd Edition game that introduced me to Roleplaying. I've been away from Rifts for quite some time, but recently, my players have shown interest in a high-tech / supernatural setting. So, I decided to dig around in my past knowledge, and resurrect an old idea, inspired by Chaos Earth, and run a game set in that.

For those who remember the original idea for Chaos Earth, this should be very familiar. What if the nuclear exchange in South America happened even a few hours later, so that the deaths didn't correspond with midnight on the beginning of the lunar month during the Winter Solstice. The idea is that society survives the cataclysm mostly intact, and instead of the beginning of hundreds of years of apocalypse, we end up with an initial catastrophe, requiring exceptional people to stand against the tide.

Imagine the cataclysm. Subtract the most world-upsetting aspects of it -- the Ring of Fire didn't erupt as hard, the Yellowstone Caldera didn't erupt at all, all the tidal waves were less catastrophic, as were the earthquakes. Instead of Richter 12 earthquakes, they were more manageable 6s and 7s. Instead of 300m tidal waves, they were closer to 30m (with some localized 100m waves), on top of a 10m rise in sea level due to the arrival of Atlantis. New York, for instance, did not experience any major tectonic shifts, though the tsunami from Atlantis' arrival did serious damage to the city. Society was seriously damaged, and there's no guarantee that mankind will escape the event unscathed, but the Flash was not an Extinction Level Event in of itself.

With society not unraveling, at least as badly as in canon, I will be focusing more on the world of 2098. There is little information available about the world in canon, as understandable, so I'll be fleshing out the world more. Before December 22nd, the world would resemble the views of modern Transhumanists, with baseline medical technology allowing the average human to survive up to two centuries, and this is just baseline humanity. We get hints in Chaos Earth that there are genetic upgrades of humanity. We'll definitely expand what that means, borrowing ideas from GURPS Biotech and GURPS Ultratech to round out the types of human upgrades are available. Uplifted animals will come in numerous forms, ranging from the predecessor to the dogboy, the K-10 uplifted dog, through the weird uplifted octopus. AI will also be elaborated upon, with the usual high-end neural network based AIs in the form of ARCHIE-III being complemented by more compact volitional AIs in robot bodies or living in small home-based computers and less sapient AIs. Cybernetics will range from neural interfaces and implant computers to full cybernetic reconstruction.

For players of GURPS Tranhuman Space game, the setting will be recognizable. I will be toning down most of the weirdness. For instance, I'll not be importing memetics into the setting, and I'll be de-emphasizing the importance of AIs. Volitional AIs, called "Neural Intelligences" in the setting, are expensive to program and require expensive and heavy quantum computers to run. Non-Volitional AIs ("Robot Intelligences") only require Neural Network computers to run (Double Cost), while the very limited Dedicated AI ("Simple Intelligence") can run on any computer. The consequence of this decision is that many more AIs will be non-Sapient or Low-Sapient AIs, with Sapient AIs being restricted to rich inventors, megacorps, and governments. Nano will be present in the setting, but weaponized applications will be restricted by international treaty. Instead, focus has been on human augmentation. You are more likely to find a parahuman suited up in a battlesuit or a cybernetically augmented warrior, not to mention chemically enhanced 'juicers', than you are to find anything like a bioroid or nanoswarm.

So, if this interests you, there's one stumbling point we'll have to get past first. As you can probably tell from my sprinkled references to GURPS, I am much more familiar with that system. While I enjoy the setting Rifts offers, I'm not sold on Palladium's system. In short, using GURPS will allow me to control power levels better, customize characters to player's desires closer, and create a feeling for the setting that closer matches what I want to run in. Here are some consequences of this choice.

1) You can build your character exactly as you want to. Palladium players who would rather take a pregenerated template can do so, but even they will be able to customize that template by selecting skills, boosting attributes, and selecting powers.

2) Combat will have more realistic effects. For instance, being hit by a vehicle scale railgun will cause significant damage to the target hit, and the shot will continue to inflict damage behind the struck target. A single rail gun from a SAMAS will not smear a human, but instead will blow through the human, possibly killing him and definitely inflicting a major injury, before going through the house behind him. This makes so-called 'megadamage' attacks survivable while still being more threatening than a modern rifle.

3) This gives me a better idea for campaign power levels. While I won't be anal in restricting PCs to a certain point level, this will help me gauge relative power levels between different PCs.

While I don't want to debate the merits of various game systems, I will understand if there are players on Palladium's forums who do not wish to play in such a game. However, I do hope that there will be at least a few players interested in playing. I have one confirmed player and one possible player. I will want 5 players to start. This is what I'm expecting in players.

1) You can consistently make games at 4pm MST on Sunday nights.
2) You play Rifts for character development and story telling. Yes, I'm not interested in munchkins and rules lawyers.
3) You trust the GM enough to run the game. Especially if you've never played GURPS before, you'll need my help to make your character.
4) You like having fun, and like making it possible for other players to have fun. See #2...
5) You are not opposed to using OpenRPG or Maptool (virtual tabletop RPG tools)

I'd be extra happy if some players are willing to run scenarios so I can have a chance to play, but this is not necessary to play.

If you're interested, PM me or respond here. Of interest would be what you'd be interested in playing. Options available are friendly supernaturals (case by case basis), NEMA agents, or civilian empowered (psionics, magic) characters. Once I get an idea of what everyone interested would be interested in playing, I can start narrowing down what the goal of the game will be.