What's new
Star Army

Star ArmyⓇ is a landmark of forum roleplaying. Opened in 2002, Star Army is like an internet clubhouse for people who love roleplaying, art, and worldbuilding. Anyone 18 or older may join for free. New members are welcome! Use the "Register" button below.

Note: This is a play-by-post RPG site. If you're looking for the tabletop miniatures wargame "5150: Star Army" instead, see Two Hour Wargames.

  • If you were supposed to get an email from the forum but didn't (e.g. to verify your account for registration), email Wes at [email protected] or talk to me on Discord for help. Sometimes the server hits our limit of emails we can send per hour.
  • Get in our Discord chat! Discord.gg/stararmy
  • 📅 October and November 2024 are YE 46.8 in the RP.

Community Meeting

In Discord Voice 1
In Discord Voice 1

Race of the Day CCG

Zack

Zack

Inactive Member
Last time, on Uso posting things:
* Consider temporarily disallowing the creation of new playable factions (new species would have to be part of an existing faction)

Have you considered making a setup that would allow people to play new races but only require them to flesh out a single character? Something like a 'alien of the week' CCG. Their pretense could easily be explained with a few 'standard' reasons for them being here like refugee from Ayenee (start on nepleslia) or maybe freed NMX slave (as the NMX could have conquered other races that don't show up on the starmap that no one else had a chance to first contact).
Click to expand...

And now, the conclusion:

I figure I'm going to go ahead and try to build this and base it on the freespacer character creation guide which seems to be the best one out there right now. I know I've seen new players try and make characters here before and the least problems tend to come up when using Jess's outline. I'll post more here when I have something to show though comments and such would be appreciated on a few topics.


What abilities should be allowed for RotD?

How powerful should we allow those abilities to be?

History options, as they need a reason to be in this setting.

New Skills that RotD might have.

And anything else you think might be important.
 
I like this so far (although obviously much work is still needed).

Perhaps as far as abilities go, it might be best to use the STO method where there's a list of wanted abilities and the race of the day gets to have X number of them. Alternatively there could be charts like you did with the starship stats.
 
I don't think that's fair, since race like Nekos get powers like flight and rapid healing but they still get 7 skills. The abilities should (IMO) be in addition to skills. Another reason is we're talking apple and oranges here...skills are learned and abilities are innate (although they might want to have a skill based on expert use of one of their abilities).
 
At this point we're talking about an entirely new section of the CCG which might not be a bad idea.

It would certainly make sense to have a racial abilities section of the CCG for everyone, especally the NH series weapons which have varying features from model to model. This way you could quickly look up some of the things your NH can do when you look at your character sheet.

Also if we aren't going to tie abilities to skills (See: Limit 7 and you have to give up a skill slot) we'd need a new way to balance them out. Either more negatives built into the racial abilities (like: Cold blooded has its perks and its drawbacks same with flight and ect) or some other balance system. Or should we just have it be on a per issue basis and leave things to a GM's discretion?
 
I think the first step is to come up with a pretty comprehensive list of powers, how many points they're worth. Let's say a given race gets 4 points to spend on powers. They could spend it on 2 major powers or 4 minor ones or one major and two minor ones. Some powers might have built-in drawbacks.

Examples of minor powers:

- Night vision
- Enhanced hearing
- Telepathic communication

Examples of major powers:

- Super strength
- Anti-gravity flying
- Rapid regeneration
 
Maybe they should also try their best to explain how their powers work. Like how nightdwellers can see in the dark because of a type of glowing fungi in their eyes. That could help with the specific drawbacks.
 
Yeah, the special abilities that they can choose from should have a description of how it works, limitations, and the game play aspects.
 
This is going to be a limited kind of thing though. Right? Cause this site has a whole bunch of races as is. It would get really crazy if everyone came up with their own Alien of the week.
 
Personally, I wouldn't mind a large number of crazy misfit aliens running around, as long as they weren't overpowered. The idea isn't to make "bettter" races than the standard ones, just to allow players to express themselves.

Speaking of that, I ought to revamp the Yamataian CCG to emphasize how customizable they are.
 
I like this train of thought. As Uso stated, I don't think we should have any more factions than what we currently have, but I do think that people should be able to make playable species so they can express themselves.

For instance, I've already stated that I've thought of making a species of mouse people. Originally I had thought to have a whole new faction, but I'm starting to seriously reconsider, what with all the other races other people have been making or planning to make. I'd actually be perfectly fine with making a race that could join other factions and would only be role played while under the command of said factions, so long as I'm able to describe their home planet, their culture and other such things.

Coincidentally it fits fine with my race, so I actually like it that this has been brought up.
 
Is it too much trouble to make one planet race? Though I suppose it could be created later if a random race picks up on popularity. Like I said a race doesn't need to be a faction.
 
Well, I mean, it certainly has been done before. Azoreans being one example, and the more popular Iromakuanhe being a slightly wider, different example, but I think we all want to be able to have our race go across the stars and meet other factions and interact with them.

For instance, my reasoning as to why the Azoreans haven't really been filled out (other than their FM is away at the moment) is that they're stuck on their planet. The Kohanians have their own planet, and some people RP them, but they aren't many.

I think the main reason why that wouldn't work is because that's not what the site is designed for, and there are other sources that provide much more reference for such role plays, which would probably end up in the Cluster Flux section. The general mentality of the site is for the setting to be in space, where future soldiers interact with each other and other factions in their star armies. Thus the name of the site. Having a race that cannot do that would make that race kind of out of place and rather limited, as opposed to other, more advanced races.
 
Considering how diverse the two major factions are, making a race within a dome of someone else's control is more practical now. It would also be easier to manage a planet, rather than managing an entire faction (i.e. designing tech as the race evolved rather than going to Origin for something).

For instance, the Kohanians could go to Yamatai and ask for armors to defend their planet with, if it wasn't for the insistence of the FM to become its own faction.

Azoreans probably be their own faction if it wasn't for absence of RL implications.

Not sure about Phods though.

Also, a new race under protection of a major power wouldn't need to worry about making new tech for itself, since much of it's military is far outclassed by modern armies. Join my army and we can protect your planet from harm!

And we also gottah tax ya, because you know, we own you.
 
Exactly. Much of like what the Freespacers are to Nepleslia, the new races could be to other factions... except, you know, with actual ownerships of planets and such.

The problem that might be brought up by this is the fact that most self-respecting people will want to be independent from other factions. Most colonies we know of IRL have fought back in the name of independence, the United States of America being the biggest most blatant example that can be shown. Of course, the outlook of the people on their 'owners' and benefits of being a colony might ease the unrest of such idealists, so it depends a lot on the temperament and pride of the species as a whole as well as the pros generally outnumbering the cons in either quantity or quality. Also, it will depend greatly on relations between both the 'owning' race and the 'owned' race.

There will always be independent idealists-- hell, there might even be some military conflicts based on these ideals, but they shouldn't overwhelm the majority until the race either has enough popularity or has died off enough to become independent and either become an entirely NPC race or a new faction by popular demand.

...that's the way I see it, anyways. =d
 
Did we ever make this CCG? I couldn't find it.
 
RPG-D RPGfix
Back
Top