Spock and Vulcans

Thanks to Leonard Nimoy’s presence as Spock, and his care in developing the role and working with the writing staff to keep him consistent, Vulcans were the first alien race to develop defining cultures in the Star Trek universe. This kind of thought helped create both a believable alien culture and an individual character standing apart from it, a race well worth studying as an example when creating a setting and a character to look at when choosing to play something you will define.

Vulcans have a well-developed philosophy, a sense of history and glimpses of a rich culture, as well as a reason to befriend humanity and join them in their adventures. The individual role of Spock goes a long way to define Vulcan culture, but also stands in contrast to much of it. Other Vulcan characters, like his father Sarek, Xon in the abortive Phase II, Saavik in the films and T’Pol on Enterprise, defined themselves partially by difference as well as his example. Playing a Vulcan without making it a caricature can be a challenge, but the depth of the society and portrayals to follow can really help. Some features created for the sake of drama fit awkwardly (see Amok Time for an obvious example) but all in all Vulcans presented a culture and an ethos I could believe, and Spock himself contrasted with it as he did with humanity, bringing the wisdom of the outsider to both sides.

Leonard Nimoy

Leonard Nimoy, who defined the outsider looking in for generations as Spock in Star Trek, has died. His last message to followers on Twitter, just four days ago, read “A life is like a garden. Perfect moments can be had, but not preserved, except in memory. LLAP.” Live Long And Prosper.

The Year Without A Summer

To my surprise, another one-line idea for Dark Eras is up for voting - Promethean in the year Frankenstein was conceived. Along with six other appealing ideas. Drat.

Edit: It won! That feels strange.

Innocents in the Blitz

I was (possibly) the first to suggest the Blitz as an Innocents setting for World Of Darkness: Dark Eras. It has now lost two polls, so, okay, I get the hint.

The hint being do it myself. :)

Conpulsion games are coming in (though more be needed!) including, oddly enough, an Innocents game set in the Blitz, by someone other than me.

Plan Nine From Red Square

When a Russian bio-bomb turns most of the men in America into flesh-eating zombies, women and children have to fight to survive using any available means. A Romero-style zombie apocalypse hits city centres in the 1950s in Dead Scare so most of the survivors are out in the suburbs - women, children and the elderly or disabled.

Congratulations to The Watch House producer and star Cat Tobin, now Managing Director at Pelgrane Press!

Secret identities?

You know that bit at the end of Iron Man where Tony Stark has been briefed with a secret identity cover story and then just says “I am Iron Man.” It was a pretty big surprise at the time, as secret identities are pretty standard operating procedure for superheroes and this had carried over into previous movies. The Marvel Cinematic Universe has largely followed Tony’s example and gone for public identities, apart from those actively working covertly and the Hulk. Note all the unmasked faces.

In the modern age of surveillance a secret identity would be hard to maintain without some hacking and trickery. This is how Finch and Reese operate in Person Of Interest.

Or would Batman just post his work on Facebook?

For modern melee armour, see also these guys who look like obscure 90s Marvel Night Thrasher.

(For my 1337th post, ninjas seem appropriate.)

The Owls are not what they seem

Cocktail bar with live owl entertainment to open in London. (Via Steve D)

The Strix openly revel in mortal worship!

... Actually, that’s a pretty good plot hook for them. Monsters who don’t care about the Masquerade are certain to clash with those who strive to stay hidden.

Police issue APB for the Snow Queen

Okay, as Kit Kindred notes, there has to be a plot hook here. (Besides other supernatural cold characters being annoyed about Elsa getting the blame.)

Most heroic things your PCs have done?

I started this RPGnet thread in late 2007, apparently. It was in response to a thread about the most evil things PCs had done, which got kind of scary. The “most” in the title led to a lot of stories about heroic sacrifices, as those are hard to top.

What about you, O readers?

Oscar Game Night, Part II

Another alternative:

What would a session of your game centred around an awards ceremony or similar event be like?

This is easy enough if your PCs are entertainers or other public figures likely to given awards - the medals at the end of Star Wars provide one model of how to end a big adventure, one rarely played that straight since.

But what else?

“And the winner is... urk!”
Murder At The Awards
Perhaps an obvious suggestion, also available as a murder mystery party, but a big high society event would be the perfect setting for a murder mystery. Some similar crime, like the theft of the big award (or the main picture at an exhibition opening) could work too. In any case, there’s plenty of room for backbiting, gossip, shocking secret revelations, and possibly a killer disguised by Oscar-quality effects makeup!

“Me? Oh, uh, I’m here for... Adapted Screenplay...?”
Undercover On The Red Carpet
Even without a murder or some similar crime to focus attention, PCs from outside high society having to mingle with it can always find ways to get in trouble. Forced by circumstance, escorting a celeb, hunting a lead... spies have to do this a lot, and so do vampires... And of course, one of the PCs has to end up on stage (see below) at some point.

“Let’s go steal an awards ceremony.”
Leverage: The Statuette Job
In Leverage S1 the crew steal a movie to get an aspiring actress to wreck a fake adoption scam, and in S2 they use a fraudulent scoop to bring down a tabloid TV anchor and a borrowed fashion show to close a sweatshop. So let’s say the heroes of a heist game want to ruin a studio head who stole a script? Making up an awards ceremony of their own would be the easiest way, but why go easy? He’d love a shot at prestige - maybe an award that isn’t totally tied up, like Best Short Film, could be stolen... And Neil Patrick Harris would totally help.

“Just doing my job...”
The Heroes Get Awards
Public hero types like superheroes and world-saving fantasy adventurers might sometimes receive due recognition... and may be targeted by villains who want to literally rain on their parade. The players will certainly expect this. Maybe hit them with an awkward press conference instead!

“And the prize for Villain of the Year goes to...”
The Monster’s Choice Awards
The idea of a secret awards ceremony for supervillains or monsters would work for a suitably weird superhero or urban fantasy setting. It’s a slightly more insane spin on the classic villain auction setup, with a bunch of high-end bad guys in a single room all vying for the same thing, just a rather trivial prize. (Although it could be a world-threatening artefact or gadget...) It would fit the LA setting of Angel perfectly.

Oscar Game Night

Not about playing Oscar bingo or drinking games or anything... looking at the Best Picture nominee stories for plot hooks.

The tricky part here is looking at all the real-life stories and not just going with Doctor Who. I will admit I have once. (Best Animated Picture is so much easier there...)

Warhammer 30,000?

Games Workshop is apparently bringing the End Times to Warhammer Fantasy Battle, and bringing back much-loved early ideas (like Genestealer cults and Eldar Harlequins!) and plastics for the ancient Horus Heresy to 40K. Appealing to old-school fans is a pretty sound policy - those Harlequins are the first non-third-party 40K figures to tempt me in over a decade...

Winter Keeps Coming

It’s been a long but not-too-snowy winter here, but in the USA and Canada it’s been crazy. You can’t quite walk across the frozen Hudson River, but it’s not far off it.

Weather control is a fairly low Weird Level, so that if this kind of thing happened it would be someone’s fault and you could go and punch them until they stopped. That would be nice right now, if climate change had a face you could punch.

RPG contests

... some with really tight deadlines. The Strange one has until 8am tomorrow UK time. At least the D&D one is running all week.

Possible lost Sherlock Holmes story?

The Brig Bazaar, written for a charity fundraiser that Sir Arthur Conan Doyle attended in the Borders, features a journalist attempting to imagine an interview with Holmes and Watson. So probably not canon...

Experts reckon not by Conan Doyle either. Oh well.

The Settlers Of Catan: the... film? TV show?

The Settlers Of Catan, vanguard of the Euro boardgame renaissance, could be on the way to TV or films.

I don’t get it. It’s about trading in a pre-industrial island.

Can you spare a monster?

Urban fantasy author Sara Amundson needs monsters. I’m sure some of you have some spare...

Dreadstar

Plans are apparently afoot for a TV version of Jim Starlin’s Marvel Epic (and various other places like First and Malibu Comics) SF series Dreadstar, which was one of the wilder “comics don’t need to worry about the budget” space operas to come out in the wake of Star Wars. It has the man who killed the Milky Way fighting a sinister intergalactic church, backed up by a catman, a blind psychic and a lich. (By comparison, Mike Grell and John Ostrander’s Starslayer only killed our sun after being abducted by time travel from his home in Celtic Britain, and acted like that was a big deal.)

It’s a fine example of setting up a space opera setting where the main characters make a major impact... in one issue the heroes fight fifty gold cyborg royal guards (each individually designed by the writer/artist) and that’s a minor side point.

Taking the places of the stars of a setting

I’m currently playing Dragonlance, and none of us took on the roles of the canonical / pregenerated characters directly as we make our shambolic way through events somewhat familiar from reading the first trilogy of novels decades ago.

We do, however, have a player who has read the books playing a Red High Sorcerer of suspect motivation, the defining shtick of one of the standout characters, and another who hasn’t read the books playing a half-elf would-be Solamnic Knight who started with the staff of healing and became a healer following the good gods - the defining shticks of all three characters on the cover of the first novel. His player stepped onto all of them quite by accident, and her character makes sense with each, but it’s still kind of odd.

I myself don’t really fit any of the main characters, and purposely ducked out of being a leader type. (If I fit any character’s defining shtick, it’s Han Solo.) This is a deliberate choice on my part, for one thing not wanting to deal with the magic system or any complicated classes, and for another not wanting to push the game down the rails the books ride on. I have picked up a relatively minor plot complication - a foe from the past being an ally, a reverse of the Kitiara problem - so I’m not totally out of place.

If you replaced the protagonists of an existing story rather than playing alongside them, how would you do it? Do you follow their style, think “what would I have done differently?” or try to keep knowledge of plot, setting and characters out of your head?