Aces and Eights: Characters
March 14th, 2010
We just completed our character generation session, though we were a little short with Dad out sick. Here’s the skinny on the characters to date. [The dice were cold; Kev wound up having to generate 4 sets of stats to finally wind up with one decent set.]
Kev created Dr. Emerson Brown, a wealthy son of a doctor and landlord in New York City. He had a great upbringing, but wants to escape dad’s shadow. He just turned 21, and is headed out west with a few guns and a medical kit. He’s known for his doctoring and has a few other white collar skills. He’s impulsive, short tempered, and has high standards. He has bedside manner, and comes off completely dismissive. He could be interesting to be around.
Mike used his last character, a kid of 15, and just finished up allocating the new building points (for reputation) and buying more gear tonight. He has outdoors and riding skills, and is headed out west to start up a ranch, capture some wild mustangs, and turn a tidy profit. He’s terrible at lying.
I created a boy from rural Tennessee, Bob Cassidy, now 19. He’s got a lot of natural talent [high wisdom], good cooking/fishing/observation type skills, a lot of experience handling a wagon, and some good gossip and talking skills. He won’t say no to food, and can’t lie to save his life. If you hear rustling at midnight, it’s probably just Bob looking for a snack.
We’re going to start at noon on Saturday. We’ll start off in St. Louis and join a wagon train, supply up, and start off for the territories to homestead a town, or build up a struggling town with a lot of new talent.
Late last night, I was thinking about aides that would have streamlined character generation a little more. The core realization is based off of something Fred Hicks wrote about 4e; that the character sheet you use in play is a lot simpler than the character worksheet you use to derive those numbers. I used that insight to create an Aces and Eights character worksheet. It guides you through the process from stat rolls to finishing up skill points and buying gear.
Here’s my character, Bob Cassidy. Without all of the math in between, and by separating the combat and non-combat parts of the character, I think it’s pretty easy to get a feel for him.
Speaking of math, here’s a simple spreadsheet for spending.
Finally, the real easiest way to do it: use the character generator. It does the math for you, and will roll or allow you to input your rolls. If I hadn’t already done things several times, this would be the way I’d enter it all– for the math check if nothing else!
Cooking Success Story: Carrot Soup w/ Ginger
March 12th, 2010
Yesterday I made Carrot Soup with Ginger, from Wednesday’s soup recipe article by Joan Obra. It was delicious and simple; about 1 1/2 hours from start to finish, but each step was easy. You can start the onions and work on the carrots and ginger while they’re cooking, then start your water for the chicken broth when you toss in the carrots and ginger.
Blooming around the house
March 12th, 2010
State of Decay by James Knapp
March 8th, 2010
This book wouldn’t let me go when it was time to sleep last night.
For the first long bit, the book is a dystopian near future police thriller. There is one obvious twist: Heinlein Inc. has been producing reviors– technologically reanimated corpses– for a while now. They fight wars for the US government, and are smuggled in/imported for other grunt labor.
The book has four point-of-view characters who get regular turns– no one gets only half the chapters of the others. Two link up soon and substantially: Nico and Faye, who are FBI and police respectively. The other two tie in less strongly, but their perspective provides useful balance to the world view: Calliope and Zoe. Zoe has a strange perspective– it’s clear she has a lot of problems– but it’s also clear that she’s going to be an important POV for the sequel. Speaking of which: the story ends at a good break point, it feels like a completed novel. You might be content to call this a stand alone novel, until Nico’s final scene, which clearly signposts a continuing storyline.
The characters are all good and interesting, but Nico has top billing. The other characters all compliment his story well, but the driving force of the story is his. In many ways, his is the only life that is enviable– everyone else is wrestling squalor, exhaustion, and third class status.
All in all, a good book, with a very interesting twist that develops throughout the second half of the novel. I’ll be looking for the sequel. [It's called THE SILENT ARMY, according to the author's blog.]
Stalking Diaspora
March 8th, 2010
Doyce has a couple of good posts for Diaspora: Being Immortal and a huge Session One post. Let the stalking begin. ;)
Judd’s game, a thread on ENWorld.
Aces and Eights resources
March 8th, 2010
Our upcoming game is Aces and Eights, and we’ll be playing members of a wagon train heading west. Since there’s a lot of changes from real world history, and it’s a new system to us, I thought I’d dig up some links.
The history of the continent is wildly different, due to a much earlier civil war. This annotated map does a good job of showing the various countries and conflict zones. This timeline is a very short “one page” of differences that setup the map above.
The download page has excerpts from the rulebook and many other interesting references, including objects to hide behind in a shootout, silhouettes, a stage schedule, the alternative history excerpt, and so on.
There are two bits of errata linked on their website: Basic Combat and Wounds Modifiers Primitive Ranged Weapons.
The revised chapter 6.5, detailed backgrounds, is a PDF. It has the 01-92 “parents legitimate” fix, and probably a few more. Kenzerco also posted up tutorial videos for the combat system. For a couple of nice combat reference PDFs, see this post.
From RPG.net, there’s a quick example of play that went pretty well. (If you scroll down, you get the 7 session story.) The play log and characters are here. They just started a sequel game here.
Despite extensive searching, I haven’t found good third party or personal guides to the system. I know that I often appreciate different explanations and guides– sometimes the third time, you hit on the formula that explains it perfectly.
Next Game Selected
March 6th, 2010
Today we met and discussed the options for our next game. After much debate, we decided that the next game we play will be Aces and Eights. We’ll get together next weekend and create characters. We will make characters as a part of a wagon train, heading west to seek a better life. We’re aiming for a detailed campaign– somewhat complex and a little detail oriented to start with.
Next weekend, we’ll get together at 3 pm, watch an episode of a western show to get on the same page, and make characters ready to head west.
Farthing by Jo Walton
March 3rd, 2010
This is a great alternate history mystery, with two engaging and well drawn main characters.
Lucy is a great window into the aristocracy, with enough bristling at the system to make her sympathetic, but enough background so she makes sense. Inspector Carmichael, from Scotland Yard, is no fool, but there is quite a tangle to work through on the murder.
Along the way, the variations in belief and sympathy from the different characters keeps the book feeling real– each character comes from its own place and has its own prejudices. The main characters, fortunately, are quite progressive in their mindset, which does ease a modern viewer into their viewpoints.
I liked this one enough that I’m looking going to check out the rest of the trilogy (Ha’penny and Half a Crown). Though I wonder where they’ll launch from– these characters reached a strong break in their story. I wonder if we’ll follow new people in the next books.
The Chains That You Refuse by Elizabeth Bear
February 28th, 2010
A great collection of very interesting and quirky short stories. I look forward to reading just about anything she cares to publish.
The Plot by Will Eisner
February 23rd, 2010
The Plot is an explanation of the The Protocols of the Elders of Zion. It traces their historical development, from an unrelated book published in 1848 [The Dialogue in Hell Between Machiavelli and Montesquieu], copied with slight renaming into the first “Protocols” by just changing the dialogue to a “report”, and mutant descendants from there.
It’s a thorough and largely scholarly look, told as a comic book. It works, particularly given Eisner’s strengths… but for me, it would have worked as well as a long prose pamphlet.