Figured I’d start. I’d definitely want to see large events happening. Since it would be run by the Lab, I think the managed campaign would be a great setting to begin and develop the coming Evolutionary War.
The campaign probably won’t officially debut until Origins and Gencon next year - we have yet to hammer out the story arcs and goals for the campaign, as well as lining up the writers and assigning projects to fulfill the story arc adventures that we will need…
One of the main goals, however, will be to "fill in the gaps" and help flesh out the back story for the gameverse that will appear in upcoming products. In that regard, you can be sure that an adventure’s initial debut release will be timed appropriately with the "current" events of what is happening in the gameverse and will usually show one of the many viewpoints towards a topic, such as the War.
Is that specifically vague enough? <!—s:)—>{SMILIES_PATH}/icon_e_smile.gif<!—s:)—>
I guess I will begin with a "hello, I’m new to this forum !"
On the second hand, I’d like to show my interest of this MSL-runned campaign and ask for multiple "adventuring" groups all with different objectives. A little competition is always nice.
Can’t wait to have more infos about that campaign guys. Bought your rulebook a few weeks ago and I like a lot "most" of it !
could you elaborate more on what you mean by "multiple adventuring groups"??
i can tell you that one thing we’ll be gearing up for is to have the characters be able to use their CDPs along with role playing to join secret societies and other organizations, both secret and open (using the Membership ability). Depending on the organization, your character may receive objectives that may or may not mesh with the rest of your adventuring group - you will have to come to grips with the decision you will have to make, or find some creative way to solve the situation. Do you tell your fellow teammates? Do you expose yourself and your membership in the secret organization? How will you reconcile being pulled in two (or more!) different directions when the time comes to complete one of your conflicting objectives?
I believe d00mguard is referring to several different groups of adventurers (and players) being active in the same persistent world.
I’ve seen a couple of campaigns run like this, but it generally requires more than 1 GM. It is an interesting scenario though. Everything sounds good so far.
hmm, interesting…do you have any examples or know where this has been done (successfully) before? If i understand what you’re looking for, i have done this in a tournament format, where we started with 12 tables and eventually, after three rounds, came up with a winning table - the players of course were showered with gifts and praises… <!—s;)—>{SMILIES_PATH}/icon_e_wink.gif<!—s;)—>
this was a stand alone, one shot tournament though, not part of the managed campaign. all the characters were the same, so that we would have an easier basis for judging the winners.
basically, you’ll start each adventure (for the most part) with a "Handler" contacting the characters and arranging for them to undertake a task or mission. that mission will obviously have major, and sometimes minor, goals to be achieved to be considered "successful". my intention is that there will be times, for instance special tournaments at the larger conventions throughout the year/various regions, or a special adventure that must be played during a specific time frame, where we will take the results of all the tables that play the event, and the majority end-game situation will be decided as "the result" that will be reported as the outcome of the adventure. for instance, if the mission is to rescue a kidnapped man, and the man is successfully rescued at 75% of the tables, then it will be reported that he was rescued - if 75% of the table report he ‘journeyed to the other side’ in the rescue attempt, then his continued presence in the campaign will be highly questionable… <!—s:twisted:—>{SMILIES_PATH}/icon_twisted.gif<!—s:twisted:—>
i can see some possibilities for doing what you suggest, but only at conventions - as i mentioned, let me know of any suggestions you have!
some examples:
1. in a superhero campaign, having one table play the ‘bad guys’ and one table play the ‘good guys’ and for the second slot, bring both tables together.
2. in a large tournament, have a ‘cannonball run’ style of race, with each game time slot ending with a checkpoint - the tables would be scored collectively by the GMs based on how well the players did for roleplaying their character, problem solving, acheiving various goals, etc. the next slot would only be open to those tables that ‘passed the checkpoint’...2-3 tables for a simple one round event, 4-6 starting tables would be a two round event, 8-12 tables for a three round event.
Sorry for how bad I explained myself ! But Hecubus got the point.
For exemple, I’ve been part of a few adventures on <!—m—>http://www.rpol.org<!—m—> , which is basically a website hosting forums dedicated to role-playing. I was in a game held by a single GM who was running 3 groups at the same time. From times to times, when some characters parted ways, he was "really" splitting the group to continue separately.
It was running pretty well but wasn’t that on a large scale. If you intend to have more than a dozen players (which I really wish you will !), a few GMs would be more than handy.
For the point of going out at some CONs, I really don’t know. I can spend some week-ends out but I can’t travel very far. I.e. I could drive to Ottawa, but surely not Toronto, being in Montréal, Qc.
As for the superhero thing, I figured AO was more realistic than that according to its rules. I was intending to go on a human character and I’m not looking on being a Wielder. Technology will rule’em all !
as for the examples i gave (like the superhero one), i should have pointed out that those were in other game systems that i’ve done in the past - not Alpha Omega settings!
while I am loath to use the "L" word, for the sake of clarity, the managed campaign is basically a "Living" campaign, along the lines of the RPGA’s Living City, Living Greyhawk, and others for the D20/D&D products; or Catalyst Labs’ Shadowrun Missions for Shadowrun; or many of the others that are out there. They are primarily intended for play at conventions or special events, but the evolution of the concept has made it such that they can be played at home as well with your local gaming group, and even online (although online games could be considered a virtual convention). A lot of the premise is that you get to play with a bigger player base, making the world seem more than just being saved by the same group of 4-6 characters - you can do a lot more metagaming stuff like the secret societies or other things with other players than with just some NPCs your home GM comes up with. it is a persistant world in that everyone around the world will be playing the same adventures and playing in the same campaign and story arcs. you have to have a suspension of reality however when you talk with another player that has played the same adventure as you have, but may have had a different outcome, or certainly played the adventure a different way.
at this point, unless someone could enlighten me, the only way to do what you are suggesting would be to have special tournaments for multiple tables at a convention, with close coordination between the GMs, or an online setting with separate chat rooms and one VERY talented GM who can also type like the wind!
for now, i’d be happy to just get the story arc locked down and start getting people to submit adventures for all of us to start playing!
Ah ok ! Now we understand each other. We were far from talking about the same thing ! I’ll leave my idea as it is and will give you some ideas about what should be in the Living AO ;
- A new "Space Race" for mankind ; which Corporations would be the first to claim small communities on the Moon and Mars, for exemple.
- A vast intimidation campaign about race to new armements and warfare equipments
- An international peace commitee for the integration of the Evolutionnary Species, which would surely provoke riots
please don’t use the "L" word any more…. for now, you can call it the Alpha Omega Managed Campaign, or AOMC—and besides, we’re going to strive to be better!
Are we talking about eventually taking the AOMC to 2283? with the invading armies and war in full effect? I think that a good way to start the campaign would be to have a few adventures to intro everyone into the world. Rescue missions and the preverbial "bug hunt". I do like the idea of characters being part of secret organizations, and recieving orders in modules. Would extra CDP’s be awarded for those characters that completed their assignments?
that’s exactly how it will be done - we are going to strive to keep the campaign as close to the official timeline as possible - right now, we are shooting for a set of five introductory adventures to be released/premiered at Origins next year. While these will not be part of the managed campaign, they are going to be designed to give a broad overview of the gameverse of Alpha Omega - a kind of appetizer sampler if you will…
as for the secret societies - yes, there may be extra CDP for achieving results - but for the most part, the benefits will be gaining contacts, access to special gear, mesh, etc, favors, or just plain Trust. joining a secret society is optional and a larger part of the game, so the rewards should not be something that will overbalance the character against your contemporaries. it might make your life a little easier, but that is just to compensate for the difficulty you may experience in performing your special missions.
Well, getting stuff is always a nice reward…especially if it’s access to stuff that is either not normally allowed in the campaign, or if it’s illeagal in game(the Mantis Hand Cannon comes to mind). My only worry is that some players will cry foul if they aren’t allowed to get gear as well. My answer to that is those who have access to it have already paid to get it through CDPs at creation, or through expending them when they have them to spare throughout the campaign, forgoing buying up other things like skills, wielding, and abilities.
[color=#BF80FF:ff210]Yes, I can see internet gameplay and roleplaying especially with different factions and using some techniques such as Skype or even webcam to connect characters across the world. This sort of communication by Wardens (both internet and on land) should be given credit for participation and not just for combat events.
My players have been looking forward to a second game per month and so playing MSL sanctioned events over the Internet with a VGT would be great. Standardization though is key to make it fair across the board for all players. [/color:ff210]
