About to run pic related. Do you guys typically give your players

>>51683174
Forgive my ignorance but I have not heard of this game before. Could you explain a little what it's about beyond its general setting (which I assume is sci-fi)?

>>51683241
It can be basically whatever you want in terms of setting, you could go full Star Trek or Firefly if you wanted to, while the "default" setting is technically post-apocalyptic sci-fi. The system itself is fairly simple, 2d6 for most rolls and 1d20 for attack rolls.

>>51683241

It's a sandbox space game similar to Traveller. The DM uses rolls to generate planets, aliens, and factions then provides a bit of fluff and lets the players explore.

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Our DM leased one out to us if we helped Space Britain with all their busywork.

God, that game was fun.

>Five man party
>Two of which were skilled merchant as well as soldiers
>A Danish mercenary
>An American sniper
>And myself as a Space Catholic Priest from Space Rome (who was a Bio-Psionic)
>We need new spike drive
>head to nearest planet which is Space Texas
>Merchants go off to drink and leave Dane in charge of buying a new one
>Accompany him as moral support
>He proceeds to get wrangled in through the hard sell and buys one that puts us seriously in debt
>Merchants can't blame anyone but themselves
>My face the whole time

Fuck me I miss that game sometimes. I had religious conversations with our sapient-ish AI in the ship. That was amazing. FUCK

FYI >>>/tg/osrg/

Also, Is a Free Merchant a decent starting ship? Seems like it would be useful for traveling and trading.

>>51684342
c >>51684055

>>51684342
Free merchant is basically the de facto starting ship as it has low crew requirements and is good at carrying cargo and going from place to place while also being able to defend itself fairly well. The big thing though it the crew number being so lax as opposed to the patrol boat, and shuttles and fighters aren't really supposed to be interstellar ships.

>>51684055
>>51684392
There's no rule on /tg/ that every topic must be confined to the most relevant general.

>>51685077
Stars without number also doesn't really belong there, it's based on old school D&D but it isn't actually that old a system.

>>51685145
>it's based on old school D&D but it isn't actually that old a system.
That's what OSR is. New games based on old school D&D.

SWN is Moldvay Basic in space, it's as OSR as it gets.

>>51685184
Okay, I was confused as when I skimmed it I saw a lot of straight D&D and not much else.

>>51685250
Yeah, SWN doesn't get talked about much there, but the trove in the OP pastebin has like every book for it.

>>51685250
That's because it IS mostly dnd. This guy >>51685184 is just being an idiot. Because no fun allowed, don't ya know. Ignore him and carry on your conversation.

>>51685250
That's why it's better to make separate threads in certain cases, in my opinion. Sort of like the worldbuilding general is actually all fantasy and pretty much all scifi worldbuilding happens in individual brainstorming threads, and how it's pretty much always better to start a new boardgame thread instead of posting in the board game general.

>>51685326
>That's because it IS mostly dnd.
Yeah, like I pointed out here >>51685309

>This guy >>51685184 (You) is just being an idiot. Because no fun allowed, don't ya know.
Hey faggot, I'm saying SWN is an OSR game, but I also fucking said >>51685077
So, kill yourself.

>Ignore him and carry on your conversation.
Or don't ignore me, because, again, I said >>51685077 and still carry on with the conversation because I never fucking ONCE said otherwise AND was defending the right to.

So, fuck you and the horse you rode in on.

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>>51685332
Yep! Too much circlejerking in established threads....
>>51685401
See? He was just itching to blow up on somebody.

>>51683174
I started it as a dungeon crawl with the spaceship at the bottom.

They're scavenging for parts and repairs now.

>>51683174
depends on the group. Usually start with 'so, you've bought your first ship', or otherwise in media res.

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>>51685564
>See? He was just itching to blow up on somebody.

>>51683241
No.

>>51685613
This is actually kind of the standard SWN campaign starter.

Run the PCs through a short adventure of some kind and make the reward access to a ship.

>>51685717
le sigh
>Hey faggot
>So, kill yourself
> fuck you and the horse you rode in on
I'm sorry: you were confused about something? You sayin' you didn't blow up?

>>51683174
The cardinal sin of GMing is wasting playtime.

Your players likely didn't sign up for Space Car Salesman Adventures. The central idea of SwoN is that the PC have a spaceship - so start them off having just acquired their spaceship. If they want to develop how it was acquired, work with them to figure out the ship's history. Maybe do flashbacks later if they seem keen.

But for God's sake, don't start a game about a spaceship crew having space adventures, without a spaceship in which to have space adventures.

>>51685828
>The cardinal sin of RPGing is wasting playtime
ftfy

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>>51685825

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Another good thread derailed by a sperglord who is bored now that quest threads are gone. What's wrong with having another sci-fi discussion? There aren't enough as it is, imho

>>51683174
Thanks for reminding me of this, been needing some ideas for planet generation tables

So I looked at the tags I got generating factions and just developed some fluff about them based on that but nothing super detailed. Is that how I'm supposed to prep for this game?

For example, I got "Holy Family Confucianists" as a religion and decided that they worship an AI that might have been programed in a pretech military outpost.

>>51686125
>So I looked at the tags I got generating factions and just developed some fluff about them based on that but nothing super detailed. Is that how I'm supposed to prep for this game?
Basically, yeah. Since it's meant to be a sandbox gaming system a lot of the idea is for details to be fleshed out in play, you mostly only generate the basics in advance.

>>51686227
To expand on this, you can do as little or as much world(s) development as you wish just make sure you leave room for the players in your world, that or having the world be too empty are the things I see most often as issues with sandboxes.

>>51686125
What immediatelly came to my mind was the direct agnatic male line descending from Confucius that used to be nobility (the Holy Dukes of Yen) but is now a civil appointment in Taiwan. The current Sacrificial Official to Confucius is a 79th generation descendant of the philosopher. The Taiwanese actually have a similar office for all the families of the Four Sages.

>>51686449
>when you can't tell if it's sci-fi worldbuilding or real life anymore

>>51686554
That's when you know you're doing it right.

>>51686448
Both those things are very easy to fuck up, too. It's really hard to gauge if you've done too much or too little detailing prep work for a sandbox.
It's something you've really got to just get the feeling of over time, you're not going to acquire a good gauge of how much detail you need until you've fucked it up a few times.

Under the hood, SWN is Moldvay D&D cleaned up and slightly tweaked for sci-fi. Where SWN shines is in it's setting mechanisms.

SWN is a SANDBOX CONSTRUCTION KIT and perhaps the best I've ever seen. Trade, factions, world building, all of it is modular and can be easily applied to whatever rules you may be using. Crawford, SWN's creater, freely admits designing those systems so they could be used that way.

Equally importantly, those systems operate in such a way that they constantly produced what Traveller calls "adventure seeds" for your players. For example, trade isn't just a couple of die rolls, some table look ups, and a spreadsheet. Instead, the consequences of roleplaying actions are easily applied to various parts of the trade process and, in some facets, are required.

You simply cannot go wrong by looking over SWN. There's almost too much to use, borrow, and plunder.

>>51685828
>t. someone whose never played a game involving ships and their spacefaring kind.

Half the fun as a player is stealing the fucker, gives a great story to tell. If you leave it to just flashbacks and background stuff, it doesn't have as much buy-in for more people.

Our GM started us out on a planet, we did a few small missions for a session or two to get used to the session and then the group signed up with a ship captain as crew for a scavenging mission a few sectors away.

In the campaign we had multiple chances to get a ship, it was pretty good overall I think. Made it feel like we really started from nothing and was working our way up.

>>51687233
The reason I first got SWN was so I could hack the Faction Turn stuff for one of my games, and it definitely helped the world feel more alive. It was later on when I actually played it that I actually fell in love with the system.

---

If you want some good sound advice for running/playing SWN I highly recommend RollPlay's Swan Song and the GM Prep turns the GM has up on personal Youtube Channel. The game was Space Mastered by Adam Kobel (the guy who made the Dungeon World PbtA game), so take that as you will

>>51689193
Swan Song is pretty good until the last 3 or so episodes. What the fuck was happening, why couldn't they just end the show normally since stephen was leaving?

Like any of the rollplay shows it takes a while to get going but once everybody gets into character it's really good.

>>51689233
>spoiler
What even happened to Piani? Did she turn into crystals?

>>51689445
stephen's character died to save her and he left the show (sob). a live show for episode 50 is coming out soon with Matt Mercer as a guest.

>>51689445
Something like that, then the universe reset to just before Higgs shot randy and stole his ship in episode one.

>>51689562
>Matt Mercer
Oh god why. Bring back Neal, whatever happened to him?

>>51683174
I did the second by giving them a few mission which they could handle and at the end a very hard one for enough money for a ship or for a ship itself.

>>51689582
Neal does his own thing now, you can check out his stuff.

>>51689635
Dicing with death is good, I couldn't get into his other series though since it's just regular d&d stuff

>>51689562
He didn't die so much as take her place as THE Odin, which then reset the universe.

>>51689582
>>51689635
As someone who started watching RollPlayer post-Neal and only hearing a few passing references to him from a few of the players; who exactly was he, and why would he be preferable to Mercer?

>>51689128
You're right, anon; since your opinion is objective truth, I must have no first-hand experience with SwoN or Traveller or any similar games on which to base mine. It's the only plausible explanation.

>>51691973

You stated your opinion as if it was an objective truth.

Question about making factions, do I start them all of as minor factions, or do you guys typically have one major faction and a few minor ones?

>>51683174
My GM started off with us having a busted-ass old ship, then over time we upgraded it. Now it's a serious badass.

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>>51683174
>Do you guys typically give your players a basic ship from the start or have the first adventure revolve around acquiring a ship
kinda

1 you can let them get a shity ship to start and let them upgrade or trade for a better one

2 give them just what they need to build a ship and have them "build / make" the first ship to there liking but within a material / time budget

3 give them a budget for ship and weapons and supplies and all the things they need and offer a selection that makes it so they cant have everything they need in one go
cheap ship but good weapons and equipment
expensive ship but few to no weapons and equipment

4 offer a choice of ships that are wildly different
like one is a luxury passenger ship one is a battle ship one is a long range explorer science ship
each comes with its good and bad points and they don't share pros and cons

5 give them a ship that is multi role to start with (little bit of everything) and let them pick/acquire a specialty ship later if they want it

6 find ship. have players in an adventure where they are in a place and FIND a space ship that is not completely operational "crashed or old space junk or whatever" and they have to fix it to get it flying once more

7 combo. of two or more of the above
kinda like battleship yamato anime story start find old water battleship and fix it to become a space battleship

8 players pick. have them decide to buy a ship, steal a ship, build a ship, or find and fix a ship


last is one im running now that has them pick a ship and equipment and stuff from a selection with a big budget but you can only have one ship and so much room on choice of ship for equipment and the like
after choosing ship, weapons, equipment, supplies, and whatever else they think they will need. then they go to a world that is not technologically advanced and what they brought is all the advanced tec they will get for the whole campaign
chose wisely

>>51695458
Tips about factions:
1) Not everything needs a faction. That religion or local planetary government? Probably doesn't need a faction of its' own.

2)If a faction isn't active for three or more turns, take it off the turn list until something happens to make them need to become active again.

3) Base factions off their relative strength. Major shipyards and most pirate/criminal groups are minor. Something like a multi-system empire is probably Major.

4) Don't adhere to the faction turn rules 100%. If the group does something that removes an asset or faction from play, then remove it.

5) Just because something's on the faction turn doesn't mean it has to be hostile toward other factions.

6) Use common sense.

7) If you're unsure about something, chances are you're thinking about it wrong.

Also, how do you handle the cost of the ship and how do you generally scale rewards?

From what I understand, you pay 20 bucks per head per day for basic life support, and 200 bucks per drive rating to refuel, and 5 percent of the ship's total cost in maintenance per year.

What about the expense of the ship itself? Most of them are 500k+

>>51683174
I remeber one game were i rolled a xenologist
Had a high history score and knew there language, they ended up being mythical figures from which the majorfro of the settings technology came from

The character died when i tried to use genetic engineering to transform my character into the alien species

The humanist faction found out and killed me

>>51685145
OSR stands for Old School Renaissance.
The name doesn't fit anymore because the movement is like 10 years old.

But it's about making modules for old systems while dodging intellectual property (by making them 'for' new, almost identical systems).
It's also about slapping enough of your homebrew and house-rules into the old boosk, and then selling it as a new system.

It's all Moldvay or Menzter Basic (or occasionally AD&D) at the core, but those 3 are pretty much the same thing.
As are all the OSR 'retroclones', a category which includes Stars Without Numbers.


Any OSR module or splatbook can be used with any OSR system with minimal (but some) fuss.

>>51699069
Monthly payments equal to 1% of the ships final price.

The sample Free Merchant would run the group 7,750 credits a month. It'd take roughly 8 years and 4 months for the ship to be paid off, with just the minimum payments. However, the group can choose to overpay each payment to try to pay it off faster.

>>51687233

This is very accurate.

I am currently using Starvation Cheap, Skyward Steel, and the base Faction rules to run a fantasy-17th century game.

Players will be commanders in a distant NotScotland who must choose to enter the sudden civil war on the side for or against The Crown.

>>51699278
Clearly, they're going to choose the "Look at me, I am the Lord of the Land Now" option and try to fight them both.

Throw them right into action.....

"This is Free Trader Beowulf, calling anyone...Mayday, Mayday...we are under attack...main drive is gone...turret number one not responding...Mayday...losing cabin pressure fast...calling anyone...please help...This is Free Trader Beowulf...Mayday...."

>>51699417
I'm personally planning to open with "So, in your own words, how exactly did you lose your last ship?" from a two-bit corporate bureaucrat onboard the podunk aster
oid habitat the players have just been towed to.I find it's nice to start the RP with players blaming each other for fucking up.

Followed by said bureaucrat offering to cook the books and give them the old clunker in the hanger if they use it to get him away from the scary belters who want his head.

>>51699417
>The groups' ship exits drive space.
>The ship is just sitting there in space.
>no signs of an attack.
>scanning the ship shows no structural damage.
>When they board the vessel, there is enough dust to make it look like it hasn't been lived in for hundreds of years.
>The distress beacon shows no sign of having been activated.
>Sounds of whispering can be heard a few feet away by anyone who is on their own. Attempts to follow the noise just leads them back to where they started.

>>51699568
10/10.

I like making players fear insurance agents.

>>51699568

Look at it from our perspective.You freely admit to detonating the engines of, and thereby destroying, an M-Class star-freighter. A rather expensive piece of hardware...

>>51699377

I anticipate them waiting to do so until they've leveraged themselves as invaluable to one side or the other-- get themselves where they have just about won the war, then start stabbing backs.

When they do so, I'll kick the Faction rules into overdrive and they'll have to start thinking about more than just how to make sure the other guys die faster on the battlefield than their guys.

Fluffing an entire sector from the get go seems daunting, do you guys just flesh out a few worlds closest to where they will be starting and expand from there?

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>>51699669
If I had a penny for every time a crew claimed it was a "type-X biohazard" and that they "really needed to blow the reactor, it was the only way" I'd have enough to pay for ten of your freighters

>>51700052

Yeah, honestly, just get the Tags down and pick out the Friends/Enemies etc. Once you flesh out the starting world and basic factions you'll have more than enough to fill in on the fly.

In SWN, the idea is to frontload DM work-- it is admittedly a lot of elbow grease to get all the information for a sector, but once you do most of your work is reactive rather than preparatory.

>>51700052
You can always just use this http://swn.emichron.com/ as a guide line and pick what intrest you the most

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>>51700056
So, wow, we've gone from space opera to mundane garbage, and the players don't even have a ship yet....sounds real fun.......quality game experience.......

>>51700189

Pretty sure he was referencing Aliens you autist.

>>51700424
Woa - yer either functionally illiterate or you're itchin' for a fight - try reading the whole thread first, if you in fact are being genuine.
If you're just pretending to be stupid, kindly exit.

>>51700481
You do seem to be pretty autistic though.

>>51692470
>Your opinion is wrong because you've never played a spaceship game, which you must not have because your opinion is wrong

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>>51700572

>>51700481

I read the whole thing, you're still an autist.

>>51700189
>wut is roleplay and worldbuilding?

Is there any reason at all to use this over Traveller or Machinations of the Space Princess?

>>51701133
>wut is playin' a space game without a space ship?

>>51701273
If you're a recovering DnD player, it could help methodone you, but the real value is in the world building tables, which can just as easily be used for any other system you like.

>>51701302
It's an introduction to the setting, in a manner that immediately draws in the players, with airs of stuffy office, nervous sweating, and soon, a fresh start. The whole point is getting a new ship shortly after the audit.

You fucking ignoramous.

>>51701337
Then what's the point? If they're just going to get the ship anyway, what, seriously, is the point of making them dance and jump through hoops? I mean, have you READ the game? It clearly states, multiple times, that you should dispense with unneccessary dice rolling and skill check garbage, and focus only on actions with some sort of consequence for failure. Give players choices and decisions to make, not dice to roll and arbitrary time wastage. You are making the players go thru the motions, but is there really any chance that they will FAIL to acquire the ship? If there's no chance to fail, if they're going to get the ship regardless, then why waste time and energy on needless, non-space opera shit?

You butthurt sperg.

>>51701425
Because it's a roelplaying game. The point is to roleplay. The best way to get into character is to be in situations in which to get into character. Go play Halo or something if you don't like roleplaying. Or god forbid, DnD or something.

Seriously. Roleplaying. Fucking nerd.

>>51701302

We're talking about one introductory session. You're acting like these people are playing dozens of hours without a ship.

Setting up how they aquire the ship gives them a reason to care about it beyond "you already had it" and connects them to the world.

>>51700189
>>51700481
go to bed kyle

>>51701425
Do you also chimp out when you play a high fantasy game and there are no dragons involved in the adventure?

>>51701425
>Hey everyone, in our scifi campaign do you want to start out with a spaceship or earn/steal one? I'm down for gming either. Or something else if we want.
>reasonable consensus from players
>okay cool, let's do that

easy

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The butthurt is strong in this thread, I see.

>>51701668
Giving intelligent and perfectly reasonable answers isn't allowed here, friendo

>>51701425

Who suggested doing a bunch of dice rolls? Most of what everyone described above is just some basic setup.

I imagine a lot of players would appreciate some backstory instead of just being dumped into the sandbox, they're both valid ways of playing.

>>51701668
>>51701741
samefagging, friendo?

>>51701818
KYS

>>51701818
>two responses
>lol samefag
neck yourself, my man

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>>51701818

>If the party is on the arctic world of Gelida with its iron towers full of zealous fire-cultists, it’s something of a waste to run an adventure about a double-dealing psychic charlatan-thief and his sapient alien “monkey” henchman
Quoted from corebook p. 127. As you can infer, the author doesn't want players wasting their time on nonsense: he is keen on cutting to the dramatic, and cutting out the superfluous. This>>51699568
and this>>51699605
and this>>51699669
and, finally, this>>51700056
while fine and good conceptually, are not exactly within the definition of 'space opera'. It's possible that such mundane bureaucratic wheel-spinning will appeal to some; but, not the type who are generally attracted to space opera games.
I know the concept of other people having different thoughts from you is scary, but, anon: you gotta grow up.

>>51701858
>>51701875
oh noes! samefagged again....

>>51701957
>If the party is on the arctic world of Gelida with its iron towers full of zealous fire-cultists, it’s something of a waste to run an adventure about a double-dealing psychic charlatan-thief and his sapient alien “monkey” henchman
Sounds like somebody's an unimaginative fuck.

>>51701957
But its also explicitly designed to be cut up and ported to whatever kind of game the players and gm want. That's the entire point of the design.

Not sure why you think stealing a ship, or fighting ancient androids for parts is bureaucratic. Pretty sure you're an idiot though.

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>>51702007

>Pretty sure you're an idiot though
Oh, the cringe...

>>51701957
Corebook p.82 outlines how it would be unsual for a group to start with a spaceship, that they would be easily interested in adventuring on the starting planet, to limit their means of travel to a small area, and that the struggle to maintain a ship once gained is a fun part of the game.

>>51701957
The page you're referencing doesn't have anything to do with rolling dice. At all. Or space opera. Or having a spaceship or not.

>>51702163

Correct me if im wrong but doesnt the book have a section on the cost of maintaining a ship for this reason? I think it suggests that debts motive players to get as much money as they can out of jobs and makes social rolls and negotiation more meaningful.

>>51702236
Yeah, its in a couple of spots, 70, 132. Dude's an idiot.

>>51702290
Yeah, this is what I was thinking of.

>A quick glance over the starship costs will make clear that even a modest free merchant hull costs far more than any adventuring party might expect to make in rewards, and the maintenance and upkeep costs just compound the gap. If the rewards given above are the only income an adventuring group gets, they’ll never be able to buy a ship.

>The simple solution is to let the players acquire a ship in the course of their adventures. There are a great many situations where an antagonist might have a small merchant ship landed someplace discreet, and if it should vanish into the hands of the PCs the malefactor can hardly complain to the planetary government. It might also be possible that a grateful employer gives them the use or ownership of a craft, or one might be discovered abandoned on a remote world or distant ruin. The ship may not even be human in manufacture, requiring its own adventure in figuring out how to use the ancient controls and maintain its bizarre engineering.

Nothing there suggests that they have to start with one, or that the writer thinks it's essential to the space opera genre to have a ship within the first five minutes. He even suggests how acquiring the ship could be and adventure.

>>51702400
ikr? Guy upthread's just being a shitter.

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What's wrong with you kids?

>I know the concept of other people having different thoughts from you is scary, but, anon: you gotta grow up.

Love how this is coming from the same guy who just pots smug reaction pics in reply to every opinion that isn't his.

>>51702597
No no! I'm laughing at their stupidity, not their opinions. They don't read too good; they can't comprehend worth shit; and they're arguing out of their asses.
Fun times.

>>51702709

Those sections of the rulebook hardly seemed like arguing out their ass, you conveniently didn't reply to that one though.

>>51702776
What one? This one?>>51702290
Oh, kid! You're adorable! Page 70 is referring to what exactly? And page 132 is the start of the adventure seeds.....
So, son: you gave page references referring to what, exactly? How did referring to those pages help your argument? And: what the hell IS your argument, kiddo?
See, this is what I mean when I say you kids is stupid. Your opinions are fine; your stupidity is laughable.

>>51702820
You're a real piece of work, lad.

>>51702776
Yeah, that's what I thought: nothing but a bunch of shitters who know nothing about the game trying to fuck the thread. Buh-bye, now.

>>51702820
Your argument is that the game states players shouldn't start with spaceships.

Page 70 and 132 state this is not the case and undermines your argument.

Your reference to page 127 doesn't have anything to do with expediency in adventure, or anything to do with the players having a spaceship or not.

I thought you were a persistent troll, but you might actually just have mental problems.

I heard *someone* recently praising SWN's trade mechanics, but as far as I can tell they don't actually exist beyond "give them x price, let them decide something that seems reasonable, give them 1d10-2*10% profits", which seems decidedly underwhelming. Am I missing something here?

>>51702820

If you have to resort to calling someone a kiddo you clearly don't have an actual argument anymore.

>And page 132 is the start of the adventure seeds.....

What kind of argument is that? Doesn't change the fact that the book clearly states that acquiring a ship can be an adventure on its own, which is what people are suggesting.

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>>51702875
I know! That's why I win, and your butt is sore! Hahaaaaaaaaaaa!!!

>>51702892
Nope, that's it. They're not for Traveller or gurps autists; they exist to move the game along.

>>51702892

There's a whole book on trade that goes beyond that, Suns of Gold. That one has all sorts of complications/adventures revolving around failed rolls and such.

>>51702901
>look mom! I made them give me (you)s!

>>51702897
>he caught my bogus page reference, oh noes!
>I'll misdirect and evade...that's a good trick!

>>51702929

How is it a bogus page reference? The entire passage is about acquiring a ship, which was the point of the discussion.

The passage you chose was about monkeys.

>>51702511
>>51702820
>>51702878
>>51702901

How does someone become such an arrogant faggot? How do they find people to play with them?

>>51702910
I liked the Traveller ones because they seemed moderately functional and worked as a sort of minigame within the system that you could interact with in or out of character. Working economic rules are kinda neat.

>>51702914
Oh! I'm looking in the core book. Is the Suns of Gold free too, or available in hardcover, or what?

>>51703015

I think the PDF is 9 bucks right now but I imagine there are copies floating around.

Y'all should be aware the game supports all styles of play.

So fuck off.

>>51703015
>I liked the Traveller ones
Oh, they are quite good - but as you say, it's like a minigame of its own. In the SWN core, the emphasis is on gameflow, so the rules tend more towards fast and lite. I haven't read Suns of Gold yet, so I can't comment on it.

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>>51702984
>ad hominem
Aaaand thanks for coming out!

I'd argue that easing the players into a ship is a good thing if everyone is new to sandbox games and the system. It allows the DM to familiarize everyone with the rules and setting without getting too overwhelmed by getting too expansive too early.

Have the first session be about exploring a derelict ship and getting it up and running again, or stealing a ship from a hangar (even have a few ships in the hangar to choose from so the players still have freedom)

The second session can all be about the consequences of getting the ship. Who did they fuck over to steal it? What killed the original crew? Now there's some drama, but they also have a ship. So from there you could roll into navigating, ship combat, etc.

Seems like a perfectly natural progression to me and it's not like you have to railroad it.

>>51683174

Is something just really wrong with SWN players? This entire thread reminds me so much of the one time I tried to post in the SWN Reddit and one asshole just babbled his opinions incessantly until I nuked the thread.

>>51703558
Don't be surprised it's the same guy.

>>51683174
I've run two campaigns in SWN and I find that starting the party with a ship allows them more freedom to explore right off the bat, more leeway to escape in case a job goes bad, and if they start off with a loan to pay off for the purchase of the ship, a good starting goal.

>>51697464

Excellent advice. When I first read the faction rules I immediately put together a region with dozens of factions big, small, and tiny. I then struggled to put them all through dozens of turns to create a setting "history" of sorts.

It was fun, but it wasn't that fun. More importantly, most of the "history" I created wasn't that interesting or that useful.

It reminded me of the first time I saw Traveller's worldgen system 30+ years ago. I immediately started rolling up an entire SECTOR rather then concentrating on a subsector or two as GDW suggested. Again, it was fun, but not that fun, and it wasn't as useful as I anticipated.

TL;DR - Smaller can be better because smaller allows you to concentrate your necessarily limited efforts.

How do you guys keep track of all these worlds? Do you just make a Google Doc?

I know of the faction tracker, but I wondered if there were tools other than the sector generator.

And as much as I like the sector generator I feel like I should make some of it by hand first to really dig through the book.

>>51705060
That's fine, all the SWN generators, tools, and even subsystems are only there is you WANT to use them.

>>51703015
Suns of Gold's a bit more detailed than what's in the core. The tl;dr is
>each good has some list of tags (agricultural, low-tech, military, et c.), that can be used to determine the base price
>once on a world, you roll to see how much of a discount or markup you get, with Expertise/Friction and world modifiers applied
>the world modifiers may be something like -2 Alien, depicting that there's a saturation of Alien goods in the local market, or +1 Sapient, meaning they're looking to buy slaves
>usually there's only two goods available off the world's trade table, but you can find more by adding Friction, which modifies the price in whichever way's worse
>finally there's trouble tables, which usually have things like unexpected tariffs and goods being damaged
I like it a fair bit more than Traveller's system, at least the one in Mongoose 2e since that's the one I've looked at most recently.

>>51685613
>I started it as a dungeon crawl with the spaceship at the bottom.
You know, getting to the bottom of a dungeon and finding a spaceship ready to drop out into the void is a cool idea if your starting world is a rotating cylinder/torus/orbital/ringworld. Literally open the doors, undo the clamps and get thrown out the bottom of the world.

>>51705060

I would suggest this as it lets you tweak when something could be more interesting-- "Sealed Menace" and "Bubble Cities" Tags, for example, become a lot more interesting when there is no atmosphere or biosphere. The planet's population is locked into their protective bubbles, unable to escape if the Menace gets loose.

I'm interested in trying out a game of SWN, is it essentially Traveller OSR or what would be a good way to describe it? I saw that it has a class system which I don't know how to feel about, in practice how does it play out?

I've heard mixed critism about the way classes are handled in that they are all very similar with slightly different trappings, as in two Warriors are almost the same but with slight differences.

Would any of you guys recommend it? What would you say is the best part of the system?

>>51708396
>I'm interested in trying out a game of SWN, is it essentially Traveller OSR or what would be a good way to describe it?

I think it's been described upthread as Moldvay D&D tweaked for sci-fi. It fits Traveller well because, like early Classic Traveller, it's specifically designed for sandbox play.

I haven't used SWN for SWN. Instead, I've used chunks of SWN with other RPG rules. I can highly recommend the parts of SWN I've used.

To my thinking, if the chunks of SWN I've used are that good, there rest of it must be too.

>>51708396
Traveller OSR is a good descriptor. I don't have many problems with player specialization, since most differences come from skills and equipment, and the classes just focus your character in one direction. It's fairly easy to have people differentiate within a class.

My biggest gripe with the system is the existence of a dedicated fighter class when frequent combat is a bad idea. I've considered brewing up a personal fix to that, but I'm not sure where to go with it other than splitting some of Expert's stuff into it (and even then, what would make sense to do that to?).

I'd still suggest it, if only for (as mentioned above) ripping off some subsystems and bringing them into another game. One of my personal favorites is the spacecraft construction, since I'm not usually in the mood to balance out each individual block of ship tonnage and SWN's system is a good middle ground between undifferentiated flying bricks and spreadsheet simulation.

>>51687233
I use SWN for the general resources it provides for a game of D20 modern/future.

D20 futures space combat is complete garbage in terms of what we wanted to play, so we use d20 future for characters, a lightly modified Star Fleet Battles for space combat, and SWN for factions, trade, and general world (universe?) building in a homebrew setting.

It was a pain to setup, but since we got it running and fleshed out, we've been playing campaigns in it for almost 5 years.

>>51708546
>>51708535

Thanks bros, I'd like to check it out some day to convince my group to play a narrative space opera game. Normally we play Savage Worlds so I could pick apart the tables to create ships or whatever.

I never really liked the idea about a class system in a narrative game anyways.

>>51708396

I'll take a crack at it.

>>51708535
>>51708546
Are not wrong in their general analysis. At its core, SWN is old-school D&D; you roll 1d20 + Attack Bonuses + Relevant Skills + Their AC + Circumstaces etc. and if the result is 20+, you've hit.

Skills are a bit different, being 2d6 + Att. Mod. + Skill vs. Target Number (scales between 6 and 12).

There are three classes-- Guy Who Skills, Guy Who Fights, and Psychic. The designer has not been particularly happy with this and is currently releasing Beta information for an eventual 2017 Kickstarter of 2e.

Like the current edition, the core of 2e will be free. Hell, all the beta stuff he's released so far is free.

New chargen will involve picking from different archetype trees; Warrior Tier 1-3, Expert 1-3 etc. So you can take Warrior 1, Warrior 2, and Expert 1 or Expert 3 or some combination thereof. Looks kinda neat.

I will reiterate what others have said-- the core system of SWN is functional but not spectacular. It doesn't look to do anything more than give you the necessary tools to arbitrate combat and skill checks; combat is very deadly given relatively small HP v. high damage, skills have a modest bell curve due to 2d6 (but not really, but better than the d20's linear nonsense). I've been playing SWN for the last year or so and the system really is inoffensive. When we reboot the campaign we might homebrew it or slap a different one in, who knows.

>>51709146
I wish the classes were boiled down differently. As in you'd have maybe like a Captain, Weapons Officer, Engineer, whatever to form a cohesive "bridge" crew so it's not so one off. At least that's from what i've read/heard about the base system.

>>51709262

You're not wrong. I'm running a Star Treks Without Number game, and i'd guess out of 10 PCs in that setting, you'll have 7 Experts, 2 Warriors, and ~maybe~ 1 Psychic. Star Wars and other properties will probably boil down the same.

You can use classes from other Sine Nomine games (Other Dust, Silent Legions), though.

>>51709439
Have you tried the Star Trek RPG system?

How does it work in SWN with multiple people being the same class?

>>51709262

>As in you'd have maybe like a Captain, Weapons Officer, Engineer, whatever to form a cohesive "bridge" crew
The supplement Skyward Steel actually did that. There are 6 Bridge Roles which a PC can adopt-- everyone gets stuff they can do using a resource called "Crew Points", specific to the department they're running. The skill checks involved generally have enough flexibility where any class can find a department at which they'll contribute.

>>51683174

Can anyone share the supplements? I remember collecting lots of them and I'm about to run it for the 1st time but can't spot any of the .pdfs, even the free ones from DriveThruRPG.

>>51709844
Update, I've found the martial arts and naval campaign .pdfs and can share if anons have interest. Still need Suns, I think it had some bullshit string of numbers name and iLazily didn't rename it.

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>>51709917
Ive got pretty much all of them, any requests?

>>51709917
Please do. I was thinking about running a generic sci-fi and this looks very much fit for purpose.

File: Skyward_Steel.pdf (1B, 486x500px)

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>>51710116
This is the naval campaign one.

>>51710114
Starvation Cheap if you could fine sir, I'm hoping to add some ground war as background to optionally get involved in.

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>>51710114
>Ive got pretty much all of them, any requests?
>>51710223
Darkness Visible too, if possible.

>>51710116
Here's the Martial Arts one, it's free on DriveThruRPG as well.

File: Starvation Cheap - Stars Without Number.pdf (1B, 486x500px)

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>>51710223
Not the same anon, but here.

File: Darkness Visible - Stars Without Number.pdf (1B, 486x500px)

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>>51710242

File: Engines of Babylon - Stars Without Number.pdf (1B, 486x500px)

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>>51710223
Love the extra weapon selection they give in this one, landmines, LMGs and Mortars make spacefaring mercenary ops a lot more fun
>>51710285
Beat me to it, take a consolation prize

>>51710285
>>51710295
>>51710307
Many thanks my mans.

>>51709466

I've played all of the Trek games except FASA. SWN, and Experts in particular, are fairly skill-based, so as long as you've got a good mix of skills, it's not too bad.

You just have to write the adventure so everyone's weird niche specialty has a chance to contribute. Trek is a weird setting to run, because you'll get one guy that's all Section 31 black-ops, one guy that's all about science nerdery, and one guy that's a Barclay bundle of neuroses and niche engineering skill, and you're getting them to work together in a team.

Compared to balancing player expectations, balancing game mechanical niches is nuthin'.

>>51704981
I use index cards for pretty much everything that can be used as a contained unit. If there's a rule that is too big to fit in shorthand I just note the page number.

I noticed Adam was filling out PDFs for his Swan Song sessions. Is that a feature you only get if you pay for acrobat? Is there a way to fill these out and save them for free?

>>51714458
Good Documents. If you have a youtube/Google Plus account then you have access to it.
>Go to Google.com
>Click the google apps button between the notification bell and the image search tab.
>Click Drive.
You can now make word documents, spread sheets and I think slide shows. Plus maybe a few other things.

>>51700189
You need to be 18+ to post here

Not totally related here, but is anyone familiar with Ashen Stars?

I saw it in my LGS when I swung by today. Texas Rangers in Space seems bretty gud.

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>>51715013
Another boring day in your shit life, eh? That's hilarious, anon! Sadly, I got things to do, so....

>>51715796
no you don't

>thread is still up for me to come home and swipe a bundle of SWN pdfs
Yessssss.

Tell me, is there any date on this theorized SWN 2e? I gotta say, the character creation is ok, but it really is the biggest turnoff for me.

You can find the entire SWN PDF line in the trove in the OSR General.

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>>51709262
>I wish the classes were boiled down differently. As in you'd have maybe like a Captain, Weapons Officer, Engineer, whatever to form a cohesive "bridge" crew so it's not so one off. At least that's from what i've read/heard about the base system.
Check out the naval combat system in Skyward Steel, it's perfect for adding this to your game. You don't actually add class abilities as such, you just assign each player character a role.

Do you guys reroll if you gets things that don't make a lot of sense? Like an airless atmosphere but human miscible life?

>>51718344
Either reroll, pick something better off the table if something catches your eye, or come up with a justification.

>>51718344
Let the dice lay as they fall. Otherwise, you may as well just pick what options you want.

>>51718528
Nah. You should always try to come up with a way to use the rolled results, that's half the fun, but you don't have to treat them as worldbuilding gospel.

>>51718344
>Do you guys reroll if you gets things that don't make a lot of sense?
As said before, all the tools are there to be used when and how you want to use them. You're not beholden to anything.

>Like an airless atmosphere but human miscible life
You could use weird results like this still, you just gotta get creative.
Maybe the planet has a vast and cavernous tunnel network filled with breathable air and water and strange underground ecosystem but the surface is completely barren as there isn't an atmosphere to speak of.

How many aliens do you guys typically throw in your campaigns? I've been toying with the alien creation chapter and mixing it with the xeno bestiary a bit.

Right now I've got a sentient fungus, with the pacifist and subtle tags.

I imagine that they are immobile just like real fungi, instead of being humanoids that are made out of fungus. Sensors implanted into their hyphae allow them to control drones that do the busywork for them. Since they're subtle and pacifist, I figure they're merchants or info-brokers.

I thought it would be fun if they developed that tech by using a cocktail of chemicals to drug a bunch of scientists into making the drones for them. Maybe they're "subtle" because people who inhale their spores are open to suggestion.

>>51719502
>I imagine that they are immobile just like real fungi, instead of being humanoids that are made out of fungus. Sensors implanted into their hyphae allow them to control drones that do the busywork for them. Since they're subtle and pacifist, I figure they're merchants or info-brokers.
Someone made them, obviously.

Praise Juffo-Wup.

>>51719529
Hell, if they're uplifts, why not give them little wheeled carts to ride around on? Some kind of rider thing. You could call them... what's a good sf name, scroad... skroderiders! Yeah!

h e x a p o d i a i s t h e k e y i n s i g h t

>>51719553
I was just reading that, but fuck I lost my freaking jacket with the book in the pocket. Aaaaah I liked that jacket.

>>51715796
You clearly don't

>>51716055
>>51722599
Stop fucking responding to him.

>>51683174
The one game I played of Stars Without Number we got a ship right off the bat, owned by another PC. Part of the operating cost was the loan payments for said ship too.

Wish that game continued, my scientist became the BBEG.

Anyone has made something similar to System generator but for Starvation Cheap/Suns of Gold?

>>51716525

Crawford mentioned a March 2017 Kickstarter for it. And his is one of the few Kickstarters I'd back because he is so historically generous with his products and reasonable with his deadlines.

Moreover, the new core will apparently have a free edition as well.

>>51724398

What do you mean?

>>51726221
Software than makes those things easier basically.
http://swn.emichron.com this one for example makes system generation so easy than I'm hooked tweaking them.

Is there a way to quickly add/edit a world in the sector generator, or do have to cut and paste all the info?

I assume all changes also have to be made to the PC file separately, or can you just import info over somehow?

I guess the same question applies to organizations, aliens, etc.

>>51726883
Shit senpai, if it's just math and bookkeeping, even I could probably write a program for it.

>>51727267
Np, I discovered a web http://www.dxcontent.com/than lets my ignorant ass to make some tables with a very copy-paste style of programing. If for some unbeliable shit I make something worthwhile I will post it here.