Forum CYOA: Mercenary

[Caranfin]

Let's get this started, then. If you don't know what a CYOA game is, take a look at this thread. If you still haven't got a clue, ask. The crap about the world and stuff might be a little bit wall-of-texty. If that gets to you, just skip to the bit in bold red.

Quick links to stuff
Party summary

Get Oriented

   The World

The world is named Tian. According to legends, it was the world of spacefaring humans in the past. At some point, some sort of a global catastrophe occurred, and most of them died. The reason for this apocalypse is not clear, but various explanations have been suggested. Your people are the descendants of the survivors. Tian orbits a yellow sun much like ours, at around the same distance from the sun. The gravity is very close to Earth-normal. It has no moons, but large irregular shaped objects can sometimes be seen in orbit with some of the telescopes your scientists have recently produced.
   
Your character is the leader of a six-person mercenary group currently working for a small lord in the southwestern part of the kingdom of Prajna. Prajna is bordered in the south-east and east by the Ahimic empire, which your kindgom is in war with, in the west and to the south by a mountain range and the Sannyamar nation, who your country has some trade with, but due to the difficuty of travel in the mountains, not much else. In the north and north-west is the sea. You are aware of one more country, Makaen, which is south of Ahim.

The terrain is mostly dry; yellow grass and scattered rocks, with moderate vegetation close to the few major rivers. There are some ruins of an ancient civilisation scattered around, sometimes covering vast areas of land. There are also large craters concentrated around and in these ancient cities. Some of the most common animals include various types of vermin, wild dogs, wild cats the size of large house cats, and large wild lizards much like Dimetrodon.

   Technology
   
Before the apocalypse, your ancestors apparently commanded amazing technology, which enabled them to travel between stars at immense speeds, among other amazing feats. After it, the technological prowess of your ancestors was basically reduced to the iron age. From there, it has started to climb back again during the course of several dozen generations. Although generally the technological level is somewhat like medieval europe, with steel swords and chainmail, mainly wooden houses, and stone castles, your people have partially relearned how to use the working technology in the ruins and are currently able to operate some of the basic stuff like doors and elevators. They also have a concept of electricity, though they have no idea how to produce it. Many of the old buildings still have current running through the wires, and you have been able to tap onto this source to power some basic contraptions like lamps and the like. Independent of the study of ancient ruins, and quite unusual for a medieval culture, there have also been some technological advancement in steam-powered machinery. You have even heard stories of steam-powered projectile weapons in the capital of your kingdom.

   Religion
   
There are multiple belief systems popular in the world. Most of these mainly offer moral and ethical guidelines in order for people to be able to live their lives better, and belief in any sort of afterlife is very rare. All the religions can be arranged into two main groups: pro-technology, and anti-technology. The anti-technology religions were initially a counter-reaction to the apocalypse, and generally believe it to have been a civil war. The anti-technology religions are also usually very pacifistic, even going so far as to forbid killing insects. The main pr-technology religion believes that the apocalypse was a result of a war against a cosmic horror, and that humanity should quickly tech up so that they will be ready for the next time the monster will appear.


TL;DR: Human colony in another starsystem -> some sort of a catastrophe, most people dead -> technology to the iron age -> now at medieval stage with steam machines. Some old electrical stuff still works. You are a mercenary captain. Good luck.


Your character and your pals

As I already said, you are the leader of a six-person mercenary group. To get properly started, we need to create your character and the five other members of your group. To create the characters, you must decide on a few things.

Your character only:

Gender
Male or female. This will have a slight effect on your stats and a varying effect on how people will interact with you.

Name
A silly name will obviously effect how people see you. I will take suggestions for companion names as well, but will ultimately decide them myself.

Every character:

Attributes
Decide on an order of importance:

   Strength       (contrary to most rpg-systems, this does not determine your combat damage. It's only used for heavy lifting and grappling)
   Constitution    (not how many "hit-points" you have, but how long you can keep doing physical stuff before getting tired)
   Agility       (this is the main combat stat)
   Dexterity           (Small stuff with fingers. Effects lockpicking and pickpocketing and so on)
   Intelligence    (determines how fast you learn, among other things)
   Willpower       (determines how long you can keep going in the face of adversity)
   Perception       (yeah.. Perception)
   
Skills
You have 25 skill-points to use for each character. You can assign a maximum of 5 points to any skill.

Skills:

   Combat (Specify weapon to add points to)

      Melee weapons available: unarmed, dagger, broadsword, one handed axe, longsword (aka bastard sword, hand-and-a-half sword, not 'long blade, one handed'), two handed axe, claymore, spear, halberd,
      pole axe, quarterstaff    (governing skill for melee weapons is mainly agility, though strength is used in grappling)

      Ranged weapons available: bows, crossbow, javelin, sling (governing skills agility and dexterity)

      Defensive equipment available: buckler, small shield (round/heather), large shield (kite) (agility)

   Hunting
      sneaking (agility)
      hiding (perception)
      tracking (perception)
      wild animal handling (willpower)
   
   Thieving
      lockpicking (dexterity)
      pickpocketing (dexterity)
      climbing (agility)

   Trade
      lying (intelligence/perception)
      persuasion (willpower/perception)
      appraising (perception)
   
   Crafts (dexterity for all of these)
      wood
      stone
      metal
      leather
      bone
   
   Entertainment (These will keep your group entertained if you can't get to a town for a while. Keeps your people sane)
      cooking (no special governing attribute)
      musical instrument (Specify instrument. Mainly available are flutes, the fiddle, and some acoustic string instruments. Governing attribute dexterity)
      singing (No special governing attribute)
      juggling (dexterity/agility)
      acrobatics (agility)
      
   Science (intelligence for all of these. dexterity for performing surgery)
      electronics
      engineering
      steam physics
      archeology (archeology in this world involves ancient languages and knowledge about the function and operation of ancient machines)
      medicine

[Ant]

I propose the main character is a male and we call him 'Steve'!

Still mulling over the attributes and their dispersal.

Okay I have come up with four possible characters to debate upon so far:

Fight then/and/or Flight:
Attributes (in order of importance): Strength, Agility, Perception, Dexterity, Willpower, Intelligence, Constitution

Skills (5 points in each): Unarmed, Sneaking, Hiding, Lock picking, Pickpocketing.

Summary: This is a basic front wo/man, good for recon, turning a profit by robbing, any trouble he/she gets in shouldn't be a massive problem with his/her unarmed and strength, plenty of room for loot not having any weapons to lug around. Good for one on one figthing by having the advantage of the surprise attack and good for running the hell away with hiding and sneak too. I shall name this template the 'Fight then/and/or Flight' template!

HomeMaker:
Attributes (in order of importance): Intelligence, Dexterity, Agility, Perception, Willpower, Constitution, Strength

Skills (5 points in each): Wood, Stone, Leather, Bone
        (3 points in each): Dagger
        (2 points in each): Buckler

Summary: Crafter, basic defences.

Subterfuge:
Attributes (in order of importance): Intelligence, Perception, Agility, Strength, Willpower, Constitution, Dexterity

Skills (5 points in each): Lying, Cooking, Singing, Medicine, Halberd

Summary: Telling a lie while wielding a halberd makes people believe you more... seriously!


NB: Perhaps IRC would be a good place to discuss these things rather than fill this thread up to the brim, Caranfin has decided the room to be #masuCYOA

[Gravehill]

I think that propose about his name being Steve is great.

When it comes to character I'm bit hesitant. We're talking about leader here but it's happen in quite barbaric environment. Usually leaders are good in finding ways and routes - charismatic and they should back enough punch to kick teeth down from any wannabe-leader.

Attributes : Willpower, Agility, Intelligence, Constitution, Perception, Dexterity and Strength

Willpower comes first because he must stand example. When other ones get bitching and aching he can still keep on going and keep up the good morals by his example.

Agility comes next because others must respect him as fighter as well.

Intelligence comes as third because he must have experience and way to utilize all the information into tactics.

Constitution comes next by the same reasons as willpower. As leader he don't have to do that much physical tasks or run around in circles but still he can't be first one who gets tired over simple things.

Perception comes as fifth because he must notice what's happening around... He don't have to be hawk-eye of the party but he must obtain information efficiently nonetheless.

Dexterity ain't that important skill to leader, I think. Let some other patch up party members and their equipment

Strenght is even less important... Leader has light weight gear, others can carry more if necessary.

Skills ;
Weapons : I would use 1-2 points to unarmed (for disciplinary purposes) and 3-4 to main weapon which could be something like broadsword. From ranged weapons bow is perfect as it's good for signaling and long distance kills. 3 points to that. In all points used this far 7-9 - lets give him small shield skill also with 1-3 points so he have something light protection. Points used 8-12.

From hunting skill I would pick every one ; 1 points to each except to wild animal handling 2 points (so he can use oxes, mules, horses and stuff like that if they got means of transport or for example something like dog as personal guardian). In total points used 13-17.

From trade skills I would pick every skill also ; 1 point to appraising and to others 2 points each. Total points used 18-22.

From crafts I would choose none because slaves and team mates can do repairing, maintenance and crafting of new equipment.

From entertainment I would choose singing and acrobatics, 1 points to each. Easy to do, no equipment needed and easily utilized for propaganda purposes (singing about victories, fight, fallen comrades or pitiful foes and stuff like that) or in combat and infiltration (acrobatics). Points used this far : 20-24.

Rest 1-5 points I would use to engineering and medicine. Engineering helps when trying to figure out how to get past defences, how to infiltrate buildings or demolish/burn them down. It might help when trying to get over bad places like - for example - rivers (how to build bridge or raft). Medicine should anyway get atleast 1 point so he knows shape of his fighters and can help them at least bit (moral support).

That's how I would see mercenary band's leader in system like this.

[Caranfin]

NB: Perhaps IRC would be a good place to discuss these things rather than fill this thread up to the brim, Caranfin has decided the room to be #masuCYOA

This probably bears repetition. If I'm online and available, I'm going to be on that channel. So if you have stuff to ask, just drop by and talk about the rules or the game or whatever. If you don't have IRC, my MSN messenger contact info is probably available from my profile or somewhere. The channel is on Quakenet, btw.

And I forgot to assert how much the skill points are worth. Whoops.

Basically, 5 skill points is "proficient". You know your stuff, and can do it well. 10 would be "very good", someone with 15 skill points in anything would be a master, and 20 skill points is fast approaching legendary.

As it is, maybe you should rethink your suggestion, Gravehill? A jack-of-all-trades character like you suggested would not be very good at anything. Bear in mind that you have five loyal people supporting you, so your character does not need to be able to do everything. You also get to assign the skill-points and attributes of your teammates. There are six "sets" of skills, not including combat, which everyone should be able to do at some level. You have six people. Of course, entertainment might not be very valuable as the sole specialty of a character. Furthermore, your group does not need to be self-sufficient. There are towns and cities with craftsmen and scientists and healers and everything you could ever need. Of course, they charge for their time, and it is probably a good idea to have a medic close by if you can't get to a town very fast.

Oh and I think the best way to go about this character creation thing is for each of you to submit your ideas of characters, and then you can decide which one of them would be the most suitable leader and which others you would like in your team. Much like you're already doing.


As for combat, I think it should be mentioned that it does not work like a standard RPG ruleset like D&D. In my system, it is not about "which one hits the most and the hardest", it's "which one lands the first successful blow". The figts are also not done in turns with both attacking and defending against the other's attacks like in other rulesets. One character will always hold the "initiative", and can decide whether to attack or back off to regain his balance. The other one must defend against the attacks and try to regain initiative, at which point he gets command of the battle. This is largely unimportant for the purpose of this game, though, since I'm not going to make you decide on each blow, but rather the general strategy with which you tackle the situation.

Important to note, though, is that getting into a lot of fights is a sure way to get yourself killed. Especially at your starting skill level, anything can go wrong in the middle of a battle, and it's usually very bad when it does. You should always try to ambush or otherwise trick your enemies so you get the drop on them if you want to live for very long.

And, as per Ant's suggestion, I will edit the first post's skills to show the attributes that govern them.

[Laser.T]

I'm also going with the name Steve, or to make it a bit more fantasy-sounding: Ste've (STEH-veh).

As the leader of the band of mercenaries, the skills should reflect his ability to command and make quick decisions, and not be a character with too much fighting ability - surely he would send his men in first?
But also to consider is how he got into this position of leader, so he must also have some impressive fighting skill.

Because of that the order of attributes should be something like:
Intelligence; Constitution; Willpower; Agility; Perception; Strength; Dexterity

Skills:
claymore +5 (or any large melee weapon); javelin +5; tracking +5; persuasion +5; cooking +5 (he's a mean cook with an equally mean apron)

-------------------------------

As a support character, I'd like to see a female rogue-like character - it's just something I always have in my RPGs when it's not a world of magic. Called Kimhren (KIV-ren) or "Hot chick", she is an adventurer at heart, and while she is a capable assassin and thief, she is more interested in retrieving objects for her personal studies in archaeology. She moves with the band of mercenaries always on the look-out for interesting items or information on history

Attributes:
Dexterity; Agility; Intelligence; Perception; Willpower; Constitution; Strength

Skills:
dagger +4; crossbow +2; sneaking +3; hiding +3; lockpicking +3; pickpocketing +3; climbing +2; lying +3; archeology +3

[Laser.T]

iRC-agreed model:

Explosives dude

Armed with great intellect and skill with fiddly engineering, this guy loves to create bombs and used them to cause havoc and damage to foes.

Attributes:
Intelligence; Dexterity; Agility; Constitution; Strength; Willpower; Perception

Skills:
Steam physics+5
Engineering +5
Electronics +5
Quarterstaff +5
Juggling +5 (we wanted someone who could entertain with his lobbing skills)

------------------------------

@ Gravehill: you're character is a great leader, and that's what the main character needs I think, but your skills are a little too spread out. I think reducing the number of skills to allow the character to specialise is needed, as having a jack-of-all-trades, especially in such a role, will make him useless in what he needs to do: command.

------------------------------

On that note, we had a talk on IRC and thought about some of the characters already created and how to make a team out of them.

The basic template of this team included:

Leader (something like Gravehill and aka's suggestions)
Fighter (Ant's first template)
Homemaker (another of Ant's)
Subterfuge (another of Ant's)
Explosives (see above)
and Assassin (combining Ant's original and aka's rogue) involving the following attribute and skills:

Attributes:
Perception; Dexterity; Agility; Intelligence; Constitution; Strength; Willpower

Skills:
Dagger +5
Crossbow +5
Hiding +4
Sneaking +4
Climbing +4
Lying +3

[Gravehill]

Splendid This will be really interesting! Can't wait until we get into action

[Caranfin]

On that note, we had a talk on IRC and thought about some of the characters already created and how to make a team out of them.

The basic template of this team included:

Leader (something like Gravehill and aka's suggestions)
Fighter (Ant's first template)
Homemaker (another of Ant's)
Subterfuge (another of Ant's)
Explosives (see above)
and Assassin (combining Ant's original and aka's rogue) involving the following attribute and skills:

Do you have the specifics for the leader guy or are you still working on it?

If no significant complaint emerges about this party setup and I get the stats of the leader guy I'm going to have you decide on some more pre-game stuff related to your group starting Sunday and maybe we'll get to the actual game sometime next week.

[Ant]

Leader and Subterfuge still require tinkering. Can't wait for Sunday then

[Andy-O]

Explosives dude

Armed with great intellect and skill with fiddly engineering, this guy loves to create bombs and used them to cause havoc and damage to foes.

Attributes:
Intelligence; Dexterity; Agility; Constitution; Strength; Willpower; Perception

I think Perception should be higher up in the attributes. This guy is making BOMBs after all.

Ill be editing some more suggestions into this post later on. L4D calls->

[Ant]

Explosives dude

Armed with great intellect and skill with fiddly engineering, this guy loves to create bombs and used them to cause havoc and damage to foes.

Attributes:
Intelligence; Dexterity; Agility; Constitution; Strength; Willpower; Perception

I think Perception should be higher up in the attributes. This guy is making BOMBs after all.

Ill be editing some more suggestions into this post later on. L4D calls->

Do you have any suggestions with which to swap perception with? Perhaps move perception in front of strength... doubt we're going to need much strength unless we start making nukes... to throw!

[Laser.T]

Here's what I wrote on scrap paper today in school (when I should've been planning a lesson for my students) regarding the Leader character. I took into regard both Gravehill and my own leader specs.

"Leader - Steve
Wil Int Con Agi Per Str Dex

Claymore Bow Tracking Wild-Animal Persuasion
5 each"

[Ant]

We would appreciate feedback from as many people as possible here and suggestions are very much welcome to any changes before we finalise this list!

Finally, we believe the leader and subterfuge are complete and will now be posted for your review;


Leader "Ste've" -

Attributes: Perception, Agility, Willpower, Constitution, Dexterity, Intelligence, Strength

Skills: Claymore (5), Bow (5), Tracking (5), Wild-Animal (5), Appraisal (5)


Subterfuge -

Attributes: Intelligence, Perception, Dexterity, Willpower, Agility, Strength, Constitution

Skills: Lying (5), Persuasion (5), Medicine (5), Halberd (5), Archaeology (3), Cooking (2)


Hot Chick -

Attributes: Perception, Dexterity, Agility, Intelligence, Constitution, Strength, Willpower

Skills: Dagger (5), Crossbow (5), Hiding (4), Sneaking (4), Climbing (4), Lying (3)


Explosives dude -

Attributes: Intelligence, Dexterity, Agility, Constitution, Strength, Willpower, Perception

Skills: Steam physics (5), Engineering (5), Electronics (5), Quarterstaff (5), Juggling (5)


Fight then/and/or Flight -

Attributes: Strength, Agility, Dexterity, Constitution, Perception, Willpower, Intelligence

Skills: Unarmed (5), Sneaking (5), Hiding (5), Lock picking (5), Pickpocketing (5)


HomeMaker -

Attributes: Intelligence, Dexterity, Agility, Perception, Willpower, Constitution, Strength

Skills: Wood (5), Stone (5), Leather (5), Metal (4), Dagger (3), Buckler (2), Bone (1)

[Gravehill]

Seems ok

[Caranfin]

Yeah it would seem like another long post... If you don't care about the character backgrounds but want to take part in the game, just skip to the bits in red.

It seems like you have reached a conclusion about the group. Here they are:

   Your Characters

Leader: Steve / Ste've

You are very perceptive, levelheaded, agile, and reasonably fit. A proficient archer, swordsman, tracker, animal handler, and appraiser.


Subterfuge: "Rielna of the South Guard"

The only daughter in a guardsman's family, Rielna grew up in a restricted environment with the only people to play with being her five brothers. She joined her brothers in the daily halberd-excercises her dad kept for his kids, but that wasn't out of an interest in self-defence. She just had nothing else to do, except cook food for the family with her mother and heal the bruises she and her brothers accumulated during the training. At some point during her early teenage years, Rielna developed an interest in archaeology, and got quite good at lying and persuading her way out of the house so she could go dig up stuff in the nearby ruins.

She is highly intelligent, very perceptive, and reasonably dextrous. She doesn't much care for physical activities, though, and has been known to get tired very fast during excercise. She is a proficient liar, persuader, and doctor, and usually knows her way around an ancient ruin and a cooking pot. She is a proficient halberd-user.


Hot Chick: "Kimhren"

Hailing from "Somewhere to the west", according to herself, Kimhren is the most recent addition to your party. With somewhat worrying skills in assasination, you have a feeling she didn't quite come to this part of the continent just because she "got bored with the architechture back home".

She is extremely perceptive, highly dextrous, agile, and intelligent. On the downside, she seems impossibly jumpy and worried almost constantly. She is a proficient marksman with a crossbow, proficient with a dagger, stealthy, a climber, and a decent liar.


Explosives dude: "Crazy" Douglas from the Tower

Douglas was a very promising scientist in his youth, and enrolled in The Tower Academy in the north coast of the kingdom to study engineering, physics, and electronics.
However, his enthusiasm for juggling (especially while conducting difficult scientific experiments) and reportedly "goddamn insane" glee during mandatory quarterstaff practice got him expelled. He then wandered south along the coastline and joined your party around a year ago.

Douglas is almost impossibly intelligent, highly dextrous, very agile, and fit. On the other hand, he is short-sighted and has bad hearing due to some explosions. He is required to wear his spectacles if he wants to see where he's going. He is a proficient steam physicist, engineer, and electrician. He is also a proficient juggler, and a proficient quarterstaff user.


Fight then/and/or Flight (what a goddamn long description): Haq-ilar Nabar

Haq-Ilar is a long-time friend of yours. His parents moved in from far south, from a land you don't even remember the name of. His family had a hard time surviving and he had to resort to thievery, which he grew to like a lot over time. When his stealth fails him, he likes to punch people in the face and then run the hell away. You grew up in the same neighbourhood and he grew to trust you over time. He is extremely loyal, sometimes to the point of stupidity, and will follow you anywhere.

His strength is high, but his intelligence isn't. At all. He is a proficient sneaker, hider, lockpicker, and pickpocketer. He also packs a mean punch.


HomeMaker: Sehra of the Great Ruin

Sehra is from a city built in a huge ancient ruin in the south. She is an orphan, but was taken in for care by a craftsman, who taught her as his apprentice. When the craftsman died, Sehra moved north in search of better materials to construct stuff from, and joined your group.

She is almost impossibly intelligent, and pretty dextrous. Not very strong, though. She is a proficient craftsman when she gets to work on wood, stone or leather. Metal is also fine. She also has experience with bone. She can use a dagger, but would prefer not to.



I might include a doodle of each or some of the characters at some point if I can find time to fire up Photoshop and dig my Wacom from under all the papers and crap it has accumulated on it.

Stuff

Now, then, with your characters created we can move on to another important aspect of your equipment and party. Loot.

You will have to decide on a few more things before we get to the actual gameplay. First off will be loot division. How will you decide who gets what? Will you get some items for common use, and what will these be? Will you perhaps deal differently with money than with equipment or extra socks or whatever?

You will also have to decide how strict you want to be with this. Will you allow some people an item that would not usually belong in their personal share occasionally, will you just give fuck-all about loot division and let your people do their own thing, or will you be absolutely adamant that no-one take more than their share, ever? All kinds of middle ground between these choices is available of course.

---

Next thing to decide is the party travel formation. This will be important if you get ambushed or something similar. What you will decide here will be your default party formation, mainly in use so that you don't have to tell me your formation every time you move from a town to another. You will obviously be able to differ from this formation when you want to, or modify it as you see fit.

I want you to tell me the order in which your group will walk in when travelling from place to place, and the approximate distances between all the party members. You can also assign party members to move cautiously forward, which would mainly be used for scouts and the like at least in this point. "hidden" is also available, but will not be very useful at this point. Both "move cautiously" and "hidden" slow down your travel speed, "hidden" greatly so. If you have someone scouting too far ahead of the group for you to see him, you will have to decide how often they should get back to the group so you can maintain contact with them.

And a decision on how strict you want to be with the formation is also needed. You don't tolerate any kind of deviation from the set pattern, even in friendly towns? Fine. You don't really care and let the guys run around how they please and stop for a game of liar's dice in the middle of a march? Also fine, but what are you thinking? Again, middle-ground decision between these possibilities is obviously possible.

---

Then there's just general strictness. Do you have some additional rules you want to enforce? How strict are you with the rules in general?

   
On strictness

I have asked you to determine how strict you are with all of your policies and so on, so I guess it would help to know what this all will effect. Apart from the obvious, like the procedure of loot sharing, and that leniency in your travel formation will result in a certain randomness in your starting positions in the event of a surprise encounter, it will determine what sort of people you should hire to your party later. Some people like efficient and strict leadership, some people like for things to be more flexible. If people don't like your leadership, they will complain. Some might do something more radical. Your starting party is used to the way you do things, and are mostly very happy with it.

Also important!
I am not clear on your decision on your character's name yet. Thus, we're going to have a vote. The possibilities for the name are "Steve" and "Ste've". You vote by posting in this thread, and specifying the name you wish to vote for by typing it in bold.


Wall of text, again. D: