[Deleted User 69497]

The one big benefit I saw to doing it via private chat is no one would know who was playing which character. And I also didn't want to clutter up the forum. I may choose a compromise of having the main posts in the forum for people to read, and have a private chat room that all the players can be in to keep the OOC and interscene actions in one place and not in the forums. Still bouncing around the pros and cons but glad to hear any feedback that is given. Gives me more to consider on how you want to play it.

[Deleted User 69497]

Mice of Lison RPG

Since there is enough interest, I am going to start up this game. The basic premise is the characters are field mice, living in an underground society (similar to NIMH). This is to be a fun and light-hearted game, and will abide by all littlespaceonline.rules for public postings.

I have set up a chat room Mice of Lison RPG for any game discussions, OOC, etc. It is password protected, so PM me and I will give you the password. Once everything is ready, I will set up two forum threads. One is for the game scenes and only I should post to this. The other is for reader comments. Player/Character comments, questions, responses, actions, etc., will be handled in the chat room. I believe this gives a good balance between keeping the forums from being overloaded and allowing player flexibility.

I will accept players for the first scenario up until Thursday 26 January. Depending on how the first scenario goes, there may be further scenarios and more might be able to join us at that time. I'd like to put up 2 new posts a week, so players should respond within 3 days of a post. A player not responding at that time, is considered asleep, distracted, etc. and will not doing anything active in the scene.

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Characters will be built using the ASL (Alkahest's Simple and Light) system, as follows (examples to follow):

Character Name – Since the characters are field mice, names should be mice like. Some possible names might be like Long-tail, Twitch-Nose, Four-Whiskers, and similar.
Gender – He or she. Purely for writing the scenes. Does not have to be whatever gender the player is in real life.


Assign 10 points to your SAS. SAS = Strength, Agility, Smarts. No value can start with more than 6 points.

All characters start with a Stamina of 9. Any 'damage' done wears down the stamina and when stamina is 0, the character is too exhausted to go on, and retires from the scenario (returns home). Conflict will drain stamina while rest, food, and medicine can restore it. There may be other ways depending on what the characters/players come up with. As long as it makes the game fun, I'm open to ideas.

The game is a cooperative game, so interplayer conflict (besides the occasional ribbing) is not allowed. Anyone who, in the GM's opinion, is bringing the game down will be permanently retired from the game.

Choose four things you are good at. No more than one combat skill at start. Combat skills are: Fighting and Throwing. These choices can be almost anything, but should fit the game being played. I'll work with you if you need it and feel free to discuss character ideas in the chat room to help build a balanced party. The mice live in nature, so any skills, abilities, etc. they have should reflect this. Skills like blacksmithing, mining, etc, wouldn't be appropriate to this game. No magic, psionics, etc. in this game, although some real-life (pseudo)science (crystals, herbalism, card-reading, etc. could be considered.

Choose one thing you are bad at (same rules as above).

Choose two motivations.

That's all there is to building a character.

Conflict resolution follows this pattern:
2d6 roll against average of appropriate stats + skill + mods must equal or exceed target number. Since littlespace doesn't have a dice roller, I'll be doing the dice rolling offline.

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Character build examples. I'll show two characters, the brothers Topsy and Turvy and how they are built using this system.

Topsy is the older brother, and is more of a 'thiefy' type. He wants good agility and adequate strength to carry things, but is not as smart. So he puts Strength = 3, Agility = 5, Smarts = 2 and has Stamina = 9 and so his SASS = 3529 (Strength, Agility, Smarts, Stamina).
He is the sneaky type. He chooses skills of Sneak, Lockpick, Throwing (since he doesn't want to fight directly), and Speech (to talk his way out of trouble). He chooses his poor skill as First Aid. His motivations are: collecting shiny objects, annoying his siblings

Turvy is the brainy brother and is more scholarly, so he chooses Strength = 2, Agility = 3, Smarts = 5 and has Stamina = 9, so his SASS = 2359.
As the scholarly type he chooses Reading, Writing, Dodging (to avoid what Topsy throws at him), and First Aid. He is not good at Lifting. His motivations are: thirst for knowledge, loves trying new foods

So the character summary would be:
Topsy, Male
SASS = 3529
Good: Sneak, Lockpick, Throwing, Speech
Bad: First Aid
Motivation: Collects shiny things. Annoys siblings.

Turvy, Male
SASS = 2359
Good: Reading, Writing, Dodging, First Aid
Bad: Lifting
Motivations: Wants to learn more. Loves food, especially new ones.

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Conflict examples:
Topsy, wanting to annoy Turvy, picks up a berry tart and throws it at Turvy, who is 2 yards away.

The tart is light (Strength 1 needed), so he can (Strength 3) easily pick it up. Since Turvy is 2 yards away, there is a -1 to his throw. He needs a 12 or more to hit. His dice roll is 8, so 8 (dice) + 5 (Agility) + 3 (for Throwing skill) – 1 (distance) = 15... a success!

However, Turvy, seeing his brother throw the tart, has a chance to dodge it. He also needs a 14 to dodge since the tart is small and harder to see coming. He rolls a 9, so the following is the result: 9 (dice roll) + 3 (Agility) + 3 (Dodge) = 15... a success!

So, Topsy's throw was accurate, but Turvy saw it coming and ducked aside. The dart flew past Turvy and hit a clan elder in the head. Ooopss...

Now Topsy and Turvy need to explain to the elder what happened, and each wants the other to be blamed. Since they are competing against each other, the higher of the two rolls wins. Topsy goes first and rolls an 8. His final result is 8 (dice) + 2 (Smarts) + 3 (Speech) = 13.

Turvy goes second and rolls a 6. His final result is 6 (Dice) + 5 (Smarts) + 0 (No Speech skill) = 11.

So Topsy has convinced the elder that Turvy was responsible for what happened and Turvy is assigned to clean up the mess, and Turvy takes 1 Stamina hit for losing the conflict.


All of this may seem like a lot, but the players only need to say what their characters are doing. So in the above example, Topsy would say he's throwing a berry tart at Turvy, and Turvy would say he is dodging, and then I (GM) would figure out the odds and make the rolls. Before doing something, Topsy could ask how hard something would be, and I'll say it is Very Easy, Easy, Medium, Hard, Very Hard. Which roughly translates to 90%, 70%, 50%, 30%, 10% chances of success. Turvy's dodge would be automatic, so he wouldn't need to ask. In the above, Topsy would have had a Easy chance of hitting Turvy.

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If there are any questions, ask in the RPG room.

[Deleted User 73026]

**Note: No one has to come up with a backstory like mine, but I feel it helps give the character depth and lets the player know a little bit how they may react in certain circumstances to help roleplay as well. Also if you see I have in each paragraph how it affected skills and the like. Good method to come up with your bonuses and detriment.

Toby was always a bit bigger than his broodmates, but he never let that get to his head. He just enjoyed playing and wrestling two of them at a time to spread around the fun and games. He did notice that sometimes he would hurt his friends and out of concern would carry them to the doctor for rest and healing. Usually staying by their side to apologize for getting a bit too rough while they were playing. That time spent in the healing hut didn't go to waste though, as even without understanding all of what was done, or some of the words, he learned how to help in a pinch. Afterall, learning by doing is the best way to learn, books always just confused Toby. (+First Aid) (-Knowledge) (Motivation: Right your wrongs)

As time wore on and he found himself growing into a fine young mouse, he started to use his brawn to help around the place and found he was quite good at it. So deciding this was one of his best ways he could help he honed in and focused on making himself as fit as possible. A lot of other mice were agile and sneaky, but Toby was strong. He could help in his own way. (+Athletics, +Lifting)

One event let Toby know though, that sometimes being a nice kind hearted mouse wanting to help his friends and family wasn't enough. Sometimes you had to pick up a weapon and defend your home! This happened one day when these tiny creatures happened upon them when they were taking apart an apple core. Toby had seen them at a distance before, but never this close. They were Ants! And not the more relaxed ones -- these were the angry red ones! Toby grabbed a nearby stick - almost instinctively and with a few mighty sweeps bought time for his friends to scamper away. Not without recourse though, the red ants were quick to react and a few climbed up onto Toby's legs and started to bite him. Pain coursed through his legs as they felt they were alit with fire. Fear crept across his face as he started to scamper away. Knowing now that these ants were indeed a scary enemy and that even the smallest of things could fight larger foes. (+melee) (Motivation: Protect friends)

Abridged:

Toby, Male
SASS = 5329
Good: Melee, Athletics, Lifting, First Aid
Bad: Knowledge
Motivations: Protect friends, Right your Wrongs

[Deleted User 69497]

With the issues caused by chat last weekend, I'm extending the deadline until Saturday night. So far we have four players and anyone else is welcome to join.

[PwincessBasi]

Snack Snatcher, Female
SASS: 1549
Good: Sneak, Lockpick, Climbing, Toothpick Swordsmanship
Bad: Lifting, Lying
Motivation: The thrill of the heist. Bragging Rights

Snack Snatcher prides herself first and foremost on the high value of things that she has stolen from the world above. While others were focused on food, she was bringing down artificial spiders in the fall, colored eggshells in the spring, tiny umbrellas in the summer, and even scored a couple of bells last Christmas. Her home has become a disorganized psuedo museum of all of her finds, with few visitors coming to look at them.

[Deleted User 70612]

SASS = 2449

cook
foraging
medicine
throwing

Saffron a little reddish and golden yellow field mouse.
Has always been at home in the kitchen. Cooking and feeding people is what she loves to do best. She has had her fair share or cuts due to the wooden knifes she uses to cut the veggies for the so saffron has learned what herbs can help heal those wounds and how to help when sick these days. To get everything she needs she venture outs to forge to get the tasty ingredients needed. However do not think you can come into her kitchen and take over you for she will defend it with a pot and a pan when they come flying at your head. She has a bad habit of speaking her mind and saying that hurt the other mice feels however she has a heart of gold and will defend the ones loves and holds dear to the death.

[LilM8]

Cheeky, Male
SASS = 3349
Good: Solving, Hiding, Throwing, Finding food
Bad: Communication
Motivations: Solving challenges, exploring new things