Interface Zero: Upgrade in Progress

[Willard]

Sweet, I'll try that when I get back home on a real computer.

Can you/we create a page that links to all the different characters/corporations etc? Working with tags, presumably?

[nDervish]

Sweet, I'll try that when I get back home on a real computer.

Can you/we create a page that links to all the different characters/corporations etc? Working with tags, presumably?

Tags would be the lowest-maintenance way to do it, yeah. The other option would be a normal wiki page with the list, but then you'd have to manually update it every time a new page was created in the category.

[Willard]

Yeah, I'd like to avoid the manual updates. Do you know how that would work? I haven't tagged anything yet, but "character" "equipment" "faction" etc would be easy enough to apply. Do you have to search for them, or can you make a wiki page that automatically lists the tagged objects?

[nDervish]

Yeah, I'd like to avoid the manual updates. Do you know how that would work? I haven't tagged anything yet, but "character" "equipment" "faction" etc would be easy enough to apply. Do you have to search for them, or can you make a wiki page that automatically lists the tagged objects?

On any of the wiki pages (but not the home page, because that has its own sidebar), there's a block showing the current page's tags along with a space to add tags.

The next box below that has a link to "Show All" and then "Filter By Tag", with links for each existing tag. Any of those links will show all matching pages, with a list for wiki pages first and then a separate list for adventure log posts. Each list is sorted in the order that the pages were created, which I consider a questionable design decision, but that's how it works, so...

As far as I've been able to determine, there's no way to get automatically-generated lists that look nicer or give more control over how they're presented.

[Willard]

I'd be up for an earlier game actually. My dog is away for the week (that's what this train ride is about), so I don't really need to be at home as much. Thursday or Sunday maybe? I know we can't all make it, but still. There's a lot a smaller group could do too.

About the game time between missions I also suggest we keep that shorter. Perhaps a flexible 1:1 ratio for the most part?

About the "old news" I'm still a little interested in the hostile aircraft acquisition and the golem mech bounty.

I guess we can try a few tags and see how it works.

[nDervish]

I'd be up for an earlier game actually. My dog is away for the week (that's what this train ride is about), so I don't really need to be at home as much. Thursday or Sunday maybe?

I don't think I can make it earlier. FFF is showing the live-action Rurouni Kenshin movie Thursday night, then there's a rollspelshelg on Friday/Saturday (https://www.facebook.com/events/541535462583287/) that I want to check out and I expect to be recovering from that on Sunday...

[God45]

1) Is next Monday still good for the next session?

Yes

2) In-game, when do you want to make your next run? I know I was talking earlier about leaving a month between adventures, but now I'm feeling like it might work better to do them closer together, both to keep a better flow of world events and because I seem to recall that some of you can't reliably meet your cost of living with only your day-job income...

Let`s make it a week between them instead, it will give us time to heal but will still allow us to get a couple of jobs in

Oh, and if we had time to get Bullseye to my healer contact inside the golden hour he should be fine.

then there's a rollspelshelg on Friday/Saturday (https://www.facebook.com/events/541535462583287/) that I want to check out

See you there

[Willard]

Monday it is then.

I sort of got the hang of pictures in the wiki. Now I'm inclined to have a really fancy party and invite all of Chicago's elite, just so I can add characters with beautiful pictures. It took a while, but now the Pinterest bug has really bitten me.

You also asked what we liked and didn't, and I guess I have a few thoughts on that.

First, perhaps taking the words out of Sebastian's mouth, I'm glad that we/he could actually try to talk in a lot of situations.

What we could have done is get to the rolls a little more quickly: once you've got the gist it's either going to work or it isn't, and just chatting back and forth gets tedious for everyone else. In other situations of course it's appropriate to elaborate on the arguments, add some flourishes and what not.

And that's basically the second point on this note: it'd be great if we could be in positions where talking actually is reasonable and has a good chance of working.

I may be going out on a limb here, but personally I don't think regular combat is all that interesting. We could try to find some more situations where that doesn't have to be the solution (intimidating those gangbangers was a surprising twist into this, that was neat).

The chase mechanics were a first for me. In a way it felt strange that most people couldn't do anything for most of the time, and frustrating how much depended on the cards you were given. On the other hand the rounds go a lot faster when you can skip a bunch of the participants. Next time we do it it'll probably move along even faster, and might even be faster than a regular combat. So I'm up for trying that again, even if it did feel a little strange.

[Rekreativc]

Monday is good for me too! See you at 18!

Btw, can anyone post a link to our campaign on this wiki thing (forgot the name so I'm hopping this will do as a description) - I seem to have lost it and now I can only get to the landing page. Thanks!

I liked last night's game, and I enjoyed the fact that talking does have an effect on the story and gameplay. Having said that I do agree with Willard that maybe we could get to the dice rolling a bit sooner, just for the sake of us who are just standing around, waiting.

[nDervish]

Btw, can anyone post a link to our campaign on this wiki thing (forgot the name so I'm hopping this will do as a description) - I seem to have lost it and now I can only get to the landing page. Thanks!

You mean this one? http://www.obsidianportal.com/campaigns/iz-upgrading

The campaign name there is "Interface Zero 1.5: Upgrade in Progress", so almost the same as the title of this forum thread. Just remember to look for "Upgrade in Progress" and I'd thing you would find it.

[nDervish]

Characters

I've gone back through the last several pages of the thread and built what I think is the final version of Almighty, Bullseye, Paladin, and Ryder, then updated them all on OP. Please check them there to verify that they match your latest version. I also added 3 XP and 800 Cr to everyone from last night.

In the process, I checked over the math and made some notes:

Almighty:

• I think you may have forgotten that, when it added the skill specialization requirement, IZ2.0 also raised the number of skill points for character creation from 15 to 20. You have 5 more skill points to spend.
• On the other hand, you spent 6 attribute points rather than 5, so one needs to go.
• When calculating your cost of living, I assumed that you're spending the 500 Cr/month for medication to treat your Shakes hindrance.
• You still need to work out details of your Secret, Giri, and Enemy.
• How much ammo did you want for your weapons, and what kind?
• What drones and how many transponders did you decide on?

Bullseye:

• By my count, you have 21 skill points spent, so that's one too many.
• I assumed you wanted to have a "modest" lifestyle (2500 Cr/month), but can change that if I'm wrong
• I bought you some ammunition, too - 50 shotgun shells (2 used so far) and 100 rounds for the pistol

Paladin:

• You couldn't afford all the poison doses you'd listed, so I changed it to 10 knockout (7 remaining), 2 paralysis, and 1 lethal
• Your tagline on OP is "Sim with a hearth of gold". I suspect the last "h" may be a typo...

Ryder Lewis:

• For the ammo types that you bought 50 of, I increased them to 100 rounds to make it an even 5 ammo tokens
• I assumed that you are not taking any medications for your Shakes, since tending bar doesn't cover the bills even without that extra expense
• You forgot to buy a detonator for your Gelnite charge
• How many ammo tokens did you consume for your SMG last night? I think it was 4 or 5, but I'm not certain.

Time Passing

With medical treatment by a street doc (presumably Paladin's hippie zeek friend, Laura Blue), it costs 1,000 Cr (1,000 Cr per Wound for street doc, 4,000 per Wound at a proper hospital, or 500 per Wound if a PC can treat it) and takes 8 days for Bullseye's leg to heal up. (Without treatment, it would be free, but there's an extra -2 on the Vigor roll to recover, which would make it take 17 days.)

So it looks like the next run will be on April 24. I'll see if I can get a Free Press out tomorrow night.

Gyrocs

I revised the changes I made to gyroc weapons. Standard ammunition is still non-explosive and does listed damage with no blast radius, but you can also get explosive ammo (and a few other types) now, too.

[Willard]

I see that you're right about the ability scores. While I don't like it, I'll have to drop down to d6 in smarts. The alternative is a lot more cybertrauma.

What's missing from the skills is Repair (drones) which I had on paper, but must have forgot to digitize. By my count I should have six skill points left for that (remembering the racial skill bonus), which should allow me to boost it to d10 despite being over my smarts.

I've added some comments on the hindrances. They still need some work, but at least now you'll see where I'm at.

I hadn't really intended to treat the shakes, at least not proactively, since I hoped not to encounter such situations all that often. On the other hand, being wealthy, it probably makes sense to just buy the meds anyway.

I wanted the nonlethal (epoxy I think) ammo for the shotgun. Primarily knockout drugs for the dart rifle. Regular bullets for the AAK. Haven't really thought about quantities, partly because I don't intend to use them that much, and partly because it seems like such a trifle compared to the money available. But if you want (me) to keep track of it I guess something like 20 rounds for the AAR, 10 for the shotgun and 5 darts should be more than enough. I can see the need for records increasing when we get to missiles and the like, but that's a probably ways off yet.

I've only bought the drone I used yesterday (it's linked in the log) and that cost 6800 credits. I plan to upgrade that a little bit until next time; probably with a nightvision scope (750), targeting laser (150) and Notice (400 for each level above d4 (which I forgot it had)). I'm looking into the possibility of buying a LEN Stealth System for my bike as well, at 10k, but probably won't by Monday.

Generally I'm trying to stay flexible and not buy a bunch of stuff I might not use. Especially since buying things in a place like Chicago shouldn't take long at all. Assembly of home made drones takes slightly longer, of course. That's what the downtime is for.

And thanks for going through it, both with the double check and the formatting.

[nDervish]

What's missing from the skills is Repair (drones) which I had on paper, but must have forgot to digitize. By my count I should have six skill points left for that (remembering the racial skill bonus), which should allow me to boost it to d10 despite being over my smarts.

OK, yep. I was off by one skill point because I was counting d6 as the first level you had to pay for in Driving rather than d8. Reduced Smarts to d6 and added Repair (Drones) d10.

BTW, note that I changed the specialization on Shooting to Rifles (which covers the assault rifle and dart gun, but shotguns are separate). I know I said otherwise previously, but, in retrospect, I think it's probably better to stick with the official list of specializations.

I've added some comments on the hindrances. They still need some work, but at least now you'll see where I'm at.

Looks good so far!

On the other hand, being wealthy, it probably makes sense to just buy the meds anyway.

That was basically my reasoning in assuming you'd take them, yeah.

I wanted the nonlethal (epoxy I think) ammo for the shotgun. Primarily knockout drugs for the dart rifle. Regular bullets for the AAK. Haven't really thought about quantities, partly because I don't intend to use them that much, and partly because it seems like such a trifle compared to the money available. But if you want (me) to keep track of it I guess something like 20 rounds for the AAR, 10 for the shotgun and 5 darts should be more than enough.

I'm interpreting that as numbers of ammo tokens rather than individual bullets. (20 bullets isn't even a full magazine for the assault rifle...) 20 tokens of AAR ammo @ 100 Cr, 10 tokens of 10G Gumball @ 240 Cr, and 5 tokens of knockout darts @ 1,000 Cr (yes, the poisons are expensive...) adds up to 9,400 Cr.

I've only bought the drone I used yesterday (it's linked in the log) and that cost 6800 credits.

OK.

Taking out the costs of ammo and Wasp 1, that leaves you with 50,450 Cr.

I'm looking into the possibility of buying a LEN Stealth System for my bike as well

Keep in mind that jumpbikes appear to have open cockpits, so that won't do you much good unless you have chameleon body armor as well. And chameleon/LEN stealth systems are Category 4, so you can't get them legally at this point.

[Willard]

That's a whole lot of money going to ammunition. Looking at the abstract ammo rules I think what I was going for is something like two tokens of bullets (let's make them AP though), one token of slugs and one of poison. With a d10 in shooting and the wild die I hope I won't roll ones that often.

I see your point about rifles. With that in mind I'll just drop the shotgun altogether, if that's okay. The slugs too, obviously. I haven't used it yet, and only have one functioning drone as it is, so I don't need more than two weapons.

With the bike I figured it might drive around empty fairly often, and it'd be good if it was invisible as it did that. I also think the corporation should let me get a higher category (all the way to five actually) but that I'd still have to pay for it (which I'm not willing to to for now).

[nDervish]

I've only bought the drone I used yesterday (it's linked in the log) and that cost 6800 credits.

Couple things I noticed when I looked up the components for Wasp 1 to get its performance stats:

1. The Dragonfly Microlight is not a VTOL aircraft (it's listed in the "Aircraft" section, which is separate from the "VTOL Aircraft" section), so it can't hover.
2. It took a while to register on me, but I finally realized what exactly a microlight is (basically a hang glider with an engine on it) and they have a pretty large wingspan - generally around 8-9m according to google. That's wide enough to make maneuvering in a city pretty tricky and it wouldn't fit down some alleys. Typical stall speed for microlights seems to be 65 km/h, or slightly less.

I think an AGA Lone Star Recon Drone would be a better fit for how you were using Wasp 1 on Monday, being (presumably) smaller and VTOL capable. Plus it's faster, tougher, and includes lights, a weapon mount, night vision, and drone interface as standard. Better software, too.

The only thing you'd need to add to get to the capabilities on Wasp 1's OP page is the strobe upgrade, making the cost 13,250 Cr vs. 6,800. Almost twice the cost, granted, but it would actually do what you appear to want it to.

[nDervish]

That's a whole lot of money going to ammunition. Looking at the abstract ammo rules I think what I was going for is something like two tokens of bullets (let's make them AP though), one token of slugs and one of poison.

OK, the ammo reductions and dropping the shotgun saves you a 10,300 Cr, for a balance of 60,750. AP assault rifle ammo is 150 Cr/token and +6 AP/-2 damage.

With the bike I figured it might drive around empty fairly often, and it'd be good if it was invisible as it did that. I also think the corporation should let me get a higher category (all the way to five actually) but that I'd still have to pay for it (which I'm not willing to to for now).

Fair points.

[Willard]

I know the hang glider doesn't really fit, but I didn't see any other decent basis for something that can fly. Maybe extrapolating from the lone star could work, though it seems expensive. An off the shelf small VTOL should cost less than one stripped from an actual drone (costs of labor, marketing etc).

As for last night the drone was only in combat one round, maybe we could fudge that as a fly by attack, and have the hanging off to the side being flying in a wide arc? Now that I've built it I rather like it, and for scouting (it's main purpose) going faster is just fine.

I also realized that I missed my Ace bonus to all the drive tests, and that we all forgot about AP entirely.

[nDervish]

As for last night the drone was only in combat one round, maybe we could fudge that as a fly by attack, and have the hanging off to the side being flying in a wide arc? Now that I've built it I rather like it, and for scouting (it's main purpose) going faster is just fine.

OK

I also realized that I missed my Ace bonus to all the drive tests, and that we all forgot about AP entirely.

Yeah, as I was typing up the Ace edge on your character sheet, I realized that, too. AP hadn't occurred to me, though. *sigh*

[bladerunner_35]

Wow, you guys really have been working. It's going to take me a while to catch up.

I have updated Ryder Lewis. Either you didn't check the latest version or I didn't add the correct values Dave. I added Flash Compensators to my eyes (during char creation before the mission) and I'm not sure if that'll do something bad to me since my strain is now 9 (rather than 8 ). I also changed pistols since frangible ammo sucks and yes, I did buy detonators.

Also, from my calculation I should have 2 720 cr left after all equipment and cyber was paid. I am not sure where you came up with 1 100. Are they the money from the mission?

Additionally I think it's a bit of a stretch to count my switchblade and hold-out pistol as one significant item each. More like 0.5 SI each. They are designed to be carried as defense/backup weapons. The pistol weighs 2 lbs and the knife has a weight of 1 (I assume that the weights in SWD is also in pounds).

[nDervish]

I have updated Ryder Lewis. Either you didn't check the latest version or I didn't add the correct values Dave.

I went through the thread here and used the latest versions I could find, but I skimmed over the shorter posts pretty quickly, so I definitely could have missed something.

I added Flash Compensators to my eyes (during char creation before the mission) and I'm not sure if that'll do something bad to me since my strain is now 9 (rather than 8 ). I also changed pistols since frangible ammo sucks and yes, I did buy detonators.

Are those updates on OP? If not, what new pistol and how many of everything?

Regarding Strain, your Vigor check to avoid complications when you add your next augmentation will now be at -3 instead of -2 (since you're now 3 over your Vigor die), but there aren't any new psychological issues until you reach 12 Strain (2 x Spirit).

Additionally I think it's a bit of a stretch to count my switchblade and hold-out pistol as one significant item each. More like 0.5 SI each. They are designed to be carried as defense/backup weapons. The pistol weighs 2 lbs and the knife has a weight of 1 (I assume that the weights in SWD is also in pounds).

Fair enough. Call it 1 SI total for either or both. (Yeah, I know they're both under 5 lbs, so should round to 0 SI, but it just doesn't feel right to me for a weapon to be completely encumbrance-free.)

Edit: BTW, thanks for the ping on G+. For those who aren't following along over there, Jarvis has said that he expects to have the IZ2.0 world section finalized (aside from some art) and send it out on Friday. I doubt I'll have time to read it all before Monday's game, but I'm hoping it will include some additional details on Chicago and maybe also some of the major corps.