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I'd rather not make it (much) earlier than 17. There's a bunch of other things I want to do during the day, and in any case playing for much more than 4 hours in a stretch seems a little long-winded.

Sure, we can play NAC and make trouble. That's usually what we end up doing anyway

Regarding the theme I don't think there's much point in settling on an exact phrasing. The answer to this amended version would obviously be yes, and then there's the point that we're actually stirring up trouble instead of actually fighting for freedom (though we could be working towards "liberating" Boston). I'm pretty sure I'll find some issue with any other phrasing as well, so let's just not get too bogged down in that. Unless you really want to, of course, but I think we have the gist of it already.

God45 skrev:I am totally fine with playing terrorists

One man's terrorist is another man's freedomfighter. I do not want to pidgeon hole any player or character or the campaign into being evil (or good).

nDervish skrev:Sure, Sunday should be fine here, assuming the door's not locked.

Can you make it earlier than 17? If so, I figure it might be preferable to have more time to work with, at least this time when we're working out details, making characters, etc.

Yes, that door might be a problem for sure. I'll try to contact a friend to see if he'll be there (perhaps the Belgian can open). Otherwise we might need a backup plan. The café/pub Ariman or the public library for instance. We should exchange phone numbers in case we need to relocate. No point in waiting for everyone to arrive to a locked door. Everyone can send there phone number to me by pm and I'll compile a list and send it out to everyone.

Willard skrev:I'd rather not make it (much) earlier than 17. There's a bunch of other things I want to do during the day, and in any case playing for much more than 4 hours in a stretch seems a little long-winded.

That's funny. Not long ago I would have said that playing anything less than 6 hours would be a waste of time and slow down the campaign. In general a normal session for me was 13.00 - 21 or 22.00. It was actually Dave that made me realise it works well to roleplay 4 hours after work.

In any case I could make it from 16.00 but not earlier, unless that's too early for you CW?

Willard skrev:Regarding the theme I don't think there's much point in settling on an exact phrasing. The answer to this amended version would obviously be yes, and then there's the point that we're actually stirring up trouble instead of actually fighting for freedom (though we could be working towards "liberating" Boston). I'm pretty sure I'll find some issue with any other phrasing as well, so let's just not get too bogged down in that. Unless you really want to, of course, but I think we have the gist of it already.

It can be good to have something to go back to, especially if the campaign runs for a while but no, an exact phrasing is probably not necessary.

Otherwise I completely disagree with you. The answer isn't obvious and it is certainly possible that we in fact are fighting for freedom. It is all in the perspective and background of the person/player/character which makes it all so interesting.

But we're not here for a philosphical debate. This theme, whatever we decide, should add some extra spice or a red thread to the campaign. Not become a suffocating debate. So yeah, let's leave it at that.

Reviewing the world/setting section of the IZ1.0 core book last night, I was reminded that there's a third city detailed in IZ canon: The Free City of Chicago.

In-game, it's on the border between the NAC and the Great Lakes Union, who have been fighting over it since the start of the Second Civil War, back in 2066. (Current date for IZ2.0 is 2090.) During the war, both sides invaded only to find the citizens of Chicago fighting against both of them. This continued until someone set off three kiloton-class nukes, taking out NAC and GLU forward bases as well as suspected Chicago Militia positions, at which point NATO stepped in with a peacekeeping force and told the NAC and GLU to get out. With the fighting over, Chicago started rebuilding, starting with a 2-year project to build a 10-story-high, 200km-long wall around the entire metroplex. Today, 28 million people live in the 300 square km enclosed by the wall, with everything from corporate arcologies to gang-infested hellzones to an underground city of the poor to luxury executive skyscrapers to run-down blocks of century-old tenements to the latest high-tech facilities.

Although the open military action is over, a shadow war continues to this day. The NAC and GLU are still trying to bring Chicago into their territory, or at least their sphere of influence, while other forces, ranging from street gangs to nations, work to ensure neither succeeds.

Out-of-game, all three cities are written up about as extensively (around 20-25 pages each). The Boston/Frisco writeups are almost entirely location-related, while Chicago has a bit more about local corps, law enforcement, etc. Chicago doesn't have "location trappings" defined for its neighborhoods, but they're easy for me to assign based on the descriptive text.

We can stick with Boston if you're particularly attached to subverting (or being subverted by) Atlantica, but, otherwise, I think Chicago looks like it might be a more varied and interesting location to play in and the "NAC infiltration team" concept works just as well in either place.

Works for me! Unless you mind Dave I'll be reading up on Chicago.

Also I am worried that the other Dave hasn't said anything. I know he will roll with whatever we come up with but we don't know if he can come tomorrow. Is there anyone able to contact him directly?

bladerunner_35 skrev:Works for me! Unless you mind Dave I'll be reading up on Chicago.

Feel free! If you're looking for the IZ-specific stuff, it's pages 163-183 of the IZ1.0 core book. If you mean real-world stuff, don't forget to share what you learn - I've driven through Chicago a couple times and spent about a week there once, but that was 20 years ago, so I don't really remember the city much at all.

bladerunner_35 skrev:Also I am worried that the other Dave hasn't said anything. I know he will roll with whatever we come up with but we don't know if he can come tomorrow.

Agreed. I've been wondering about that, too.

Chicago works for me

I pmed David and just got this response:

Re: Interface Zero: Upgrade in Progress
Skickat: För 6 minuter sedan.
Från: Rekreativc
Till: bladerunner_35
hey, sorry I can't do weekends...

Well, I guess that's just to bad. Since I am the player that had a change in my schedule I feel it would be unfair to let another player drop out so that I can play. Therefore I see no other choice but to bow out of this game.

I am sure you'll have a blast and that we'll see each other across another gaming table again in the future. Till then, happy gaming!

bladerunner_35 skrev: Well, I guess that's just to bad.

Yes... Serious bummer that we can't find a time that works for everyone.

bladerunner_35 skrev: Since I am the player that had a change in my schedule I feel it would be unfair to let another player drop out so that I can play. Therefore I see no other choice but to bow out of this game.

OK, we're back to Tuesdays, then. You're certainly welcome to drop by on any Tuesdays that you're free, of course.

Are we certain that there is no day that works for everybody? I can play any day of the week so I am adaptable.

God45 skrev:Are we certain that there is no day that works for everybody? I can play any day of the week so I am adaptable.

I'm also OK with whenever.

From memory, David has said he can't do Mondays or weekends and Björn can never make Mondays, Wednesdays, or Thursdays and other weeknights are difficult. That just leaves Tuesday and maybe Friday as days that will sometimes (but not always) work for everyone.

Unless I've remembered wrong, of course, in which case I'm sure someone will correct me.

David plays boardgames on mondays and can't play at all during weekends. I am not sure if that includes fridays.

My kids got Tae Kwondo on tuesdays and I work every thursday night (I can play every other day of the week, just not regurlarly since I am on a six week schedule).

CW played another rpg on wednesdays.

Dave and Sebastian can play any day of the week.

While I certainly would be happy if something could be worked out it all seems like a horrible mess to me. Better then to make it easier on everyone I figure.

Well, it sure is a puzzle. There's no way we can all make it to the same game (I for one have no interest in playing Fridays or Saturdays), but dropping one player there's a few possibilities.

Björn suggested dropping out, which would allow the rest of us to play Tuesdays or Thursdays. I could drop out, then you guys could play Wednesdays. Or excluding David we could do Mondays or Sundays.

To me the best thing seems to be running both IZ and Hellfrost. Dave had the same suggestion earlier this week. Personally I don't want to be involved in both of them, and I'd prefer to play Sunday or Monday to Tuesday or Thursday. Björn seems to have a strong preference for IZ, but I don't know how he or the rest of you feel about being in two campaigns. With Sebastian's friend (whose schedule or preferences I of course know nothing about) the size of at least one of the groups will remain the same.

What do you all think?

Willard skrev:To me the best thing seems to be running both IZ and Hellfrost. Dave had the same suggestion earlier this week.

I'm game for trying to run both, but I can't make any guarantees about how well it will work out. As you may have noticed, I get absorbed rather obsessively into the game (which is a major reason why I prefer to GM - there's always something more I can do with the game world!), so running two at once could eat my life completely, then beg for seconds. But I'm still interested in trying it to see how it turns out.

If running Hellfrost and IZ concurrently doesn't go well, another option would be to run two parallel IZ campaigns in the same world/city. That would make things a lot easier for me to manage, since my obsessive world-building would be usable in both games, plus it would open things up for crossover sessions with characters from one group making occasional guest appearances in the other.

Willard skrev:Personally I don't want to be involved in both of them, and I'd prefer to play Sunday or Monday to Tuesday or Thursday.

Given what's been said about people's availability so far, it seems that the most obvious option would be IZ on Sundays and either Hellfrost or IZ on Tuesdays.

Or... (...and my apologies to Sebastian and Björn who have heard this from me a million times already...) ...we could go with West Marches-style IZ:

West Marches was a game [Ben Robbins] ran for a little over two years. It was designed to be pretty much the diametric opposite of the normal weekly game:

1) There was no regular time: every session was scheduled by the players on the fly.

2) There was no regular party: each game had different players drawn from a pool of around 10-14 people.

3) There was no regular plot: The players decided where to go and what to do. It was a sandbox game in the sense that’s now used to describe video games like Grand Theft Auto, minus the missions. There was no mysterious old man sending them on quests. No overarching plot, just an overarching environment.

(Quoted from Grand Experiments: West Marches.)

I'm not sure how well that would work with the NAC operatives concept, though, since the West Marches model relies on a self-directed group of players/PCs, so it would probably need to be some variation on a "ronin" campaign, although you certainly could choose to pursue ideological (e.g., pro-NAC) ends in your mission selection.

In a general cyberpunk context, I would imagine that it would go something along the lines of me periodically posting "job listings" of missions available to you for hire, then you would self-organize a team to take on one of them that you find interesting and work out a time that everyone interested in that job would be able to play. Or, alternately, you could devise your own objectives (like, say, if Sebastian really wants to rob a McDonald's...) and organize a group for that purpose.

This is maybe just me... But let`s West Marches the shit out of this! I think that will work great

You had time this one Tuesday Bjorn? because I still think that we need the face to face conversation/character creation session. Then we can go West Marches with it.

bladerunner_35 skrev:Apart from everything above I've got some bad news. My kids have started with Tae Kwondo on tuesdays and thursdays. I can still play next tuesday the 17th...

Björn, is it still accurate that you can make it this Tuesday, the 17th? If so, I propose that we skip Sunday and go back to the original plan of getting together on the 17th, since everyone can be there, and decide how we want to run IZ, with the addition of working out a scheduling model (West Marches, two parallel campaigns, whatever).

Yeah, I can still make this tuesday the 17th at 18.oo.

I think the West Marches sounds great in theory but I've got two misgivings:

1. I am afraid there won't be a red thread or cohesion to the campaign and that it will be very episodic. I do not mind sandboxing at all but just running around stirring up shit for the sake of stirring up shit or running mission of the week is not very appealing to me. There needs to be something driving the campaign forward - forward meaning an ongoing story that builds from session to session and that is something more than just the accumulated experiences of our characters.

2. Finding a time to get together. This is the part I dislike the most about playing roleplaying games. Finding a time where the group can get together is a pain. Now sure, in West Marches this isn't a problem in theory because as long as one or two players can play there's a session. But again, with that setup I feel there will great difficulty to keep up with the story.

I think that my misgivings steem from the fact that West Marches do not have a story - just an "environment". This may or may not work. In Savage Marches it worked well enough and we built on the story from session to session even if it just happened to be "last time we killed enemy X and liberated village y".

Perhaps this will not be a problem at all in practice and I am willing to give it a try but I've got a few suggestions:

How about, as Dave suggests, we play a mercenary group? We are all employees of a "security company" (think Black Water/Xe/Academi) and like in Savage Marches there's a pool of recruits and PCs to draw members from for each mission. We would all start as raw recruits and as we gain experience, succeed at missions and roleplay we gain status and influence in the company and will have more say on which missions we are assigned to and what missions the company will undertake.

This way we will slowly be able to stear the company towards whichever "international power struggle" we feel is the most fun.

I understand if it would be too much for other players but personally I would really enjoy if there was some resource management or administrative duties if we go with The Company. I am just brainstorming now but inspiration would be drawn greatly from XCOM (without aliens...) and perhaps Cerberus, Shield, Stopwatch and or Global Frequency.

If we really want to dig into that aspect of gaming we could make executive decisions, like which missions to send our limited recruits to and while we play through "our" mission Dave rolls for the other missions and then we'll see how much money we manage to earn this month and if we make enough to just pay bills and salaries or if we can buy some new and shiny Jaeger m90 carbines to our veteran troops or hired new recruits. Or perhaps buy that APC or finally put Sebastian's character under the knife in order to have our very own cyber psycho...

Hey sorry I haven't been active in the discussion. Lately I'm spending very few of my after work hours behind the computer and that certainly shows... I'll try to jump in more often!

bladerunner_35 skrev:David plays boardgames on mondays and can't play at all during weekends. I am not sure if that includes fridays.

If everyone else can do Mondays I don't mind dropping that other thing and making time for a weekly game with you. In fact, last week I didn't even go for that Monday game night since playing on both Monday and Tuesday was a bit too much.

When I said I can't do weekends I meant Fri-Sun... So it's really Mon-Thu for me, but any of those nights work for now.

If Monday works for everyone I'd gladly make time!

I really like Björn's comments, and will just add that it also makes it easier to delve into the various sub-plots we were talking about a few days ago.

So, West Marches starting Tuesday. Glad you thought of that, Dave.

I understand the feeling, David. The last two weeks I gamed on both Tuesday and Wednesday nights, and while the evenings were all fantastic fun it still feels a little less than ideal. Better to spread it out a little more.

The possibility of all meeting on Mondays is a great bonus, but I for one would really like to try the West Marches thing (even if we now have far fewer players than the guy who started it) now that I've started reading about it.

bladerunner_35 skrev: Yeah, I can still make this tuesday the 17th at 18.oo.

Excellent!

bladerunner_35 skrev: 1. I am afraid there won't be a red thread or cohesion to the campaign and that it will be very episodic. I do not mind sandboxing at all but just running around stirring up shit for the sake of stirring up shit or running mission of the week is not very appealing to me. There needs to be something driving the campaign forward - forward meaning an ongoing story that builds from session to session and that is something more than just the accumulated experiences of our characters.

One of the things I always do behind the scenes is to have a list of factions/corps/whatever which are pursuing their own goals. That was partially exposed in Savage Marches, with the reputation gains for collecting "Resources" (Food/Influence/Morale/Security/Tech) for Eastmere, but I was also tracking those things for multiple factions in Brassport, the orcs you encountered at Close Inn, and several other groups that you never got around to meeting. And this played directly into the game you saw - the reason the orcs were stealing cattle from Close Inn in the first place was because they were looking for additional Food resources.

For IZ, I'll definitely be doing something similar regardless of what form the campaign takes - NAC operatives, ronin, running a security company, whatever - even if it's only so that I can give you a list of the latest headlines off the news feeds each week. In a West Marches context, that would be modified somewhat so that my behind-the-scenes faction game would instead provide the source of job listings for you to choose from, with the news reports following later after the jobs are done, either by you or by NPCs.

In more concrete terms, West Marches doesn't mean that you can't arrange for a theocratic government to take Chicago over and sign treaties making the city effectively a part of the NAC, it just means that, to accomplish that, you'd have to find appropriate jobs to do to pursue that goal by your own route rather than me laying out a specific path for you to follow.

So not just "PCs stirring up shit and doing missions of the week", but rather "factions competing with each other and sometimes drawing the PCs into their web". Does that provide enough of an ongoing story to meet what you're looking for?

bladerunner_35 skrev: I think that my misgivings steem from the fact that West Marches do not have a story - just an "environment". This may or may not work. In Savage Marches it worked well enough and we built on the story from session to session even if it just happened to be "last time we killed enemy X and liberated village y".

I think that mostly comes down to what "story" means to you in this context. If you're looking for The Story, which is a pure and unified whole with a single beginning, middle, climax, and ending, then I agree that West Marches may not be the best model for that. Instead, it gives you a tapestry of many little stories playing out in parallel, sometimes in isolation, other times intersecting, with beginnings, middles, climaxes, and endings happening all the time. I expect that a larger Story will emerge from the tapestry of little stories, but it will be the Story of a city or a region influenced by many characters rather than The Story Of The Five PCs.

bladerunner_35 skrev: How about, as Dave suggests, we play a mercenary group? We are all employees of a "security company" (think Black Water/Xe/Academi) and like in Savage Marches there's a pool of recruits and PCs to draw members from for each mission. We would all start as raw recruits and as we gain experience, succeed at missions and roleplay we gain status and influence in the company and will have more say on which missions we are assigned to and what missions the company will undertake.

If we're going to use the "flexible/player-driven scheduling" aspect of West Marches, then I think you'd probably have to either be independent contractors or high-enough up in the company that you're able to pick and choose which missions you want to be on from the start.

bladerunner_35 skrev: I understand if it would be too much for other players but personally I would really enjoy if there was some resource management or administrative duties if we go with The Company.
[snip]
If we really want to dig into that aspect of gaming we could make executive decisions, like which missions to send our limited recruits to and while we play through "our" mission Dave rolls for the other missions and then we'll see how much money we manage to earn this month and if we make enough to just pay bills and salaries or if we can buy some new and shiny Jaeger m90 carbines to our veteran troops or hired new recruits. Or perhaps buy that APC or finally put Sebastian's character under the knife in order to have our very own cyber psycho...

We could definitely set up some faction stats for a small PC-run company and have you guys run it in the faction-level game. Or perhaps multiple factions, so that everybody gets one of their own, even if your character isn't technically running it, depending on whether you'd prefer to do collective or individual management.

The system I'm using for faction-level play comes straight out of Other Dust (a post-apocalyptic game by the same guy as Stars Without Number), with a few pieces bolted onto the side from the IZ1 "Hostile Takeover" supplement (mostly just Corporate Trappings), and it's fairly simple. Each "faction turn", you have eight actions to choose from (half a page describes the rules for all eight), then there's another two pages of perks that you can get to give bonuses to certain actions, and that's pretty much all you'd need to run a faction.