Alternity (and OOP games in general)

[Umbran]

I've Alternity on my shelf, and I've used it a few times. Good system, but not one I've run a full campaign in.

My shelves are loaded with OOP games - teh one I pull out most often is Marvel Superheroes.

 

[(Psi)SeveredHead]

Two questions:

1) Anyone here play ALTERNITY? If so, any opinions, thoughts, comments?

I used to play and run it when I was younger and more interested in just combat rather than villainous plotting. It was a great system. It was designed for sci-fi rather than modern, so it did StarDrive game balance much better than Dark Matter game balance. I regularly convert Dark Matter adventures into d20 Modern (which I think does modern-times gaming better). I would rather play Alternity for sci-fi, although I must admit that sci-fi has so many barriers to it that I doubt I'd play anything other than Firefly/Serenity setting (which is so close to Modern that Modern probably does it better, re: Reynold's use of Remain Conscious).

While Alternity is light-years better than d20 Future for sci-fi (IMO) it made spaceship combat way too complicated. The rules were making spaceships were much better designed but also much more complicated. Naturally for some reason my players always wanted to design their own ships.

Practically any maneuver required Vehicle-space checks (but at least there was a mechanical benefit). A "realistic" space combat system should go into an advanced rules section so those of us who are more interested in cinematic combat can ignore it. That includes the hated facing rules (which weren't present in Alternity personal scale combat).

Compartments meant that combat got way too complicated, as "focus firing" on each one was too difficult, and things got worse especially because of Alternity's "condition track". Here's an example:

An enemy spaceship has five compartments: bridge, engineering/stardrive, weapons, quarters and cargo. There's a roughly 20% chance of hitting each compartment (assuming you hit). You (onboard your own spaceship) could better your aim with help from the sensor operator, but you didn't get much benefit when it came to targetting compartments. As a result, you were just hitting the enemy ship all over the place ... kind of like d20 Future.

The enemy ship has many crew members, most of whom are NPs (Alternity's version of the 0th-level character) and have Con 9, so durability 9/9/4/4. They're all wearing soft e-suits, which gives armor.

Every time you hit the enemy ship, your opponents take damage (equivalent to the damage dealt to the compartment). Each compartment had its own durability (hit points) and condition track, so that's just more numbers to keep track of. If the compartment NPCs are in takes stun damage, this applies to all their stun ratings (and can eventually inflict step penalties or unconsciousness), but armor applies. If the compartment they are in takes wound damage, they all take wound damage (armor applies, penalties can build up) and half that as stun damage (armor does not apply, unless they have lots of ranks in Armor Operation; penalties can build up). I'm going to assume you just roll armor once for each hit, rather than roll armor dice for each individual NPC. It's just faster that way.

You can batter the crew into weakness or unconsciousness by hitting the compartments; because you can't effectively focus-fire, you end up facing an enemy ship with multiple damaged compartments with multiple damaged NPCs taking almost random-seeming penalties (their weapons are at a one step penalty to hit due to compartment damage, their pilot is taking three steps because he's taken lots of stun damage and his compartment has taken lots of wound damage, etc). Each compartment could take up to four steps in penalties from stun and wound damage (one step each for losing more than half its stun points, losing more than half its wound points, crew losing more than half their stun points, crew losing more than half their wound points) and all this assumes that the crew are in the appropriate compartment (they aren't always; the gunner might be on the bridge while the weapons compartment, which doesn't have life support, is on a more strategic part of the ship).

Now what happens if the enemy ship has multiple named NPCs (or just specialists; some Marines, some engineering crew, different stats for the pilot, commanding officer, XO, and so forth)? Oh dear... the PCs don't face this problem because each PC can quickly calculate their own damage, as long as they don't have (m)any specialized crew types on their own ship.

That's a lot of work to no benefit. IMO you shouldn't be able to "focus fire" at compartments, at least not if you have any kind of "condition track" system for NPCs. (D20 Future went too far towards simplicity by just stating that "PCs can't take damage when their ship gets hit", which of course makes no sense.)

That makes me want to play Firefly/Serenity, where no one walks around with exotic energy weapons (except one episode) and the eponymous starship doesn't even have weapons!

 

[RobJN]

What you seem to forget, though, is that in Alternity, not every action *requires* a die roll. You can run scenes using as many or as few rolls as your play style dictates, depending on how much detail you want to go into. (Narrative/Visual, 3-D Vector from Starships [slide rule not included], or the revamped Warships rules [abacus sold seperately])

 

[(Psi)SeveredHead]

What you seem to forget, though, is that in Alternity, not every action *requires* a die roll. You can run scenes using as many or as few rolls as your play style dictates, depending on how much detail you want to go into. (Narrative/Visual, 3-D Vector from Starships [slide rule not included], or the revamped Warships rules [abacus sold seperately])

But I don't forget that. The problem was having PCs who wanted to take part in spaceship combat. Why else would they want to design their own spaceship?

I'd be willing to run Alternity in the future again, but I would tell the PCs not to make starship officer a part of their character concept, as that's just wasting it.

 

[evildmguy]

Yea for Alternity!

Wow.

I saw this and read it and it was like reading it the first time. Then I saw my own response and shivered! (I had just watched the Doctor Who episode Blink.) Very strange.

It's two years later and I still have a group and we still play (fantasy) Alternity. And I am doing a FR campaign that is working out very well, using only the Core Rules for FX. I was using Red Dragon's (on alternityrpg.net) fantasy rules but decided to try the core rules and they are working well for me. They are helping me understand Exalted's system a little better, and as that is one of the other two games my group plays, that's a good thing!

I still find Alternity to be the best system I have run or played. Within its own rules, it has the ability to be simple (the suggestion is to skip all specialty skills and let them use the broad skills instead, which makes it a lot more like a WW game) or as complex as the group wants it. For myself, I find WW's system good but sometimes too simple. I have not run as much SciFi but I ran a Dark*Matter campaign and it worked out very well. Even the SciFi ones I have run have been good.

I didn't find the problem with ship combat. But I abstracted it a lot. Like others, I wanted it to be quick and more dramatic, so I simplified it for all NPCs and kept enough detail so that everyone could be involved on the PC side of it. I could see how it could get complex but I get away from those. I don't think ANY complex rules help an RPG and I try to avoid them when I can.

I think the only bad thing about OOP games is that if it doesn't cover something, I have to write everything myself. (Or steal it and write it! ) I recently came up with the idea of "borrowing" feats for Alternity and it has also worked great! It gives the game more choices, perhaps too much, and makes characters unique, which I like.

So, as I ramble more, yes, still playing Alternity. Still enjoying it a lot. Could accept it if that's the only game I could play for the rest of my life.

Take care.

edg

 

[DM_Jeff]

My group loved Alternity.

We played XXVc Alternity (don't ask).
We played Star Drive/Blue Planet Alternity.
We played Gamma World Alternity.
We played Medieval Fantasy Alternity.
We played Dark*Matter Alternity.
We played gritty superheroes Alternity.

Man I got a lot of mileage out of that system. And then I published the "Action Check" e-zine for a year after it was cancelled by WotC. Once we really got into d20 Modern, Alternity began sitting on the shelf sadly, through a combination of having played it to death and a real happiness with the new rules set. Alternity Supers, Gamma World, and Dark*Matter were still some of the best campaigns I ever played, literally because of the Alternity system itself. Three Cheers for Alternity!

-DM Jeff

 

[ShadowDenizen]

I play WAY too many OOP games; my shelves are full of failed/OOP games!!

But, to list a few (not including OOP D+D settings):

White Wolf's WoD1.0
Abberant
The End
Torg
Marvel Supeheroes
Twilight 2000
Cybergen (Cyberpunk... with kids!)
Gamma World (Older versions, NOT D20.)
Deadlands Classic
Fading Suns Classic
TMNT
Buffy

 

[DMH]

Man I got a lot of mileage out of that system. And then I published the "Action Check" e-zine for a year after it was cancelled by WotC. Once we really got into d20 Modern, Alternity began sitting on the shelf sadly, through a combination of having played it to death and a real happiness with the new rules set. Alternity Supers, Gamma World, and Dark*Matter were still some of the best campaigns I ever played, literally because of the Alternity system itself. Three Cheers for Alternity!

I wondered what happened to you, Jeff. Do you visit A.net from time to time?

 

[w_earle_wheeler]

I own a few OOP games (Star Frontiers, AD&D 1e, 2e and Moldvay/Mentzer, Top Secret, Warhammer FRP 1e, GURPS 3e, Dark*Matter and Buffy The Vampire Slayer).

It's very hard to find people who want to play or run these game. Or -- more accurately -- it's hard to find people who have the time to run or play these games!

 

[DM_Jeff]

I wondered what happened to you, Jeff. Do you visit A.net from time to time?

What happened to me was d20 and D&D 3.X I sure do stop over there on occassion, yes, and love the ongoing support for the system!

-DM Jeff