Doctor Who: Who-dunnit?!

[kookalouris]

"Oh, Bother. I'm being murdered ...again!"​

The Doctor is the greatest of the Time Lords. But he wasn't the only Time Lord who bounced through Time and Space in a wonky old TARDIS righting wrongs.

Others followed his example. One of them is being stolen, one life at a time, at different places and dates. Can his companions solve the mystery and his life in time (and Time) before it is too late?

I'm measuring interest in a Doctor Who PBEM (well, play-by-forum ). There are no rules as such, just consensual storytelling.

You get to play one of a group of companions who must find your stolen Time Lord and defeat the unholy alliance out to destroy him.

You may play an incarnation of your Time Lord if you wish, all of the Time Lord's lives are together in a different place and time from the companions.

There is currently no website for this game. It will most likely be run off of a forum, most likely ENWorld or Yahoo.

Let me know if you are interested.

BYOJB (Bring Your Own Jelly Babies )

 

[Deuce Traveler]

I'm interested. Will we make characters and will there be any dice rolling or will this be like an Amber diceless game?

 

[kookalouris]

Yes, you will get to play your OWN characters

Deuce Traveler,

Yes, you will get to play your OWN characters. I wish I had made that clear in my opening post. I think its cost me a few days and players.

You can make up a companion to the limits of your imagination, I would imagine a character from now or the past, or from one of the imaginative futures the series postulates.

If you want, you may play an incarnation of the game's Time Lord. The reason I don't have a lot of information about the game's Time Lord (even a name) is I haven't had my players design him [or her] yet).

This is a multi-Time Lord/Companion story so all PC are together along with just as eccentric NPC's.

Believe it or not, you can actually choose what WHO villains you want in the game. I want to give the players that much control over the game.

Minor spoiler: The Time Lord's arch-nemesis (similar to the relationship between the Doctor and the Master) has made an alliance with several other 'powers' to bring about an infernal plan. Unfortunately, the villains mistime their sudden but inevitable betrayals and it turns into a mess for all concerned.

The beauty of Doctor Who is that most series villains are very alike.

There are the 'millions of minions'; (Daleks, Cybermen, etc.)
The single Bosses (The Fendahl, Eldraad, etc.)
and the human dupes (the possessed, cloned, impersonated or just deceived and plain stubborn about admitting it.)

The players can choose their favorite villains and I will try to work them into the plot.

As for rules, there isn't an official RPG for Doctor Who yet. One is on its way. The few older systems didn't sell and, frankly, IMO there were reasons why.

If the majority of players want formal rules, we can probably pick out some rules system that can be modified. Otherwise, it will be consensual. I will point out that the characters who are disadvantaged usually get more 'screen time' in Doctor Who. That should encourage people to be vunerable with their characters and avoid 'munchkinism.'

Let me know what you think. If two players commit to the game, it is a go.

 

[Deuce Traveler]

John Paul Jones.

 

[kookalouris]

Sorry, no actual characters from history.

There are several reasons for this...

• While the Doctor interacted with historical figures, none were companions in that they continued to travel with the Doctor
• What if the companion died before they were 'supposed' to, some people are too important to Time for the Doctor to risk having them as companions

Now, if you want to make a completely original character, say, 'Jim Peter Smith', who 'just happens' to be very similar to John Paul Jones, that would be cool.

Otherwise, if not being able to use actual historical figures is a deal-breaker, I understand.

 

[Deuce Traveler]

I have an idea germinating. How long of a description do you want and how should we handle describing the characters talents as well as their flaws?

As for John Paul Jones, no one is quite sure of where he was buried (and whether the remains they found of him are actually his) and the time of his death was a confusing period with few reliable records. So I thought he would be a good candidate of disappearing with the doctor at the time of his 'death', but alas...

 

[kookalouris]

Deuce,

Actually, John Paul Jones would have been a great choice if I would have allowed actual historical figures. I do recognize the thought and care you've put into your first choice for a character.

I once ran a Shadowrun game where some Dreamchips malfunctioned (Shadowrun is a cyberpunk magictech game, on the off-chance any readers don't know. A dreamchip is a very realistic virtual reality chip) giving the players new downloaded historical personalities. This led to two different players each having control over one of the two personalities of the original character. Most PCs had an Arthurian knight as their new surprise personality with mythic skills to match. But some PC's had a actual historical personality as their 'downloaded bloatware.'

What's my point? In that game, it seemed that there is simply no historical figure that isn't controversial to someone, somewhere. Also, it always turned out that some little-known unsavory fact would be discovered about long-dead historical figures ("Thomas Jefferson did what now?!").

The vast majority of people dead for centuries had views that would seem terribly wrong or cruel. I'm not blaming them, the world learns painful lessons each new generation but realistic historical companions wouldn't fit into the simplistic Doctor Who universe (this isn't a complaint, but Who stories are more like fables children can understand and adults could appreciate). It would be possible to 'gloss' over a historical figures 'lumps' but at that point you would be playing a highly fictionalized version of that character anyway.

Also, 90% of the rules are for 10% of the players. Allowing your excellent choice for a character from history would make it hard for me to de facto limit someone else's less well-thought out choice.

As far as your new idea, I would love to hear as much as you feel like typing out. But I suggest you don't commit to more than a few sentences now. To be brutally honest, by this point, I had expected a larger response for the game (this isn't the only place I've advertised). So far, you are the only applicant.

While the game is a go if I get just two committed players, bitter experience has proven to me that at least half of a forum game's players ultimately 'flake' and never even show up once the game starts.

Anyway, sorry for the long post, I've got some spare time since the game is slow to start (if it does at all).

I look forward to your questions, comments or suggestions.

 

[Deuce Traveler]

This site caters more to the 3.5e/4e crowd with a smattering of CoC and M&M on the side. I tried to do a C&C game, a BECMI D&D game, and a Spaceship Zero game here but no one bit which is part of the reason I'm supporting your idea.

Anyway, I'm thinking of a fictional character from the American Revolution. British Dragoon who is released from service and broke in London of the early 1770s. Meet Ben Franklin during the crisis before the war, and the two share a fondness in the theories of electricity and natural philosophy. He goes back to the Colonies with Franklin to try his luck, ends up as a failed merchant, then a failed land speculator, then earns fame as a soldier, then has some failures as an officer in a militia. He loves Scottish philosophers like Hume and has courage, but he gambles too often with his fortunes and tends to lose them. He is in the midst of the Revolution serving as a captain to Colonial militia cavalry when he meets an odd sort of character that changes his life.

 

[kookalouris]

Deuce,

I will probably be away for a few days. My dad is in the hospital (nothing major) but I will have to watch the house (amongst other things). And my parents do not have reliable internet.

But I wanted to say...
I like your character idea as far as I have read.
Should you ever pitch your Starship Zero idea again, I would interested in hearing more.
I am in a CoC game, the Witching Hour, possibly still recruiting. You can read more at http://www.enworld.org/showthread.php?t=225977&page=1&pp=15
AND
http://www.enworld.org/showthread.php?p=4251846#post4251846

If there isn't a second player by the time this pitch at the pbem2.com site disappears (about the 26th), I will declare this game a botch and move on to another pitch (most likely, something based on the new Battlestar Galactica series).

I will respond to your last post with the extended reply it deserves when I can.

Gerry

 

[Vertexx69]

I think you will need some kind of system for people to wrap their heads around your concept. I played Amber for 2 years, and while it was diceless there is still a system that people can frame a character on.

I like Doctor Who, but without a system of some kind, all this would be is cooperative story telling in a familiar universe. That type of thing really relies on all of the contributing writers to be on the same page, as far as plot advancement goes I have done this several times but the more and less creative writers tended to grate on eachother.