Twilight 2013

[Treebore]

There is a level of interference that comes from a game's background that sometimes makes it difficult to "work around". And as someone on the rpg.net comment thread notes, "You can change that if you want to" is never, ever a valid argument for bad game design. (Paraphrasing, but still).

Hell I could ditch the 2013 timeline altogether and use the T2k setting instead, but trying to "game around" the quite frankly utterly fantastical leaps in logic that 2013's setting purports would just be an annoyance to me as a GM.

As always, YMMV.

I'm always amazed at the experts who think they know how the world works and will work. Its hard to predict how a single business will do in the business world. For instance no one would have predicted that the big 3 auto makers would be dancing with bankruptcy if they were asked to make a prediction 2 years ago.

Yet the RPG.net reviewer, and now you, seem to think they are so wise about how the world works that the Twilight 2013 setting won't work.

Plus he knocks the mechanics of a system he hasn't even tried.

I agree the mechanics seem weird, but I am willing to give them a try. Making attributes checks by rolling 2d20 and having to roll under your attribute to succeed is an interesting idea. Having 1 d20 to roll per rank of a skill, and having to roll below a TN on at least one to succeed also seems interesting to me, especially if you succeed on more than one of the dice you get to add a +2 to your success.

The probability differences given by using multiple d20's are very intriguing to me, so I am definitely going to give it a good try out and see how I like it. However, in my "expert" opinion I do not find the rules "clunky", just different, or "weird", and only because they use multiple d20's. Other than that I have seen the rules concepts and terminology in many other RPG rules sets.

As for the setting, I personally cannot go back to the cold war ideas of T:2000. The possibilities presented in T:2013 I can definitely work with. There are some assumptions that I do not agree with, but guess what? Its going to be easy to ignore them and do it how I want, and it won't interfere with my ability to use the rest of the ideas.

However I am certainly not going to write a review, or go on a message board, and make claims that I know how every country on this world will act in the future. No one knows that, not even about any one single government. Not to long ago a LARGE number of "experts" would have said the USA would not have the current President that it has. So much for experts. You never know which one might be right until after everything is said and done. So I'll take this setting as offered and alter it to fit what I want to happen, just like I do with every single setting I have ever used.


The cool thing is I do think I will be able to use my old T:2000 modules for T:2013 games. I will definitely have to alter back ground "premises", and figure out how to fit the mechanics fo the old with the new, but if nothing else I believe I am smart enough to just decide what the degree of challenge is in the new system on my own. So I will still get to use the ideas of many of the scenarios and the maps, and if nothing else I can just make a judgement call in assigning skill ranks under the new system. I think that is one reason why they give skill descriptors in T:2013 ranging from novice to legendary. I'll just determine where in these descriptor ranges the old T:2000 NPC's fall, and rank them accordingly.

So I look forward to giving this system a try, which I will, in about 8 weeks, after we finish our current L5R game.

 

[thedungeondelver]

I'm always amazed at the experts who think they know how the world works and will work. Its hard to predict how a single business will do in the business world. For instance no one would have predicted that the big 3 auto makers would be dancing with bankruptcy if they were asked to make a prediction 2 years ago.

Yet the RPG.net reviewer, and now you, seem to think they are so wise about how the world works that the Twilight 2013 setting won't work.

Right, because that's exactly how I presented myself, as a geopolitics expert.

Nobody, myself and the reviewer included (at least based on what he posted) makes any pretense about poli-sci knowledge. With that said, there's a degree of plausibility that I prefer in a game that advertises itself in a certain way. Frankly the idea of French nuclear attack submarines maneuvering up waterways - as noted in the rpg.net thread - as being too shallow for a WWII LST to launch nukes at Beylorussia, as well as a myriad of other WHAT THE moments in their backstory are as feasable as sticking in a spec ops team from the MOOOOOOOON who flew here by flapping their arms.

TWILIGHT:2013 has, as it's pedigree, one and a half (or two if you include MERC:2000 games that had a pretty decent grounding in reality based on the geopolitical situation at the time. Now, I'm entirely sure if in 1985 you'd said "Let's make a hard military RPG about soldiers fighting in Iraq in 2009, and there's no Soviet Union - they simply went out of business without so much as a whimper - and Iran isn't involved, and oil prices don't shoot up to $500 a barrel because of it", well, I'm sure that would seem pretty improbable, too.

But the fact is, there are too many magical-not-even-based-in-a-notion-of-reality moments in the 2013 story line for me. I'm sorry that chafes you so bad.

Plus he knocks the mechanics of a system he hasn't even tried.

I rather like the mechanics as described, so that's not a problem of mine, anyway.

However I am certainly not going to write a review, or go on a message board, and make claims that I know how every country on this world will act in the future. No one knows that, not even about any one single government. Not to long ago a LARGE number of "experts" would have said the USA would not have the current President that it has. So much for experts. You never know which one might be right until after everything is said and done. So I'll take this setting as offered and alter it to fit what I want to happen, just like I do with every single setting I have ever used.

And you'd have found a number of experts who'd say it would. The current president isn't an issue at any rate: it's the utterly loony tunes stuff 93S has laid down for TWILIGHT:2013. There is a degree of suspension-disbelief I'm willing to engage in to enjoy a game. Fireballs, were-rats, dimension door, a +5 holy avenger. Part and parcel of the genre.

There's a dozen different, far more plausible scenarios that could've led to the "end of the world as we know it" that 93S could've chosen. I'm entirely unclear why they picked the one they did. I don't like it for the reasons I've outlined. I find the idea of going back to an alternate 80's history more enjoyable than what 93S has laid out.

 

[Treebore]

Could you give me a couple of examples of what you consider "loony toon"? I just read through the history again last night, and again there are a number of things I found highly unlikely, but not impossible.

Like I agree with the review quoted earlier that the France/Belarus/Russia scenario is highly unlikely, but its certainly not impossible. There were so called Russian and Geo Political experts that didn't think Russia would have invaded Georgia like they did, for the reasons they did.

So just because actions cannot be foreseen does not mean they cannot possibly happen. Its up to us to decide if they do happen, and its up to us to come up with reasons as to why they did, no matter how unlikely, contrived, and crazy those reasons may sound. Just look at the Russia/Georgia conflict for a real life example of "loony toon" reality.

 

[xechnao]

I believe it is highly improbable any apocalyptic event in the close future as we stand today. So perhaps a huge comet passes and disturbs earth's climate to apocalyptic proportions for civilization or something like that. But then again the game should rather be named "year of the comet".

 

[Treebore]

I believe it is highly improbable any apocalyptic event in the close future as we stand today. So perhaps a huge comet passes and disturbs earth's climate to apocalyptic proportions for civilization or something like that. But then again the game should rather be named "year of the comet".

Yeah, I watched one of those "What if a big meteor hits the Earth" programs within the last month or so and I considered setting my T:2013 game on such a scenario. Its not how our civilization gets destroyed for this game, its what we do with our characters after the world as we know it is in ruins. So I might go in such a direction.

As it is I am going to pretty much go with the T:2013 scenario, however I am going to use far fewer nukes and have a lot more germ warfare weapons used. I want my campaign based around controlling what resources are left so I want most of my cities destroyed by natural fires not nuclear blasts. I am going to stick with mainland China being totally nuked, though. Then I am going to have Bio weapons of mass destruction employed to stop the Chinese armies in other areas in their tracks. Except on the peninsula. I'll still use bio weapons there too, but much less lethal strains, but far more debilitating.

I still have plenty of time to think about it, so we'll see.

 

[xechnao]

You could also try to work around a DOOM like scenario but not necessarily with demons and stuff. It could be more realistic. For example some moon facility that goes terribly wrong, disrupts moon's orbit or even destroys moon and due to this earth feels the pain.

 

[cignus_pfaccari]

Like I agree with the review quoted earlier that the France/Belarus/Russia scenario is highly unlikely, but its certainly not impossible. There were so called Russian and Geo Political experts that didn't think Russia would have invaded Georgia like they did, for the reasons they did.

Especially since IIRC Russia is very, very fond of Belarus, so they might actually intervene.

The problem with the setting is the events seem to be a chain of low probability events magnified by the worst possible decisions made. Which is fine, but it makes suspending disbelief hard.

Heck, a revitalized Soviet Union might be easier to work in.

Brad

 

[coyote6]

Really, to kill off civilization, you do need to have several improbable events pile up on top of each other (at least I hope you need that, otherwise we're in trouble in real life), so I don't have much problem suspending disbelief to allow various scenarios. Sure, there are some scenarios I would find improbable -- but since the point of the game is having a post-apocalyptic setting, you kind of need to have the apocalypse beforehand, no matter how unlikely the apocalypse might be.

Of course, I'm sure one could come up with something that seems more probable than what the T2k13 authors came up with, but it would be tough to do and hit their timeline. I'm assuming they chose 2013 because it's post-"end of Mayan calendar", and thus the next most apocalyptic date. If you pushed your apocalypse out further, you'd have much more room to maneuver in terms of suspension of disbelief.

(OTOH, I guess if you add current economic crisis + worst-case influenza pandemic + peak oil + something else -- upheval in some ICBM-armed government, asteroid strike, whatever -- you could get to WWIII really fast.)

I kind of think that a Black Swan-fueled doomsday scenario actually makes it easier to swallow, in some ways. Yeah, it's unlikely, but if it were likely, it would be predictable, and that's the point of a Black Swan -- you can't really predict it beforehand.

 

[Treebore]

Really, to kill off civilization, you do need to have several improbable events pile up on top of each other (at least I hope you need that, otherwise we're in trouble in real life), so I don't have much problem suspending disbelief to allow various scenarios. Sure, there are some scenarios I would find improbable -- but since the point of the game is having a post-apocalyptic setting, you kind of need to have the apocalypse beforehand, no matter how unlikely the apocalypse might be.

Of course, I'm sure one could come up with something that seems more probable than what the T2k13 authors came up with, but it would be tough to do and hit their timeline. I'm assuming they chose 2013 because it's post-"end of Mayan calendar", and thus the next most apocalyptic date. If you pushed your apocalypse out further, you'd have much more room to maneuver in terms of suspension of disbelief.

(OTOH, I guess if you add current economic crisis + worst-case influenza pandemic + peak oil + something else -- upheval in some ICBM-armed government, asteroid strike, whatever -- you could get to WWIII really fast.)

I kind of think that a Black Swan-fueled doomsday scenario actually makes it easier to swallow, in some ways. Yeah, it's unlikely, but if it were likely, it would be predictable, and that's the point of a Black Swan -- you can't really predict it beforehand.

Lets also look at it from the other direction with ragards to Twilight 2000, no one was predicting the Cold War and the Berlin Wall would be things of the past by 1997. The only predictions being made for the end of those two things was WW 3.