Upcoming Savage Setting Kickstarter: Olympus, Inc.

Charles White, from Fabled Environments whose products I've reviewed before, dropped me an email regarding a new setting for Savage Worlds they are planning to release: Olympus, Inc.

Art by Mirco Paganessi.

Olympus, Inc answers the question of what would happen if the Olympians were kicked out of the heavens by Gaia and the Titans ruled. Unlike most settings that have tackled the concept of Demigods in the modern world, we are a bit different. 

After she ejected them from the heavens, Gaia was also kind enough to use the Lethe river to cause all humans to forget that the Olympians existed. This nearly killed the Olympians, who began to fade away. However, the Olympians realized that the could draw from our obsession with the almighty dollar and gain power. Therefore, the Olympians traded their stone temples for towers of glass and steel. They formed the world's largest corporations. Now the Titans and Olympians fight a battle for control of the Heavens and Earth with each wielding incredible power. In the midst of all of this are normal humans who are asleep to everything that is around them. 

Interesting. Very interesting. It reads sort of like a cross between Shadowrun and Percy Jackson. I'm already beginning to dream up character ideas.

Gaia has put a few rules in place to ensure that the Titans and Olympians don't tear each other apart as well as the rest of the inhabitants on Earth. This is known as the Nemesis Effect. The Nemesis Effect prohibits the use of visible supernatural abilities in front of sleepers (normal mortals). It also prohibits mythical creatures from appearing in front of a sleeper in their true form. If anyone breaks the rules, the Goddess Nemesis punishes them. It can be anything from being wracked with intense pain to death. It depends on the severity of the infraction.

Therefore, the Titans and Olympians fight a secret proxy war in a world identical to our own. However, most humans don't know that the gods exist and they certainly don't know that monsters and demigods with superhuman abilities roam the earth.

The setting has a strong cyberpunk feel with a bit of superpowers and espionage thrown in for good measure. The core book will present 6 Olympians and two demihuman races as well as new edges, hindrances and weapons all for Savage Worlds.

The Kickstarter for Olympus, Inc is scheduled to start January 15. While Fabled Environments has produced many fine floorplans and Savage Worlds modules in the past, Charles promises to bring in some world-class talent to help make this setting a worthy addition to any gamer's bookshelf (or hand drive, if you've given up on those primitive papery things):

We have several authors that have signed on to created 2000-3000 word adventures as stretch goals: John Dunn, Sean Preston and Umberto Pignatelli just to name a few.

 Mark your calendars for January 15, mere mortals, the Gods command it!

(SW) Fearsome Critters: Cake Walk

Savage Worlds is the role-playing game that bills itself on being "Fast, Furious, and Fun." Over the years I've played elvish warriors, pulp adventurers, steampunk cowboys, cyborg assassins, and other action packed player characters. So when I was offered a chance to review Fearsome Critters: Cake Walk, a new one-shot, introductory adventure for Savage Worlds written by John Beattie, with art by T. Jordan Peacock,  and published by Fabled Environments, I wondered what sort of heroic (or anti-heroic) archetypes players would be asked to try one. Then I read the adventure and found out:

Animal Control Officers.

Yes, you read that correctly.

I know what you're about to say next; "Animal control? You mean shooing raccoons out of chimneys and chasing after stray cats? No magic swords, tommy guns, or "vazed-plazma-rivles-in-ze-vorty-vatt-range?"  Outside of the rare rabid rottweiler, what sort of adventurous life is that?"

Well, it depends on what sort of animal you're trying to control. Without giving too much away, in Fearsome Critters: Cake Wake you play members of a special division of animal control that deals with "unusual" fauna and a call from an abandoned snack cake factory leads the players into the very different pest than they bargained for. While reading this humorous adventure (no spoilers here) I realized that Cake Walk reminded me of West End Games' classic Ghostbusters RPG, a game I have many fond memories playing back in middle school when I was a budding gamer.

As an introductory adventure, it's a great way to acclimatize a group of new players to the Savage Worlds engine. It contains just about everything you'll need including five pre-generated PCs and a blank, campaign-specific record sheet for original PCs; a detailed map of the where the action takes place; player handouts; and since Savage Worlds is a miniature-centric game, full color figures including shipping containers and a pair of trucks. This scenario is designed to be a one-shot, just the thing for new players or a quick game to run either at a convention or as a delightful, palette-cleansing, diversion from the usual gaming routine. However, it also includes a few one-page adventure seeds for those who want to draw this out into a larger campaign.Those familiar with Fabled Environments line of gaming maps will recognize the hard work and quality the publisher put into this product.

Obviously, Cake Walk is meant to be a far-less serious adventure than what most gamers expect. In my experience, deliberately humorous games can be rather difficult to pull off well. It often takes a GM with no small amount of comedic skill themselves as well as the ability to think fast if PCs take the adventure outside the author's intended path.  Unless you're gifted at improv, it's very hard to deliver a good punchline when the audience is re-writing your material as you go. It's also works best when PCs also have a great sense of humor and are capable of playing for laughs. That makes GM's job is much easier. Of course, how much humor you choose to inject into Cake Walk is the GMs call.

Cake Walk also tries to get PCs to try to solve their problems with role-playing rather than resorting to gunplay and melee. Your character's most dangerous weapon is a can of pepper spray. How the situation turns out will depend greatly upon how well they can puzzle out the mystery of the Golden Creme Delights Factory and how they react to what they find within. For some, it can be quite refreshing from the usual hacking, slashing, and blasting that are used to resolve most RPG adventures.

Therefore, if you're looking for a light-hearted change of pace or want to give neophyte Savages something easy to play for their first few games, Cake Walk is an excellent and fun-filled choice.

(SW) First Nova Praxis PC: Janus

As the Kickstarter goodies for Nova Praxis: Savage Worlds Edition keep rolling in, I tried my hand at creating my first PC for this transhumanist sci-fi setting. It could be a very involved process depending on what sort of character you want to create, perhaps more so than creating a PC for Interface Zero 2.0. You get to create your PC au naturel then, depending on the character's "state" (i.e. Pure, Sleeved, or Sim) you then get to upgrade your body accordingly and there are a lot of great augmentations you can use to customize your PC's "sleeve." I decided to create a sleeved Coalition spy/assassin uploaded into a totally synthetic "cybersleeve." 

As usual, thanks go out to the folks behind HeroMachine 3.0 for helping me compensate for my lack of artistic talent.

Note: all stats in parenthesis are for the PC's sleeve.

"Janus:"

State: Sleeved
Rank: Novice

Bennies: 2

Attributes: Agility d8 (d8), Smarts: d6, Strength d6 (d6), Spirit: d6,Vigor: d6 (d6)

Charisma: -4; Cohesion: -3; Pace: 6; Parry: 5 (6); Toughness: 12 (6)

Skills: Athletics: d6, Fighting d6, Knowledge (Politics) d4 (d6), Knowledge (Security) d4 (d6), Investigation d8 (d10 with Agent Bonus), Notice d4+1, Persuasion d6, Shooting: d6, Streetwise d4, Stealth d8

Edges: Assassin, Scion of House Kimura

Hindrances: Habit, VR Pornography (Major), Malware Afflicted, Mean. 

Rep: 4, 1d4, Bump 6
Assets: 3, 1d4-1, Bump 4

Augmentations:

Sleeve: Alpha Cybersleeve Cost 5 (6 -1 for Scion of House Kimura Edge)
Customization: +1 Cost, Removed sleeve's Dubious Construction Hindrance

Hindrances Outsider

Apotheosis (Comes with Mindset, Mnemonic Core, Data Jack)

Agent (Beta) Grants Skill Increases in Knowledge (Politics) and Knowledge (Security)

Fully Synthetic: +1 Toughness, Ignore 1 Wound Penalty, Synthetic Biology, -1 Benny
Performance Enhanced (Agility)

Hidden Weapon System (Monoblade Dagger "Claws")

Gear: Beta Agent, Light Battle Armor, Light Coil PDW, Light Rail Pistol, Spider Gear Kit, Plasti-Rope Dispenser, ARID Tag

Whoever he or she was before hir Apotheosis, "Janus" is a mystery. This newly appeared contract killer prefers to keep their nearly all aspects of hir identity a secret. Janus prefers the anonymity of cybersleeves, even going so far as to adjust hir sleeve's vocoder to produce an entirely androgynous voice. Janus approaches hir profession with ruthless efficiency making hir not the most friendly of companions. To help compensate for the muted existence of life in a cybersleeve, Janus indulges in promiscuous virtual sex during hir downtime. Keeping to hir sexually ambiguous nature, Janus will often alter gender and and orientation; male or female, hetero or homosexual, it doesn't matter. Unfortunately, Janus menomic core has picked up a few annoying trojans and viruses during hir VR trysts, but, so far, nothing serious.

UPDATE: Realized I miscalculated on the skills and had to lose the Licensed edge to increase my Spirit, which meant I had to rethink my Gear and my sleeve's augments. Then I updated my picture.

(Savage Worlds) My First Interface Zero 2.0 Character: Marcus "Fenris" Slade

After finally getting having access to both Interface Zero 2.0 and Wild Card Creator, I decided to put them through their paces by designing my first IZ 2.0 character: A cyborged-up street samurai with timber wolf genes to boot!

Marcus "Fenris" Slade:''

Race: Fierce Hybrid (Timber Wolf)
Rank: Novice

Attributes: Agility d6, Smarts d6, Spirit d6, Strength d8, Vigor d6

Skills: Fighting d6, Intimidation d6, Notice d6, Shooting d8, Streetwise d6, Throwing d4, Tracking d6

Charisma: 0; Pace: 6; Parry: 5; Toughness: 8 (2); Firewall: 4; Strain: 3; Street Cred: 2

Hindrances: Code of Honor, Loyal, Vengeful (Minor)

Edges: Chromed, Counterattack, Ex-Soldier

Gear: AGA Thunderbolt (Range 12/24/48, 2d8+1, Shots 11, AP 4, Semi-auto), AS Foley Arms TAW 2022 (Range 25/50/100, 2d8+1, RoF 3, Shots 45, AP 3, 3RB, Auto, see notes), ED Combat Vest (+2, Covers torso), Emergency Support Patch x5, WT Lacerator Knife (Str+d6, AP 2; requires a battery), $33600

Augments: Cyberlimb/Cyber Eyes, 2 Modules (Streetware) (2 Strain; See modules) x2,  Enhanced Vision (Eyes; Halves penalty for Medium and Long Range), Night Vision Optics (Eyes; Gain Low Light Vision monstrous ability), Recoil Compensation (Arm; Removes 2 penalty points from auto-fire), Reflexive Strike Module (Arm/Leg; Gain Counterattack Edge), Smartgun System (Streetware) (1 Strain; Shooting roll Wild Die is a d8 (Extras gain a d4)),

Marcus Slade, grew up in the sprawls of Chicago in the shadow of the corporate metroplexes downtown. While not particularly patriotic or loyal to the Great Lakes Union, he had no love for the racist theocrats of the neighboring North American Coalition (What sane person does?) and joined the  GLU army. Looking for a larger paycheck, and the opportunity to join up with special forces, he opted for transgenic modification. With wolf DNA spliced into his chromosomes he was attached to the 112th Urban Shocktroops (aka "The Berserkers") where he earned the nickname "Fenris." During an assault mission, Slade lost his right arm and both eyes when he was caught by a mortar shell. Patched up with cyber-replacements, Slade was discharged.

Since then, Slade has sold his gun hand to anyone willing to pay. Finding a home in Chicago's Hybrid community, he works as an enforcer for the Vasquez Brothers, a pair of small time hybrid hoods specializing in drugs, gun running, and information brokage that use a huge chunk of their proceeds to protect other hybrids. It was on a run where he met Jasmine "Ixchel" Bravara, a sassy jaguar-hybrid hacker who took an instant shine to the brawny, quiet Slade. The two became fast lovers, using sex to sate their more feral passions. (By the way, only a idiot makes a crack about "dogs and cats sleeping together" in Slade's presence.)

---

All in all, I'm very pleased with the results. I've always had a soft spot in my heart for the cyberpunk genre. Especially in this day and age with its near-ubiquitous computing and multinational corporate control of politics resulting in widespread corruption, environmental destruction, and rapidly growing economic disparity between rich and poor.

(Update: I played around with Heromachine until I got something that looked MUCH cooler