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Announcing a New Game Series: Sentinels of the SCUverse

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Announcing a New Game Series: Sentinels of the SCUverse

For those looking to play by forum, we have the "Episode X" series of bog-standard (except for the occasional houseruled villain) SOTM games, and there's the "Shattered Storyline", which is heavy on special scenario rules.  Now, I would like to present a Third Option.  I will facilitate these games, which are almost, but not quite, run in the usual fashion.  They will start out very much like the SOTM you know, but over time, they will develop their own continuity and become something akin to a simulation of the entire comic 'verse, with all heroes playing out their own adventures more or less simultaneously.

The conceit behind this series of games is that Sentinels is becoming a series of movies, akin to the Marvel Cinematic Universe (hence the title, replacing Marvel comics with Sentinel comics).  We will start with the Freedom Five, as Marvel all but started with The Avengers; we're pretending that they each already had their own solo movie (except probably Absolute Zero, he can be the Hawkeye of the franchise, having had a cameo in Tachyon but not really appearing until now), and now this is their chance at the big time.  As soon as the box-office results come in, a sequel is greenlit, and then another and another, as long as audiences keep showing up (ie as long as we still have players for these games).  Over time, the Cinematic Universe expands to include Ra and the Prime Wardens and Scholar, then the Dark Watch, the three time-travelers, the Vengeance heroes and any concurrent mini-expansions, and whatever comes in the last two expansions.  But at every step of the process, the studio is involved in the process, retiring unpopular characters and introducing new elements in order to generate "buzz", seeking to maximize their proceeds from this lucrative franchise.

The following special rules apply to each game in the SCUverse:

* Movies may be many things, but they are NOT random; every aspect of the story, setting, character appearance and so forth is meticulously scripted, minutely scrutinized, focus-tested ad nauseum, and otherwise sculpted to what the studio hopes will be an irresistable masterpiece, which everyone and their cousin will watch in 3D theaters four times before buying the Blu-Ray.  As a result, players start the game by drawing SIX cards, then put two of these on the bottom of their deck.  Whenever a hero would draw a card, they instead draw two cards and put one on the bottom, repeating this process if they draw more than one card.  Players are fully encouraged to record the order of these "archived" cards...the decks are not shuffled between games!  (The longer a franchise runs, the more it begins to repeat itself, and eventually it embraces its predictability in the name of fan service.)  Any cards that were revealed during the previous game (hand, play and trash) are shuffled together, then placed at the bottom of the remaining cards in the deck, forming the deck for the next game.  But beware, heroes!  The "scriptwriter" isn't only making sure you get all your coolest toys!  Whenever a villain or environment card would be played, the facilitator chooses between the top two cards of the appropriate deck, playing one and putting the other on the bottom.  Thusly, both heroes and villain are bringing their "a game".

* The facilitator makes choices for the villain and environment whenever there is more than one valid target.  Thusly, if an Automaton Drone blasts the highest-HP hero and there's a tie, I pick who gets shot, not the heroes.  Combined with the choose-between-two-plays, this will make all villains significantly tougher...as a result, matches default to being non-Advanced at first.

* Because it is all but unheard-of for a superhero movie to end with the villain triumphant, the last hero left standing in a game cannot be incapacitated.  If reduced to 0 HP, that hero is restored to their maximum HP and continues playing.  However, this represents the movie ending with what audiences will criticize as a "lame deus ex machina", and the character becomes unpopular as a result; they are therefore written out of the sequel.  Any character who has received an "extra life" in this fashion is dropped from the next game in the series.  Thusly, the next game will be played with 4 heroes, and then 3.  Conversely, if exactly one hero is incapacitated during the game, that hero is also dropped; they suffered a Comic Book Death for Rule of Drama and the studio is pretending that they're actually dead, though it fully intends to bring them back in a future movie.

* Characters dropped from games as described above are placed on "the bench".  At the same time, for each game in the series, one not-yet-available hero is placed on the bench.  This shall follow the sequence alluded to above, though I may insert promo characters at points yet to be determined.  Whenever at least X heroes are on "the bench" at once, where X is 8 minus the number of heroes active in the current game, a new game is slotted for all of the benched heroes.  Thusly, if Bunker is dropped after the first game (representing the movie "The Freedom Five"), he joins Ra on the bench.  If the second game ("Freedom Five 2") sees no heroes defeated, Tempest appears on the bench as well.  When Legacy is defeated in game 3 (completing the trilogy), he also goes onto the bench, along with Haka.  Before the FV are played again, we get a new game in which Bunker, Legacy, Ra, and the two Prime Wardens-to-be fight some new threat together.  Once multiple hero groups are active, they take turns playing games.  Any hero who has been benched and then returned to play shuffles his deck before entering the new game.

* In all cases, it is not necessary for the same player to play a hero from one game to the next.  When a new player assumes control of a hero, shuffle that hero's deck.  Thusly, if you keep playing the same hero, you draw cards you haven't seen before (and, assuming your deck doesn't do any fetching, you'll eventually be able to predict all your draws based on the cards you previously bottomed).  But if you take over a hero from someone else, you start fresh.  (This whole don't-shuffle rule is the most experimental and potentially-broken part of this scenario, and I'm open to reconsidering it.)

Our first matchup is the Freedom Five vs. Omnitron (not Advanced) in Megalopolis.  It will probably be a cakewalk, I know, but it'll give us the chance to get used to the houserule.

EDIT:  I have loosened my rules out of general laziness; players now opt whether or not to leave their decks unshuffled between games, and I'm opening up a second game even though we haven't "benched" any heroes yet.  Additionally, a new adjustment is made to the don't-shuffle rule within games:  If you play a card which would shuffle your deck, leave any "bottomed" cards in their current position, and shuffle only the cards whose order remains unknown.  Cards which are in either the ordered or random parts of your deck are equally accessible during deck-searching, but all determined card positions, other than those of cards removed from the deck, must remain unchanged.  (Example:  Wraith starts the game by placing Mega Computer and Inventory Barrage on the bottom of her deck.  She plays Trust Fund on her turn, drawing a total of five cards on that turn and bottoming five others, which we'll say are four Grappling Hooks and a second Trust Fund.  She is then very abruptly incapacitated.  At the start of the next game, she shuffles her hand and trash, a total of nine cards including one Trust Fund, and puts them on the bottom of her deck, then draws her new hand of six cards, bottoming Stun Bolt and IREP.  When she plays Impromptu Invention on her first turn, she first draws two cards, one of which is another Mega Computer which she bottoms, and then searches her deck for some Throwing Knives.  Before searching, her deck consists of the following cards, aside from the four in her hand and the Impromptu Invention in play:  17x random, Mega Computer, Inventory Barrage, Grappling Hook x4, Trust Fund, 9x random, Stun Bolt, IREP.  She may search either the top 17 cards or the near-bottom 9 for her Throwing Knives, but must shuffle either pile after searching it, and the other pile if she saw any of it while sifting through the deck, and the end result must still have two piles totaling 26 random cards, either 16 and 9 or 17 and 8, separated by Mega Computer, Inventory Barrage, all the Grappling Hooks and a Trust Fund, and with Stun Bolt and IREP on the bottom.)  The facilitator is free to decide, on a case-by-case basis, whether or not this rule applies to the villain and environment decks.  I have also edited the above with a new clarification about decks which are left unshuffled between games, in red text.  In theory, I should be strictly applying these randomization rules in order to enforce the milieu, but in practice I lack the ambition to do so...if you decide you'd rather just shuffle your entire deck, I probably won't have the energy to call you on it (and even if you do, my ability to punish you for breaking the rules is limited to a mildly disdainful attitude and refusal to include you in future games of the series).


"Is there beauty in a forest, if no creature stops and calls it lovely, now and then? Isn't that what 'sapience' is for?"
--David Brin, "Brightness Reef"

dpt
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Interesting! What happens when cards are revealed? (I.e., how do Oblivion or Arcane Cadence work?)

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There are no changes to those cards, other than the potential to use them to somewhat greater effect if you can get through your whole deck.  (Of course, Argent and Nightmist are some ways off in the sequence I set up.)  Yes this comparatively "nerfs" Cadence and other not-draw effects a bit; an acceptible loss.


"Is there beauty in a forest, if no creature stops and calls it lovely, now and then? Isn't that what 'sapience' is for?"
--David Brin, "Brightness Reef"

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I'm in, though I might be sporadic in posting during the break. After Monday, I should at least be able to manage nightly.

I currently have core + Unity (who should get added in early in the process, IMO), and hope to get at least some others as presents.

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Unity is definitely an early add because of Freedom Six.  This is also why Tempest is the first Prime Warden to join (while Argent is the last since he's non-core; I haven't entirely decided whether Haka or Fanatic joins first).

So who else is on board for Freedom Five vs. Omnitron in Megalopolis?  I know most players have probably had this match, possibly several times, but I think it's an important starting point to get used to the de-randomization mechanic.  There will be room for more players in later matches.


"Is there beauty in a forest, if no creature stops and calls it lovely, now and then? Isn't that what 'sapience' is for?"
--David Brin, "Brightness Reef"

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I'll give it a shot!

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We're more or less saving a slot for Meerkat (though I'm concerned that he seems to post a bit less often than others, hopefully the game doesn't get derailed by his absence), so we need about two more to get started.


"Is there beauty in a forest, if no creature stops and calls it lovely, now and then? Isn't that what 'sapience' is for?"
--David Brin, "Brightness Reef"

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I am most definitely in :D


“You gotta have blue hair."
-Reckless

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2 slots open!  By way of incentivizing people to join, people will get to choose which hero (out of the Freedom Five) to play in reverse order of their posting in this thread.


"Is there beauty in a forest, if no creature stops and calls it lovely, now and then? Isn't that what 'sapience' is for?"
--David Brin, "Brightness Reef"

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I'm interested. Don't know if I can though, since I'm travelling over Christmas/New Year.


I don't know what makes me different and I don't care. Maybe it's not my problem, but why do they stare? - The Living End, Strange

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If you have to miss Round 1, such is life.  We'll have plenty of room once the additional games get rolling (eventually, we could accomodate 18-24 players, though I doubt I'll be up to that anytime soon).


"Is there beauty in a forest, if no creature stops and calls it lovely, now and then? Isn't that what 'sapience' is for?"
--David Brin, "Brightness Reef"

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I know I'm second-to-last (or maybe last), but I'd kind of prefer to take AZ or Bunker from the Freedom 5. I can play any of them competently, though. (From the core set, Visionary/Haka/Fanatic are the ones I feel like I have trouble making effective.)

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@jffdougan, Envisioner specified REVERSE order. So the next person to speak up will get their first choice, and you're guaranteed of either AZ or Bunker. EDIT: Oops, I didn't notice you were the first to speak up.

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Two questions:

Is there still a trash, and how will the trash work with the deck not being shuffled between games?

Do heroes heal fully between fights?

I'll sit out this round, since there are 5, and I've been in most of them.

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I'll give this a shot.  Home for the holiday season and should have time.

Not picky about hero, so I'll take a left over (so to speak).

 

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dpt: I know I was the first to speak up, and think that makes me the second player. However, I was making a wish known for those who (like Oaktree) didn't have a preference.

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Hm.  I hadn't decided about hero order...think I'll probably do that random.  It'd be more cinematic to have the order vary between rounds, but I don't think the game rules could handle that, and certainly it would be too much work.

And yeah, the trash...that's a sticky question.  I might have to abandon the idea of not shuffling.  Starting with cards in the trash is probably not right.  Maybe shuffle the trash and put it on the bottom?  That injects some randomness back into the game, while still allowing for long-term Chekhov's Guns to be set up between games, which was part of the idea behind the unshuffledness.

So I believe we have one spot open, unless ThetaSigma wants to get in despite her/his travel issues?


"Is there beauty in a forest, if no creature stops and calls it lovely, now and then? Isn't that what 'sapience' is for?"
--David Brin, "Brightness Reef"

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Ok I can do it if that works.

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I'll wait for a later round, I think.


I don't know what makes me different and I don't care. Maybe it's not my problem, but why do they stare? - The Living End, Strange

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phantaskippy wrote:
I'll sit out this round, since there are 5, and I've been in most of them.

I don't understand this sentence.


"Is there beauty in a forest, if no creature stops and calls it lovely, now and then? Isn't that what 'sapience' is for?"
--David Brin, "Brightness Reef"

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There were six people interested in playing (thought T/S was in) and since I am in most of the forum games I volunteered to sit out.

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phantaskippy wrote:
There were six people interested in playing (thought T/S was in) and since I am in most of the forum games I volunteered to sit out.
But you are in now, correct? I think you're up first for choosing a hero, if so.
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I'll take Bunker, but I don't really care, I'll run anyone.

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The game thread will be here; I was starting to set up turn 1, but then I realized that with the heroes having choices in their opening hand, I need to not reveal Omnitron's card plays until after the hands have been posted.  So I need everyone to select their hero - I had said that the last in could be the first out, but at this point I don't want to wait for anyone, so just grab whoever's left as soon as you can post - and create your opening hand, then we can get started.  With the Shattered Storyline on hold, I figure now is the perfect time to get this ball rolling.

Remember also that the two cards you don't select from your opening hand, and each card that you don't select when drawing a card, should be tracked in a "Deck" field.  (Use a "?" to represent the still-shuffled part of your deck; eventually when someone's playing Visionary or fighting Kismet, you'll be able to learn topdeck as well as bottom-deck cards and can list those in front of the "?".)  If you play the same hero for two games in a row, we will try the "don't shuffle between games" thing, with your trash from game 1 being stacked on the bottom of your deck in the order of your choice.  If this proves to break the game in half, it can be dropped eventually...about that time we'll be bringing in more characters, so normalizing the game will make up for the restricted character selection being improved.


"Is there beauty in a forest, if no creature stops and calls it lovely, now and then? Isn't that what 'sapience' is for?"
--David Brin, "Brightness Reef"

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Ready to start round 2 yet? I have thoughts about appropriate villain/environment combos if you need them. :)

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Question: Is one game only 1 movie?

Also, I'd be up for a game, but I don't have too much time.


"72% of all statistics are made up"
-XXVZ

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jffdougan wrote:

Ready to start round 2 yet? I have thoughts about appropriate villain/environment combos if you need them. :)

RL is busy, so it's probably not starting until this weekend.  I also have such thoughts, but wouldn't mind hearing yours.

XXVZ wrote:

Question: Is one game only 1 movie?Also, I'd be up for a game, but I don't have too much time.

I would like it if we could change out players periodically, but it carries the consequence of shuffling the hero's deck, whereas the same player can resume a role and have their deck partially stacked.  (Not too useful for Wraith, since I hadn't instituted a fix to her deck-shuffling...if we are to rotate a new player in, she'd be the best one to change out.)  Yes, my thought is that each game is a separate movie.  (Probably not exactly the movie we played out in our game...I'd want to do a bit of a rewrite on the exact events, as they didn't have a great narrative flow, what with not having been fully planned out in advance.  Doing that would obviously have made for a terrible game, but not doing it made for a pretty bad script...I could keep some of the little moments we had, but they'd need to be restructured considerably.)


"Is there beauty in a forest, if no creature stops and calls it lovely, now and then? Isn't that what 'sapience' is for?"
--David Brin, "Brightness Reef"

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My thoughts about bench characters are to make some combnation of Ra, Haka, and Unity the next three on the bench. Sticking with the core set for now, I'd use Baron Blade as the next villain in the Ruins of Atlantis and then bring in Cosmitron in one of the next two games after that.

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Envisioner wrote:

 

jffdougan wrote:
Ready to start round 2 yet? I have thoughts about appropriate villain/environment combos if you need them. :)

 

RL is busy, so it's probably not starting until this weekend.  I also have such thoughts, but wouldn't mind hearing yours.

XXVZ wrote:
Question: Is one game only 1 movie?Also, I'd be up for a game, but I don't have too much time.

 

I would like it if we could change out players periodically, but it carries the consequence of shuffling the hero's deck, whereas the same player can resume a role and have their deck partially stacked.  (Not too useful for Wraith, since I hadn't instituted a fix to her deck-shuffling...if we are to rotate a new player in, she'd be the best one to change out.)  Yes, my thought is that each game is a separate movie.  (Probably not exactly the movie we played out in our game...I'd want to do a bit of a rewrite on the exact events, as they didn't have a great narrative flow, what with not having been fully planned out in advance.  Doing that would obviously have made for a terrible game, but not doing it made for a pretty bad script...I could keep some of the little moments we had, but they'd need to be restructured considerably.)

 

Should not be too hard to re-constitute a player's deck from the last turn of the previous game - they generally had a track of what the in-hand, bottom cards, in-play cards, trash, etc. were for each player.  For the (?) cards they are supposedly in an unknown/random state and those being shuffled by a new player shouldn't really be an issue since in the abstract their order was not known anyways.

Was there a ruling or suggestion for how the end-of-game trash, in-play, and hand would be put onto/into the deck for starting the new game?

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jffdougan wrote:

My thoughts about bench characters are to make some combnation of Ra, Haka, and Unity the next three on the bench.

Prime Wardens first (possibly excluding Argent Adept), then Visionary and Ra in some order, and then Unity.

Quote:
Sticking with the core set for now, I'd use Baron Blade as the next villain in the Ruins of Atlantis

Ennh....not feeling it.  Blade is kind of a tool, I want to think more about how to make him interesting.

Quote:
and then bring in Cosmitron in one of the next two games after that.

Not happening.  I want to put off repeat villain matches for a good bit (probably not the full 18/19 games, but at least several), and the next match vs. Omnitron will be regular Omnitron on Advanced.  Only then will he get the Cosmic upgrade.


"Is there beauty in a forest, if no creature stops and calls it lovely, now and then? Isn't that what 'sapience' is for?"
--David Brin, "Brightness Reef"

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Envisioner wrote:

 

jffdougan wrote:
My thoughts about bench characters are to make some combnation of Ra, Haka, and Unity the next three on the bench.

 

Prime Wardens first (possibly excluding Argent Adept), then Visionary and Ra in some order, and then Unity.

Quote:
Sticking with the core set for now, I'd use Baron Blade as the next villain in the Ruins of Atlantis

 

Ennh....not feeling it.  Blade is kind of a tool, I want to think more about how to make him interesting.

Quote:
and then bring in Cosmitron in one of the next two games after that.

 

Not happening.  I want to put off repeat villain matches for a good bit (probably not the full 18/19 games, but at least several), and the next match vs. Omnitron will be regular Omnitron on Advanced.  Only then will he get the Cosmic upgrade.

that's cool, too. Your movies, your scripts. I was thinking of the way that Harry Osborne came back as the Green Goblin in Spidey 3.

If you're willing to branch out beyond the core set, especially if you're bringing in Prime Wardens, then I'd probably go with (Advanced) Ambuscade in Insula Primalis. Ambuscade in Insula is one of my go-to combinations for teaching new people the game now.

Off this topic: The Grasshopper (age 8) and I played two games yesterday morning, getting CRUSHED by Akash'bhuta in the Tomb of Anubis and then having a tough-but-fair fight against Ambuscade in the Final Wasteland. It's the first time I've ever seen Ambuscade's traps go off, and he set two of them off in a single turn.

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Baron Blade and Ambuscade would both gain a lot from this style.  Esp. if you used the traps play a card rule, revealing two each turn would bring them up much faster, and make his play the top card engine way more powerful and frequent.

With 6 of his cards being Quick Stim/Run&Gun/Armed&Dangerous, and another 4 being traps that is 10 cards out of 25 that would play the next card of the deck.  That gives you a 65% chance of hitting one first turn or after a re-shuffle.

When you are burning 2 cards each time that plays wicked fast.  Plus with how much he shuffles the trash into the deck you wouldn't even have to be concerned about stashing some of them, since the ones that get trashed will get shuffled back in.  It might make Ambuscade fun.

 

The Baron would give you a better chance of hitting his actually good cards, but he still might need more help to be threatening, mostly on his second side, because you don't want him winning on his first side, that isn't how these things go.

(You could have the end of turn card discard start high and taper down to represent the countdown timing used in films where you can't do more than walk up a flight of stairs in 8 minutes if there are 15 left on the timer, but can drive across town, discuss the nature of the universe, cure cancer, take an online bomb defusing course and make up with your ex in the last 30 seconds before cutting the wire and saving the day with one second left.

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Thinking about the next match, I'm finding that my favorite candidate is actually The Matriarch, but with a twist.  I don't like the idea of most of the major villains coming onstage before their hero nemeses do (I'll likely make a few exceptions for ones where the rivalry isn't especially personal), so with Vengeance not quite here yet, I'm limited to the enemies of the F5, and Bunker and AZ don't have any.  Wanting to save Baron Blade just a bit longer, that leaves Matty or Spite, and aside from the fact that Spite isn't precisely second-movie material, we just got done with him in the Episodes and I'm sick of his stupid face.  But even given that the heroes can't really lose, Matty is way too hard for a fight this early, still using an experimental houserule (one which goes exceedingly pear-shaped with her; I may simply decide to not have her use it, which will give you guys a bit of an edge against her).  But what I'm really thinking is, she's not really villainous so much as misguided, and so in the first part of the "movie", I'm thinking she's not Matriarch yet, just Tachyon's annoying brat cousin Lilian, who's tagging along while you fight some B-threat.

So here's my idea, although I don't feel I have it fully cooked as yet.  So far I'm just brainstorming, but tell me what you think of this.  We'll go with one of the more dangerous Environments, not quite Rook City or Time Cataclysm but something close to that, and the first turn of the game will be an Environment turn, while Villain turns will happen at the end of each round.  Until some goal has been achieved, Lilian is not a target, does not have the Mask of the Matriarch in play, and can only play a single Fowl card per turn, none of which affect the heroes.  At some point when the heroes are done fighting the dinosaurs or the kraken or whatever, Lilian wanders away from the heroes and finds the Mask, at which point the Fowl who've been milling around harmlessly in the sky suddenly attack at her direction.  At that point, Matty is fully in play and the game proceeds normally.

jffdougan wrote:
that's cool, too. Your movies, your scripts. I was thinking of the way that Harry Osborne came back as the Green Goblin in Spidey 3.

Yeah, the Raimi Spider-Mans are not what I consider a standard of writing to emulate.

phantaskippy wrote:
(You could have the end of turn card discard start high and taper down to represent the countdown timing used in films where you can't do more than walk up a flight of stairs in 8 minutes if there are 15 left on the timer, but can drive across town, discuss the nature of the universe, cure cancer, take an online bomb defusing course and make up with your ex in the last 30 seconds before cutting the wire and saving the day with one second left.

Again, this is not a trope I strive to uphold.  I prefer to deconstruct, lampshade, or otherwise deal with the cliches that are least overtly stupid, and the rest I try to throw out altogether.  (I actually think it'd be neat to do a movie where there are maps and chronometers and stuff in the margins to give you a better factual sense of where everyone is, and avoid the ability for the writer to play fast and loose with the reality of the setting.)


"Is there beauty in a forest, if no creature stops and calls it lovely, now and then? Isn't that what 'sapience' is for?"
--David Brin, "Brightness Reef"

Oaktree
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Or simply have people looking at clocks every now and then like in High Noon.

jffdougan
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A fitting environment for what you describe is probably the Tomb of Anubis, which lets you put Ra onto the bench (I know he's not a Prime Warden, but I think he gets mentioned on some of the environment cards). When the heroes first recover a relic, the Mask of the Matriarch comes into play.

 

How's that?

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Thought about that, and I may decide to go that route, but I kinda feel as though Ra ought to be in the game before Anubis is, although I'm less committed there than I am with the Ennead.  I'll keep thinking it over a bit more.


"Is there beauty in a forest, if no creature stops and calls it lovely, now and then? Isn't that what 'sapience' is for?"
--David Brin, "Brightness Reef"

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Well the Ennead starts out attacking cities, the tomb of anubis would be more fitting as an end to that series.

With as easy as the first fight ended up I'd say it was a proper first movie, they all come together despite their different backgrounds and all that drama, and go save the day.

Now the second fight we need to kill someone.

Could do Voss with an added rule that the last non-voss villain target is indestructible and immune to damage.  That would up his deadliness a good bit.  Would also need to flip with that one in play.

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This looks like an interesting...thing!

 

I would be interested in joining in a game of this...if you guys would be willing to take me.  I am not super familiar with all of the perceptions of each hero's personality, though I do have some idea (I've played the game, after all).  I am pretty good at role playing, writing the flavor text, etc, though, and I'm all right at playing the game too. 

 

I read through the first one you guys did, it looks like fun!

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I'd also be up for joining a game.


"72% of all statistics are made up"
-XXVZ

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Well, the plan was that there would need to be at least one more F5 game before we expanded the series, but maybe I should just say "screw it" and start two new games in tandem so that everyone can play.  i wasn't really feeling the "don't shuffle your deck between games" rule anyway.

Anyway, one of our games is definitely F5 vs. the Matriarch, and I'm strongly leaning toward Insula Primalis as the Environment.  Last chance to argue the point....


"Is there beauty in a forest, if no creature stops and calls it lovely, now and then? Isn't that what 'sapience' is for?"
--David Brin, "Brightness Reef"

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Dinosaurs. That's me not arguing the point.


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-Reckless

legionbrony
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Personally I don't mind one way or another.  The only thing I have to add is if I am in a fight against any villain from infernal relics or rook city, I might need a bit of help, because I don't own those expansions (I know, I know), so I can't just look up the card descriptions.  I have fought most of them before, so I'll have some idea of what I'm doing, but Matriarch would not happen to be one of those I have fought.

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Envisioner wrote:

Well, the plan was that there would need to be at least one more F5 game before we expanded the series, but maybe I should just say "screw it" and start two new games in tandem so that everyone can play.  i wasn't really feeling the "don't shuffle your deck between games" rule anyway.Anyway, one of our games is definitely F5 vs. the Matriarch, and I'm strongly leaning toward Insula Primalis as the Environment.  Last chance to argue the point....

Considering Marvel Cinematic Universe as an example, I think you could get away with this. We've had Iron Man off w/ non-Avengers characters in IM3, while Black Widow is heading off withi Cap in the upcoming Winter Soldier.

I might, though, split the F5 against Matty if that's the route you take.

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Birds evolved from dinosaurs.  Might have some inferiority complexes going on there.

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Right, Insula it is.  Will get the game set up probably on Sunday, I think I'm off to an all-day gameathon tomorrow.

Brony, let's figure on you being in Group 2, who I'll try to get started not too much later.  Will have to see who exactly is on hand for that one, might be starting with just three heroes, and the choice of heroes will influence the choice of villain.


"Is there beauty in a forest, if no creature stops and calls it lovely, now and then? Isn't that what 'sapience' is for?"
--David Brin, "Brightness Reef"

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I should be about.  Not many plans for tomorrow beyond paying partial attention to the Superb Owl once it actually gets underway.

Is your intention to match up the same players with the same heroes as Round 1?  Or switch things up a little regarding that as well?

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I have 1st edition so I'll probably want to play a RC/ST/IR hero in one of the later "movies" (Dark Watch maybe?)


"72% of all statistics are made up"
-XXVZ

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If you don't own Enhanced Edition then please be sure you follow all errata in the game, as you'll be expected to conform to the version that I'm using.  (Not that I would be terribly likely to notice if you played something differently, but I would be firmly un-amused if it did happen.)

Oaktree wrote:
I should be about.  Not many plans for tomorrow beyond paying partial attention to the Superb Owl once it actually gets underway.Is your intention to match up the same players with the same heroes as Round 1?  Or switch things up a little regarding that as well?

Player's choice.


"Is there beauty in a forest, if no creature stops and calls it lovely, now and then? Isn't that what 'sapience' is for?"
--David Brin, "Brightness Reef"

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I'd still rather just use an expansion hero so I won't have to question everything


"72% of all statistics are made up"
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This is why I'm thinking you should not be in the Matriarch / Insula game (which is after all an experiment) and should just play in game 2, which will use Haka, Tempest and probably Fanatic (you could probably persuade me to replace her with Ra).


"Is there beauty in a forest, if no creature stops and calls it lovely, now and then? Isn't that what 'sapience' is for?"
--David Brin, "Brightness Reef"

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A tentative plan is coming together.  I was originally going to have Haka, Tempest and others gradually introduced in the course of F5 games, but instead I guess I'll assume that they got their own origin story movies.  So, if you are NOT playing in the current SCUverse game, pick either Haka, Tempest or Fanatic as your character.  We will be using the Time Cataclysm as a stand-in for a "generic" Environment (I've never really felt that it properly reflects the setting, so when I want to really set a game in the TC, I'll do something much fancier), but I still have to pick a Villain that I like for the purpose.  I really wish there was an official "mooks" deck that I could use, other than the Chairman...instead I'll probably use Kismet just because she's kinda wimpy, but I'm not married to the idea as yet.


"Is there beauty in a forest, if no creature stops and calls it lovely, now and then? Isn't that what 'sapience' is for?"
--David Brin, "Brightness Reef"

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