The War In Heaven: The Epic Role Play , the ideas thread.

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Durabys
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The War In Heaven: The Epic Role Play , the ideas thread.

Post by Durabys »

WARNING: This is just an ideas thread where I gather input and ideas from you guys to flesh out a future Council Role Play game. This is not the game thread that I will be making later on.

Guys. I was thinking *yes I know a horrible thing* about an idea for an RP that was buggering me.
The Divergence: In the beginning of the 22nd century the Orgus voted-in a more assertive and anti-isolationist government that not only began to trade with nearly every known race including the Loroi ... but that also in early 2110s found about a massive Umiak military build-up. This government seeing the war coming, having a bad astro-strategic position in regards to the Umiak and knowing that their own expanding industry being only able to slow the Umiaks down if they ever decided to invade, immediately send out secret scout units to find a fall back position for their people ... barreling straight into Humanity in early 2120's.

At first shocked at their apparent similarity to the telepathic Loroi, but later learning that they are just a new emerging specie, decided to help them if only to make them better meat shields for themself. The Orgus made a complete presentation about the Galaxy as they know it and informed the Humans what is happening, that the Umiaks have a rabid hate of telepaths and that their massive war machine will be mostly concentrated on the more advanced and telepathic Loroi ... for the moment.

Still they share with them their fears that the Umiaks will probably attack Humans if they found out about them just for physical similarity they share with the Loroi - something that is highly improbable, which confirms the suspicions of some scholars that Humans/Terrans were manipulated by aliens in their pre-historic past. Also some people will say that Humans are probably telepathic too - if only latently - if we go with legends and myths that is. If the Umiak find out about that - the Human race is toast.

Information about anything related to the scout units and Humanity was compartalized by the Orgus government to an absurdly paranoid degree to prevent the knowledge leaking out. The Orgus population and traders do not know anything at the moment.

Meanwhile, in the highest echelons of the Orgus government, a very furious debate is going on. If the Orgus evacuate their people they will practically become beggars overnight and will need a lot of help to re-industrialize and increase their population to current levels - they will need better protection - so even thicker meat shields. They will need a protector for the time being. In the end a secret Co-Prosperity and Protection treaty is signed with Humanity - that will later bind the traders further to the even more assertive and aggressive Terrans. Orgus shared most of their technology with Humans and their traders will scavenge the markets and known space for information and technology that they will funnel into Orgus and Terran space while Humanity will prepare itself for the coming War In Heaven.

It was then decided to amalgamate Earths governments into a stronger supra-national body that will represent ... not Humans ... but Terrans now as a whole in the galaxy. The Terran Alliance was born.

You, players, are now put into the roles of a 9-member council of directors and decision makers:

Science Councils of the Terran Alliance:
- Director of the Natural Science & Engineering Council,
- Director of the Martial & Physical Council,
- Director of the Humanities & Sociology Council,

Government branches of the Terran Alliance:
- Chairman of the senate, Legislative branch,
- Councilor-Coordinator of the Executive branch,
- High Judge of the Judicial branch,

Chief decision makers of the Terran Alliance:
- Chief of the Admiralty Board,
- Liaison-Director of the Intelligence sector,
- Chief Administrator of the Terran Colonial Administration.

Your mission will be saving the Terran ... ... ... and Orgus races and wither down the oncoming storm.
The year. 2121 Common Era. And the greatest technological, military, industrial, infrastructural and colonization build-up in Terran history has begun.

If this works right for you then you could get close to 40 years to prepare yourself.
So what do you think of this idea? Would it be doable?
Last edited by Durabys on Sun Nov 24, 2013 12:56 am, edited 6 times in total.
Si vis pacem, para bellum. - If you wish for peace, prepare for war.

CptWinters
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Re: The War In Heaven: The Epic Role Play , the ideas thread

Post by CptWinters »

Could be interesting. It's certainly a "what if" question that's been going around the forums for a long time.

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Re: The War In Heaven: The Epic Role Play , the ideas thread

Post by Michael »

i take this will therefore be non-canon since we'll be following a different tract to the story line? ether way, should be interesting, im game :)
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ed_montague
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Re: The War In Heaven: The Epic Role Play , the ideas thread

Post by ed_montague »

Ooh. Dibs on Humanities and Sociology. What's going to happen? How does all this work?
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Re: The War In Heaven: The Epic Role Play , the ideas thread

Post by Durabys »

Uh oh. :shock: This is an ideas thread to flesh out the game. I only came with the basic premise. The rules, laws and ect. will need to be made first. If Arioch would grace us with his presence that would be nice.

Of course. You are free to use my premise to create the game yourself. Just write somewhere that I started and you are golden. :D

UPDATED

Info: Also because of the Orgus previous assertive, pro-active, anti-isolationist policies you now have the technology and the scientific knowledge of what the Terrans had in OTL 2160, due to the Orgus becoming your, uh eh, Client Race, sorta *more like they just want to use you as more effective meat shields ... stupid fools, there is more to the Loroi×Human similarity then the looks in this RP ... to paraphrase Kim Vogel Sawyer: "Looks aren't everything. Looks fade, but character the mind remains.” :twisted:* and shared with you really most of the tech they either developed or cough*stole*cough.

Your ships will evolve over time ...

*currently: OTL 2120's designs >>> OTL 2120's/2130's designs w/mods to increase general capabilities >>> Upgunned&Upgraded 2120's/2130's desings w/Early-Orgus tech >>> Upgraded w/Later-Orgus tech >>> Upgraded&Upgunned w/Latest-Orgus +Early-Terran tech >>> Generation Ia Upgraded w/Later-Terran tech >>> Generation Ib +Full integration of current and future by Orgus stolen alien tech >>> Generation IIa Upgunned&Upgraded w/Latest-Terran tech +Loroi tech >>> Generation IIb +Full integration of Loroi tech >>> Generation IIIa +Umiak tech >>> Generation IIIb +Full integration of Umiak tech >>> Generation IVa +Historian tech >>> Generation IVb +Full integration of Historian tech >>> Generation Va +Soia tech >>> Generation Vb +Full integration of Soia tech >>> Generation VI x+Full integration of all tech into new desing philosophy<=the last two/three won't happen during game time, it is here just here for comparisson, the looks of the ships WILL change: Pre-G1 it is like an evolution until it gets the OTL 2160 look, with a grey/white/red theme; GI-GII it looks sleeker with a light-orange/gold-white/red theme; GIII-GIV it gets the look of the ships in the picture, azure-blue/gold/white theme; GV-GVI it gets much more prolonged and bigger hull, dark-blue/black/gold theme*

... But I can safely say that this will be the final product exiting your shipyards - if you get some good lucky rolls - after the War In Heaven or if you manage to remain hidden until mid 2160's:

Image

This gorgerous picture is a courtesy of Arioch. BBUH.
Last edited by Durabys on Sat Apr 14, 2012 10:19 pm, edited 5 times in total.
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ed_montague
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Re: The War In Heaven: The Epic Role Play , the ideas thread

Post by ed_montague »

Oh, ok. Right then.

It seems to me that even with the Terran/Orgus military cranking out starships for military purposes (very nice picture, by the way, absolutely splendid, Arioch is our god), there'd be some sort of contingency plan in place just in case things go pear-shaped during the upcoming conflict. (Despite everything, the Orgus were still the galactic equivalent of a third-world, second-tier power, and the forces of Humanity aren't exactly the most advanced in the world, even if we might share some latent telepathic traits with our distant Loroi cousins and be awesomely human derp herp.) If I might throw an idea into the mix:

The Terran Alliance (and the Orgus, to some extent) are keenly aware that they might not end the war in a favorable position. (By which I mean ending up as Umiak slaves or getting exterminated.) As a result, a project has been set up to preserve as much of Terran/Orgus culture as possible, just in case. The humans, to the bemusement of the Orgus, have insisted upon naming the project "Noah's Ark," after a minor aspect of their mythology, and have selected certain species of Earth organisms to preserve by sending them/their embryos/their genetic code/whatever along with the "Ark." In addition, there are plans to send actual humans and Orgus into space should the Umiak be in a position to crush the Alliance in order to continue the two species.

Too cliche sci-fi for this? Thoughts/comments?
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Durabys
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Re: The War In Heaven: The Epic Role Play , the ideas thread

Post by Durabys »

ed_montague wrote:Oh, ok. Right then.

It seems to me that even with the Terran/Orgus military cranking out starships for military purposes (very nice picture, by the way, absolutely splendid, Arioch is our god), there'd be some sort of contingency plan in place just in case things go pear-shaped during the upcoming conflict. (Despite everything, the Orgus were still the galactic equivalent of a third-world, second-tier power, and the forces of Humanity aren't exactly the most advanced in the world, even if we might share some latent telepathic traits with our distant Loroi cousins and be awesomely human derp herp.) If I might throw an idea into the mix:

The Terran Alliance (and the Orgus, to some extent) are keenly aware that they might not end the war in a favorable position. (By which I mean ending up as Umiak slaves or getting exterminated.) As a result, a project has been set up to preserve as much of Terran/Orgus culture as possible, just in case. The humans, to the bemusement of the Orgus, have insisted upon naming the project "Noah's Ark," after a minor aspect of their mythology, and have selected certain species of Earth organisms to preserve by sending them/their embryos/their genetic code/whatever along with the "Ark." In addition, there are plans to send actual humans and Orgus into space should the Umiak be in a position to crush the Alliance in order to continue the two species.

Too cliche sci-fi for this? Thoughts/comments?
Sorry, but it will be an STL Arc, with only space for a few thousands so that it has enough space for redundancies and also with a timer for awekening after 100k years.

The Terran Goverment informed the Orgus that they are going "into the eye of the storm" to wither it down. Sorry, no ecapes or backdoors for you. You will have to win this the OLD fashioned "Space Opera-ish" "80's Ham-ish" way. :D But I will say this. If I become GM I am going to give you four bonus slots for beginning. I will roll a 5d10 for these slots and on each side of the dice will be a different bonus - so not dependant on higher dice equals better bonus. No. Oh! As you notice you also will get a fifth but for now hidden bonus that you will reveal later on through R&D.

5 BONUS SLOTS: Game, Councilor, Racial-Mental, Racial-Physical, Racial-Paranormal *hidden*.

I am a Good GM. You can actually win this. It will be hard as hell but it is doable.

I also updated my earlier post with ship tech idea.
Si vis pacem, para bellum. - If you wish for peace, prepare for war.

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junk
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Re: The War In Heaven: The Epic Role Play , the ideas thread

Post by junk »

Sadly for me, the scale of the BW is far too big. I'd prefer something like a human unit a decade or or so after contact and inclusion. (character driven as opposed to faction driven)

So this is a no go from me.

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Re: The War In Heaven: The Epic Role Play , the ideas thread

Post by Halbrogen »

I would be down for it. :)

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Re: The War In Heaven: The Epic Role Play , the ideas thread

Post by Fotiadis_110 »

I admit I like RP in general
But Dislike Politics.

Also: VERY HARD scenarios typically imply 'mess up one move and the entire mission was for naught' scenarios.
I'd pass as well.

Also: the issue with STL vrs FTL

If said society defeats you
you have a very slow ship on a very predictable course which can potentially be intercepted and destroyed....
Otherwise let us presume you travel at .999% of light to help minimise ship travel time (to those on board to help prevent issues from arising)
By the time you hit said light system 100 years from now... you are probably at a star system that would only be a few years travel via outsiderverse FTL anyway.
If i take this one step further and aim for one 1000 ly away
Their EMPIRE may have spread further than the starsystem you were aiming at... or may have imploded completely.
I'd be tempted to send such a 'zoo' on a loop trip back to the human solar system, eta 1000 years or so.
Because life on earth is notoriously difficult to wipe out, and the tendency of life on earth to evolve and use oxygen is something that can't be erased easily either.
They can glass the planet, and you can come back and breath the nice photosynthetic air when you return anyway :P
Last edited by Fotiadis_110 on Sun Apr 15, 2012 8:51 am, edited 1 time in total.

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Re: The War In Heaven: The Epic Role Play , the ideas thread

Post by Durabys »

Fotiadis_110 wrote:I admit I like RP in general
But Dislike Politics.

Also: VERY HARD scenarios typically imply 'mess up one move and the entire mission was for naught' scenarios.
I'd pass as well.
This is an ideas thread. I am just working on things. Help would be appreciated. Also I would be a Good GM which means you would have to mess up BIG TIME to get an utter dissaster from a bad roll. I am not making this game as a form of a Canadian Jokes Humiliation Conga.

UPDATED
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Re: The War In Heaven: The Epic Role Play , the ideas thread

Post by Fotiadis_110 »

in contrast, a family member of mine has done DnD with a number of people... their GM has a tendency to like big dangerous creatures, and to throw only one or two at them at a time.
There is a reason heros find defeating large hoards appropreate rather than dragonslaying...
When Dragonslaying if you make a bad roll, you can easily die...
If you fight a hoard and make a bad roll, you get an arrow in your arm, -1 to hit... wow :p

Lets just say the local preist (aka the DM NPC) routinely called for donations to resurrect the poor heros who fell in the line of duty to protect their humble town...

It was then calculated by my older brother out of curiousity, that in 3 months of heroing they probably cost would the town more than the king received in taxes from the town each year (based on average time to complete quests, average morality rates and the cost of resurrection...) So often did this happen that something amusing occured: He had in fact been a Dragonspawn character, he had tons of fun with it, but apparently a priest failed a listen check and reincarnated him instead, into a weak puny pink human.
Needless to say the character was not impressed (but did gain a bunch of free level upgrades to spend to become more proficent at what he was already good at... how 'convenient')

Needless to say, while HARD may be nearly impossible, being impossible can in fact be fun as well, particularly when the reward for living is high and the penalty for dying is minimised.

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Re: The War In Heaven: The Epic Role Play , the ideas thread

Post by Durabys »

Fotiadis_110 wrote:in contrast, a family member of mine has done DnD with a number of people... their GM has a tendency to like big dangerous creatures, and to throw only one or two at them at a time.
There is a reason heros find defeating large hoards appropreate rather than dragonslaying...
When Dragonslaying if you make a bad roll, you can easily die...
If you fight a hoard and make a bad roll, you get an arrow in your arm, -1 to hit... wow :p

Lets just say the local preist (aka the DM NPC) routinely called for donations to resurrect the poor heros who fell in the line of duty to protect their humble town...

It was then calculated by my older brother out of curiousity, that in 3 months of heroing they probably cost would the town more than the king received in taxes from the town each year (based on average time to complete quests, average morality rates and the cost of resurrection...) So often did this happen that something amusing occured: He had in fact been a Dragonspawn character, he had tons of fun with it, but apparently a priest failed a listen check and reincarnated him instead, into a weak puny pink human.
Needless to say the character was not impressed (but did gain a bunch of free level upgrades to spend to become more proficent at what he was already good at... how 'convenient')

Needless to say, while HARD may be nearly impossible, being impossible can in fact be fun as well, particularly when the reward for living is high and the penalty for dying is minimised.
And that is why the D&D crowd came with things like:

■ Here's a fun trick - slap a Portable Hole onto something living, like a dragon... horrors of falling entrails aside, then throw in said Bag of Holding. Can you say, "divided by zero?"

■ If a bag of holding is placed within a portable hole, a rift to the Astral Plane is torn in that place; both the bag and the cloth are sucked into the void and forever lost. If a portable hole is placed within a bag of holding, it opens a gate to the Astral Plane; the hole, the bag, and any creatures within a 10-foot radius are drawn there, the portable hole and bag of holding being destroyed in the process.

■ An alternative version of the portable hole has been changed in the latest edition. It's a five-foot circle of fabric that, when you place it against a flat surface, it instantly makes a five-foot deep hole through that surface. (This means that if it's less than 5' thick, it's open on the other end.) Anyone can grab an edge (from either side, if it's open on both) and pull it off, as long as the hole is empty at the time. It's no longer an infinite-storage item, now you can pull stunts that would make Wile E. Coyote proud.

... or ...

You can also reach godhood in one of the versions of the game with a lvl 1 Gnome character. Can someone say "Infinite Experience Gained". :lol:

Also, you don't know how a Good GM's works e.g. on spacebattles.com forums.
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Re: The War In Heaven: The Epic Role Play , the ideas thread

Post by junk »

Aren't good DM's on spacebattle's about how quickly they can kill the PC's without making it too obvious? :P

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Re: The War In Heaven: The Epic Role Play , the ideas thread

Post by Durabys »

junk wrote:Aren't good DM's on spacebattle's about how quickly they can kill the PC's without making it too obvious? :P
Of course if you are so adamant about me having to be a total a**hole GM then I can be, no problem. :twisted:
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Re: The War In Heaven: The Epic Role Play , the ideas thread

Post by junk »

Durabys wrote:
junk wrote:Aren't good DM's on spacebattle's about how quickly they can kill the PC's without making it too obvious? :P
Of course if you are so adamant about me having to be a total a**hole GM then I can be, no problem. :twisted:
Not adamant :P
I've just heard enough horror stories of bring four spare character sheets :P

But yeah, while I do honestly like an RP I don't like the scale of this one. So count me for the sidelines at best.

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Re: The War In Heaven: The Epic Role Play , the ideas thread

Post by Iskander »

This sounds good enough that I decided to register. I'll probably end up regretting this (I'm going to be busy enough as it is for the next month or so) but count me in. That natural sciences/engineering post sounds good. If we have to be characters in addition to portfolio-holders, I think I already have something in mind.

By the way, how fleshed-out are the rules this thing will run according to be? Is it going to be pretty structured (i.e. regular turn structure, etc.) or will it be fairly loose, with just a few ad hoc dice rolls? Will there be a strategy-game style map?

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Re: The War In Heaven: The Epic Role Play , the ideas thread

Post by Durabys »

Iskander wrote:This sounds good enough that I decided to register. I'll probably end up regretting this (I'm going to be busy enough as it is for the next month or so) but count me in. That natural sciences/engineering post sounds good. If we have to be characters in addition to portfolio-holders, I think I already have something in mind.

By the way, how fleshed-out are the rules this thing will run according to be? Is it going to be pretty structured (i.e. regular turn structure, etc.) or will it be fairly loose, with just a few ad hoc dice rolls? Will there be a strategy-game style map?
*groans*

Did actually anyone of you read the title of this thread to its end - "ideas thread" - which means I am just fleshing things out and need input from you.
Si vis pacem, para bellum. - If you wish for peace, prepare for war.

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Re: The War In Heaven: The Epic Role Play , the ideas thread

Post by Iskander »

Durabys wrote:
*groans*

Did actually anyone of you read the title of this thread to its end - "ideas thread" - which means I am just fleshing things out and need input from you.
Yeah, I realized shortly after, heh.

Well - I guess you're going to have to model several different aspects of the Terran polity. The economic model can be fairly simple. I think you'd need to represent GDP somehow, and also industrial capacity, the way some of Paradox's games do it. I'm not sure if they'd even necessarily be separate, but there would be other sectors of the economy besides what IC would represent, and they'd all be a source of revenue. All of this is going to be funded by taxpayer money, right? The simplest thing would be for 1 IC to equal 1 IC, whether it was Loroi, Umiak or Terran. You'd commit so much IC to a certain purpose for however long and get whatever out - basically, IC would produce points you could accumulate to buy things. But technological advancement would make new purchases possible and make IC cheaper.

Possibly IC might require inputs - energy and raw materials and labor. Could we look at having a workforce, in abstract terms, anyway?

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Re: The War In Heaven: The Epic Role Play , the ideas thread

Post by junk »

Iskander wrote:
Durabys wrote:
*groans*

Did actually anyone of you read the title of this thread to its end - "ideas thread" - which means I am just fleshing things out and need input from you.
Yeah, I realized shortly after, heh.

Well - I guess you're going to have to model several different aspects of the Terran polity. The economic model can be fairly simple. I think you'd need to represent GDP somehow, and also industrial capacity, the way some of Paradox's games do it. I'm not sure if they'd even necessarily be separate, but there would be other sectors of the economy besides what IC would represent, and they'd all be a source of revenue. All of this is going to be funded by taxpayer money, right? The simplest thing would be for 1 IC to equal 1 IC, whether it was Loroi, Umiak or Terran. You'd commit so much IC to a certain purpose for however long and get whatever out - basically, IC would produce points you could accumulate to buy things. But technological advancement would make new purchases possible and make IC cheaper.

Possibly IC might require inputs - energy and raw materials and labor. Could we look at having a workforce, in abstract terms, anyway?

I'd personally go with an even simpler model.

MIlitary output/military output effectivity.

The first being your total military economic output and the second being how much of your actual infrastructure is geared toward military output.
a MOE of .2 would mean that only twenty percent of your industrial base is putting forward military ouput. Can simulate fairly simple the war gear up that's been pretty common in all our larger wars. Where in the end a lot of industry gets retooled to actual military output. Probably an aspect we'd excell at compared to other species.

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