Aersalus Season 1, Session 3

 

The Cast of B-Team (Aersalus)

Listens to Ocean aka Osprey (Rory) Halfling Magistrate, mage, healer, priest, historian.

Rhum Kaldalsson (Curtis) Minotaur artist.

Trapper (Chris D) Gremian, artificer, hunter, Armsmaster.

Unit 7 (Brice) A Cog, magical construct golem.

In Memorium Christian

NPC's

Altan ru Chuulaii the tax collector

Wolftrap, Day 3 and 4

We continue to wander around fixing what is needed and seeing to supplies.

Listens heads to the cliffs, finding a good place for his morning meditations. Its high up, about a 100 yards above the water, he considers jumping but decides its too risky, it would likely not kill him but would be embarrassing and a waste of resources as he heals himself. Still he considers it a minor goal to work towards if this becomes main base.

He spends the predawn and after dawn time listening to the spirits, they are definitely around but seem very quiet for some reason. He also looks for the waterfolk, though its far too early for them to arrive if they choose to act on the captains message.

After awhile just listening and enjoying the fresh air and feel of the wind and sea air he heads to town to get started on the days work. 

On the way he stops by the hut of the town wise woman and healer. Jyrki iul Heino

They chat for awhile as she is cleaning bandages, he uses his magic to speed things up and dry them, she has skill but no apparent ability with songshaping. She mentions the plague that wiped out a town about 8 months ago, and children who broke their legs helping the foresters yesterday. She is quite wiling to share local news and advise Listens on what the town needs. He knows most of it already but the research is still good. She does not really believe him when he says they intend to take care of the bandits but is glad for the supplies and the work done so far. The town is very wary of promises and not trusting of the new duke. Not a surprise after the last one and it will take time to earn their trust.

He heads into town.

The rest of the team is up and about as he arrives, most having already headed out. Rhaum spends the day escorting Altan, not a fun duty but a needful one. Altan can be quite irritating and disrespectful and Rhaum tries to learn him some manners. They start at the Inn before heading out to the farms.

Trapper continues learning the lay of the land and hunting for food for the Inn. The innkeeper Meiri and him are building a good relationship. He brings her a rare bird (super large bird of prey, nearly the size of an adult human) and she asks him to find its nest and bring her the contents.

After talking with the quartermaster to make sure Jyrki gets her supplies Listens looks for the forester. He is curious about what is going on in the area, the spirits are too quiet and of course he has to talk about the injured kids. He expects Riato has already worked to prevent more accidents but still Listens should offer his help. Listens casts a spell and asks the spirits for directions, they should easily find a group of wood cutters chopping down trees after all. The spell works, but at first he does not see the spirit that arrived. Eventually it gets his attention, a land crab. They introduce themselves, the crab is named Myrk the Lurk, though he prefers Myrk.

Murk leads him to the foresters and they have a shirt discussion. Apparently the children were overly excited and trying to be helpful. Getting too close to falling trees.

Riato points out something odd about a stand of dead tress. As a woodsinger, any tree he considers odd is worth paying attention too. The trees have had all the moisture drained out of them and then just broke off. Also moisture has not returned, even though its been months and the rains should have affected the wood. Myrk thinks it reminds him of something and he agrees to ask around. He vanishes into the ground.

Listens wanders around a bit before heading back to town and Myrk pops out of the ground with news.  They head to the inn for beer and mutton (two things Myrk expressed love for) and talk. Meiri is still less than thrilled to see Listens but is at least polite and welcomes his coin. Listens finds a table at the back and sets the land crab on the table, ordering meals for them both. Meiri is rather surprised to hear a talking crab and quickly fetches their food. Listens was expecting her to tell him he could not sit on the table, but supposes she was unwilling to insult a talking crab. Others in the inn take notice as ell and the table remains theirs till Raum and Altan come in.

Raum and Altan had a good day collecting taxes, though some of it was in barter rather than coin. Raum appears to have made a deal with a local spirit, return a kana crystal to it that as stolen by bandits. Listens anticipates a problem from Altan over the matter but will address it then.

They all head back to the constable station. 

Unit 7 is back after scouting unsuccessfully for the bandit camp but found a bonecarver. The bone carver and the corpse appear to not be getting along. Listens looks at the corpse, politely asking if it wants to talk but is ignored and so lets it be. Not really his area as much as nature spirits and even those he tends to leave be if they so desire.

The corpse does however seem to have taken a definite shining to Trapper. It turns its head to look at him periodically.

Raito calls listens outside for a chat. He explains to Listens that his hand is turning blue, a sign of big trouble. Listens bandages it to cover up indication and offer some pain relief. They hear a scream form the wilderness and run to investigate. 

Tesseikai come stumbling into town, gravely wounded.  Listens shouts for help, using his best sailor voice and tends to her wounds with a quick Lesser Succor spell.

Earlier Myrk had warned him about Blood Mama a vampire like spirit that drains blood form groups of people and was imprisioned but somehow released and its making all the spirits nervous. They are not her favorite prey but hungry enough she will go after anything. Listens is worried as the group goes into the forest to see who attacked Tesseikai but they need to check for other survivors as she was not alone.

She is missing a finger but likely she can repair that herself, if not Listens has a Restoration spell.

Aftermath

A few other things happened but Listens is unlikely to know about them so you'll have to read about them in the GMs recap. Myrk expressed an interest in becoming a companion and Listens said to wait a week, make sure he is making a good choice as Listens lives a dangerous life and will be traveling.

A land crab is not my first idea of an allied spirit but its a cool direction and I like Myrks personality.

GURPS High Dives and Cliff Diving

 I have a character in a campaign who is part water spirit and one of his gimmicks is being a great swimmer and diver, also a water mage sailor.

For reference he has Swimming -17; Amphibious; Breath Holding 2; Catfall (Accessibility, only to land in water, -50%); Temperature Tolerance 2; and the perk Smooth Diver. The latter lets him dive without making a splash.

We came across a cliff over the water outside town and he wanted to cliff dive from it. The skill penalty appeared to make this an impossible task. Since it was a 100 yard tall cliff that irked me a bit but not by much as it is a ridiculously high height to jump form. However, it appeared that normal heights also seemed way too hard to do. So I went to the forums!

After a few days reviewing the rules and discussing them on the Steve Jackson Games GURPS forums I came up with a reasonable chance at making more normal cliff dives.

The results are....

GURPS Diving

Quoth, p.B431 "When striking water or a similar fluid, a successful Swimming roll (or vehicle control roll, if “ditching” a vehicle) means a clean dive that negates all damage. This roll is at a penalty for

velocity; use the speed penalty from the Size and Speed/Range Table (p. 550)."

Normally it says to read the speed as column 3 on that table, so this wording led me to use column one instead.  At least two others feel that the normal usage is what was intended and I am going with that.

I might ask the line editor when he is back from vacation to be sure and to see if errata should be submitted.

So what is our penalty?

World Record is 60m (-36 skill original way or (-9) the other way)

Standard dive of 85-92 feet (-25 or -26) or (-7).

Reality check thus says use the more typical number.

Highest dive from a diving board is 192'10"* for (-8 to skill)

*Lazaro "Laso" Schaller (Switzerland/Brazil) in Maggia, Ticino, Switzerland, on 4 August, 2015. 

Want some video?

90' dive (Skill-7)

10m dive (about 33 feet) (Skill-5)

3m dive (Skill-4)

Standard diving boards (spring) from 1 to 3m high. (Skill -0 to -4)

If you make the skill you take no damage, fail and you take falling damage into a soft object. At these heights its unlikely to kill you, though the higher dives may very well knock you unconscious so better have someone in the water to rescue you!

Catfall subtracts 5y from falling distance, a great help[ at lower dives and about a +1 effect at higher distances. more importantly it allows a DX roll to grant half damage if you fail that clean dive Swimming roll.

Swimming is used to avoid damage and to move around in the water after your dive.

Sports (Diving) lets you know the rules for the sport, trivia such as record holders and famous diving spots, and perhaps most importantly to look good when diving. Use it or Acrobatics to do things like flips, tucks, and somersaults when diving. Modifiers as per Acrobatics, +1 for Perfect Balance, +2 for 3D Spatial Sense.

High Dive (H) is a technique that lets you buy off the penalty to Swimming when making a dive to avoid damage.

Catfall with Accessibility, only to land in water, -50% is a bit more realistic than regular Catfall so may be more easily allowed in a noncinematic game. Make no mistake, its still cinematic though!

A high diver will need Swimming and can benefit from Sports (Diving), a level of Temperature Tolerance for cold water, Fit or Very Fit, high HT and DX, and perhaps First Aid, Hiking, or even Climbing to get to out of the way spaces.

At Swimming -5 for an Olympic level athlete I think GURPS Diving is reasonably good at letting your character play a great athlete even in a realistic campaign.

Alien or non realistic campaigns may consider Amphibious, DR (Tough Skin), Breath Holding, and a few other things to spice it up.

Special Thoughts

At least 12 feet of water is advised for high dives and clear water is best to help avoid obstacles like high rocks or see other swimmers.

Telescopic Vision can help see what you are diving into from high above.

Good quality equipment and conditions such as a good platform, minimal wind, and clear area  might be good for +1 to +2 quality bonus.

Use Time Spent to help with those tougher dives. Though in a sport your unlikely to get more than a minute to set yourself up.

This is just another example of how GURPS can add to your campaign by giving players or NPCs something cool and fun to do without a lot of special rules or handwaving.

 

Aersalus Season 1, Session 1&2

 The Cast of B-Team (Aersalus)

Listens to Ocean aka Osprey (Rory) Halfling Magistrate, mage, healer, priest, historian.

Rhum Kaldalsson (Curtis) Minotaur artist.

Trapper (Chris D) Gremian, artificer, hunter, Armsmaster.

Unit 7 (Brice) A Cog, magical construct golem.

In Memorium Christian

NPC's

Altan ru Chuulaii the tax collector

The Trek Begins

Duke Tellengeri has decided to fix up his territory. By beating his brothers, the duke (Tellengeri) gained legitimacy and additional funds and prestige. He leveraged the newfound wealth to create a merchant empire which he then used around 1/3 of to purchase the land from Duke Jutaharro who had no heirs after the Second War of the Ashen killed them all. The old Duke was more into graft than his people and there is a lot of poor sentiment among the citizenry. He has embarked upon a big renewal and rebuilding project.

Along with almost a hundred others the team is dropped off near Wolftrap which is the largest town in the area. This will make several teams

Forestry Team, led by Riato a woodsinger and forester

They will go off to check on the wilderness, primarily the huge forest called "The Great Green" which is an unusually temperate and warm forest for this near arctic area.

Mining Resources Team led by Jarrah?

The goal is to see how the known mines are doing, what needs to be done to get them back to full production, and possibly find new mines.

Mappers#1

Goal is to survey and map the area.

Mappers#2

Goal is to survey and map the area

Aid Team #1 (Us) led by Listens to Ocean

Our team is going to be based in Wolftrap but will circumnavigate the area. We are to bring justice to the towns, collect taxes, and increase prosperity and well being of the regions citizens. Listens is an accomplished spellsinger, Ministry trained healer, Shen (shaman), and magistrate so is leading the team. He also has good experience with working people, being a long time fisherman and sailor. The team also includes a taxman (Altan ru Chuulaii) to collect the taxes. Since dispensing justice and collecting taxes are not too popular we also have three capable bodyguard's and security people who are also good at other things, helping the teams versatility and overall mission.

Rhum and Unit 7 are both very strong and Trapper provides ranged support.

Aid Team #2

This team will head in the opposite direction as Aid Team #1. It includes one magical healer and several Ministry Trained healers as well as a couple of other spellsingers.

We know they have Water, Wind, Stone, and Wood covered.

 Wolftrap

We all roll into town after being dropped by airship a day or so away. Wolftrap has seen better days, it is a port town with a nice freshwater lake nearby. Fed by two aqueducts, one from the lake and another from the mountains. Listens spends the most of the second day checking the first one out and cleaning it.

We meet Meiri the innkeeper who promptly decides to price gouge us for rooms. Listens does not like that kind of corruption and mentions how if she is charging that much for her rooms she must be doing very well indeed - and our tax collector will be glad to hear of her prosperity.

Altan's ears perk up and he is quite pleased to have a conversation with her, she of course is less so.

(Tried to pull an Eastwood here, letting the towns people know we are not to be cheated or trifled with as a strong first impression. Eastwood would have done it better).

Much of the town is in ruins or burned out and we head over to the remains of the Constables station. It has most of the stone walls, a basement, and a few cells.  Trapper investigates the basement, bringing up a corpse and a couch for it to lie on. The corpse appears appreciative. Trapper also fixes the boiler and we get heated floors for the evening.

Next day Trapper does more work on the building, as well as some others from the large group and then goes hunting for food and supplies for the inn. He also meets Toragana, the local tanner and exchanges hides and such. He also makes friends with Tessikai, a young healer and water singer (probably part of Aid Team #2).

Unit 7 is unhappy at waking up to find Listens had already left and is talked into helping out on repairs.

Rhum makes friends, he talks Trapper into getting food for Meiri and the inn and visits the blacksmith Jetei iul to get supplies for hauling wood he cuts down from the forest for rebuilding. Also meets the local miller Molomo.

Listens has a chat with Kohana an Kekkonen about the town. Kohana advises that annoying Meiri was not wise as she is an important town figure. Listens explains what happened, letting him know he will not tolerate corruption but understands his advice and will see what he can do. While they are talking a ship sails into port and having a plan (GM coached) Listens excuses himself during a lull in the conversation saying as an old sailor he wants to meet the ship.

Turns out the ship is run by an old friend, Captain Junras who gives Listens the lay of the local ocean and mentions a community of waterfolk nearby. Listens appreciates that and hopes to get them trading with the town. Listens also buys the entire ships worth of grain for the town. It will help the largest town in the area get on its feet faster, especially with winter coming and helps out his friend who would have to sail it the rest of the way up the coast, trying to sell it as much as he could and possibly not selling it all. This also gets him back to main port faster for another run. he offers Listens an investment opportunity in a ship which Listens takes him up on. Ideally hoping to encourage more shipping to the area.

Player Summary

A good first two session, its been several months since we last played. One of our players who was supposed to rejoin us died recently and it would have been nice to see him again. The rest of us were dealing with personal issues as well, everything from losing a beloved pet, to surgery, pinched nerves (or minor stroke), to the normal maladies we seem to have. It was good ot get together, both sessions were short but we got a lot done and got to start digging into this world that Christopher has rebuilt.

GURPS Golfing

Watched Rising Impact, an anime on Netflix about golfing recently and decided to stat out Golf.

Sports (Golf) is an Average DX based skill.

The goal is to hit a ball into the hole in as few shots as possible.

There are three main types of swings in golf, the Drive, Slice, and Putt respectively.

.Average driving distance is 200 to 224 yards.  (ST 10 or 11); 70% of amateur golfers hit 250 (ST 12 to ST 13), Average PGA distance in the 2020's is 300 yards (ST  15) with the longest drive in history 787 (ST 39!). Various factors, especially wind can make a big difference in distance.

So lets set Driving distance at ST*20

Putts dramatically fail outside of 10 feet. A golf hole is 4.25" in diameter (SM-7) with -1 to hit at 9 feet, so that works. Skill 12 would be 5 or less under 9 feet to hit the hole. But Aiming should apply for +3 and club quality for Acc 1 (fine clubs) or Acc 2 (Very Fine).

A professional could get the +4 routine task modifier for another +4 (newcomers might cave under pressure and not get that).

So we have target -7, Aiming bonus of +3 to +5, routine for +4 meaning against a skill 12 we get an effective skill of 12 to 14 depending on club quality.

That works out rather nicely!

 A slice is the ball curing towards the dominant hand due to a slight spin on the ball. Normally you do not want to slice, but sometimes you need to angle the shot to avoid a hazard on the course or angle it to work with the wind. Sounds more like adjusting to the situation so we will ignore this kind of stroke in favor of circumstantial penalties.

So what does this give us?

Sports (Golf) (A) DX

This is the skill to play a good golf game. Driving distance is ST*20 with a bonus to ST of +1 for Skill DX+1 or ST+2 for DX+2. Wind speed may add or subtract from a drive, each 2 MPH is 1 or 2 yards. The golf hole is -7 to hit, plus range penalties (p. B550), and additional penalties for terrain or wind may apply. Treat rough or sand as -1 to -4. Add wind speed to the range penalty when making drives with a crosswind. When driving (rather than putting) add +4 to hit the hex and use the Scatter rule (p. B414) to determine where the ball landed. When putting assume you miss the hole by 1 foot per margin of error.

Trained golfers may opt to use the Precision Aiming rules (GURPS Gun Fu, p. 12. or GURPS High Tech, p. 84)

Note that professional golfers will also invest in Games (Golf) (E) IQ for a through understanding of the rules.

Useful perks include Bank Shot, Bend the Bullet, and Deadeye from GURPS Gun Fu; and Eye for Distance (GURPS Power-Ups 2: Perks).

A new perk also seems appropriate.

Read the Green

 Grants +1 skill and allows Time Spent modifiers (base time 1 turn) when making a putt.

Looking at GURPS Streetwise

 Streetwise is one of the influence skills, meaning it can be used to replace a reaction roll in the appropriate circumstances. It is an Average skill, typical of them, though Carousing is Easy and Diplomacy is Hard, the rest are all Average skills.

What do the rules say its used for?

GURPS Basic, p. 223 says its the skill to get along in rough company and "You may substitute an Influence roll against Streetwise for any reaction roll made in an underworld or “bad neighborhood”  situation; see Influence Rolls (p. 359)."

GURPS Social Engineering, p. 30 says "Streetwise isn’t the same as Intimidation; the latter makes you seem dangerous and hostile, while the former conveys that you know your way around. "

This can be a bit risky as a failed Influence roll (p. B359) can get you a worse reaction than not using an influence skill, and the roll is resisted by Will. So if you are going to rely on it its a good idea to be very good at it.

Additionally the skill lets you ask for information among criminals and seeming like you belong there rather than are an undercover enforcement officer or perhaps a criminal rival. Specifically it helps you find the criminal element, or those catering to it (such as corrupt police), know a good bribe price, and perhaps find the local "action".

It is not used to buy things (use Merchant) but at least it can help you seem like a legitimate customer and perhaps find venders of illegal wares. Also Streetwise at 12+ cancels the normal -3 to Merchant for buying illegal goods.

Overall a decent skill, but can be risky to use and perhaps lacks flavor and oomph for that cinematic expert. So here are some additional suggestions.

1) Allow Optional Specialization (p. B169) for certain types of criminal elements. Examples Docks/Ports; Gangs; Neighborhoods; etc.

2) Add techniques such as...

Fits In (H) Streetwise-3, purchased up to Streetwise (at 4 points) to offset the penalty for obviously being a stranger in the area.

Cutting Out (H) Streetwise-4 to pick an individual out of a group to use your skill on. Social Engineering, p. 81)

Hinting (H) Streetwise+0 (up to Streetwise +6) for being subtle enough in your questions that observers might not pick up on it. (Social Engineering, p. 81).

I really like this one as its often a good idea to be discreet when asking about illegal activities!

3) Certain perks and other advantages can of course also help. "In the Know" (Social Engineering, p. 79) grants +2 to finding an illegal connection, such as a fence.

Star Heist: End of Mission 1

 After six game session the team completed their first mission. It was loosely based on an old and frankly not very good movie called "Deadlier than the Male".

After the game we did a post session summary and the two players left (one had to go to work) seemed happy. Two NPCs Dr. Kirkpatrick (Ugler healer) and Captain Slater (Human analyst) did a lot of work in the background that helped out. However, no one seemed to feel they were overwhelming or too important to the game. They contributed information that the players were able to use but it was mostly behind the scenes and they were not involved in decision making.

I think that they filled roles the players had not really focused on and did not make any big decisions for the group was a big contributor to them seeming useful and fun to interact with but not taking any of the spotlight away from the player characters.

Notable NPCs..

Dr. Kirkpatrick is the ships doctor and was useful in saving one PC's life as well as providing opinions and detail on autopsies and medical reports. Also helped the team diplomat with psych profiling.

Captain Slater is the ships captain and mission lead but his specialty is statistical analysis, this was intended to help me give the players guidance if they got stuck and to spend the required hours of research and slogging through paperwork that many cases would require but would be rather boring to the players. With him going through the paperwork and videotapes they could focus on more active tasks.

Sam and Snick are the ships engineers, mostly intended to keep the ship running and repair things. They had some interaction with the players but were very much background characters.

Bear the security specialist was intended to protect the ship so the players don't have to and to act as reinforcements if they got into a fight. Mostly background, some interaction but he stayed out of things this mission.

JJ the ships pilot (PC) did some Streetwise, that did not directly help but got them a taste of the bad guys when one of them tried to assainate him with a poisoned cigar. Other than that he mostly played chauffer. That is the job of the teams driver/pilot but I want him to be able to get more directly involved, this is the area I feel the most disappointed in so far. If the player remains only the chauffeur I feel he will get bored and so I am hoping he comes up with some directions to grow in that we can work with.

He with the long name that I cannot pronounce and hence cant remember is the groups decker and rigger. Still concerned with the robot allies and being good enough at driving to make the JJ feel redundant but so far it hasn't come up much. He was frustrated at not being able to use his computer hacking abilities but the players opted for a mostly law abiding team and role which hampers the effectiveness of one who is mostly designed to break into other peoples computers. However, the player is smart enough to know this was going to be an issue so its more of a challenge to work around than a serious obstacle, so far anyway. He did get to hack one persons computer which got them the really big clue they needed to decide the case so we both felt good about that.

Duri the diplomat (final PC) did the bulk of the front and center work as this was mostly a working the people kind of mission. I think everything went well there and he was not greedy about the center stage, just that is the way the cards fell. I suspect his character will be the most useful most of the time as talking to people is rarely illegal and tends to come up a lot.

I explained the roles of the ships crew in more detail at the end of the last game. Paying for a ship and its crew is a bit extravagant so they have other duties. Captain Slater, Dr. Kirkpatrick, and the engineers can review various cases by going through paperwork and making recommendations. So they can cover a lot of rather routine cases as background and earn their keep that way. The full team is only needed for major cases and the field team is mostly the PCs with occasional help and support from the NPCs.

General GM Thoughts

NPCs provide a lot of the flavor in a campaign, which is great but they come with a big risk. For example a spacefaring or seagoing campaign often needs NPCs to flesh out the crew. They need to be competent but not overwhelmingly so or at least not prone to taking over the campaign from the players. In this case I assigned them important roles but ones that are more backup or background. So far its working out and I think will continue to do so.

The Research Skill in GURPS

 For my Star Heist campaign I expect the Research skill to see a lot of use and wanted to add some detail. Obviously you can apply task difficulty modifiers for more difficult questions, but some research should take more or less time - especially in a world with computers and a version of the internet readily available!

So here is a version I came up with, thought I would share.

Research

see p. B217

Research is a common task in the Star Heist setting, and computers greatly speed it up. The default time for a Research roll is based on the complexity of the question.

Trivial: Summed up in a short sentence and something commonly asked. Search databases are used to these questions, making for fast and accurate answers. Time 1 turn, +4 to skill. Examples: Nearest place to eat or shop for common item.

Simple: Typically, one or two sentence questions with one or two simple qualifiers. Time, up to a minute, no task modifier. Examples: The best place in town for a good steak.

Average: A question with several parameters but not a complicated subject matter and one with plenty of data available. Time, 5 minutes, no task modifier.

Complex: Typically, on a specialized subject, often a scientific or legal question that requires precision and detail. Time 1 hour, -2 to -5 skill, complementary skill bonus.

Amazing: This is something on the level of research for an academic paper, involving multiple refinements to the search after reviewing results. Another skill is typically required to properly refine the questions. Time, 1 day, -5 to -10 skill.

Comprehensive: Sometimes more than a single answer is needed, even the top few answers might not provide enough data. For example trying to research a world to prepare for an expedition. In this case multiple people can assist. Let each researcher make a skill roll suited to their own capability and skill mix and compile everything into one neat package. Alternatively researchers may assist the overall project by taking on some of the workload, in which case each competent assistant (Skill 12+) can offer a complementary roll to the overall project. This is only applicable on large data as with small projects multiple researchers tread too much of the same ground and may even confuse things with conflicting bias.

Computer Software can be a great help here. Most computers will have search programs available; this is considered basic tools. However, a search routine and database optimized for the subject gets a quality bonus (+1 or +2) and reduces the time spent by one step.

As one might note, it is inspired by the Invention rules, with the time and penalties lowered and the addition of the Trivial category. For a cinematic campaign, or one where the person making the skill check might be an AI additional traits might apply. For example why not a variant of Gadgettering to further reduce time and penalties?

As a friend remarked, this setup can be applied to other skills, I intend to use it for science skills for example.