New downtime project: Neocron tabletop conversion

[dWintermut3]

Another project I'm working on for downtime:

A tabletop RPG conversion to play Neocron over forum, online or with my friends.


I'd love to make it a public project.

Right now I'm considering three potential systems to base it on:

GURPS:
Pros- does everything, rules exist for almost everything in game (but drones, really). Very fast to learn and run
Cons- Doesn't handle high-tech very well (power balance makes the system VERY lethal and weapons all-or-nothing, doesn't fit Neocron's ethos)

RIFTS:
Pros- Has rules for everything neocron has right out of the box from Psionics to mutated animals to heavy weapons to powered armor.
Cons- the system itself is painfully clunky and said rules are spread over dozens of books. No droner rules

Shadowrun 3rd Edition:
Pros- Has rules for most of what Neocron has. Excellent combat system that balances realism, tactics and ease of use.
Cons- No rules for psionics (would have to modify magic rules)



Anyone have thoughts? right now I'm leaning SR3e.

[Dribble Joy]

I've also been tempted to do this for while. I was probably going to use the Dark Heresy (40K RPG) system though that's mostly because I'm most familiar with it.
It does cover all sorts of weapons, skills, psychic powers and some crafting.

[dWintermut3]

I'm not familiar with Dark Heresy as much though I'm familiar with 40k.

[Forget My Name]

Shadowrun 3rd Edition:
Pros- Has rules for most of what Neocron has. Excellent combat system that balances realism, tactics and ease of use.
Cons- No rules for psionics (would have to modify magic rules)

This is the only game choice really.

Neocron Developers obviously took Shadowrun ideas and just put them into a mmo form. When you play Neocron, you are in fact jsut playing Shadowrun.

As for Psionics, well, that is just a word. Monks in Neocron are magic users, period. Monks became Wizards and Clerics. So no change would be required there.

You literally just take Shadowrun, and change the game setting to Neocron and that's it.

Also, just use 4th edition Shadowrun. It is a great edition.

[Dribble Joy]

I'm not familiar with Dark Heresy as much though I'm familiar with 40k.
D100 system. Chars have 2D10+20 (generally, origin will make this +15 or +25, so scope for different classes) in each stat, of which there are nine. Class determines cost of raising a stat. Skill system covers just about everything with plenty of scope for modification.

[Chuck Norris]

seems for 2.2 they fell in love with FIREFLY instead of shadowrun.. which totally destroyed character models and feeling of post apocalyptic future

[LiL T]

This is the only game choice really.

As for Psionics, well, that is just a word. Monks in Neocron are magic users, period. Monks became Wizards and Clerics. So no change would be required there.



Psionics != magic

look it up.

[dWintermut3]

Shadowrun it is.

I'm using 3rd edition because I like it better. 4th is World of Darkness system (Stat + skill, compare to target number) using six-sided not 10-sided dice. I never liked that approach because it makes a lot of interesting character concepts (say, troll decker) totally impossible.

Character creation rules are well under way. Basically it's stock Shadowrun creation except cash is reduced by a factor of 1,000 so starting wealth is between 50 and 10,000 NC.

Here's the chart:

PRIORITY RACES ALLOWED STARTING SKILLPOINTS ATTRIBUTE POINTS RESOURCES PSIONICS ALLOWED
A Any 50 30 50 NC Any
B Spy, Human 40 27 200 NC Adept (either APU/PPU Only)
C Human 34 24 900 NC None
D Human 30 21 4.000 NC None
E Human 27 18 10.000 NC None

[Kane Gregory]

PRIORITY
RACES
ALLOWED STARTING SKILLPOINTS
ATTRIBUTE POINTS
RESOURCES
PSIONICS ALLOWED


A
Any
50
30
50 NC
Any


B
Spy, Human
40
27
200 NC
NC Adept (APU/PPU only)


C
Human
34
24
900 NC
None


D
Human
30
21
4.000 NC
None


E
Human
27
18
10.000 NC
None



Okay the idea is really cool. I'm not really familiar with the rule of shadowrun or other tabletop/pen&paper/etc. games. I only played warhammer fantasy a short time in my youth. But I short idea:
Maybe it's possible to let the character like in neocron choose a class => Spy, Tank, PE, Monk and after they choosed their class, the player can spend the amount of skillpoints the class give them restricted by the main-skill.

Some example for u to understand what I mean:
Player A choose the Tank. He got the default main-skills: int with 5 startpoints; str with 20 startpoints; con with 10 startpoints; dex with 10 startpoints; psi with 0 startpoints. Now he can throw a dice for every mainskill and become with every thrown 5+ a level up and +2-5 skillpoints.

Player A thrown for int(4), str(1), con(5), dex(4) [it's not allowed as tank to throw a dice for psi]
Now he got the following character setup for beginning the game:


Class
INT
STR
CON
DEX
PSI


Tank
1 (5 skillpoints)
4 (20 skillpoints)
2+1(dice) (15 skillpoints)
2 (10 skillpoints)
0



I really have no idea, how u will plan the game. Maybe you can gave a short description what do you thinking about. I'm a little bit confused because I only know shadowrun as a pen&paper. Or do u mean it is constructed like warhammer with two different teams (you units are tanks, spys, monks etc.) who fighting again or a team (player a) and a bulk of monsters (player b)?

[Forget My Name]

If we are going to stick Neocron into Shadowrun, then I would advise to do it as close as possible.

What I mean is, when coming up with concepts, ask "what does Neoconr do?" before asking "How to do it in Shadowrun".

Here is an example; Cash and starting equipment. In neocron you don't have a choice in the matter, so why do it in Shadowrun?

For each profession, the player has a set Equipment. So a Spy always starts out with the equivilent of what he does in the video game. Same goes for all professions. There shouldn't be a choice here. Also, everyone should start out with the same amount of money.

I understand that Shadowrun has the ALLURE of letting you customize your Neocron character how you want, but that isn't Neocron. Remember, we are playing Neocron with Shadowrun rules, not Shadowrun with Neocron ideas thrown around.



So in my opinion, the character creation system needs to be tweaked a bit so that you can customize ONLY your skills. Your starting Attributes, Equipment and Cash should be set depending on your profession.

[dWintermut3]

The reason I'm changing that slightly is because Neocron does it for game balance, and not Lore reasons.

Realistically your choice of faction, profession and so on should all affect your starting equipment and wealth level. In this priority build system you can select your resource level, and then explain to the game-master why that is. "Why do I start with more? Well I work for City Admin and they're not about to send me out there with a vest, a pistol and a prayer, if I get cacked it would look bad"

Every character in Neocron is a newly-awoken cryo-recreation from MC-5. This system opens up the possibility to play something OTHER than an MC-5 baby.

For the record. There will be rules for playing a "standard" neocron character that has the attribute spread locked. They are Race: A (Any race), Psionics B (APU/PPU pick freely but only one), Attribute 27 points, skills 30 points, and 1,000 NC (they spent 1k on a generep) or 2,000 if you're starting play with the optional MC-5 tutorial game module that teaches players how combat works.

Kane: One reason I like Shadowrun as a system is that your attributes DO have an effect on your skills, they get more expensive quicker the lower your skill is. End result is that for the same number of experience points, a spy will buy far more points of Rifle than a monk will, and a genetank will be about the middle.