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These Benighted Stars: Ringworlders

Grey

Dialectical Hermeticist
Once, there was an Empire.

It stretched from the temple-cities of the homeworld to the furthest stars. It was built upon wonders of magitech that bent physics to their whim and laughed at the interstellar gulf.

It was a time of peace and enlightenment. No one now remembers what it was really like, but we know it was glorious - and it was lost.

The Others came screaming out of Elsewhere, a dimension where reason and science failed, and tore apart the works of the Magi.

The war raged for a century or more, and the Magi could not prevail, barely able to fend off the Others no matter how many weapons of apocalyptic might they forged. Both they and their mysterious enemies are gone now, perhaps having destroyed each other.

The Virdina system is in chaos, and the colonies around distant stars are forgotten. No living Magi remain and their various inheritors squabble for power, with innocents descended from colonial settlers caught in the crossfire or eking out an existence amid the ruins.

And across the system, hidden in ancient stasis-vaults and armoury-temples, sleep the Bandi - the elite warrior caste of the Magi; peerless fighters and sorcerous adepts, encaged in mystical armour.
Perhaps they can be woken.
Perhaps they will usher in a new golden age.
Perhaps they will be the killing blow to a world sickly and faltering.

-----------------------------------------------------
The Ring is an ancient construct of the Magi - an artificial world in a polar orbit around the planet Sithri. Allegedly the Magi disassembled the moons of the world for raw material. Unfortunately, like so many such habitats, it has fallen to chaos without the Magi - the green zones grow out of control, intelligent machines long gone insane terrorize or rule sections of it, and the Ringlanders live in fortified segments. While they lack the ability to project force in the system, they’ve been impossible to bring to heel for those who would rule them. They’re the most diverse population in the system, with relatively easy access to minor genetic manipulation and a cosmopolitan, welcoming approach to outsiders.

You are a group of treasure-seekers, archaeologists, criminals, and itinerant mystics who have come to - or come from - the Ring to explore a distant, derelict segment for lost secrets of history. Or perhaps just a huge payday. The oppressive Jukari Empire and stranger aliens are always looking for a way to take control of the Ring, so maybe it's freedom that motivates you.

Whoever you are, you'll want to be careful, be curious, and keep friends close among these benighted stars.

This game will use the Crucible system, modified for sci-fantasy adventure. No prior experience with that or any other system required; newbs welcome.

You can learn more about the setting here: Benighted Stars Core

Jukari will not be playable immediately, but they and Bandi may become options as things proceed.

Post interest and character concepts below; feel free to go a bit wild. Cybernetics and genemods are largely freely available and we can come up with some fun backstory to justify them. It's a big solar system, afterall.
 
I will take that as a yes. Really quickly, do you mind if I make my character one of The Golden Spear group? Also, do you have a basic character sheet you would like me to fill out?
 
I'll probably allow it, depending on how you write them and how they fit the group we form. My only major stipulation is that they're a relatively young and inexperienced Spear at the start of their no doubt storied journey. For reference, one of their parents will have to be a normal mortal - Duster, Twinned, Ringlander, Scattered, that kind of thing.
They're subject to some special rules so give me a little time to edit a sheet for them, and no doubt you'll have questions about the setting to flesh them out so ask away.

This setting shard is about 4000 hours away from completion to my usual standard and players asking questions always help me focus the early stages.
 
Grey Grey
Okay. I can agree to all those stipulations. It is fully understandable considering the power that a Spear is said to hold. In any case I planned to make my character unbeatable in a very specific context, but if even one thing is off he is rendered almost useless. Would that be acceptable?
 
Grey Grey

It is basically this. Being he is half normal mortal does inhibit his latent abilities. Think of it like a Superman type problem. He has the capability of being one of the strongest beings alive, but his mortal limitations on his own body create a sort of effect where he is only effective in one very specific case. I haven't decided what that situation is yet, but I do know that outside that situation even a little will drastically decrease his effectiveness in the situation.
 
Grey Grey

It is basically this. Being he is half normal mortal does inhibit his latent abilities. Think of it like a Superman type problem. He has the capability of being one of the strongest beings alive, but his mortal limitations on his own body create a sort of effect where he is only effective in one very specific case. I haven't decided what that situation is yet, but I do know that outside that situation even a little will drastically decrease his effectiveness in the situation.

Mmm, doesn't quite fit with how they work. All members of the Spear have a mortal parent, but whatever provides their power ultimately wins out. Their inherent powerset looks like this:

Excellence – Spend 5 Essence to add Training specific to any weapon when you pick that weapon up. If you already have Training for that weapon, spend 2 Essence per die to reroll failed dice up to your Ascendance when using that weapon. Effectively, this allows a Spear to instantly master any melee weapon.

Brilliance – Spend 5 Essence to add a bonus die, up to your Ascendance, to rolls with a weapon in which you have Training. Just straight up makes you a better fighter.

Dominance – Spend 10 Essence per die to convert Bearing dice to automatic successes when using a demonstration of superior skill, knowledge, or status to socially compel another character. I feel like this speaks for itself; when you're better than someone at something, you can assert control over them.

Blinding – Spend 2 Essence to apply +1 difficulty to enemy efforts to hit you, up to your Bearing. Spend 5 to deal Condition damage equal to your Bearing in searing radiance to anyone within your Bearing x2 in feet, damage decreasing by 1 the further from you they are. Essentially, you glow so brightly with magical sunlight that it blinds and burns people.

And on top of that, they can exceed some statistic caps on normal mortals.
 
Thinking about it, EccentricFantasy EccentricFantasy one thing we could do is give them a trait where their Essence pool is empty except in a specific circumstance - but that's such a major nerf I'd make the tradeoff something like a higher maximum or higher Ascendance rating when they do.

I know some of these terms don't mean anything to you so:
Essence: the supernatural power that flows through Divine Peoples such as the Golden Spear and fuels their superhuman abilities.
Ascendance: a measure of how powerful a member of the Divine Peoples has become as they transcend their humanity.
 
Grey Grey
That actually fits perfectly with what I was thinking. He doesn't get access to his abilities like other Spears, but if the circumstances are right, he is the best. For this specifically I think a higher amount of Essence would make sense. Like in that circumstance he is able to perform more than any other Spear of his level could.
 
On reflection, a bit of both would probably work. We'll hash it out if we get enough players to do chargen and group building.
 
Okay, loose concept: Ringlander doctor who's a bit too quick to jump to invasive surgery as an option, and sees all living things as designs to be improved upon, but is ultimately motivated by a desire to make people happier, healthier, and less resource-intensive so they can stop fucking squabbling over every inch of arable land. Altruistic, visionary, enjoys his work wayyyyy more than his patients would like.

No visible cybernetics/gene-tweaks except for maybe photosynthetic skin, but has replaced most of his internal organs with improved versions, and no longer experiences pain as unpleasant in order to more effectively perform surgery on himself.
 
Okay, loose concept: Ringlander doctor who's a bit too quick to jump to invasive surgery as an option, and sees all living things as designs to be improved upon, but is ultimately motivated by a desire to make people happier, healthier, and less resource-intensive so they can stop fucking squabbling over every inch of arable land. Altruistic, visionary, enjoys his work wayyyyy more than his patients would like.

No visible cybernetics/gene-tweaks except for maybe photosynthetic skin, but has replaced most of his internal organs with improved versions, and no longer experiences pain as unpleasant in order to more effectively perform surgery on himself.

Excellent. Very on-brand.
 
The setting.
If I see one more character from you, I'll have an idea of what to expect. So far I expect good things, though.
 
I'm contemplating making a vampire for your other game, but I'm already planning on playing one meta-human horror in this system and I need to pace myself.
 
Ba-bump. Surely someone else is up for transhuman sci-fantasy which, my legal team advises me, isn't that obviously inspired by WarFrame.
 

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