Alpha Source-ery

how did tim go about building his moon base?

Because of the whole RedEye thing actually.

1. He had that million-something gold bounty on his head which he abused a number of times. He faked turning himself in like twice, and ended up getting the bounty twice. After that, the country refused to pay out for his dead/capture, but instead 'encouraged' his death, and would look the other way if someone killed him. So, he amassed a fortune there.

2. With his RedEye following, he actually had the manpower at his disposal. A number of people in his organization were craftsmen and smiths as it were anyway, so that also helped in the construction. He basically gave them the blueprints/design he wanted, and they built it. Granted, it actually took quite some time to complete, even if it didn't seem like it in-game.

And, with the money, he could more than pay for the magic aspect of it.

So, you could say it was because of his infamy.

actually, I was referring to 'how did he design this in terms of mechanics?'

Well that's boring.

He just used magic-missile enchanted rockets that 'respawn' like once a day. As for the actual platform, idk, I think it was just flight magic or something.

This might be a really unpopular idea, but i still want to throw it out there

most stories in modern settings have big corporations and big businessmen as the antagonists of the story, the ones who are fucking over the average joe, or worse those who are already impoverished or oppressed

but

what if the enemies were Those individuals. People off the streets, some of the societal dregs formed together to attack the corporation for slights that they think it has committed, when in reality the corporation has been trying to do good things (and maybe even is) but just has bad press.
Or the CEO or Chairman or whatever is attacked, and it turns out that some of his subordinates made these crippling decisions without his knowledge or approval, and now he is trying to run damage control and fix everything

the players might be somewhere along the lines of the street dregs, who find out that they have been attacking the wrong guy
might play employees of the corporation, or maybe even the upper management itself, but that would be unlikely

Game setting like Baccano:
there is perfect and imperfect immortality, and the perfect immortals can devour their imperfect counterparts
You as the player wake up in a dungeon, having been turned into an imperfect immortal
you must break out, go to ground, and solve a hundred-years old riddle before you are re-captured and eaten

A world has no heroes of its own, so it steals some from others

Setting:
Eccentric god comes to a world and decides to give a handful of people super-powers
based on their names

just for the lulz

and not just superpowers in the way we think of them, but weird ones
Example: person named Dr. Manhattan would gain the ability to manipulate the island of Manhattan, if it were Earth
or someone named Keyes would get the ability to open or circumvent anything that bars her way

Kind of based on/ripped from the move Monster vs Aliens
the government has a secret base where monsters are kept after they emerge in order to keep the general populace from panicking. for the most part, they are kept underground, but occasions do arise where they are called to solve problems of a certain circumstance (usually other monsters or other non-humans). the monsters usually agree to do these jobs in order to get some fresh air

since they cannot use money regularly, they get a number of requisition points per week or bi-week, which they can use to purchase things
it is hard to disguise what they are and if the call goes out for them, the civilians have already been evac'd, so they usually don't even bother

interestingly, i think it would be cool to have players roll to get a genre (giant, mutant, slime creature) and then make their character, just to see how creative they can be

Idea:
in a normal post-apoc zombie game, you have a small number of human survivors fighting the endless hoards of zombies in a blasted desert of a world

but that is also assuming that you use the traditional trope of zombies being undead, rotting, mindless monsters.
What if zombies were instead just people who had lost the ability to normally die? like, they could still lose limbs and shit, they don't regenerate, but at the same time they feel no pain and can't be considered dead until their bodies are completely destroyed.

basically, they are immortal.

what's more, if the odds of the virus transferring is low, you basically have a reverse of the typical trope
the zombies are hunted for multiple reasons- fear, experimentation, etc, so they have to form their own safe havens, go into hiding, or do their level best to kill as many people as they can

this is where you actual start getting back into the realm of the blasted wasteland, because while it is true that most immortal beings wouldn't enjoy having their limbs blown off, if they literally can't be permanently killed with anything short of a small nuke, then each and every one of them could fight an army individually, and if anyone wanted to stop them, they would Have to bomb the shit out of their own world to do so

Vector Campaign

I never completely fleshed this one out, but I'll give you what I've got

The Vector(s?) campaign was supposed to be about a bunch of super-soldier projects all around the world to achieve various effects. I was going to have it set up so that they could achieve anything from basic physical modifications (all of them had that, come on) up to things like... I think it was Project Poseidon or something that was based around effecting wave motions in the ocean to disrupt trade routes, screw with the weather, and throw walls of water at problems.

I seem to also recall that most of the projects also involved a major point of using mechanized suits to enhance their abilities- these ranged anywhere from Bioshock Big Daddy sizes to Warhammer 40k Dreadnoughts to goddamn Pacific Rim Jaegers- it was weird; sue me.

Basically, the players are the results (or at least, the latest results) of these experiments, and they wake up in their assorted facilities with little to no memory of who they are, and they just react to the world around them, most likely leaving the facility and getting into trouble as the collective governments kind of shit their pants when they realize that their (in most cases mothballed) super bio-weapons are going AWOL

if I find or remember anything else, I'll add it in. For now, here are the notes I can find:

Notes:

Putting this up because I am probably scrapping the idea due to reasons I will explain.


A couple of years(??) ago, in the Contemplative Topic for Roleplay Discussions, I had put up an idea called A Kingdom’s Fate. It involved a kingdom in shambles, a corrupt government, and a king who was doing basically nothing because he was deep in grief due to his family dying left and right with no way for him to stop it. The players were going to play a band of ordinary (or perhaps not so ordinary) adventurers who were just going about earning their keep the way adventurers do.

Here’s what I never got around to explaining: during the course of one of their expeditions, they come across a horse with the emblem of the royal family. A little further in, they find the king himself, kneeling by the river. Before they got the chance to process this, monsters and men spring up from all over, trying to kill both them and the king.
Once they finally drive them off, they end up talking to the king
Here’s the big spoiler-y part: through the course of the conversation, the adventurers remind him of some aspect of his dead children (either good or bad), he laughs, and pretty much adopts them on the spot.
I didn’t say this from the outset because it was meant to increase the ‘wat’ factor, when these rough-and-tumble adventurers are suddenly trapped in the affairs of the state (maybe they would enjoy it, maybe not). After a rather strange meeting with some of the higher-up security personel (whom the king had escaped from- go figure) and a really claustrophobic couple of hours with their assorted maids and manservants, they go down to dinner with their ‘father’, which is where things got…weird.

The king discretely put a mystic substance in their drinks, allowing them to be connected with the blood of the ancestral line. It turns out that, in this world, ruler-ship is more or less actual divine intervention of one form or another, all kings/queens/etc are linked spiritually, and they are granted special powers (stupidly strong, but also heavily linked to emotional states). The TL;DR version is that they are ‘official’ royalty now and they each have their own spirit guide (a king or queen from past eras; the adventurers have probably heard stories of at least a few)

From then on, the rest of the campaign was all about cleaning house, rooting out problems, collecting personal guards or attendants to suit the needs of these strange new royals, and basically getting the country back on track.

Why am I shelving it? Partially because the goals are really vague, there’s a lot of room for error, etc. Also, the story was really convoluted, and some of it really didn’t make sense. I also had my own ideas as to how the game would progress, which is bad because I started planning for those specific events to actually occur (you can’t do that in a game of players- they just do their own thing). But perhaps the most important reason is that, outside certain common-sense laws, like physics, games are supposed to be about freedom of player choice- this game was, now that I think about it, really rail-road-y. which was my fault.
Hell, the biggest problem was probably the king himself. Logically speaking, the adventurers could simply refuse to talk to him- you are compelled to do so. You should have the ability to say, ‘I already have a dad’- he carries you to his horse and you can’t really stop him. He’s a thin/weak-willed guy, we’ll just overpower him- nope, his ‘royalty powers’ make him virtually immune to damage, overwhelmingly strong, and tell status effects to go cry.

All in all, it would have been good for a laugh, but I put too much of my own thought and want into it for me to believe it would actually be any fun for anyone else to play

Part of an idea I had; i might come back and clarify later, but not right now:

resurrection ash- resurrection takes a toll on the body, taking a toll on its life force. if one is resurrected who does not possess the lifeforce necessary to stay alive, their body is reduced to glowing ash
resurrection ash is valuable both in its normal form and in its compressed state, though not the reasons one would think
often known as grief ash and hubris tears respectively, they possess both the life force of a living being and the power of the gods

___ Constance= Constant Vigilance, or something like that
looot of similarities with Constantine from Thief
this is for that bare-bones campaign. he is the collector that hires the party to obtain items for him
some of the items are just art or are valuable in some way, but some of them are (secretly) his personal items, and are very dangerous once brought together
he also has them kill various people who 'obstruct his business', who are secretly the people who locked him away long ago
He has a made who is secretly an intelligent slime

Why do i suddenly have the desire to run a game where all my players are literally nobility brats who either purposefully or consequentially have to start adventuring for x reasons?

so they all start off with a crap-ton of gold and gear, but most of what they have are basic noble skills, like riding and diplomacy, and they have minimal fighting expertise at best
and now they are running for their lives and having to fight tons of monster, otherwise they will die or starve to death

...might actually try running this actually...
from the outset it seems more plausible and less convoluted than most of my campaign ideas

Some time ago i posted the idea that i wanted to run a game where a .700 Nitro rifle was the primary or iconic weapon in the game, but couldn't get the idea to seem plausible. today, i came up with an idea to make this seem realistic, but doesn't necessarily allow all the gameplay value i want

you play a character whose grandfather has recently passed away, and you have been invited to the lodge your grandpa built out in the forest for his wake. while there, you are taken aside and shown to this beautiful .700 Nitro that is on display, and given the key for it. It was your grandpa's favorite gun and he wanted you to have it.
then the lodge and its grounds are assaulted by an unknown force, and are forced to defend yourself.

the gun is introduced to you early, and you can pick it up almost immediately once the action starts.
The two cruxes to the game are this:
The Nitro is, hands down, the most powerful weapon you can pick up
There is only a limited amount of ammo for the Nitro (mostly what is in the case next to it and in your grandpa's bedroom), and once it is gone, it is gone

This is coming from me because i hate how people tend to get the most awesome and special gear immediately after the point at which it would be useful, so it never gets a chance to shine. Here, you get to use it right away, and on whatever you want
this does bear the question of is it a bad idea to give players the most powerful weapon and let them use it against anything? answer: given that you have limited ammo, i don't see why not, as the game is possible to play without the Nitro, it just makes certain spots in the game easier

but that brings up more problems: if people know they are supposed to reserve ammo, they might reserve too much. Like, 'what if i'm only supposed to use it against the final boss? what if i need it later? what if there is a special area that needs it?' etc and so on.
also, if this is supposed to be the main weapon, or the 'iconic' weapon of the game, then is it really a good idea to make it so that the weapon can't see much action? that seems kind of counter-intuitive. i mean, sure, i could say that there are certain areas that will provide you with more a little bit more ammo, but that still means the Nitro would hardly see the light of day, and ruins the point of you getting 'all the ammo for the gun in the game' right off the bat

siiighs

well, on a side note, i had a vision of the character in third-person mode having the Nitro belted around their waist like a sword in an anime and it made me laugh

at once this idea both sounds good and also wreaks of the iconic, "But I might need it later" Syndrome you pointed out (Which has lead to collecting many super-weapons in my day and never using them or finding infinite use things that are just better and no longer having a reason to use them and thus never getting to see them).

That said I like the concept but it may need a bit of clever ammo distribution management. odds are a player will always want to have at least one clip left just in case or some semi-arbitrary amount ("Exactly 20 bullets, no less unless I see a god eating the planet!"). With any luck and always allowing for just enough ammo to accumulate that the weapon will see the light of day every now and then you may be able to pull this off quite well.

The concept reminds me a bit of Outlaw Star, and the main character's Caster Gun which was potentially insanely powerful the but bullets were rare and cost a small-to-large fortune each so he never wanted to actually fire the thing and always did so reluctantly (one of the bullet types just shot a miniature black hole that absorbed one person/target and then stopped existing).

Point being, sounds fun but a little finicky to pull off.

Several years ago, i started building a campaign for a (now ex) friend of mine who wanted to play d&d, but couldn't get to the main group, and was actually outcast from the group (for what i now know to be good reasons). I built her a solo campaign, but she never got all that invested and it was pretty soon dropped

looking back on it now, the entire concept of the campaign was pretty convoluted, but one adventure set in particular actually still seems really fucking cool and i wish i could run it properly. It involves the PCs entering this town and finding that the children are slowly disappearing, and are drawn to find out why.

What they basically end up dealing with is Slenderman, which for those of you who don't know was a creepypasta that was popular those years ago. It was a lot of hype, but i actually liked the concept, especially because my brother and i actually sat down and talked it out and basically came up with our own explanation for it
to us, the Slender man seemed more like some kind of fey, and in particular a guardian of children, taking them away from bad situations and tormenting them in the same way

back to topic, this adventure actually dealt with several different fey and magical beings, but the overarching 'big guy' was the Slender man, who was constantly terrorizing both you and the town
over a course of time (time seemed to flow differently in this town...) the adults in the area are killed in gruesome ways or are driven to suicide, while the children continue to disappear. Turns out the adults of this town are all actually massive dicks who basically abuse their children verbally, physically, and emotionally, and the children's cries drew the fey and their wrath.

If the PCs did what I expected and did their level best to save the children, the Slender man would seek to test them and how far they would go, how many children they could save, which led to the PCs surviving to go interact with the other interesting characters of the town. Eventually, all the adults would be dead, and all the children saved (either by the PCs or by Slendy itself) and the PCs would be confronted by Slender man once more, who would either punish them for getting in its way or reward them depending on how many children they saved.

I think i liked this quest hub in particular because it was creepy and unsettling, really ambiguous, but actually not meant to endorse direct combat. Most of your interactions with Slender ended with you blacking out and waking back up or just straight up running, and most of the interactions with the other 'local' denizens usually resulted in you learning lessons, helping in tasks, or playing games, when you weren't just going around looking for clues to what was going on.

here is the list of 'neighbors'
Hag
Doctor Eliza
Headmistress Isabelle
Fog friend
Troll (Ignotius)
The Woman In Black
Samuel the Skeleton and his boisterous crew
Slender

a lot of them were based around various horror aspects- the woman in black is an entity very similar to the one in the movie of the same name, doctor eliza was based around the character Dr. Bathory Menegle from Bloodrayne, but some were more original ideas, like Fog Friend, who appeared as a woman wrapped in a silvery-white fur cloak who found children lost in the forest and led them home safely, and played games with the children when no adults were around.

all in all, i still wish i could run this, but i'm not completely sure how well it would fly, especially since most settings it would fit into revolve heavily around fighting and killing people, which if the PCs tried that here they would die just like everyone else

Sudden image i just had: it's gonna be a little jumbled, but i've got to get this down before i forget

in the bioshock series, you always start off at a lighthouse, you always go to a fantastical city; this was mentioned in-game by Elizabeth to be a constant within the multiverse

columbia (the sky) and rapture (the sea) have already been done, so the main two things i can see it going to from there are either underground or to space
given technology and physics-bending in-universe, either is believable, but i still find it a little bit difficult to believe you could successfully launch into space from a lighthouse-sized structure

But

The idea I just had is this: many lighthouses are along the coast, where the tide rolls in
what do we get along the coast? sea caves
where do sea caves end up leading, due to the motion of the waves wearing down the stone?
Caverns

Realistically, if there is going to be another game within the bioshock universe, odds are good that it will be underground

wub

The princess was kidnapped, the prince is certain she is alive, and is determined to find her. Only, in this version, he brings the pcs along. The prince is…ok, but it is very obvious that while he is a dmpc, he needs needs needs the pcs in order to stay alive

don't know if you could make an entire campaign about this out of this kind of escort mission, but could make for an extended mission set

Noting for noting

the noble campaign- the weres
the campaign where adventurers took too long to create, and the dragons were killing everyone, so some group went about creating creatures to fight the dragons, only those went out of control and now the adventurers have to find a way to stop them
the campaign about the dragons of hell

You defeat the dragon, only for it to shrink down into the form of a beautiful and unconscious, bleeding sorceress. The guy who hired you comes in to stab you in the back, and you must flee with the mortally injured woman in your arms
You then spend the bulk of the remaining game helping her recover so that she can regain her strength and help you storm the castle

This one is going to be chaotic as hell, so if something needs exposition, just ask.

Had this idea for a series of games. It’s set in a world somewhat similar to our own, around the time frame of world war 2. The series mostly stars the group that would technically be the Nazis- they are strong, incredibly loyal to country, scientifically advanced, etc. thing is, they also aren’t dicks- some of their lands were taken from them, and they are just trying to take them back, to which large chunks of the world have launched attacks against them. So, this group (which I shall call the Not-Nazis, or NN) is taking waging war and taking over territories mostly so that they don’t get fucked (again).
Game 1 starts in a major city that was taken over some time ago, and a detachment was left there with a major officer mostly so that the people of the city didn’t try to attack the advancing army from behind. Buuut the colonel turns out to be a corrupt asshole who starts using his appointment to enforce all sorts of bullshit regulations and pretty much turns the city and countryside into his own private demesne.
Then, one day the populace is given notice by the very distraught troops: the ‘Fuhrer’ is on his way, with some of his loyal troops, to inspect the city and basically check on how the citizens are doing. Make sure everything is okay. The colonel and all his soldiers are starting to freak because this means that they are about to get found out as not being under orders, and are probably going to be court-martialed, if not dismissed and executed for their inhumane actions
You play as a resistance fighter, and in the game you are caught at one point by the fuhrer’s own guards, but are sent on your way, even though you are very obviously fighting them.
Later you are hiding out in your safehouse, and the door opens. This gets your attention because everyone who belongs there is already sitting in front of you. You all turn to find the NN officer who sent you on your way earlier standing before you.
She doesn’t have her weapon drawn. In fact, she sees rather calm
She politely asks you all to follow her, and you are escorted by her and the soldiers under her command down several buildings, and are led inside a boarded-up office.
Inside, you are met by the Fuhrer
Turns out the fuhrer is just trying to win the war, and he explains that the colonel was supposed to be here just to make sure the populace didn’t riot and attack his soldiers from behind their own lines. The colonel has twisted his commands to bring about this period of terror, brought in scientists to force experiments, etc
(Experiments of unusual and eerie nature are a common theme throughout the games)
He asks you to help stop the colonel, and offers is soldiers’ aid in doing so
So you play the rest of this game serving alongside ‘Amelia’ and company, and eventually topple the colonel and retake the city, before you succumb to injuries and disease. You are buried in a public military ceremony, with the injured fuhrer praising your deeds as those of your people, and could give you no higher honor

Yeah, it turns out that the NN are not actually assholes by nature. Most of them (and Amelia of particular note) are actually rather polite and well-mannered, and are just trying to take their country back. At the end of game 1, the Fuhrer (who himself was injured in the fighting) opts to stay in the city for the time being in order to show the replacement resident officer how he expects the city to be run, which is basically to make sure that no one is trying to start a rebellion, and otherwise allows the citizens to go about their lives as normal.

1st game was supposed to be closed world, kind of like Arkham City in a way. 2nd game is supposed to be more like an open-world shooter
Each of the games is supposed to be different, forcing you to adapt to different mindsets and playstyles to get through each one
2nd game, play as Amelia, trying to run around the country to stabilize the lines
Plotwise I haven’t developed much yet, but it will address the fact that she lost her left arm in the first game, and her replacement experimental arm is kind of…twitchy, limiting the way she can play. Also, while the war drugs were a joke in game 1, here they play a huge role, partially due to their interaction with the experimental prosthesis.
Game 1 protag was a normal human, kind of like ajay ghale from far cry 4. Amelia plays much more like a tank

At some point you are introduced to the Admiral, which sets up game three

Game 3 puts you primarily in naval combat territory.
Lots of ship fights, lots of time exploring and upgrading your own ships.
Amnesiac castaway picked up. Young woman in surgeon’s clothes
‘leviathan’ experiment
At some point, you encounter both a submarine and an underwater laboratory (nod to bioshock)
End game, the admiral sends his crew away and activates the experiemental ‘project rogue’ which uses the entire ship as a depth charge in order to destroy the leviathan
He may or may not be picked up by the submarine crew
End of the game, crewmembers are dying in their lifeboats, and suddenly someone is there to treat their wounds. The sun rises behind the amnesiac’s back, as she has regained her memories, revealing her to be the ‘angel of salvation’, a surgeon who has been mentioned in previous games.

I know I want to have a stealth-based game, and a spy-type game, but do those need to be independent?
Assassin-style: stealth-based combat, killing enemies before they know you are there
Spy-style: skulking about, making dinner conversation, weaseling for information, breaking into computer systems and sending info back
Thief-style: just what it says; breaking and entering, looting, and getting dragged into events even though you don’t want to, much in the style of the Thief series
Still need the medic game
Also want to have a game where this protag is a child who was pulled into the war, to show how war fucks up child soldiers
Sniper game?
‘Fuhrer’ game? I want to play a game where you play as the supreme commander, but I feel like that would end up playing as more of a 3rd person, xcom style of game, which I really don’t like
Aerial game? Major open world? flying fortress?
Allied nation has turned against what you believe in, so you play as a protagonist whose unit has been sent to combat this newly-turned enemy
Tank/vehicle game?
In every game, the protagonist for the next game is introduced in the game you are currently playing
This is kind of an ‘anyone can die’ series: the protag of game 1 dies, game 2 makes you believe Amelia dies in the introduction, the Admiral dies in game 3, the spy (if I decide to use that style of gameplay) dies in their game.
Side note: a lot of the soldiers in the army are actually female; it’s just hard to tell past the uniforms and the gas masks

about two weeks ago i came up with an idea for a major mechanic in a video game
early in-game you are introduced to a 'guide' character, an individual whom you can ask at any time to show you where loot is, show you hidden snipers' nests, take you on scenic tours of the city, or...you know, actually show you to your next objective
and you can also ask them questions about things, and they are just generally polite

but as the story progresses, the game starts to take bizarre turns as your actions start to have consequences
okay, fine

but you start to get the subtle notion that your guide happens to know more about what is going on than you do, as they are hardly ever surprised by the shit that goes down

as it turns out, the polite and chivalrous attitude is all just a facade, and the helpful assistant whom you've been hauling around all game isn't actually all that nice.
and when you finally get it in your head to ask, why didn't you tell me that my actions would doom all of humanity, their deadpan answer basically boils down to
'you didn't ask'