Okay! My turn for a forum RP! I call it “The Pocalypse: Against the Machine”! It’s my first attempt at an RP, so I’m still experimenting. It is based in The Pocalypse world, but the characters have never met the characters in The Pocalypse’s main story (the comic)… as far as we know! If you want to participate or just read it, check out the forums!
The game is inspired by three of my favourite “old-school” RPGs: Earthbound, Robotrek, and Pokemon (like I need to link that one). Earthbound was the first RPG I ever played! (I don’t count “Lagoon”. Yuck.) So, expect a few RP gameplay elements from those games. Maybe. I’m not sure what I’m doing ;)
I know that a lot of you have waaay more experience with this stuff than I do, so Im counting on you to help me and the story out! Here’s the first screen from the forum:
An eighteen-year-old young man stares at the walls of his crummy one-room apartment as he waits to be named.
What is his name?
As I’m still experimenting, I don’t know how often I’ll update it, but know that The Pocalypse’s main story will always take top priority! While you’re waiting for an update, feel free to participate in the other awesome RPs in the forums!
Enjoy Scene 13 – “Until Proven Innocent”!
Please continue to vote! :D The Mystery Mutant’s sketch is still the incentive! Thank you for voting everyday!
You can follow The Pocalypse on Facebook, Twitter and RSS, too!
OH NOES!!! Hopefully Graybane will be able to talk Rusty from being a complete dumbass, but hey, at least Rusty cared about Jan.
rusty is in love with jan he just didnt no it until now!
leave it to rusty to jump to conclusions
@ somebody- sadly I have to agree to that statement to the fullest, plus he is angry about the loss and hunter I don’t think he was ever in love with Jan I think he is finally seeing things differently since he did say he hoped they got ate or something.
In responce to Desc. His name is Ash, Ash Ketchem
^^^^^^What he said.
@Anonymous_Jr & Matthew – Haha, yup! One of many Pokemon influences ;)
Hopefully Greybane will make Rusty believe he is innocent. Though I kind of doubt it, Rusty seems like the kind of hardheaded guy who, after setting a goal for himself will either achieve it or die trying.
Great update, by the way :)
@sykes Rusty is one of those people who act like they don’t give a damn on the surface but are actually rather soft on the inside, meaning most of his insults are empty including the “I hope you get eaten” one, and on a different note I can see multiple ways for Greybane to talk his way out of this, along with multiple offensive ways, and a escape route also.
I was on holiday last week so haven’t read the comments from the strips. Is Greybane the guy’s canonical name or just a fan nickname till we find out what it really is? I’d pretty much just been assuming this was Bernie and Jess’ Dad.
And I’d love to take part in the RPG but I’m in the middle of exams just now. If you’re still accepting new players in a month I might give it a go.
Bonjour M. Joe!.. It is Easter here! or Paques if you are french, how are you?,i have nice long weekend ahead of me & I intend to take very great advantage of it…I have not heard any bad news form your sector so I assume you are doing well….may you prosper M. Joe…..Joyeuses Paques!
i think this episode was to short! -.-
@Chris B Chikin – When Joe first met him in the earlier scenes of the comic he gave his name as Greybane.
BWAAAAHHH. Stupid RSS ticker effs itself and I had a million entries to sift through and I miss a whole two episodes to comment on!
How will anyone ever get by without my constant droning that Rusty’s gonna diiiiieeeeee?
Also, I’m getting a good vibe from this new vampire in the dreamscape…
You should never shoot angry, you almost always make a mistake, but Greybane can get throuhg this easy, poor Rusty never knew how much he cared
I’ll tell you right now, some of the best RP’s I’ve played in have the least complicated rules. But don’t get me wrong, I feel all RP’s need rules and stuff to make sure it follows well enough.
One of my biggest complaints is when someone starts a free form RP and just expects people to go with the flow. It shouldn’t be that unusual for someone to want their character to be the best they can be, so the person running the RP shouldn’t expect someone to willingly die or take damage or suffer.
I feel it’s a good idea to incorporate dice rolls, coin flips or some sort of stats to help determine the outcome of an event without forcing the players to make a decision and then later be called a “power player” or cheater.
I’ll tell you right now I’d never willingly get hurt, get caught, die or whatever else under my own free will. I’d try my best not to suffer negative penalties. That’s what stuff like stats, dice or coin flips are for, to add in that natural, uncontrollable element.
There are add-ons you can get to actually add dice rolls and coin flips right into your forums, or there is a website geared to allow people to make online dice rolls and then report them back to the forums, it even keeps a log of them so the moderator can make sure no one is trying to cheat.
No,I am actually positive Rusty loved Jan, even before now. Noticed, that no matter how much of a jerk he was, he always tried to make sure Jan survived, along with her son. Being angry about it and tough was just his way because he did not want to admit it to the others.
@Description: his name is
ZOOSMELL POOPLORD.
Er… I mean… let my try this again.
JOHN EGBERT.
@ Aethrys – Haha, nice MSPA reference.
Anyway, that was a pretty dumb guess of Rusty, since Greybane was on the couch, sleeping all the time.
@ Jeremy: To be honest, I’d argue that a person who’s never willing to let their character suffer injury in a free-form RP has missed the point and has no business taking part. In a traditional RP the player’s main objective is to survive to the end. In an FFRP their character is guaranteed to survive as long as they want it to, allowing them to concentrate more on an interesting story. And an interesting story requires interesting characters, and perfect, invincible characters that never suffer are boring. If you want the RP to be fun and interesting then you need to be willing to make compromises for your character else you’ll find it to be little fun for yourself or the other players.
The first FFRP I played in (link below) was a zombie apocalypse story which for some reason also included werewolves and aliens. Within a couple of hours in-game of my character joining (page 20) I had him suffer a bad injury to one arm so that he couldn’t carry shotguns or rifles. Other players really were killing off their characters, and those deaths made for some really interesting plot points (sadly one of the big ones never got resolved) so really, unless you’re willing to take some hits and not play as a Mary Sue then you should find another type of game.
s
http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/362.110982-Zombie-Apocalypse-Squad-Cancelled?page=1
Thank you for that Chris… I think we lost the distinction between roleplaying and role-play games when people started to blur the lines. Now people forget that roleplaying isn’t competitive. It’s about writing about someone else, or pretending to be someone else. Role playing games are the same, but there’s a goal there. A goal that you make it to, or you don’t. Role plays might have a goal, but you can always veer away from that goal and still THUROUGHLY enjoy the story you’re writing. Honestly, a lot of my FAVORITE characters in roleplays, are the ones I plan on killing off later. The exeption to this is when I make a character whose abilities are less than stellar. The abilities they have are usually JUST enough to help them survive, but at the same time, they never go anywhere. And then, when they finally realize how awesome their abilities are, bam… I make a plan to kill them off. It’s kinda morbid, but fun. And that doesn’t mean that I always kill them off. If they’re a really good character that deserves to reach their goals for some reason, then I have a hard time killing them off.
In any case, role-players and gamers are two different kinds of people. Roleplay’s and RPGs (even tabletop RPGs) are different too. I think we need to remember that. It’s hard because so many people have tried to blur the lines.
Robotrek was awesome! It was the first game I bought after I received my SNES, and I played it for hours. That and the original Final Fantasy (for NES) were probably my two favourite RPGs of all time. The ones today are nice, but they are not comparable to those old style games. And I agree with you, Joe, Lagoon sucked.
@Jeremy, Chris B Chikin & Willy – Thank you for tips! I have a lot to learn and your help is greatly appreciated :D
@Zarthanon – Agreed! You really can’t compare old-school and new-school RPGs. I try to keep up with the new stuff, but I always find myself re-visiting the classics :D I bought Earthbound (well, my parents did. No way I could afford $90 back then!) because it came in a huge box (because of the player’s guide) and it just caught my eye like a monolith of awesome.