A Buffy question.

Oh, yeah.

I forgot the The Five, which were a group of big Demons which Samual used as an elite guard (and to attack people in situations that vampires couldn't - such as invade Jessica's private property). The Five looked basically like Jem'Haddar or like "The Judge" from season 2 of Buffy.


Season one was basically as season of transition. The Slayer and the Watcher were there basically long enough for the White Hats to be confident enough to handle things on their own... a safety net if things went south. Mercy and Jessica were destined to die and when I finally did the deed, everyone in the group felt it. It was my first time trying something as emotional is this and it actually worked... a little too well as Stone, distraught over the kidnapping of Mercy, went on a Matrix-like vampire hunt. Think Vampire Biker Bar, major firepower, and slow motion camera action...oh yeah and grenades. Shudder :D

Season Two died about mid-way through the season. Stone and company had found out about the Cabal, the Shadowgate, and the mystic runes which bound Molly's soul to her body. They had just survived a major smackdown by the Cabal involving kidnapping attempts by a group of Initiative-like commandos.

It died because of my own burning out and the group as well. Only one of my players is a big Buffy fan (the player of Stone). Molly's player watches the show because of his significant other and the Slayer's player never has seen the show or movie. It was really hard to maintain the Buffy feel under these circumstances.

I had already added a lot of Witchcraft info in the Buffy game (filling in blanks in the Buffyverse) - for instance the realms of the dead and the Sentinels showed up for one-shots. So I figured that I would darken the tone of the game and add all sorts of Unisystem information. However, tonights game fell very, very flat. So Buffy may have to take a vacation for awhile while we find more Buffy-friendly players and I watch more Buffy DVD's...

Shame too, since we had soooooooo much fun in the game :(

Wow! These sound like really good games. I might just take a closer look at the RPG in the New Year. You mentioned Witchcraft, I've seen it at my LGS, any good?

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You mentioned Witchcraft, I've seen it at my LGS, any good?

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It depends what you like in a game. Witchcraft is a game in the same vien of the World of Darkness. You play the Gifted, which are those which can do "magic".

Sort of like Mage: The Ascension without all the metaphysics which can drag things down. Also, the Gifted's powers aren't all the same - each of the Gifted abilities (Invocations, Devine Inspiration, Necromancy, and Psionics) are all unique in execution. For instance, Invocations fall a very freeform system much like Mage, while Seer powers have to be bought with Strength and Art scores but don't require Essense (personal energy) to power. Works really well, actually.

As far as the rulesystem, its a much more complex version of Buffy's "Unisystem Lite". But all the streamlining (such as removing the variable damage ratings) are already integrated into the rulebook - for instance all damages are listed with both the variable and "quick" damage ratings. My All Flesh Must Be Eaten books serves as a guide to Equipment in Buffy, for instance.

WC is full of cool things. Ferals (Werecreatures), Vampires, Ghosts, Phantasms, Seraphim, Fiends, Pariahs, Mad Gods, True Immortals, Etherials, Realms based on the Sephrioth Tree of Life. And with the Advantage/Disadvantage system you can play things such as Vampires, Ferals, and Ghosts without buying a whole bunch of core books (just a couple of supplements). For instance, in the Mystery Codex has rules for Vampires, Relentless Dead (Think Crow or Jason), Ghosts, or Phantasms; Abomination Codex has rules for Ferals. One rulebook instead of having to buy five or more...and all utilize the same base system instead of making their own mechanics.

I dunno. I like the game a lot - and with Unisystem, you have access to other genres too - for instance All Flesh Must Be Eaten is the game of Survival Horror (against Zombies - think Resident Evil) and Terra Primate is the same except with Apes (Congo, or Planet of the Apes). While character generation may differ, the point values and rule systems don't - so its possible to use a Quality (Advantage) from Terra Primate in Witchcraft or Buffy.

Thanks for the run down, I shall take a closer look at it as well. Though my interest in the occult is based more on my study of Ancient History, Mummy: The Resurrection is a favourite. :D

Thanks all for the nice info! :) It's very interesting to read.

Okay, I thought of sharing my own campaign as well, that died down a year ago... We used a point-based ICON system with some tweaks (and I'm glad to see some of the game mechanics I thought of appeared in the Unisystem - in a much more balanced way than my own, that is ;))

The series happens in a Florida harbor called Coascape. Guess what? It's a hellmouth of its own right :)

The PCs, season 1

Luna Shepperd - Slayer. Always hungry, strong-headed, a bit dumb sometimes a la Xander (gave us most of the funny lines of the series).

Alessandro Calavez Lopez - Luna's watcher, Sandro is in fact an immortal (a la Highlander, they existed in this Buffyverse. That was an error, there was too much power difference between the PCs). Professor of archeology of maya origins.

Celena Springs - Our goth bisexual witch, saved from the death when she was young by some sort of androgynous divinity called Avatar. Since then, Celena must follow Avatar's orders.

Azlilz Russel - Special agent trained as a commando. Gorgeous blonde, childhood friend of Luna. Her parents were killed by vamps.

Rebecca de Winter - Your average cheerleader spending most of her time finding the ultimate outfits...

Guest star PCs for the S1 pilot

Kevin Waters - Demon buying souls with contracts...

Cléo Willy - Teen liking everything gypsy.

Batosai Imura - Vampire samurai. Retains a feeling of honor after death using meditation techniques, making him not a predator but a worthy ally.

Season 2 PCs

All the previous regulars minus Sandro, plus:

Orgg - 2 meters tall demon, previously used as a killer-on-invocation. But the spell went wrong and Orgg is struck into our dimension. Took a strong liking to TV series. A nice guy, finally.

Steven Veiga - Misfit teen with a gift for machinery and engineering. Designs nifty machines all the time.

Next: the story and why I didn't last as long as my TrekRPG campaign.

Season 1 --------

The big bad was Tutankhamen. The pharaoh died as child in mysterious conditions - the fact is he was sired, but then locked into his sarcophagus with no way of escape. During 2000+ years, he didn't die really but starved to the point where he almost left this world. Additionnally, he was greatly driven insane.

So Tuthankhamen's demonic soul, struck midway between our world and the hell dimensions, tries to prise himself free.

Over the course of season 1, the PCs experienced some "reality shifts", meaning they found themselves several times between dimensions, or in other ones altogether. "The barriers between the dimensions are thinning" warns Engoulevent Placide, a shaman NPC that was to take a lot of importance.

Appears Sandro's nemesis, an immortal conquistador (don Pedro de Castilla) Sandro spent his life evading.

Seems like he works under Tutankhamen's orders.

Approach the end of season 1. The PCs get clues as to a mysterious thing called "Rada".

The Acathla statue is stolen and arrives at Coascape: Tutankhamen intends to use it to open a passageway for himself. The plan was foiled, happily, thanks to the help of Batosai Imura, and - big surprise - with the help of don Pedro, who changed sides at the last moment.

He still doesn't side with the Slayer yet. What's his agenda?

Season 2

With the death of Tutankhamen, the whole dimension thinning should have ended. On the contrary: things get worse. don Pedro makes regular appearance and is s2's big bad (he's an awesome warrior combining immortal power with magic - he's able to wield a monstrous 2 meter long double handed sword with one hand to deflect bullets!!!). Rada is in fact Radament, an international conglomerate with lengthy ramifications (a la Wolfram and Hart). Their objective is yet unknown but they play a part in the dimension thinning business.

What's really going on

don Perdo works for Radament and Tutankhamen was just a pawn to help thinning the dimensions - he followed orders when he killed Tutankhamen. Radament's objective is truly to thin the dimensions to a point where they can do... er... what they want to do. Summon some hellish god, most likely.

Why it didn't work out

- The system was incomplete, especially in terms of magic. I designed spells on the fly, but not a lot and they were too much underpowered since I feared to have too powerful a magic. There was no real limitation to the number of spells you can cast...
- The PCs were completely out of balance, even though I had tried to put in some sort of Drama Point system before Unisystem to help balance the PCs. Sandro with his immortality was way too high, then Luna as a Slayer could take damage and dust vamps as she wished, and the white hats didn't have a lot of compensation.
- But all these problems you can deal with when you are an experienced player (hell, Amber works fine without dice). The two main reasons for the campaign dying down were:
- Unexperienced players. After my awesome experience in STRPG (we were in the middle of s4 at the time), I think I asked too much of the players. Throw in...
- Serious personal differences between the players that arose in the course of the game, to the point where the players were divided in two camps almost working against each other.

So, with the departure of Luna's player, we let things die down. I regret that, since it was the first time I had planned a campaign from the very beginning, and some characters had an awesome potential. We had succeeded in keeping the Buffy spirit in the beginning, even if the players made too much separate teams.

Next: Memorable quotes

Woah, seems you all have some very good games here, guys. That'd make me want to try the game, although I know next to nothing about Buffy (must have seen something like the pilot plus one or two episodes - and didn't like them much). Pity nobody else in my gaming group does either.

Rebecca: A corpse! A corpse in my locker! Er, do you think it was a move from the other team to dispirit us cheerleaders?
Cleo: Of course not. If it was the case, they would have put it in before the game, not after.

(Kevin's eyes shine in the dark, and puts on his sunglasses everytime Sandro turns off the light.)
Sandro: You behaving is telling.
Cleo: Telling what? That he's got conjunctivitis?

Sandro: There may be a more brutal method...
Luna: Yeah! I like that!
Sandro: ...something like a phone call.
Luna: THAT is brutal??

Sandro: Luna, when you train, it's not for tomorrow. It's not like exams.

Luna: Hey Aziliz, did everything go fine?
Aziliz: Yup, the guy was dead.

Sandro: He was a navy captain; he guess he could swim.
Luna: Of course not!! Otherwise why would he need a boat?

Aziliz (trying to see what's happening in the opposite building, and entering into an apartment): Aziliz Russel, I'm a government agent, I'm here to look out your window. Intel reports you have a nice view.

Celena: And he will be able to multiply the bread!
Luna: You forgot he's on a diet.
Celena: Okay! Then he'll multiply little lo-fat diet cakes.

Celena: Since she's here, she would continuing being fine, but from now on, the more she continues being here, the less she's better.

Sandro: I'm coming right now! Er, do you really need me?

Sandro: I was having dinner at some friends'.
Luna: Oh, you got friends? Cool.

Luna (to Batosai): It's your so-called undead life that's at stake here.

Aziliz: Sorry pals, but he really looked more like a demon than a nice guy.
Sandro: Don't equate demons and evil guys, please.

Luna: She will likely turn into a frog. Or a staircase.

The Oracle: How did you get through this?
Aziliz: Thanks to my superior speech talents.

Celena: If you don't exactly think we're normal, that's normal; we're not exactly normal people, in a not exactly normal dimension.

Aziliz: You're demon... that doesn't kill? That feeds on dead flesh? That has a liking for freezer food?

Rebecca: This demon lacks so much taste. My, but he had the choice between a fast-food and a French baker!

Aziliz: Take the cat. Hallo, still batteries in there?

Aziliz: Don't wanna talk to you anymore, back off! Damn, she's got the car keys.

Steve: And this neon light, does it speak morse as well?
Luna: Nope. This one really doesn't work.

Ahh, souvenirs.

Next: episode listing

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Originally posted by KillerWhale
Luna (to Batosai): It's your so-called undead life that's at stake here.

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Ok, wait : what language was the game played in ? 'Cause I can't see how this pun could work in french...

For BtVS Directors out there: here's the list of the episodes (summed up as hooks), if there's some you'd be interested in, drop me a line, I'll detail them. Some were adapted from other RPGs.

1x01/1x02 Welcome into our hellish lives
The death of the caterer of Coascape High, killed by vamps, leads to a necromancer under TK's orders.

1x03 - Love letters
An ancient love story with a background of Native American shamanism.

1x04 - Boring to death
A reality shift brings the PCs into a wacky parallel world.

1x05/1x06 - Ronin
A man able to impose his will on others is loose in Coascape.

1x07/1x08 - The memory of the world
An ancient demonic artifact contains a vast sum of knowledge, but knowledge has a price.

1x09 - Parallels
Helping parallel world critters to escape slavery, with the background of a lunatic asylum.

1x10 - Christmas-3D
TK tries to use Coascape TV to control their minds.

1x11 - Songs of deepest Earth
The revelation of TK's true nature, first run-in with Don Perdo.

1x12 - Day and Night
Final fight against TK.

2x01 - Trials of individuality
(Note: this eps mirrors STRPG 509/510 called Trials of plurality)
An ep designed to reinforce cohesion in a PC group that was seriously beginning to fall apart...

2x02/2x03 - Spring Equinox
A demon and its hunter are locked in time, but they come back to finish their fight at the... spring equinox.

2x04 - A night a the Succubus Club
Radament conspires against the owner of the Succubus Club, your typical demon/vamp bar.

2x05 - The one girl
Time for the election of the May Queen. A girl makes a spell so as to win, that goes awry.

And the game died down here :(

C5: that's the advantage of being a translator, you can sometimes improve the puns ;) (However I couldn't translate other ones at all). The game was played in French and the original line was:

Luna (à Batosai): C’est quand même ta soit-disant vie-morte qui est en jeu.

Here are some others for French speakers completely untranslatable:

Luna: Je veux un Catena! Non, on a appelle ça un katana.

Luna: Si on mangeait un Boulino?

Celena: Y a des flics en fraction? Euh, faction?
Sandro: Le premier mot était adapté; ils prennent leur quart.

Luna: Vous arrêtez de faire les homo-tamponneurs?

:D

C5: Darn it, if you were in the area (and if I had the time, which is my biggest problem now), we would have given it a try!

Watch the series, you won't regret it. You should try to start with the very beginning, as the plot thickens and the relationships deepen.

Be warned that you may have to watch several eps before liking it... The series has a whole b-movie feeling, mixing nonsense with grittiness, that makes you think "this is the most stupid thing I ever saw" when you watch an ep, and then "this is one of the most awesome and subtle things I ever saw" when you watched 5 eps.

Well KW, who knows, maybe one of us will move one day :). Though the time is also a problem for me (so far we're having so much trouble with my gamin friends gathering all players for a particular RPG that we end playing only one-shot games)

As for watching the series, I may give it a try, but I already have a full season of Enterprise plus many taped Doctor Who episodes to watch, and still haven't started to...

Yep, that would be nice!! :)

Same here, I got a friend who has English satellite TV, plus friends who have the French cable; they tape a lot of series for me, I have all Voyager and didn't find the time to finish s7, I have the beginning of ENT and only watched the pilot, and I never found the time to get past 6x07 in BtVS :(

Anyway, if there's only one ep in BtVS to watch to determine the feeling of the series, I'd recommend "Hush" (season 4), "Les gentlemen" in French. If this leaves you cold, it's safe to say you may not like the rest of the series ;)

Okay, noted. Actually, the only episodes I saw were the pilot, and one episode where a demon is sent on the Internet (then on a robot body) after the book in wich he was trapped was scanned. Thanks to reruns, I managed to catch it again some months later. My favourite character was the librarian guy with the glasses (er, not counting the various female characters, but that's for other reasons :D)

Damn. I wanna play. :(

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Originally posted by AslanC
Perri is a general studies student.

Kimmi is studying art in defiance of her parents desire for her to study sciences.

Tyler is on a scholarship.

Heather is studying Wicca.

Father Murphy is a spiritual advisor for the kiddies.

And Nigel is a teacher.

Right now Dr. Darkholme has put them together as a group to participate in an expirament.

They take all their classes together for one year and she will allow them to get their Bachelors in 3 years instead of 4.

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C5: These eps you saw were S1 eps (Welcome to the hellmouth for the pilot, the one with the robot stuff is I robot You Jane IIRC.)

S1 has the typical b-series feeling that can make you go "duh" if you expect some seriousness... The mix between terror/angst and humor (which IMO is the success of BtVS) really appeared later, in S2.

The librarian (Giles) is one of my favourite characters as well... And no, let's not discuss the girls ;)

Geez, I wish I lived closer to either of you guys. This has really gotten seriously interested at taking a closer look at this game.

It is hands down one of the best RPG books I have ever seen, for one of the best TV series I have ever seen.

This book is right up there with the CODA Star Trek NG for quality of game product :)

I getting my Buffy RPG book from Ebay.
I just sent the money for it on Sat.
I also got the Director's Screen coming with it.
So far my wife wants to play it, working on some of my friends to play too.

I particularly like what I saw about how the game runs Werewolves.

What is it? 3 levels, first 2 are drawbacks and the 3rd is an advantage (12pt or something like it.) 1st level is the 'average' werewolf, pc has no control. Can't remember exactly how the next level works, and the 3rd (advantage) is called the White Werewolf (correct?) and the character can change at will and maintains full control. Or something like that, I find that a very cool way to run it.

BTW Aslan, is Soul Suvivors worth a view? Been thinking about renting it.

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It is hands down one of the best RPG books I have ever seen, for one of the best TV series I have ever seen.

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One thing about the success of BTVSRPG is that C.J. Carella will finally get the respect of the general RPG community. Whatever success the game has, both in writing and game system is Carella's doing. He designed the Unisystem and he wrote the book.

Maybe it'll shut up the Rifts fanboy critics who have been ridiculing him since he left Palladium.

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Originally posted by Phantom
BTW Aslan, is Soul Suvivors worth a view? Been thinking about renting it.

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I would say no. I have it for Elizha :) Yum yum yum :)

But if you want to see the same subject material done way better, rent Jacob's Ladder. Superior film in every regard (even if it doesn't have Eliza :( )

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Originally posted by prophetsteve
Maybe it'll shut up the Rifts fanboy critics who have been ridiculing him since he left Palladium.

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I have Pantheons of the Megaverse, what else did he do for them?

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Originally posted by AslanC
I would say no. I have it for Elizha :) Yum yum yum :)

But if you want to see the same subject material done way better, rent Jacob's Ladder. Superior film in every regard (even if it doesn't have Eliza :( )

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1) Uhm, who?
2) Seen JL, long time ago. Should rent it again, I seem to remember liking it at the time.

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Originally posted by Phantom
1) Uhm, who?
2) Seen JL, long time ago. Should rent it again, I seem to remember liking it at the time.

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Eliza Dushku... Faith? You do watch Buffy right? :)

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Originally posted by AslanC
Eliza Dushku... Faith? You do watch Buffy right? :)

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Yeah, but I haven't memorized the actors names, yet. Well, not beyond SMG anyway. ;)

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I have Pantheons of the Megaverse, what else did he do for them?

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The most infamous was Rifts: South America 1 and 2. Basically since then a lot of Rifts fans have called him a powergamer's dream and have gone so far to blame him for the ruining of the game.

While I admit the SA1 and 2 are overpowered, the ruining of Rifts started long before that...but thats a rant for another day...

Also they ignore the amazing stuff he did for Palladium. Nightbane was sort of a Palladium version of Werewolf or Witchcraft. He took existing Palladium concepts and moved them in amazing new directions (like the expansion of the Astral Plane) and gave us cool new heros and villians. He wrote three sourcebooks for the game; all of which I concider the best books to emerge from the company in years. Ironically only one sourcebook came out after he left Palladium and Nighbane basically died.

I cut my teeth on Palladium (not long after my introduction to gaming via Star Frontiers) but long ago drifted away from it for "greener pastures". Nightbane was my last link to the game system (although I buy Heroes Unlimited books occasionally).

Now that Unisystem has caught my attension, by break will probably be complete - CJ is writing a superheroes game utilizing the Buffy Unisystem Light system and once its out I may find myself abandoning Palladium completely.

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I particularly like what I saw about how the game runs Werewolves.

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You can tell that CJ was a big GURPS fan by the Quality System. It mixes the best part of GURPS with the ease of Storyteller (and without rolling fistfulls of dice).

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What is it? 3 levels, first 2 are drawbacks and the 3rd is an advantage (12pt or something like it.) 1st level is the 'average' werewolf, pc has no control. Can't remember exactly how the next level works, and the 3rd (advantage) is called the White Werewolf (correct?) and the character can change at will and maintains full control. Or something like that, I find that a very cool way to run it.

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Level 1 is a Drawback; your basic standard historical Werewolf. You turn into a Werewolf during a full moon. You have no control over your Werewolf side and you will have no recollection of what you have done.

Level 2 is a Quality. You have control and recollection as a werewolf but you only change during a full moon (limiting its usefullness).

Level 3 is a major Quality. You have control and recollection plus you can change at will.

Ok, let see if I have this straight (possible spoilers);













-Xander is the foreman of his crew
-They are re-buildeing the High School...On top of the Hellmouth!
-Spike found his Soul, but has lost his marbles
-Anya is back in the freelance Vengence business
-Willow has been 'Betty Forded" with the help of Giles (and presumably the Council).
-Buffy has a job at the HS as a counselor

Do I have this right so far?

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Originally posted by Phantom
Ok, let see if I have this straight (possible spoilers);













-Xander is the foreman of his crew
-They are re-buildeing the High School...On top of the Hellmouth!
-Spike found his Soul, but has lost his marbles
-Anya is back in the freelance Vengence business
-Willow has been 'Betty Forded" with the help of Giles (and presumably the Council).
-Buffy has a job at the HS as a counselor

Do I have this right so far?

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You have accurately described the "initial state" at the beginning of this season. Some changes have occurred (more spoilers):






















- We've learned a little bit about why Spike lost his marbles. It's partly due to the fact that his new soul means he feels all the guilt for what he did all during the time he didn't have it.

- Anya is no longer in the freelance vengance business. D'Hoffryn granted her request to be permanently disenfranchised -- for a price.

- Giles is missing; when we last saw him, a cultist was swinging an axe at his head.

- The Watcher's Council is destroyed, it's members dead or scattered.

- This season's "big bad", the First Evil, has been playing mind games with Buffy and the Scoobies. Involving, among other things, showing them visions of dead people.

- Andrew and Jonathan, of the Nerdly Trio, returned to Sunnydale. It turns out that Warren, or his ghost, or the First Evil is giving Jonathan instructions. Andrew, sadly, fails to realize he is being duped, and loses his life as part of an attempt to bring a "real vampire" into existance. The First Evil's minions have captured Spike and are bleeding him to complete this summoning.