Last week I mentioned that my group and I were embarked on a playtest of Shawn Gaston’s Clockworks game . I created a Obsidian Portal Page for the occasion as well.
I told my players that we would be starting in the Free Nations and they would be hired on as Sky Pirates. Each of them have either been in a Great Republic prison, exiled to the Vori Islands, or in hiding (their choice) for the last several years. Each of them are going to come up for a reason for why they found themselves in the situation they are in.
Character Creation
I decided to start everyone out as Seasoned this time around so they could start a little more experienced and powerful than our normal games (which I usually always start at Novice, or level 1 if it’s a OSR D&D game).
The players could choose any Edges from Savage Worlds Deluxe Edition, Clockworks document, the Thrilling Tales 2e book, or the Deadlands Noir Kickstarter PDF.
For one of their Edges, they could ignore the rank requirement (except for Legendary), but had to meet the other requirements. The other Edge (or two if human) had to follow standard SW rules.
Now character creation did take longer than I would have liked for a couple of reasons. 1) Players showing up late (for various reasons), meaning I had to start the explanations all over again, and again. This caused a snag in the flow of the evening… Oh well. 2) Some unfamiliarity with the rules. It’s been awhile since my players have used Savage Worlds, so I had to walk through many parts. 3) Options. With the use of four separate documents and flipping through the Edges and Flaws to see EXACTLY which would fit the concept of their character best; it made Chargen take a while.
Sadly two of my players were not able to make the session so they are making their characters this weeks so we can play on Sunday.
Player Concepts
Reece- Hard-boiled Detective just recently released from the slammer.
Fletch- Doctor on the run for performing unnecessary procedures and “cures” on patients.
Nate- Human ex-soldier now gone sky pirate.
Omar- Fae-blooded Elementalist.
Stephen*- Human Weird Scientist.
Liam*- Fae-blooded something or other.
*= Was not able to make the sessions, so I only have the brief explanation that they emailed me.
Into the Skies
Sunday we will kick off the campaign with the group receiving a simple job and seeing what hijinks they find themselves in.
As I mentioned in the previous post (see link at top), this game will be heavily influenced by Heroic, Adventure, and Crime pulp stories. Predominant among them, The Voyages of the Scarlet Queen.
To give it that pulp/heroic feel I debated on using the Thrilling Tales rule of ”Heroes Don’t Die!”, but I’m not a huge fan of death immunity. I think that the threat of death can be lessened to fit the feel of certain genres, but I think that there still should be that threat/scare (so the game stays thrilling).
In the end I decided to make a rule that the player can burn a benny, and instead of rolling on the incap table/to soak (after wounds -3) the player will be back and wounds -3 and still in the fight. If the player is out of Bennies, then they have to roll on the Incap table and then they are shit up the creek if they roll bad.
Here are the benny rules I’ll be using in my Clockworks game.
Benny Rules
You can burn a Benny to:
- Soak damage- as per the normal SW rules.
- Reroll a failed test- as per the normal SW rules.
- Roll 1d6 and add that to a trait test (this must be declared before the initial roll).
- Not Die- If you fall incapacitated you can burn a Benny to immediately go to wounds -3, be conscious and live to fight another day. If you are are out of Bennies, you must soak as per normal SW rules and roll on the Incap Table.
- It’s Not As Bad As It Looks- Once per session burn a Benny to reduce Wounds by one- as per Clockworks rules.
- It IS As Bad As It Looks- Once per session burn a Benny to ignore all wound and fatigue modifiers for one round- as per Clockworks rules.
- Plot Twist- Once per session burn a Benny to add something to the narrative. This must be approved by the GM and cannot change something that has been previously stated as true, unless there is some justification and agreement on declaration.
This Sunday: Time for Adventure!
