The metaphorical creative wall is slowly being worked through, with a couple of hitches...
The setting is coming together nicely in my head and on paper in the form of trace notes. There's still a lot of details to work out, plus a timeline and some rudimentary maps, but I at least have *SOME* handle on it. Yeah, there's a lot of work to do for it, but getting enough done to start should not be that difficult... except...
I still have no idea what system I am using...
I have looked through and/or thought about all the systems I have that are generic... I have looked through specific systems... Hell, I have looked through "dubiously acquired" PDFs of games I do not currently own to see if something really fits what I am trying to do... and I am at a loss... I currently have nothing system-wise that I feel comfortable shoving this setting in.
Trouble is... I know that every time I write a "new" game system, I am just re-inventing the wheel, and there's not always a need to do so. I mean, if you want to play high fantasy, there's really no reason to reach for something other than D&D/Pathfinder. If you want to play superheroes, grab Mutans & Masterminds or Champions/HERO. Horror? Call of Cthulhu or Chill will serve you well. Science-Fiction... it's not that simple as there as has never been a truly definitive system for it other than Traveller, which does hard sci-fi REALLY well, but mucks space opera all up. There are games that can do space opera, but most of the them are tied to a licensed setting and have added "features" I want nowhere near my game.
What I have in mind is space-opera with hard sci-fi leanings. The closest analogue to the setting I can think of is Firefly/Serenity, but the system published for that is horri-bad. Plus, it has a couple of elements that don't jibe with my setting. One is small, but the other makes a huge difference. Religion... F/S has it, though in a minor capacity. The setting I have in mind doesn't... at least not in large enough doses to make a difference. Second, F/S has no non-humans, and for once in my miserable gaming life, I want some alien weird shit available to my players. No non-humans will kind of kill the history I have in mind for the whole thing...
It's enough to make a crazy man crazier, but not quite enough to make him sane...
I understand this is a prison of my own making, but I'm typically crafty enough to escape... This one, though... This one's tough...
Knowing me, I'll kluge together a "new" homebrew and make it fly... 'cause when you don't have an actual key to the cage, you gotta fashion one out of gum wrappers, toenail clippings, and nacho chips because that may be all you have available... and you gotta try to escape... It probably won't work, but who the hell knows...
It just might...
-- GopherDave
