Fragged Empire is one of my favorite settings, and I've wanted to play it for years, but darned if I can make sense of its mechanics. Recently, my brother told me he was starting up a game in the setting, and when I suggested we use Genesys, he tasked me with writing the rules.
My biggest hold up with writing these rules is that I'm going to be a player in this rule set (as opposed to the GM, as I'm used to), so I'm wary of accidentally making things too favorable for my or my allies' characters. So, I figured I'd pop in here and see if any of you fine folks might offer some assistance.
At the moment I'm none too worried about Talents (the Core set ought to work well enough, and if we want more later we can deal with it then), and wanted to first focus on the four species of Fragged Empire. My general philosophy when designing races for a game is to give them each a minor passive ability and a major once-per-session power. I didn't bother to choose EXP or Wound/Strain Thresholds yet, but I'll get to them soon enough. Here's what I got so far:
Corporate
|
Brawn |
Agility |
Intellect |
Cunning |
Willpower |
Presence |
|
1 |
2 |
2 |
2 |
2 |
3 |
-
Starting Skills: +1 to any Social Skill of your choice
-
Well Off: Begin the game with +500 starting Credits
-
Make Your Own Luck: Once per session, after rolling for a check, you may choose to reroll the entire check, keeping the new result (even if it’s worse than before)
Kaltoran
|
Brawn |
Agility |
Intellect |
Cunning |
Willpower |
Presence |
|
2 |
2 |
2 |
3 |
1 |
2 |
-
Starting Skills: +1 to Perception, Vigilance, or Cool
-
Lowlight Vision: Remove up to 2 Setbacks caused by darkness
-
Vision from the Ancestors: Once per session, you may flip a Destiny Point from Dark to Light
-
Optional - Blind: You are incapable of sight; reduce the difficulty of Perception and Vigilance Checks based on hearing by 1. Perception and Vigilance Checks that rely on sight are now impossible. You may otherwise perform as normal (no effect to combat or Initiative checks, and your character can navigate the same as other characters).
Legion
|
Brawn |
Agility |
Intellect |
Cunning |
Willpower |
Presence |
|
3 |
2 |
2 |
1 |
2 |
2 |
-
Starting Skills: +1 to any Combat Skill
-
Cold Resilient: Never receive Setback due to cold; exceptional cold may still harm a Legion by GM discretion (such as near-0 Kelvin).
-
Tough as Nails: Once per session, spend a Destiny Point to reduce the effect of a Critical Injury to 01
Nephilim - Emissary
|
Brawn |
Agility |
Intellect |
Cunning |
Willpower |
Presence |
|
2 |
2 |
3 |
2 |
2 |
1 |
-
Starting Skills: +1 to Medicine, Mechanics, or Brawl
-
Fast Healing: Whenever you received healing, you may take 1 Strain to recover 1 additional Wound
-
Mind of Eden: Once per session, spend a Destiny Point to use your Intellect as the Skill rating for a check
The next thing I need to work on is the money system--using Credits (a la the vanilla money system) would be the simplest way, but doesn't fit the theme of the game, and I much prefer the mechanics of Fragged Empire where you allocate Resources rather than spend money (one of the few things I enjoyed about the system). I'm considering jury-rigging the GM's Weapon Creation toolkit into a Resource-based Build-a-Gun-Workshop (with Corporates getting double starting Resources), but that's a bit off so far. Ships will likely just be ported over from EotE, for ease of access.
What do y'all think? Any suggestions, recommendations, concerns, criticisms? I'll be passing this along to my GM soon, so of course he gets the final word, but anything is appreciated.
Best Wishes,
--CastleCruncher