Webs in worldbuilding

Science In My Fiction has a post up with the title Spiders In Space: Our Constant Companions. This may not be The Drune's post at ix on Space Spiders, or any of Needles' incredible creatures at Swords & Stitchery, but it's intriguing nonetheless.

It makes me think of the end of this article, when the subject turns to Biosphere 2.

Reading it all as a worldbuilder and games designer, there's a challenge - how to evoke or enable these evolving webs, with potential for unexpected niches and cracks? For me it also ties in with the idea of minus level characters, via ckutalik's image of ripples.

Can a game system represent or suggest an ecology in a simple way? The posts here on growing a tabletop say I think it can. And it seems to me a set of supplementary mechanisms like this could make a sandbox more of a living, breathing space, increase the fun through naturalistic development, greater immersion. Does it burst your buds?

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It's life, Lalei, but not as we know it

A quick update on the Humanspace Empires playtest being run at Spaceswords & Glory, where the tension's rising fast.

There's an intruder on the ship, one of the interdimensional Mihálli. The Deeds of Glory is now being locked down and a security team with a plan is moving to intercept, cautiously.

Down on the ice planet, at the site of the former research station, unknown beings are closing on the shuttle. Warbots are prepared, air tablets in and weapons made ready...

We've got a half dozen or so players. I'm guiding Payákár, a compassionate eight-limbed alien armed with a mighty Z-ray energy rifle - phasers on kill, shoot to stun - and bearing a secret. A mystery influence.

 

You can read up on the events so far and all follow the action through the posts and comments, and there's general info on the project here. If it's new to you, Humanspace Empires is a pulp science fantasy roleplaying game by The Drune at ix, reviewed here.

I highly recommend checking out the second of the two games as well, at Ancient Astronauts, an exploration of a future Mars. The escape in the van just hit a snag...

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Interactive express elevator

Payákár is on the away team, and on board the shuttle for the wild ride down to the surface of Ice Planet Nine...

Which means the real action is starting at Spaceswords & Glory, the blog hosting one of the two Humanspace Empires games being run online. If you haven't heard yet, HE is a pulp science fantasy roleplayer by The Drune at ix, reviewed here.

You can read up on everything that's happened so far and follow all the action through the posts and comments.

There's some more general info here, with a brief summary of the second of the two games, Ancient Astronauts.

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Flash Fearsdelayed & taken over - Haak

A little late, my tale for Flash Fearsday at Lunching on Lamias, at 140 characters.

I'm not prey, I'm predator! At least, I was.

But it watches from its eyrie.

I feel that eye, not meat - mechanism. It wants to improve me...

I got a bit carried away, and worked up a new creature for Hogintu, as well as some background on the time technology and space elevators.

The rules are at the bottom, also using Humanspace Empires.

Here, puss, puss, puss...

Yep - we have bugs of all kinds for the science fantasy game Humanspace Empires. So I've thrown down a gauntlet with a Doctor Who clip, from the late-'80s seventh Doctor story Survival.

Ray Rousell described the cat in the clip as evil and The Angry Lurker is no fan; it's not so often they agree on anything... Cats it is then.

Here, puss, puss, puss...

Cats were common to a majority of homes on the world of Hogintu before the Bluing, across the strata of class, caste and clade. There were breeds of all kinds, many purely ornamental or engineered with a calming, charming psychic aura. When the civilisation dragged itself down into the dust a number survived, reduced to eight lives perhaps, their residual instincts seeing them good in the harsh new circumstances. The large feline creatures now stalking the dark nights of the Cerulean Sphere keep their own pets...

Animal doctor?

Hmm... No domesticated animals adapted for Humanspace Empires. Yet. Who starts?

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What's that buzzing?

If you've been following the ongoing one-upmanship in creating a collection of creatures using the Humanspace Empires ruleset from ix, you know we have all kinds of odd beasties, many based on creepy-crawlies with pulp science fantasy twists.

There's a list here, in yesterday's post on the famous bug hunter Suwár Tar.

Inspired by a comment from Needles on that post, here's another option, the cortical hornet. Rather than give this stats for one system, I'll make it the second piece of propluristemic content. The first is granulation.

It's in support of the idea of the polycosmos, my possible sketch of which is here. Propluristemic content is something marked up as intended for use in many systems and settings, and even non-gaming fiction, assuming some adaptation.

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They call him Swarm Breaker

So we now have snakes, beetles, spiders, ants, gigapedes and worms, both large and small, and some of these not even fully in our reality.

Humanspace really isn't looking like a space for humans who are squeamish.

Unless, born of a stray NetherWerks comment at the home blog ix, you find the man they call...

Suwár 'Debugger' Tar, 'Swarm Breaker'

An arachno-mutant turned from the hive, now a renowned underworld hire.

Born on the post-apocalyptic world of Hogintu, Suwár was adopted young by nekrobra smugglers when he showed an exceptional talent for charming. He was attacked on a run by space spiders and partially transformed, serving his arachnoid masters loyally before a dimensional distortion brought about by an unrecorded weapons test severed the connection. Discovered by a super-scientific explorer team, he was interned in a research establishment, before escaping into the underworld with other test subjects.

Do the skrabs scrabble?

The response to the nekrobra was encouraging so here's a second creature of blue Hogintu, or the Cerulean Sphere as it will now be known thanks to the ever-inventive Justin S. Davis.

I've statted this one using Humanspace Empires too because I like the approach, but it would suit any generic sci-fi or fantasy setting, and is easily converted to other OSR systems.

Hush! Do the skrabs scrabble?

The skrab is a small blue insectoid creature apparently unique to Hogintu, and swarms wherever the cobalt sands drift, even deep within the ruins. It is an aggressive creature with a lightly-armoured, bulbous body and scurries rapidly on a dozen spindly legs, the forward three of which are needle-like and used for skewering its prey. A swarm brings down larger victims through the individuals attaching themselves and using their weight to topple and pin, all the while stabbing at vulnerable points until the victim succumbs.

The creature is of relatively recent provenance and in the short time since its appearance skrab populations have fluctuated dramatically for no clear reason. The skrab is seen as a mixed blessing, for when the skrabs are scrabbling, the nekrobra is rare...

Skrab

No. Enc.: 1D6+6

Alignment: Neutral

Move: 150' (50')

Armour Class: 6

Hit Dice: 1

Attacks: 1

Damage: 1D6 + pinning

Morale: 12

A skrab making a successful attack will also attach itself to the victim, who must then pass a force test or be brought to the ground. At the Referee's discretion, larger potential victims may require multiple skrabs to achieve this. If additional skrabs are in combat with the victim, all but one will now pile on. The victim has its armour class increased by one point for each multiple attached and the combat continues as normal, with all participants fighting. The victim may attempt to free itself in each subsequent round by making one force test per multiple; if any are failed, the victim remains pinned by all.
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The Cobalt Cobras of Hogintu

The new miniatures in the Warhammer Tomb Kings range haven't been universally well received. Again, technically superb models have arguably less than superb concepts.

There's a flavour here at Subject to Stupidity of the case against, and also in potentially offensive language here at FightingFantasist. At Musings of a Smurf, here, there's an argument against even the detail on the latest GW minis, or maybe against the major games in their current form. CounterFett is doing his best here to find uses for the new parts in 40K, and Dark Future Games here has Thousand Sons space marines in mind.

I want to help too, and I have something in mind for the necropolis knight build, i.e. the cobra-like snakes with skeleton riders. By doing as little as removing the rider, there's something to work with. Filing off or filling in detail would also make them less obviously ancient Earth culture and more fantastical or alien. The heads are not very snake-like, but that could be fixed with greenstuff, and a compromise would be keeping the basic head structure and going wide and flat over it. They are pretty good giant serpents all in.

But I'll assume you don't want to make too many changes. Here's a possible use almost as is, riffing off the silliness and references, with one or two more thrown in; no prizes for guessing. I've statted them for Humanspace Empires by The Drune at ix with ideas from this post and inspiration from Mutant Future. The idea isn't aimed specifically at the Humanspace setting, but should suit generic pulp sci-fi or fantasy.

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Review - Humanspace Empires Playtest Draft (2/2)

The second part of the two-day review looking at Humanspace Empires, a new game by The Drune. It's currently in its Playtest Draft and available to download free at ix.

If you haven't read the first part yet, Humanspace Empires is a pulp science fantasy roleplaying game set in the sumptuous and complex Tékumel universe, a reimagining of the famed Dungeons & Dragons development Empire of the Petal Throne (EPT).

Yesterday we had the design context, the key terminology, some D&D history and an introduction to the setting; today we look at the pdf proper, and the very special ruleset.

Review - Humanspace Empires Playtest Draft (1/2)

Here's a game review in two parts, for the Playtest Draft of Humanspace Empires by The Drune, free at ix.

Today we'll have the design context and introduce the setting, and tomorrow a proper look under the hood.

If you've not heard of it yet, Humanspace Empires is a pulp science fantasy roleplaying game set in the sumptuous and complex Tékumel universe.

It's a reimagining of the famed Dungeons & Dragons development Empire of the Petal Throne. But just as EPT was much more than a new D&D in space, Humanspace Empires is far more than just another retro-clone.