For as long as living memory holds, the Inklings and the Octolings have been at peace with one another. Well, at least as much as they've been at peace with themselves. Sometimes Lings didn't like each other, considered each other unfresh, but there was always plenty of room to go find your own place, away from anyone whom made you want to strangle them.
This is now changing, though most are of yet unaware of it.
For, unnoticed and unwarned of, the sea has begin to rise. Why? No one knows. Perhaps the ice caps are finally recovering from the ancient war so long ago. Perhaps it is some evil Salmonid experiment, hidden beneath the deep blue sea. Perhaps the sun is shining unkindly upon this world... or perhaps it is something that is just happening, and the reason why really doesn't matter.
Because what matters, is that the great island is shrinking, one shoreline at a time. The lowlands soon will become unlivable wetlands, farmlands will flood, rivers overflow their banks, and only the highlands will remain habitable.
And there isn't going to be enough highlands for everyone. Most Lings do not yet believe things will get bad. Most Lings, Inkling or Octoling, are not even aware of the rising waters as of yet. But some Lings, Octoling or Inkling, can see what is coming, the nightmare slouching slowly but surely towards both races.
Some lings are preparing for what will someday be known as... the Great Turf War.
Now, in this coming time of strife, betrayal, war, and sorrow, only one thing can be known for certain. There will be Ink.
As should be fairly obvious to most people, The Great Turf War Arms Race is, in fact, a Splatoon themed Arms Race. Players will join either the Octolings or the Inklings in the war to settle the future of the island they call home, and Inkopolis itself.
However, unlike most arms races, and as many might expect from a Splatoon themed game, this is not a war fought with bullets, flameguns, poison gas, shrapnel grenades, high explosive bombs, and all those other arms race staples. Instead, this is a war fought with Ink! After all, this is a Turf War, and anyone who's played Splatoon, or even had a sibling talk excitedly about it for a few minutes in their presence, should know what that means.
It means you have to paint the world your own color, that's what. Oh, and maybe Ink up all your enemies while you're at it to keep them from interfering. These are not, however, the Turf Wars players are familiar with. For one thing, there's a lot more then four fighters a team deployed to these battles, and for another... Well, this is set 100 years before Splatoon. Technology has marched on since the Great Turf War, and you're all on the wrong side of that march. At least to start with. The Great Turf war wasn't begin with all the fancy weaponry people see on their TVs, all those cool specials and effective subweapons.
Here, at the dawn of the Great Turf War, the first Ink-Tech weapon has just been invented. It is an innovation that will change the world in the future. It's called the Bamboozler. No, not the Bamboozler 14 Mk insert number here... just the Bamboozler. The Bamboozler 1, if you want to put it that way. It is the first step into a larger world, but it is not a step great enough to achieve victory. Not when the other side has it too.
Your job, as brave Octoling or Inkling engineers, is to advance the frontier of Ink-Technology, find and recruit heroes, construct devastating superweapons, and otherwise lead your side to the ultimate victory of being able to stay up on the surface, instead of being forced down into the underdark below.
So no pressure, eh?
RULES
An Arms Race game is a 2-team "suggestion" game about designing new weapons, items, and other objects for your nation's military. These designs will be routinely compared to the other team's arsenal in Battle Reports. The game is split into several phases:
Phases
A Turn (three months-ish) is divided into several phases, done in order.
Design Phase
In the Design Phase, all you smart wiz-kid inventors, genii, and engineers come up with newer, more devastating weapons, sub-weapons, specials, or other such things for your side. Sometimes, what you will be inventing is less a physical item, and more a new social thing (or a new giant robot super weapon, or non-giant robot super weapon), but either way, what you invent in this phase is key to your factions success.
How it works is simple. Everyone gets to submit their proposals, and then everyone votes on which one they like the most, or at least think would be most useful. The submission with the most votes gets designed that turn. If your design didn't win, don't worry... just submit it again the next turn unless you've come up with something even cooler since you made your last thing up!
Revision Phase
In the Revision Phase, you fix the mess ups of past turns, and make what you already have even better. It works basically the same as the Design Phase, but instead of a powerful design action you can use to make cool new stuff, what you are doing here is revising your old gear to make it better. Revisions can't make something new out of whole cloth, but they can certainly use technology developed after something was originally designed to rework it into something 100% fresher.
Deployment Phase
In the Deployment Phase, you, well, deploy stuff. Shocker, eh? But no, really, that’s what you do here. You decide where to deploy your superweapons, which superweapons to use, where to send your heroes, and any other such choices that don’t fit in the other phases, as well as to which fronts you'll send reinforcements to in an attempt to push forwards. Just remember, when arguing over if deploying mecha-kraken or mecha-godzilla is better this turn, to keep said arguing polite instead of salty. As Lings, you really don’t want to end up covered in salt, you hear me?
Turf War Phase
In the Turf War Phase, you don't actually do anything! This is when I, the relentless and sometimes kind master of the game, take in everything each side has done over the preceding turn and decide who wins when both sides clash over the battlefront. Don't worry, I don't decide things just by flipping coins. This phase ends when I finish writing up the turn's battle report and post it so everyone can see how well (or not well) the design and revision they did this turn did, and so take in that data and use it to argue about what to do next. After all, after the battle report comes next turn’s Design Phase.
Each side has one home area, which they must defend at all costs. To loose your side’s home area is to loose the game. For the Inklings, your home zone is Inkopolis Plaza, the heart and center of downtown Inkopolis, and for the Octolings your home area is Octo Valley, an ancient center of Octoling Civilization. Home areas are defended far more fiercely then other areas, and therefor possess an extra point of territory.
The Top Path is Moray Towers, Lost Outpost and Kelp Dome.
Moray Towers is a heavily built up urban zone, known for its towering towers. These towers are connected by a multitude of bridges, ramps, ropes, and railings, and all the Spawn Points are high up in these towers, so the ground is generally ignored. Instead, combat takes place on the windy heights of these towers, bridge to bridge, floor to floor, and roof to roof.
Lost Outpost is the location of a formerly mostly ignored desert island where mobile oil rigs were once constructed. It has regained importance due to it’s strategically advantageous Transport Kettle connections, which would allow the power controlling it to transit behind enemy lines. Of course, both sides noticed this at once, so now it is at the forefront of the battle lines. Combat here is a complicated thing, done amidst the decaying buildings and piers attached to this slightly hilly desert island. Sight lines are long and clear here, unless you miss someone hiding in a building, encouraging a highly mobile (even for Lings) and long ranged form of combat. Not counting the vicious close ranged ambushes, that is.
Kelp Dome is a wonder of Octoling Engineering, a giant self contained biosphere within which they undertook a number of highly valuable (scientifically speaking) experiments. It also had an ancient kettle connection to the Lost Outpost, which has brought horrible violence to this once peaceful scientific station. Combat within the Kelp Dome must deal with the now uncontrolled and overgrowing vegitation, the multitude of water filled pipes and tanks, and of course the fact that the walkways between the growth tanks make for highly contained firing lanes.
The Middle Path is made up of Inkopolis Square, Mount Nantai, and Octo Canyon.
Inkopolis Square is the beating heart of the city’s edge, a new and younger portion of the city built to much more modern standards then the heart of the old city. However, because of its youth and newly constructed status, it is much less overbuilt then the deeper downtown areas it stands in front of, made up of mostly smaller, single story independent function buildings instead of larger complexes. It also lacks the immensely complicated sewer systems of the old city, even if it does have a healthy network of back alleys.
Mount Nantai stands between Inkopolis itself and the homeland of Octo civilization, and as such has become a highly contested battlefield between the two races. It is a highly vertical place, of sheer cliffs and winding paths leading up the side of the mountain, with a thousand and one hidden nooks and crannies hidden in the great sides of the mountain. Combat here is in a thousand small skirmishes, from buttress to flat spot, as cunning lings go right up the sides of a properly inked cliff.
Octo Canyon is a long and deep Canyon that leads from the foothills of Mount Natai to deep within the Octoling Homeland. It is flat and often narrow, with high cliffs that lead well out of the range of the local Spawn Pads, forcing any advance, in either direction, to be a long slog. While Lings might use the walls of the canyon for mobility, their sheer flatness prevents, in general, a Ling from fighting from them, forcing Lings on both sides to take and keep ground the old fashioned way. On the ground.
The Bottom Path is made up of Port Mackerel, Calamari County, and Piranha Pit.
Port Mackerel is the name for the part of Inkpolis which faces the sea, and is built up with many different docks and warehouses. The clutter of shipping containers, abandoned ships, and many many back alleyways shape this battlefield, but so does the ever rising sea, as high tide washes much of the ink clean.
Calamari County is a backwards place compared to the big city, full of small, simple houses, trees, and peaceful streams and lakes. Combat here will be shaped by these rustic lands in ways unseen in the more modern areas the Great Turf War is otherwise covering, as here it is nature, not Ling, which has shaped the general landscape. And unlike Mount Natai Calamari County is mostly flat. A little hilly at most. The bridges that cross the many streams that cut through this county will probably become key points in the fighting.
Piranha Pit is the name called to the old industrial quarries and mines that dig into the mountains ancient Octolings called home. The once untouched mountains and hills have been repeatedly dug into, leaving gaping pits and wounds scattered across the landscape, littered with abandoned industrial machinery left running by some careless souls. The multitude of moving conveyor belts, rusting cranes, malfunctioning earth moving engines, and standing water pools from rain landing in quarries without adequate drainage make this a battlezone where the terrain can be as much a foe as the actual enemy.
Primary Weapon
Bamboozler : A compression powered ink gun that was recently invented before the Great Turf War. It charges somewhat slowly, is hard to charge on the move, can not store a charge, has limited maximum range, has low ink usage efficiency hampering repeated use before one must refill their ink tank, and can not be fired while uncharged. In other words, a revolutionary improvement over all that came before. Despite being shaped somewhat like a hammer, it is not advisable to use it in melee to hit someone over the head with. (Cost : 2 Plastic, 0 Super Sea Snails)
Sub Weapon
No Sub-Weapons start out designed.
Specials
No Specials start out designed.
Ability
No Abilities start out designed.
Personnel
Ling Militia : The basic Ling, Inkling or Octoling, now given a weapon and sent to fight for their right not to be shoved underground and forced to live off of fungi and other, worse things. While they have high morale, they are not the Splatfest Experts of the future and have minimal combat experience and training. But at least they know how to use a gun.
Cultural Artifacts
So far, nothing has been invented that makes your side Fresher then the other side. You may feel properly ashamed of that fact now.
Other Gear
Mark 1 Ink Tank : A basic ink tank, invented by the same inventor that invented the Bamboozler, and designed to work with the Bamboozler. A quarter of its mass is taken up with the complicated gearing that connects it to a Lings primary weapon and the generator for the subweapon, limiting how much ink it can store. Still better then having to produce ink manually whenever you need a refill though.
Superweapons
So far, no Superweapons have been developed.
Heroes
So far, no Heroes have been recruited for the greater glory of something or another.
As I’m sure is no surprise to anyone who has ever played a game on their computer before, in this game there are resources and items cost said resources to use. At the start of the game, no one is really expecting a war, and therefor the islands and Ling’s industries are set up for peace, not shooting the crap out of each other with brightly colored ink.
As such, each side starts out with 2 Plastics, and 1 Super Sea Snail from hastily converted civilian production centers, like those Lings who use to make Plastic Hula Dashboard Dolls now being told to make Bamboozler parts. Plastic is the more commonly used resource, as it’s what is used as the primary structural material in most weapons and other tools. A high Plastics cost doesn’t not always mean an item uses lots of plastic, but may simply need rare and hard to produce variants of plastic, or just have lots of little bits and pieces that need to be put together in just the right way. Or the thing just breaks a lot and needs constant replacement parts. As such, most primary weapons will mainly require plastic to be produced.
Super Sea Snails, on the other hand, are used in seeeecret processes that allow for strange things to be done. How does it work? Look, I just said it was a secret. But if you want things to happen like, oh raining ink, or turning into a giant monster and rampaging over the battleground, or seeing enemies through walls, or being able to shoot enemies through solid objects without breaking the solid object in question, you’ll need to use some Super Sea Snails to make that possible. As such, most ‘Special’ class items will probably need plenty of Super Sea Snails to be crafted.
If a design costs resources which you don't have, it becomes expensive, and can't be issued to everybody. The total amount of resources a design costs more than you have is called the Resource Deficit. A design with no resource deficit is Cheap, this means it can be issued to every soldier, or as often as your leaders decide is tactically sensible/Lings are willing to take the item. A resource deficit of up to 2 makes a design Expensive, meaning it can only be issued to veterans, or 1 in 10 Lings. A resource deficit of 3-5 makes a design Very Expensive, available only to the elite, or about 1 in 100 Lings. A resource deficit of 6-9 makes a design a National Effort, you can only field one at a time - so this is only worthwhile if it's something really really really cool. A resource deficit of 10 or more is Theoretical, and cannot actually be built. Some technologies are Complex, being new and difficult to manufacture, and designs featuring them become one level more expensive. Consider expenses when planning your designs!
As the war goes on, and industries convert to a more combat based footing and focus, the resources both sides have access to will increase. As well, opportunities may will end up knocking for the acquirement of more rare and exotic resources, such as additional Zapfish or potential stores of Sardinium.
This is Splatoon, so both Heroes and Superweapons are a thing. Both can be created with a design roll and a properly written up design, but note that write up quality for both is held to higher levels then for the average item. As well, Heroes and Superweapons have their own limitations beyond the fact that you’re giving up a design roll with which you could make something for all your forces with to make a singular unit that can only be in one place at a time.
Superweapons do not cost normal resources. Instead, superweapons are powered by the all mighty Zapfish. Bigger, stronger, more advanced superweapons will take more Zapfish to power. Lack the Zapfish, and, well, you can’t exactly deploy the superweapon, Have more superweapons then Zapfish and you’ll have to choose which ones to deploy.
Be careful where you deploy superweapons too. If you deploy the Ink Samurai into Mount Nantai with all its cliffs and small paths, you have only yourself to blame when it’s tricked into charging off a cliff. And so on. Make sure when you deploy superweapons together they will actually work together, not get in each others way.
At the start of the game, each side controls two Zapfish. Legends speak of a Great Zapfish, much more powerful then its lesser kin, but where such a being would reside no one knows.
Heroes, like Superweapons, do not use normal resources because, well, they are one person. It doesn’t need that much plastic to give one person a weapon that it’s meaningful on the scale of the great turf war, unless you want him or her to pilot a giant robot or something. In which case, she’s probably effectively a superweapon anyway, so go read that section of the rules.
Heroes can be equipped, if their design write up includes it, with experimental high grade gear that the general army does not have access too. And really should if you want them to be maximally effective. A hero with a Hero Bamboozler is gonna be a better hero then a hero with a normal Bamboozler after all. But it should be remembered that, well, heroes are only one person in the end. They aren’t some epic splat causing terminator robot whom can push a whole advance forwards by themselves. If you want one of those, go get a superweapon. No, heroes are a more delicate and elegant tool then a giant toaster firing rocket propelled tie-dyed toast at the other army, and should be deployed for more specific and localized goals and purposes.
Like, oh, intercepting and taking down an enemy super weapon, going to steal the great zap fish, going to interfere with enemy supply lines to make an item more expensive, intercepting enemy heroes, dealing with some specific terrain feature or other battle effecting thing, or so on. Be imaginative! The worst I’ll do is say no to something you want a hero to do.
Stolen without shame from NUKE9.13’s Battle for Aljadid, which hopefully he will someday update, this game runs off two four sided dice, or “2d4”, which are rolled and compared to the below table to figure out how successful the design or revision in question was.
Roll (Probability): Result
2 (1/16): Utter failure. You get nothing except the knowledge of what not to do.
3 (1/8): Buggy mess. Whilst you managed to make something, it isn't really usable.
4 (3/16): Below average. It works. Not especially well, but it works.
5 (1/4): Average. You get what you asked for, more or less.
6 (3/16): Above average. It works, and somewhat better than might be expected. Not a lot better, mind.
7 (1/8): Superior craftsmanship. It does its job and it does it perfectly. Its performance is exceptional and it is as reliable as clockwork.
8 (1/16): Unexpected boon. Not only does it work, but it does things you never even expected it to. If no 'bonus features' make sense, then you just get experience with some related field.
As you can see, this system tends more towards the middle then the extremes, which, yes, means you are less likely to do super well and get something super cool, but also means you’re less likely to fail miserably, completely, and totally. And isn’t that worth some minor sacrifices?
As well, each attempted design or revision also has a Difficulty. These ratings assign a modifier (+/- #) to the roll, changing the effective result. The Difficulties in question are Trivial (+2, Requires no new knowledge at all and has no notable challenges involved), Easy (+1, Actions where some minor challenge is found but nothing really that hard), Normal (+0, Actions involving new concepts or technologies, or old technologies being made better, but nothing intentionally revolutionary), Hard (-1, Entirely new concepts or technologies not using what you already have, but already implied or based on what came before), Very Hard (-2, Actions involving entirely new stuff where you only have a tiny idea of what you are doing), and Ludicrous (-3, Ok, this time you have no idea what you are doing, but according to theory it’s at least possible. Maybe).
There is also the Impossible Difficulty, which means you flat out fail because whatever you are trying to do is impossible with your current understanding of the world. You’ll still get some experience though, as you bash your head against the invisible walls of science repeatedly, over and over again. As well as a few headaches. But I'm sure most scientists would believe that is a small price for progress, especially the kinds of scientists found contributing to arms races.
As brave engineers of either the Inklings or the Octolings, there are several kinds of items you can design. Some of them are obvious… some less so. This spoiler goes over a non-conclusive list of the sort of things you might be expected to design.
Primary Weapons : These are, well, the primary weapon a Ling uses in the Great Turf War. The one everyone starts with is the Bamboozler, but other Shooters, Rollers, Chargers, Sloshers, or Splatling class weapons are certainly designable. Who knows, perhaps you’ll come up with a whole new category of weapon?
Sub Weapons : These are generally what they are called. Weapons that, while still useful, are not what your primary armament is made from. The go to example from before the invention of modern Ink-Tech for a Sub Weapon is a Paint Balloon, but others are certainly possible as well. This category also applies to non-weapon sub equipments Lings might carry around, if any are invented.
Specials : These are very special things indeed. Yes, oh so special… ok, more seriously, as a Ling runs around and fights and splats people and watches their friends get splatted a few times, they start generating what is known as Ink Energy. Eventually, this energy overloads, of which the most visible sign of is usually what appears the be the Ling in question’s hair catching on fire, and can be used to fuel a powerful and useful something or another that’s been designed to be powered of this Ink Energy. Such Specials are often dramatic, but their unreliable deployment prevents them from being overly depended on.
Abilities : It has long been known that, with the proper application of Super Sea Snails, it is possible to infuse clothing and other items with what are commonly known as 'abilities'. Abilities is actually a good description, because that's what they are. Abilities that passively (usually) alter how something works, in ways that seem to be magical to anyone whom doesn't understand the power of Super Sea Snails. Which is most people, to be honest. Either way, they're highly useful and sought after, so design better ones then the other side has, ok? Abilities, beyond their actual resource cost, will also have a note saying what kind of thing they can be applied too. Only one ability can be applied to an item at a time, so if it's a Headwear ability, you can't use that ability and another Headwear ability at the same time. Not unless you mutate and grow an extra head, at least.
Personnel : No, you aren’t inventing people out of whole cloth. Save that for trying to recruit heroes. But it has to be said, neither side, Inkling or Octoling, were really ready for the Great Turf War. The fighters on both sides can be enthusastic, but their training is often uneven. Perhaps you could develop new ways to prepare fighters for the realities of the Great Turf War?
Cultural Artifacts : Many people would say that these are useless. This just goes to show that many people are idiots. Lings, on the other hand, understand the value of being Fresh. The newest and prettiest hat, sneakers that really glow in the dark, a shirt with your favorite band on it… it can’t be denied that while such items have minimal, at best, direct value in conflict, the side that is Freshest will fight longer, harder, and, well, in a cooler fashion then the other side. This has great benefits for morale, and can swing a tie into a victory… or a close loss into a tie.
Other Gear : Well, some things just don’t fit in the other categories. Like Ink Tanks! Anything you invent that doesn’t go somewhere else, and isn’t so Fresh as to invent its own category, will end up here. Be imaginative, and you’ll invent lots of useful other gear.
Super Weapons : Sometimes you just want to sleep in in the morning, but no, a giant robot centipede has to crash through your walls spraying enemy ink everywhere. And other times, you get to be the brave and fresh engineers inventing a giant rocket powered roller skate to crush your enemies. Aim to have more of the second happen then the first. Just make sure you have the Zapfish to power your deviously devastating superweapons.
Heroic Equipment : No, you don’t get to wave your hands and make a hero appear from a fancy blueprint, even if a really Fresh description of how Fresh they are might make it easier to get them to join the war effort… or at least be recognized for their efforts in the war. But you can’t be a hero if your gear is all old and lame, right? So when you try to recruit a hero, why not try designing some cool hero level experimental equipment for them as well? Surely they could use something ten times more devastating then the common trooper has access to, right?
Discord Link :
LINKOctoling Thread Link :
LINKInkling Thread Link :
LINKGeneral Arms Race Hub Thread :
LINK95% Accurate Basic Setting Lore Post :
LINK
