Bay 12 Games Forum

Welcome to the world of Gridhood

I've spent a lot of time thinking about how this game can be properly balanced. Then I realized that maybe it doesn't need any balance. At all. Thus I present to you Gridhood 12!

In this game you can choose to either play as a god or a civilization. The two things are mutually exclusive, meaning you can only be one thing at any given time. Civilization players need to work on tiles to get resources and basically not die, while god players compete with eachother for mortal worship and make changes to the grid world.

Note that new rules will be added as the game progresses. If you want to do something that there are no rules for, that will probably trigger the creation of new rules that cover the aforementioned something. Remember to check this post for the most current rules that are in effect. Don't be deceived by the seemingly basic beginning of the game.

Keep in mind that things do not officially exist until they appear on an update post. This means you cannot settle a civilization on a tile until you actually see the tile on the grid map.

The game will update whenever the GM feels like it which will always be at least 24 hours after the last update*. If you fail to get your action in, the GM will not wait for you.


All actions that affect a tile or involve a tile must include the tiles co-ordinates. No exceptions.

NEWEST GAME RULE: Copyrighted things are not allowed. (Because its unoriginal, not because of legal concerns) and Tool Construction tweaks.

Good evening ladies and gentlemen! You are watching Cabalvision!

This is the IC thread for Bloody Bay. You can find the OOC thread here. If you did not register your team in the OOC thread, you may still post here - as one of the spectators. If you are a spectator, you can vote on who is most deserving of MVP awards, and possibly do some other sneakier things at the GM's discretion.

The first game will be decided by the first two teams to arrive at the stadium. I will start by hosting one game so that I can get a feel for how many simultaneous games I will be able to handle. Each game will be prefaced by a channel in bold - so if you want to keep tabs on a specific game you can safely skip ahead and look for the channel markers.

Reminder: In this particular game, the GM will never fudge a dice roll. The GM may twist the actual rules of the game a bit, but the dice results will never be tampered with no matter how suspiciously biased they may appear. Remember - when it comes to dice you are never due for a win. Such is the way of Nuffle.

Spring 1, Year 1



Spring has arrived. The ice and snow melts and the world is once again friendly to new life. In a grassland, a magical tree seed awakens from hibernation and takes root; and the densely packed mana within it takes form, bringing five newborn Dryads into existence.

Your objective is to protect this tree with your life, several times if need be. If the tree dies it is Game Over. There do not appear to be any creatures in the immediate vicinity...

Tutorial - Using Abilities: Even without hostile enemies to target, you are still able to use your abilities. Multiple abilities may be used in one turn. If you choose to use more than one, then each one must be assigned a percentage of your Power Multiplier. For example, ability 1 uses 0.7 multiplier and ability 2 uses 0.3 multiplier. Keep in mind that an ability with a low multiplier is likely to be resisted even by very weak enemies.

Note: Please put your actions in bold, and include your characters name with your post. This information has been recorded on Page 1 of the OOC thread.

Welcome to the world of Zenith Concert! The roleplaying game where your character is created by everyone except you!

To sign up for this game, you'll need to fill out some fragments of an application, preferably several times. After I get enough pieces of application, I'll mix them all up, assemble them into actual character sheets and that's what you get. You will be allowed to reroll fragments that you do not like. Note however that you get a non infinite amount of free rerolls. If you still aren't okay with a part of your character after you use your rerolls you can continue to reroll, but each time you do your character will be a bit weaker. Any aspect of a character sheet which is rerolled will be lost to you forever, no exceptions. I'll also point out that no part of your character will have been designed by you.

To clarify what a "Application Fragment" or "Fragment" is: It is a small piece of a character sign up sheet.

Each fragment will come with some stats. There are two different types of stats Combat and Social, many of which are specific to certain aspects. (For example, a characters name will only affect social stats). This spoiler contains the stats, and their function. Note that this may mean there are multiple copies of the same Character Sheet Fragment which have different stats. Note that the stats mentioned first should be the most relevant ones to the fragment: the last stat mentioned will be the first one to be removed from excessive rerolling. If a stat has a zero balance, it may be made up with both positive and negative stat modifiers. If it has no permitted modifiers, then it cannot. (If two fragments are clearly mutually exclusive, an additional free reroll may be negotiated.)


Below is a list of Character Sheet fragments. Each spoiler below has information about what it should contain, as well as what kind of stats and how much should go with it. Note that a fragment CAN have negative stats. For example, a fragment that grants 4 combat stats can have "Strength -2, Precision +2 and Affinity +4". The game world is not yet set in stone, and will be generated after the initial characters are finalized, so you don't need to worry too much about being "lore friendly". I would ideally like each player to contribute more than one of each fragment so that there are enough to go around. I'd also recommend not creating more than 10 of each one if you're the kind of person who likes to go overboard with stuff like this. You are permitted to have several options within a single fragment so as to account for other potentially incompatible fragments, and with some of them it is encouraged to do so.

If you have any questions, please ask. I'm sure I did a bad job of explaining something, I'm just not sure what that is.
One final note: Please do not post Character Sheet Fragments in the thread, sent them to me via PM instead. I want people to be surprised when they see your handiwork.



And below here is where I am keeping the completed character sheets. Prior to your introduction to the game, you may make rerolls to certain fragments; however if you do not have remaining rerolls, your character will be weakened for each reroll you make. The following fragments have free rerolls:

Name: 2
Trait: 2 (Shared among ALL traits)
Class: 1
Weapon Specialty: 1
History - Current: 1
Objective: 1
Appearance - Additional: 1
Appearance - Outfit: 3
Personality: 1

Introduction and Story

This game is a continuation of a forum RPG with a very long history which was started by an old friend on a different forum way back in September of 2010. I've been thinking of creating a game that uses the Black Zenith character creation sheet for quite a while now, but until now I never got around to doing that. Mostly because world building is apparently not one of my strong points. If you feel like learning a bit about the history of the game you can click on This Link to see the most recent Black Zenith game, which in turn has another link that goes to the game before that. You probably won't get some of the references to stuff that happened in a previous game; that doesn't matter in the least. All you really need to know is that for some reason Unicorns have godlike powers and are evil.

This game is set in an alternate universe from the Black Zenith game, the key difference between this universe and the other one is that in this one Rahien was defeated by the might of the terrifying unicorns! Then the unicorns proceeded to annihilate the world and all that inhabited it. The unicorns then split into two factions; The Destroyers and the Sadists. The Destroyer faction, citing the defeat of GM and DM saw the lesser races as a threat to equine supremacy and believed that they should be annihilated entirely. The Sadist faction saw the lesser beings as their playthings and wanted to keep a population of them alive so that they could torment them forever. In the Black Zenith world, unicorns are not very nice. There is also a smaller third faction known as the Supremacists who don't give half a shit about non-unicorn life who remain mostly neutral.

The Sadist unicorns have revived various champions from different places and timezones to inhabit what remains of the world. Those champions... are you! Your primary goal is to survive, defeat hostile forces of all manner, which the Sadist unicorns refuse to interact with for any number of mysterious reasons and grow ever stronger so that one day you will be able to stop the unicorn menace once and for all!

This game will not be first come first serve, however those tho express an interest within 24 hours of this post will be put at an advantage during character selection because I am hoping to update this game on a daily basis and would prefer having players capable of posting an action within 24 hours of an update. Also, feel free to ask any questions you may have about character creation.

Game Mechanics

Ordinary actions

Ordinary actions are your standard 'do this, stab that' kind of thing. If it makes sense and you roll sufficiently high, you can probably do it! There is nothing saying that a fighter cannot cast a healing spell, though if you suddenly get the idea that you can fly, you'd probably have to state a good excuse, such as casting a spell, as well as roll sufficiently, to pull it off. Also keep in mind that casting magic and likewise do not actually cost anything such as mana; If you roll well enough, you pull your move off.

Like the previous games in the Black Zenith series, whether you succeed or not will depend on how I roll a D20, plus a modifier based on your stats. I'll take care of all the actual calculations myself.

Traits
A trait is a representation of something your character is skilled at, such as swordfighting or combining two types of magic for greater results. In general, traits are passive bonuses that provide the defining basis of your character. A good example would be the ability to have a chance to make a 'combo attack' once a round, thus hitting an enemy twice rather than once. Some things are also simply impossible to perform without a Trait to allow it, though such examples are rare at best. Creativity is strongly advised when choosing your traits.

Special Abilities
A special ability is a particular move only you can pull off. Doing almost anything, special abilities are almost limitless in what they can do; they all share some rules though. Special abilities all need to be activated. Sometimes, doing so takes up your turn, and sometimes you will be able to perform another action alongside your special ability - it depends on the individual special ability.

Special abilities can buff you, debuff the enemy, or just plain deal damage or heal somebody. But that is not the full extent of what they can do - think creative.

All special abilities have a cooldown time. Some are higher than others, thus allowing for that ability to be more powerful as well - its a question of balancing it out to fit you. Most specials would have a cooldown of 7 or 8 rounds, and you can specify if your particular special should have a shorter or longer cooldown, or just a standard cooldown, through it'll affect the power of the special by a bit.

Stats
In this game there are two sets of stats. The first one is Combat stats, which are primarily used for combat purposes. The second one is Social stats, which is highly situational in this game. These are the stats and their effects.

Strength: Affects your ability to do damage with conventional weapons such as swords, bows and firearms. In this game ranged and melee attacks use the same stat.
Crafting: Your ability to perform non-combat related tasks such as building, cooking etc. You won't be fighting 100% of the time.
Affinity: Your ability to use magic. Magic abilities are far more versatile than conventional weapons and can be used for a wider variety of effects. However its raw power is not as high as Strength based attacks.
Constitution: Determines how much health you have, and your ability to shrug off certain effects.
Defense: Your ability to dodge, block or otherwise avoid damage.
Precision: Your ability to not be dodged, blocked or otherwise avoided.

Sincerity: How trustworthy you appear to be.
Guile: How much you appear to know what you are talking about.
Intimidate: How scary your character can appear to be.
Charm: How likeable your character is.

Each of your stats should generally be no less than 4 and no greater than 18. This rule is not set in stone. If there is a logical reason for your character to have a stat of less than 4 then you may have a lower stat; though this will likely cause problems for you in certain situations. Some examples may be that if your character is blind in one eye you may have a precision stat that is lower than 4, if your character is under the effects of a curse in your backstory you may have an affinity that is lower than 4. If your character is a child then you may have a guile lower than 4 etc.

You may also have a stat that is greater than 18. However this is not advised as each point above 18 will cost 2 stat points instead of 1. If you want 20 strength it will cost 22 stat points.

Character Creation Sheet

Introduction
This is a card game loosely based off a party game called 1,000 blank white cards. In this game you create your own cards and duel your friends by drawing random cards from a big deck that contains all of the cards that everyone made! I've played and hosted a similar game on another forum and have made a few adjustments for the sake of game balance, such as making it less difficult to make a comeback when you are losing. Before you start to play, you should make 5 or more cards, and cards should be PMed to me instead of posted in this thread.

How cards work
Cards can have numerous different effects as specified by players, but as a general rule each card will have a name and a presence number. A player will need a certain amount of "presence" in order to play a card. Your presence will generally go up as the game progresses and if you don't have enough presence to play a card you will not be able to play it. There are two main categories of cards, cards that have life and cards that do not have life. A card that has life will remain on your field until its life runs out, and a card that does not have life will typically dissapear after its effects take place (although some lifeless cards will stick around until certain conditions are met). Once per turn each of your cards that have attack can attack another card on the field, and if your opponent has no cards with life on their field you can attack them directly. A direct attack on your opponent will always deal only 1 damage regardless of the cards attack power. Here is a template that you can use. A card does not need to use this exact template but your cards should be set up in such a way that there is no confusion as to how it works.



How presence works
Presence replaces points from the previous games. Each player starts the game with 1 presence and at the start of each turn you will gain 1 presence. (The person who takes the first turn does not gain 1 presence on their very first turn to counter the first turn advantage thing). Cards can have special presence altering effects, and the player with less life will gain an amount of presence equal to the difference between both players life. If your presence is reduced in such a way that you no longer have enough presence to sustain all of the cards on your field then there are no negative repercussions aside from not being able to play anything else (including 0 presence cards) until you have a positive presence level.

Quick recap: Presence = 1 + turn count + difference in life if yours is lower ± other card effects - the total presence of all the cards on your field.

Card balance
As a general rule of thumb, a cards sum of life and attack should be approximately equal to double its presence level, though cards can be somewhat stronger or weaker than that. Special effects and whatnot should be factored into price. Cards with a presence cost of 0 or less can be made, but such cards should be useless or near useless.

Game rules
1) For a standard game you will start with 10 life and 6 cards.
2) You can make a card at any time, even mid game.
3) If you have 0 or less hearts, you lose.
4) You draw one card at the end of each turn instead of at the start. PM me whenever you need to draw cards.
5) You are expected to keep track of what cards are in your hand. Consider making a text document for this purpose.
6) Cards cannot attack on the same turn they are played unless otherwise stated.
7) You can only play one card each turn.

Card creation rules
1) A card must have a name as well as a legible presence number.
2) No card can target a player specifically (IE. Billy Is Great: Billy wins instantly because Billy is Best)
3) Cards can NOT affect other peoples games. Cards CAN be affected BY other players games however.
4) Cards CAN affect other specific cards, even ones made by other people (IE: Craig. Can only be destroyed by playing Blitzkrieg)
5) Cards CAN require competitions (IE. Both players play oregon trail and the person who gets farther gets points), but cards CANNOT use competitions for skills lots of people don't have (IE. Both players remix sunslammer and the one with the better tune wins points)
6) Cards CANNOT force the other player to do something they are uncomfortable with (No forcing the other player to draw Baby Muppet Porn)
7) Cards SHOULD be 300*200 pixels
8 ) Use random effects (coin flip, dice roll) sparingly.
9) Card text that is not in english, not legible, or in some sort of code is to be treated as gibberish and has no effect.
10) No submitting cards from previous games, this game works a bit differently.
11) If you saw this game on another forum, you don't need to submit cards for more than one game. Each branch of this game will have cards created from each forum the game is in.

Here are some sample cards.

In my latest fortress, I have been periodically receiving a message that Rutherer's are giving birth to twins or triplets. I can zoom to the location via the unit screen and it appears to be in a deep cavern which I have not yet breached. I already know that the only option for me is to dig deep and make judicious use of cage traps, what I want to know is has anyone else encountered a similar event?