I am considering running a pbf game. It will take the form of a committee style single blind strategic game rather than a adventure.

I need to guage player interest.

The playes will be a ruling council of a hyperborean city or settlement of one form or another (suggestions will be considered). Turns will represent a week of game world time. The players will have to discuss their actions and deal with threats to the city at the political and strategic scale. This may involve launching fleets, dispatching adventurers, dealing with plague outbreaks, preparing for winter, evading assinations etc.

I will gm the game, formulating briefings and writing npc decisions and then aducate the impact of the player decisions.

I require 2-5 players initially for this to work. Later more players can be fed into extra roles. Currently I am thinking of setting the game in a viking settlement, but Ixan might work too, and to give the players an interesting amount of resources it will probably be political significant on the game map. The starting material will be the description of that region or city from the ASSH refs handbook, but over time we will probably diverge from strict cannon.

I will run the rules entirely myself, the players do not need to know them. They are very simple and are mostly based around player logic and bit of freeform storytelling with some die rolls to resolve certain situations (all d6).

This game approach is really just an evolution of kriegspiel and has a long history; http://www.wargamedevelopments.org/Wargame%20Developments%20Handbook.pdf

This will be a bit of an experiment but it should allow us to explore Hyperborea from a different angle.

I have no idea if this is a new discovery, but the evidnce speaks for its self.

looks like a fun time, I see some victory point games action in that resturant shot.

Blackadder23 wrote:

I strongly prefer to begin a campaign with action, something like, "You are walking through the bazaar, lingering over some of the more interesting obsidian carvings from Krimmea.  Suddenly a mob of screaming fanatics bursts on the scene, attacking with scimitars pulled from their flame-emblazoned black robes."  After the attack, the surviving PCs will want to know who attacked them and why, and there's your adventure.  That's the way REH did it!

never done this, never occured to me, but a good idea. For some reason i always felt the need to have the players offered an adventure in someway.
 

I never use the tavern hook, typically you need an NPC sponsor for a mission though. The Xathoqquan priests would be a good one. A corrupt business man who owns a factory or a warehouse, the mercenary guilds of the watch, a rather sinister magician, are all others. I tend to work out what kind of adventures im going to prepare then decide how the players are going to get the mission.

As far as rail roading is concerned, you have two real options in any rpg. Before the campaign starts talk to the players about the kind of adventure or story they want, then prepare material around the results of that discussion. If they agree they want to be mercenaries employed by the Cult of Yug around the dark alleys of Khromarium then you prepare that and they actually do that, rather than hopping on a boat for Zangerios straight away. The players do get choices on the details through the decisions they make in game but the overal idea of the game is decided.
The second option is to go pure improvised sandbox and let the players do exactly what they want. This requires you to improvise most of your material but allows total freedom to the players. Theres no hint of rail roading, but usually there is no predesigned detail in any of the adventures. This option, in my experience, can often lead to infighting in the players too as they take their freedom for granted. Second, in adventure fiction, the protagonist rarely has absolute freedom.

i'm unsure of the rules, but i'd half movement under water and generally give any under water creatures initiative in any situation that requires it.

I would read the hit pens as cumulative, so even if you just had a dagger, you are still at -4, a great sword is much harder at -8.

thanks. im fairly happy with the way it turned out, i like the teeth door the most.

i've generally gone with the islands further out from the mainland being warmer and the mainland being very influenced by the multi year climate cycle.

good answers, either of you can post the next question.

Anlates Isles; full of mad amazonians

City in the Clouds; the Queen here don't recognise no authority.

I'm unclear on who the amazonians of whider Paradoxon recognise as their ruler, but they could be rebels too.