[Play by Post] Better Angels - No Soul Left Behind

Games
21

Gotcha - I’ll pick up the core book then and give it a look through today. Without reading some of the material, I can’t say for sure it fits the tone of “superpowered farce”, but I’m currently thinking I’d like to play an art teacher that’s working at the school so that his son can go there for free. He’s a little resentful of having to do it though, since it means his career as an artist is essentially over (the truth it never really took off to begin with). Having a baby was never part of the plan and changed everything, and he’s been struggling to deal with that fact ever since.

I need to go through your questions to refine this a bit, but does that sounds like a starting place for this kind of campaign?

22

I really shouldn’t commit to a game but I’m tempted. Initially the idea of the Screwtape mechanic turned me off but I’ve just spent some time reading up on the game and it’s looking better and better.

23

Sure, that sounds fine. I mean, generally speaking the characters in the playtest were people with real human problems, etc. It’s just that applying demonically-granted superpowers to said problems tended to be a bad decision with amusing (but occasionally quite unfortunate) consequences. One of them used Alchemy to turn a guard’s arms into uranium, for example, without quite realizing just how radioactive uranium is or how upset the government would be by its sudden presence in substantial quantity.

Like I say, the time commitment for a few posts a week shouldn’t be too bad. Depends on how much time you generally spend on the forum anyway, I suppose. As far as the Screwtape thing - I think it provides a really fun dynamic as long as people are careful to remember the advice in the core book about keeping it fun for the player (if not necessarily the character) they’re Screwtaping for. Like I say in the OP, it’s probably inspired by the Shadow player in Wraith, but unlike the Shadow, demons - while generally malevolent and interested in dragging the character to hell - don’t have to be as overtly hostile and deliberately undermining of the PC. As long as it leads to sin (preferably big flashy sin), they’re happy enough. Also, while the Shadow was omnipresent, the demon only gets to talk when actively invoked (either deliberately by the PC or in order to use a demonic power), although if your primary Strategy (the one that lets your demon drag you to hell if it maxes out) gets high enough they are always able to watch you (and thus see your sins). Still don’t get to talk unless you let them, though.

24

Can I join? I´ve been ogling this thread for a while, and I have come to the realization that the time commitment seems very manageable, specially since it seems I will be able to play from a phone or an iPad (no Vassal or other requirements).

So, any free spots?

25

You would make four - or five if Madmarcus decides to commit. So yes. :)

26

I’ll commit.

Tentatively planning a student who feels Bright Futures is his only way out.

27

Think I might have just missed out on this while being busy cooking all that BlizzCon food this weekend, but if you need another, I think I could manage a play by post game! But I know nothing about the system or setting, and have never actually played a forum based RPG (despite doing a ludicrous amount of in person gaming these last few years), so I’d have a lot of catching up to do in addition to pushing over the soft limit. If you do want one more, maybe @ me to make sure I notice it?

28

It does technically scale as high as 7 but I think that would get a bit crazy. Actually more so than real-time. Because the thing about play by post is that the more people there are, the more waiting you have to do to make sure everyone’s had a chance to weigh in on what’s happening - at least, if everyone’s in the same fictional space. This is why it’s actually often better to split the party in PBP - because if there’s only one player in a given scene, the GM can do a direct conversation with them and the problem of split attention isn’t an issue because it’s not happening in real time. That said, obviously there are also times when you need strength in numbers. And Better Angels does have the additional wrinkle that you do need people’s Screwtapes around as well as the player themselves. So I’m reluctant to push too high. That said, with six we could conceivably keep things split into twos and threes most of the time.

29

I would be ok with things taking a little longer.

Also, timeline for the character creation/rule reading?

I would love to play an Spanish history teacher under an foreign teacher visa with (dark) problems back home, so she needs the school to stay open or she would be forced back (visas being tied to a specific employer). Would that work within the campaign framework? It would help me missing subtleties of the US education system and setting while still being in character.

30

I am not in a huge hurry on that, especially since there’s a couple of big family holidays coming up this month and next. But conversely, the rules part isn’t super complicated and you don’t need every single detail about your character nailed down before we start.

I wouldn’t worry too much about being true to actual US education - part of the reason it’s established to be a charter school is so that it can have whatever weird quirks we want without breaking verisimilitude too much. But a foreign teacher would be cool. :)

31

I’ve now spent a couple of hours reading Better Angels related stuff. I’m probably overthinking things but oh well.

Jose Miguel Ramon Angelo Garcia-Johnston

Hispanic male age 18 (Cuban/Mexican ancestry, last name comes from his Anglo grandfather)
Sophomore at Brighter Futures
Old for his grade due to being held back in elementary school - his parents moved around and his English was very poor. Once he get to Bright Futures he started doing really well as he focuses on getting into a good college and becoming a lawyer. Idealistic about his ability to make it big as a lawyer and the power of the legal field. Up in the air as to whether he’s really a top notch student or just looking good because the school is weak.

Any family in the area? Yes, Mother and father; older sister

Why do you work in your current job? To succeed. Do well here to open doors at a good school. Do well there to open doors at a law school.

If you could do anything for a living, what would you do? Law. Or Futbol.

If you had super powers, what person would you be tempted to tell? Who, specifically, would you make sure to hide it from? I don’t want to tell anyone. My parents maybe but not til I was at college and out of their house. I wouldn’t want my sister to know which is part of why I’d want to keep it a secret from my parents.

If you had unlimited power, what group of people would benefit? Who would suffer under your rule? The only people that would have to worry are drug dealers.

To whom do you owe a debt? My sister kept me straight in middle school when I almost drifted in the drug scene. I owe her. I think the best way to pay her back is to become a success.

Who owes you something? What is it? The front office secretary. I ain’t a lawyer yet but the law is like a puzzle - its fun. So I helped her figure out her options during her divorce and eviction. In return she’s got my back at the school and helps me out with college stuff.

What’s your pet peeve? The non-local students. A few of them are decent but even the decent ones have taken a spot that could have gone to someone who needed it.

Are you religious? Catholic but that’s just upbringing. I’ve never really thought about it but I go every Sat. night.

**Superpowers are real and you regularly hear about people who have **
**them. The heroes dispense justice swiftly and on their own terms. The **
**villains take what they want and leave a trail of destruction in their **
wake. Politically, how do you feel about the super-powered? Its all crazy BS. It’s cool to dream of busting heads and cleaning things up but it’s hard to trust heroes when they aren’t acting within the law. It sounds like a Bollywood film but there should be super-cops. But you can’t even trust the cops.

You need the school to stay open. Why? I’m not getting into Columbia without it.

32

Oops, I didn’t mean to scare everyone else off. I just had the time to think about things on Sunday.

33

I don’t think you scared anyone off. Just not a whole lot else to say until character concepts are in. Although I will note that since we’re going to have a PC or two that probably have ancillary NPCs that speak something other than English…I’m not going to attempt to actually render that, either as accent or Google Translate or whatever. Just pretend they’re speaking Spanish or whatever when appropriate. Because the only language besides English that I could really take a stab at is French. :)

34

Yep, that’s fine. We can use italics or something similar to indicate non-English banter.

I read the rulebook. Some of the rules are a little bit confusing, but the overall picture is clear. Once I get an hour or two I will work on my character.

One question: The campaign asks that we have somebody that our character loves unconditionally. Does this somebody have to be local to the area the School is in or can he be back home? Since I’m working on an expat in the US, the answer to this question is going to influence some of the background I come up with (everything else I already can make do local to the school).

35

It would be difficult to have them come up in play if they’re not at least temporarily in the area.

36

All right, will come up with more local backstory then!

37

Me too… so now I must include that :D

38

Now I almost want to switch to a character who doesn’t speak English and just use Google translate for everything.

39

Somehow missed this thread until now. Would love to do a PBP if something else starts up.

40

So I’m going to suggest @Misguided taking my place here in the game. I’m so happy that there’s more folks interested in doing this, and while I’m excited at the idea of playing I know I’ve got some major life changes coming up in the next few weeks and I’ll feel better watching from the sidelines now that there’s a full crew here.