Re: [DL] Mad Scientists

["Derek D. Bass" <wangenstein@mad.scientist.com>]

Let me offer another way to run MS.  In a game I play in, There is a MS
who's
player and the Marshal never get to sit down and create devices together
(conflicting schedules).  Here's what the Marshal did.  Every once and a
while a
device that had been proposed to the MS in game would spontaneously appear
out
of his lab.  Case in point:  a soldier who had one hand blown off,
approached
the MS hoping he might be able to create him a new hand.  A week or two
later, a
mechanical hand came walking out the front door of the lab.  Unfortunately,
it
was intelligent and wouldn't have anything to do with the man with the
missing
hand.  It proved to be quite the comic relief for a few sessions.  My point
with
this dragged out story is that if the marshal gets creative, the MS
character
can still have fun with inventing... besides, most are crazy enough when
they
are created, who needs more locos.

--D

That's a pretty neat idea, Dirk. It streamlines things nicely, yet provides
plenty of fodder for the Marshal to keep things balanced. And, it can work
with my philosophy that Devices that don't overbalance the game can have a
better chance of working well.

A good point, also, about MS characters being built crazy. Most people who
make MSs have a specific level of... eccentricity... built in, without
needing help from a random table.

I don't remember if I said this last time, but I also think that Players who
devote time and effort to formulating a plausible-sounding Theory should be
cut a break, just for the creativity required to make Fictional Science.
After all, Hucksters don't have to come up with a Theory (or something
similar) every time they want to make a new Hex, do they? (They don't,
right? I didn't think so, but the book isn't in front of me...)

Derek D. Bass
Etheric Musings - The Science of the Sons of Ether
http://members.home.net/wangenstein/ether.htm

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