[UA] [OT] Godlike

[Budfannan]

The world is wonderfully thought out.  I and my players were in a campaign
for about eight months it was a great game.  I had picked it up to do a one
shot during one of our WW2 theme week at work and know one wanted me to stop
running it.  The system,which is what Greg worked on, handles the genre
really well.  It can be very deadly.  I loved it.  None of my original
playing characters made it to the end of the campaign.  It works well as a
troop play game, unless you are running more of an intelligence/covert ops
game.

The setting is meticulous.  It does an excellent job of teaching you real
history and Godlike history.  The use and explanation of powers is really
well done.  No one is too powerful.  The course of civilization is not
dramatically effected by the existence of powers.  Also, the way they
manifest is well done.  My favorite is the explanation of super minds.  As
their ability to comprehend things increases so does their ability to
understand the ramifications of their inventions.  Thus their increased
empathy makes them choose no to share creations and knowledge which can
harm.  It's an excellent example of an in game, but believably roleplayable,
control device.

Just my two cents.

Ian

PS There is a Godlike list.  You can find it at Arc Dream's website.

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Alex Lampros" <alexlampros at airpost.net>
To: "The Unknown Armies RPG Mailing List" <ua at lists.unknown-armies.com>
Sent: Saturday, March 13, 2004 10:34 PM
Subject: Re: [UA] [OT] Godlike


> You make it sound a little like Unknown Armies.  (which is a good thing)
>
> What was your impression of the world, though?  That's what I'm more
> interested in.
>
> Alex
>
> On Sun, 14 Mar 2004 14:07:57 +1100, Liam Routt <liam at routt.net> wrote:
>
> > I got Godlike on the strength of Greg's involvement, although I was soon
> > won over by the concept as well. Unfortunately the friend of mine who
> > was most likely to run a game of it chickened out, so I haven't actually
> > played it.
> >
> > My impression of the system (which Greg worked on, if I'm not mistaken)
> > was extremely positive. Erik Lee mentioned it seemed a bit White Wolf-y,
> > and while that is somewhat true, it fixes so much about that company's
> > systems, at least for me.
> >
> > For starters, there are two aspects of success (number of matching dice,
> > and value of matching dice), which gives you a lot more to work with.
> > Indeed, that alone is the basis of almost all the cool stuff that the
> > system does. Because there are two axes of success Greg can pretty much
> > do combat in a single roll per combatant, and he has a lot to work with
> > for the super powers. There are dice that are fixed at a certain value,
> > and dice that may be set to a value, for example, giving quite simple
> > mechanics to create powerful skill interactions.
> >
> > What freaked my friend (the potential GM) out was the odd placement of
> > the genre and mechanics of the game. Most guns, for example, have
> > roughly the same stats. And yet this is supposed to be a "realistic"
> > world war two game (or at least ww2 with super powers). It can be hard
> > for some people to reconcile the efficient beauty of the system with
> > what it is trying to do.
> >
> > The system also relies heavily on the GM to walk that line for the
> > group, and define it. My friend ran a game for some other people and
> > found the super powers (even simple ones) walked all over the normal
> > people. My feeling, listening to his description, was that *he* was the
> > one failing to deal with the super powers, and effectively letting the
> > players fast talk him and bamboozle him. You have to be ready to deal
> > with powers and face them with cold hard steel in an unforgiving manner,
> > or else you will end up with a four-color superhero world (which could
> > be what you want). My friend was willing to push blame for his failures
> > on to the system, which I think was really unfair.
> >
> > In summary, I was very impressed by Godlike. It is the only WW2 game I
> > can envisage playing. I think the system was elegant and avoided a lot
> > of complexity that gets drawn in when "reality" and "guns" are in the
> > same room. For all that reason, though, I think it has the potential to
> > confuse some potential players.
> >
> > Take care,
> >
> > Liam
>
>
>
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