From: Heivilin, Jim [banzai@missouri.edu] Sent: Friday, February 04, 2000 9:04 AM To: 'list, blue planet' Subject: [BLUE PLANET] - [fwd] Fluid Mechanics -----Original Message----- To: blue_planet@lists.imagiconline.com Date: Thu, 3 Feb 2000 11:07:26 -0700 Subject: Fluid Mechanics Forgive me if I missed the answer to this question somewhere... When Fluid Mechanics hits the shelves, which edition of Blue Planet will it be written toward? Obviously it was in the writing stage before the second edition was, so I was just wondering if there will be a first and second edition, just a second edition, rules for both editions in the same book, etc... The additional art will be very welcome, as that is what caused me to pass up Blue Planet the first few times I saw it in the game stores. Current games just can't get away without alot of art. Rusty *************************************************************************** To unsubscribe from this list send mail to majordomo@lists.imagiconline.com with the line 'unsubscribe blue_planet' as the body of the message. From: Heivilin, Jim [banzai@missouri.edu] Sent: Friday, February 04, 2000 9:03 AM To: 'list, blue planet' Subject: [BLUE PLANET] - [fwd] BP Scenarios -----Original Message----- Date: Thu, 03 Feb 2000 08:46:58 +0100 To: blue_planet@lists.imagiconline.com From: Jerome Darmont Subject: BP Scenarios Is there a place (read a website) where all BP scenarios are referenced and/or doawnloadable? It could be interesting, couldn't it? -------------------------------------------------------- Jerome DARMONT, ERIC, Universite Lumiere - Lyon 2 Bat. L, 5 Avenue Mendes-France, 69676 BRON Cedex, FRANCE Tel.(33)478-774-492 mailto:jerome.darmont@univ-lyon2.fr http://eric.univ-lyon2.fr/~jdarmont/ *************************************************************************** To unsubscribe from this list send mail to majordomo@lists.imagiconline.com with the line 'unsubscribe blue_planet' as the body of the message. From: Alan Broad [abroad@appsco.com] Sent: Friday, February 04, 2000 9:53 AM To: 'blue_planet@lists.imagiconline.com' Subject: RE: [BLUE PLANET] - Playtesting BP2 Any news on when those playtesting at home might receive the goods? Just wondering 'cos the e-mail address I gave was my work one and if the stuff is sent over the weekend I'll have a whole two days to wait before I can get my grubby hand on it ... not that I'm excited or anything ;-) Alan Broad From: Jason Hockley [jh39@ukc.ac.uk] Sent: Friday, February 04, 2000 11:56 AM To: blue_planet@lists.imagiconline.com Subject: Re: RE: [BLUE PLANET] - Playtesting BP2 On Fri, 4 Feb 2000 15:53:29 -0000 Alan Broad wrote: > Any news on when those playtesting at home might receive the goods? > > Just wondering 'cos the e-mail address I gave was my work one and if the > stuff is sent over the weekend I'll have a whole two days to wait before I > can get my grubby hand on it ... not that I'm excited or anything ;-) Actually that reminds me of a couple of details I meant to ask about. I don't know if I'm the only European trying to take part in this or not but does that fax number include all the codes besides the international one? Can I just add "001" to the beginning and be sure it will get through? And does it matter what time it gets in as I'm a few timezones across from Biohazard? And I was wondering how you were sending the rules out too. If I give an address it should probably be my home address which is about 200 miles away from where I'm studying and would like the stuff to go to. Jason *************************************************************************** To unsubscribe from this list send mail to majordomo@lists.imagiconline.com with the line 'unsubscribe blue_planet' as the body of the message. From: Kevin L. Nault [jskln1@uas.alaska.edu] Sent: Friday, February 04, 2000 4:26 PM To: blue_planet@lists.imagiconline.com Subject: Re: [BLUE PLANET] - [fwd] Fluid Mechanics Rusty wrote: > The additional art will be very welcome, as that is what caused me to pass > up Blue Planet the first few times I saw it in the game stores. Current > games > just can't get away without alot of art. I disagree - one of my favorite things about BP was that all the art was of good quality and full page, even if there wasn't much of it. I tend to ignore most of the art in most of the games I have, because it's usually filler, without contributing to the theme or mood. Which reminds me: if I didn't say it before, I LOVE the little vignettes in the BP book. They all add a lot in terms of giving me a feel for the tone and mood of the situations discussed, and the Marshall in particular wouldn't be complete without "In the service of Justice" (or did I get the name wrong?) I did have one question I just remembered about the 2nd ed. - is it still possible to generate unbalanced characters? One of my favorite things about 1st ed. was that a character born into an advantaged setting, and thoroughly trained, was just better than a starving wharf rat. Not that the wharf rat was useless; (the edges did a lot to even things out - are those still around?) he was just less skilled. Since that's about .05cs, I'll just quit here. *************************************************************************** To unsubscribe from this list send mail to majordomo@lists.imagiconline.com with the line 'unsubscribe blue_planet' as the body of the message. From: Kintaro Oe [dguder@speaksoftly.com] Sent: Friday, February 04, 2000 5:29 PM To: blue_planet@lists.imagiconline.com Subject: Re: [BLUE PLANET] - [fwd] Fluid Mechanics >I disagree - one of my favorite things about BP was that all the art was of >good quality and full page, even if there wasn't much of it. I tend to ignore >most of the art in most of the games I have, because it's usually filler, >without contributing to the theme or mood. I pay a lot of attention to gaming art, and while lack of it won't make me hate a game (I love both BP and Continuum, for example), it does make it less fun to look at and I would say it strongly impacts sales. >Which reminds me: if I didn't say it before, I LOVE the little vignettes in >the BP book. They all add a lot in terms of giving me a feel for the tone and >mood of the situations discussed, and the Marshall in particular wouldn't be >complete without "In the service of Justice" (or did I get the name wrong?) Some of the fiction in BP ranks among my favorite fiction anywhere, especially the contest winner in Archipelago (that was done by the great Tun Kai Poh, right? :) >I did have one question I just remembered about the 2nd ed. - is it still >possible to generate unbalanced characters? One of my favorite things about >1st ed. was that a character born into an advantaged setting, and thoroughly >trained, was just better than a starving wharf rat. Not that the wharf rat >was useless; (the edges did a lot to even things out - are those still >around?) he was just less skilled. The complete abandonment of enforced "character balance" was really the only thing about the BP system I _loved_. It made me want to try the system out instead of just using another simpler system. - kabael - Kintaro Oe - Derek Guder - "It has never happened if the memory is not there." -Serial Experiments Lain kabael's netbook - http://kabael.8m.com the McGuffin Group - http://members.xoom.com/McGuffins review developer - Ex Libris Nocturnis - http://www.nocturnis.net *************************************************************************** To unsubscribe from this list send mail to majordomo@lists.imagiconline.com with the line 'unsubscribe blue_planet' as the body of the message. From: BIOHZD@aol.com Sent: Friday, February 04, 2000 5:45 PM To: blue_planet@lists.imagiconline.com Subject: [BLUE PLANET] - Playtesting BP2 Hey All, Continued qestions about playtesing BP 2nd edition prompt me to repost a message of a couple days ago... _____________ Hey All, I am glad to see so much enthusiasm about playtesting the new BP rules. The more characters that are made, the more dice that are rolled, and the more adventures through the chute, the better the final version the the game will be. For playtesting to be productive however, we need to keep tabs on things. To this end, we will be activating a playtester's resource link (hopefully by Saturday the 5th) on the "What's New" page of our website (BiohazardGames.com). 1. This button will take you to a printable copy of Biohazard's Nondisclosure Agreement (NDA). Print it out, read it, sign it, and either snail-mail or fax it to us. 2. The button will also prompt you for some contact info. Fill out and submit this e-form as well. 3. After we receive your signed NDA, you will be emailed the latest, most up-to-date version of the new character generation rules and game mechanics (text only - sorry, no layout yet). 4. We encourage you to run the rules ragged. Play them into the ground. Ask every munchkin, powergamer and twink you know to do their worst. In other words, we want you to truly test the system. 5. Approximately two weeks later, you will be sent the access code for a special section of our website, where you can submit a playtester's after action report. Please be sure that each player in your group is given either the access code or a hard copy of the printable form, and that they are encouraged to post/mail their comments. Your playtests are of little use to us if we do not hear back from you, and this is the best trick you've got to make sure Blue Planet is the game you want it to be! THE FINE PRINT: As open and informal a relationship as Biohazard maintains with its customers, and especially the list members, we would ask that you take the NDAs seriously. Signing one obligates you to keep the details of the second edition project between yourself and your players. Note - as it is somewhat impractical for every member of every group to sign an NDA, we assume the obligation for group confidentially is the resposibility if the initial signee. We do not mean to sound all legaleese, but as they say, better safe than sorry. Thank you for your understanding and compliance - and remember - GEO Internal Security is watching ; ). Later all, and thanks... Jeff Barber Biohazard Games *************************************************************************** To unsubscribe from this list send mail to majordomo@lists.imagiconline.com with the line 'unsubscribe blue_planet' as the body of the message. From: BIOHZD@aol.com Sent: Friday, February 04, 2000 5:45 PM To: blue_planet@lists.imagiconline.com Subject: RE: [BLUE PLANET] - Playtesting BP2 Jason, You ask about faxing the NDA. Just add the country code and fax away, day or night. As per my recent post, the files will be sent out via email only. Jeff Barber Biohazard Games *************************************************************************** To unsubscribe from this list send mail to majordomo@lists.imagiconline.com with the line 'unsubscribe blue_planet' as the body of the message. From: BIOHZD@aol.com Sent: Friday, February 04, 2000 5:44 PM To: blue_planet@lists.imagiconline.com Subject: Re: [BLUE PLANET] - [fwd] Fluid Mechanics Hey Rusty, Fluid Mechanics will be all 2nd edition. However, we might consider putting conversions for 2nd edition on our website. Remember too, that most of the tech in BP is rules light, and so the majority of the info in FluMech will be 1st ed friendly without conversions. Hope this helps, Jeff Barber Biohazard Games *************************************************************************** To unsubscribe from this list send mail to majordomo@lists.imagiconline.com with the line 'unsubscribe blue_planet' as the body of the message. From: BIOHZD@aol.com Sent: Friday, February 04, 2000 5:45 PM To: blue_planet@lists.imagiconline.com Subject: [BLUE PLANET] - Game Balance and BP2 Hey Kevin, Alright! A like mined gamer - digs full page art, dislikes filler illos and grooves on the realism of unbalance characters - *cool* ; ). Thanks for the good words Kev. As per your question about character balance: Many players like the intentionally unbalanced character generation of BP1, and many do not. IMO, the frontier setting of BP often demands characters that are include both the everyday and sometimes the larger than life. BP2 has the best of both worlds. In BP2 there is something we are currently calling character power level (sounds dorky I know, so if any one has a better suggestion, please cough it up!). There are three power levels - Everyday, Exceptional, and Elite - each one with advantages over lower levels in attributes, training (skills), and biomods. At the begining of a campaign the moderator decides what power level is appropriate. He/she could allow only everyday, or anything but elite, or it could be written for only elite characters, or even open to any power level. We believe this will maintain the effects and feel of the realistic variety of characters in BP, while giving those that prefer genuine balance in thier games the option to have it. S' cool? Jeff "Everyday" Barber Biohazard Games *************************************************************************** To unsubscribe from this list send mail to majordomo@lists.imagiconline.com with the line 'unsubscribe blue_planet' as the body of the message. From: D. Baughn [dbaughn@cadence.com] Sent: Friday, February 04, 2000 5:59 PM To: blue_planet@lists.imagiconline.com Subject: Re: [BLUE PLANET] - Game Balance and BP2 How about 'Character Competency Quotient'. Sounds like something players should take more seriously. At 06:44 PM 2/4/00 EST, you wrote: >Hey Kevin, > >Alright! A like mined gamer - digs full page art, dislikes filler illos and >grooves on the realism of unbalance characters - *cool* ; ). Thanks for the >good words Kev. > >As per your question about character balance: Many players like the >intentionally unbalanced character generation of BP1, and many do not. IMO, >the frontier setting of BP often demands characters that are include both the >everyday and sometimes the larger than life. BP2 has the best of both worlds. > >In BP2 there is something we are currently calling character power level >(sounds dorky I know, so if any one has a better suggestion, please cough it >up!). There are three power levels - Everyday, Exceptional, and Elite - each >one with advantages over lower levels in attributes, training (skills), and >biomods. At the begining of a campaign the moderator decides what power level >is appropriate. He/she could allow only everyday, or anything but elite, or >it could be written for only elite characters, or even open to any power >level. > >We believe this will maintain the effects and feel of the realistic variety >of characters in BP, while giving those that prefer genuine balance in thier >games the option to have it. > >S' cool? > >Jeff "Everyday" Barber >Biohazard Games > >*************************************************************************** >To unsubscribe from this list send mail to majordomo@lists.imagiconline.com >with the line 'unsubscribe blue_planet' as the body of the message. > > > -------------------------------------------------------------------- "The problem with the rat race is that even if you win, you're still a rat" - Lily Tomlin *************************************************************************** To unsubscribe from this list send mail to majordomo@lists.imagiconline.com with the line 'unsubscribe blue_planet' as the body of the message.