Here's a snippet that illustrates how chargen and advancement have changed.

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Character Generation


1.   Look at the default statistical ratings.
2.   Choose a feature to hail from.
3.   Note changes to the default statistics of your race & note down  your Occupational Skill ratings and your Status score.  
4.   Spend 5 development points on Advantages, Affiliations or Signature Moves.
5.   character 1 or 2 goals.

Character Advancement

Characters who eradicate a problem or achieve a Goal or Ambition gain 4 additional Development points to spend on their character as well as permenantly increasing their Status score by 1 point. These can be spent in a similar way to starting characters. However, one of the benefits of increased experience is that new options open up for you.

Characters being advanced can spend their points in the following ways: -

1.   Increasing an existing Affiliation by up to 1 point.
2.   Making a new Affiliation of 1 point. The player can create a new NPC for this Affiliation if he so desires, or alternatively he can choose existing NPCs as the target of the new Affiliation.
3.   Creating a new Signature Move at the cost of 1 point.
4.   Increasing the value of an existing Occupational Skill by up to 1 point.
5.   Creating a new Occupational Skill of 1 point. With input from the GM, a new distinct Occupational Skill can be created. Example: Dr. Carpetbagger has been doing a bit of tumbling during his escapades. He has simply been using his Physique score for his dice pool. When he advances, he decides he'd like the new Occupational Skill of Tumble 1. The GM agrees with the request and the new skill is noted on Dr. Carpetbagger's character sheet.  
6.   If the character decides to move location to another local feature (or is playing in an Exploration type game), he can spend development points on the Occupational Skills listed for that feature in any number. However, he lowers his Status score by 1 point.

Quote from: Rob Lang;275308A great intro chapter there.

What are you going to be doing with it when you're done? PDF publish? Free perhaps?

No, but I'm seriously considering putting StarCluster 2 out for free DL. Still under copyright, but free. I'm still developing the ideas in SC - I'll be putting out at least Glorianna and IHW: StarCluster this coming year - and may eventually come out with StarCluster 3, but I think SC 2E has run its course as a core book.

-clash

If you do that, clash, you just HAVE to let me know. And then I'll let a load of other people know in the obvious way.

Clash, old buddy, the playtest document is winging its way to your inbox *runs and checks* Right now!!!

Edit: I've sent it to your yahoo account, not the flyingmice one. Let me know if i should send it to the other one!

Best of luck with this. It sounds great. I anxiously await the finished project .

Quote from: JohnnyWannabe;275406Best of luck with this. It sounds great. I anxiously await the finished project .

Thanks!

Here's a decription of a Lurking Menace (courtesy of Nicephorus, edited slightly). I've decided to have descriptive entries only for them, as well as Night Terrors, so that GMs can use what they like from the description to create their own custom profiles!

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69-72Pox

Legends & Lore: Pox is identified in a tongue twister popular among children:

Pox picks plucky kids.
Pox plinks picky snits.
Pox plucks punchy prats.
Pox bests petty brats.

The implication is that naughty children are visited with disease and misfortune if they misbehave.  Pox is the embodiment of such calamities. It seems from the rhyme that Pox takes pleasure in bringing down braggarts and bullies.

Some mothers are fond of scaring their children with oldwives tales about Pox. Two popular warnings are, “Wear your scarf or Pox will get you,” and, “Pox follows kids who wander off.”  

Description: Within the pages of Within the Walls, Pox is represented as a jester carrying a gourd rattle. Under this illustration, the author quotes an unknown source - “He who hears the song of his death-rattle, knows that Pox has numbered his days.”

Quote from: One Horse Town;275996I've decided to have descriptive entries only for them, as well as Night Terrors, so that GMs can use what they like from the description to create their own custom profiles!

I've changed my mind slightly on this. I'm not putting profiles in, but i'm writing a section of advice on how to give profiles to the descriptions and 50 example Attributes (similar to those for Vermin) that can be given to them.

Example Lurking Menace Attribute.

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Regenerative

Add a Regenerative rating to the profile.

The Menace permenantly adds 1 health point to the Dead health level in its profile for each point of the rating. Only when all of the Dead points are lost is the Menace killed.

Lurking Menaces with this attribute also heal bodily harm at a greatly accelerated rate. At the beginning of each round, remove 1 point of health damage from its health profile for each point of its Regenerative attribute rating.

:emot-rock:

Blew my way through 33 Attributes for Lurking Menaces today. Only 12 to go!

One of those 33 can be found below.

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Shadow Stealer

The Menace is able to curse his victim so that he does not cast a shadow. The Menace must spend a Normal action in inflicting the curse and the victim must make a Bearing test. Failure results in the loss of the victim's shadow. All of his Status tests from that day forward suffer a dice penalty equal to the Shadow Stealer rating of the Menace. However, this penalty is only imparted when the lack of a shadow is obvious or the people being interacted with are aware of the curse.

Add a Shadow Stealer rating to the profile of the Lurking Menace.

Some sages suggest that nailing the shadow of the Menace who inflicted the curse to a wall, using a silver spike, is the only way to lift it.

Right. I've finished off Lurking Menaces today. Below is the sample profile that will appear in the finished book. This uses the rules for creating Lurking Menaces. They're nasty! :eek:

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Example Lurking Menace Profile – Rattlebones

Here is my interpretation of the Rattlebones entry. The great thing is that many folk will have a different take and create a totally different profile! He's a bit of a brute using this profile. He inflicts 3 extra points of health damage on each blow, can destroy wood and stone with ease, has a 50 foot aura of fear and due to his high Physique score and his Enormous attribute, he can take much more punishment than the average denizen of the Horizon.

Have fun making you own!

Manual Dexterity 2
Reasoning 4
Physique 6
Bearing 5
Pragmatism 3

Occupational Skills: Fists 3, Stomp 2, Armour-smithing 2, Navigate 1
Attributes: Aura 10 (takes the form of approaching thunder), Armoured 5 (arcane armour with the Hypnotic attribute - 5), Destructive 2, Enormous 1

Health Profile

Uninjured
Lightly Injured  -O-O-O-O-O-O-O
Hurt -O-O-O-O-O-O      -1 die on all reflexive tests (-2 dice)
Heavily Injured -O-O-O-O      -1 die on all tests (-2 dice)
Dying -O-O-O         -2 dice on all tests (-4 dice)
Dead -O-O   

Armour

5-point arcane armour with the Hypnotic (5) attribute.

Quote from: One Horse Town;276363Example Lurking Menace Profile – Rattlebones

Here is my interpretation of the Rattlebones entry. The great thing is that many folk will have a different take and create a totally different profile! He's a bit of a brute using this profile. He inflicts 3 extra points of health damage on each blow, can destroy wood and stone with ease, has a 50 foot aura of fear and due to his high Physique score and his Enormous attribute, he can take much more punishment than the average denizen of the Horizon.

Sweet, Dan! I love the flexibility!

-clash

Quote from: flyingmice;276374Sweet, Dan! I love the flexibility!

-clash

Cheers! Do you want me to send you the finished Lurking Menace section?

I haven't included it in the Problems section of the playtest document i sent you.

Quote from: One Horse Town;276381Cheers! Do you want me to send you the finished Lurking Menace section?

I haven't included it in the Problems section of the playtest document i sent you.

Please do, Dan!

-clash

Movement

Knowing your character's movement rate is normally only necessary during a Scene. For tactical purposes, movement rate is measured in Spaces. This is an abstract term that you can place your own value on – many players prefer 1 Space to equal 5 feet. The tactical movement of your character is 1 Space for each point of his Physique statistic; add to this rate any points of relevant Occupational Skills such as Running or Athletics (only add the highest value if you have more than one relevant Occupational Skill). Example: Dr. Shortjohn has a Physique statistic of 3 and no relevant skills. Therefore his movement rate is 3 Spaces (15 feet in this GM's game). Dolly the dog has a Physique score of 2, but also has the Occupational Skill Running 2. The dog's tactical movement is 4 Spaces.  

An alternative way of measuring movement that I have found adds some tactical depth to a Scene is to have Spaces represent a fluid distance based on the height (or length) of the character. Using this method, a Space is a different unit of measurement for different people. A character that is 6 feet tall moves in Spaces that measure 6 feet in distance, whilst a 4-foot tall Ratling moves in Spaces that are 4 feet in distance. So, whilst they may be as quick as each other, their physical difference means that one can outdistance the other. When you factor in ranges of thrown weapons, this fluid use of Spaces also rather neatly represents the additional bulk that can be put behind a throw.

Chose whichever method you prefer.
   
Because of the nature of the terrain in Stone Horizons (the castle), hourly movement rates are not generally important. However, if travel is not overly hindered during a day of travel, assume that you can make about 8 miles progress each day. This travel will doubtless include passing through multiple features, tracking through warrens of passages and colonnades, and sometimes through residential areas (see Travelling the Horizons). If you are lucky enough to be in one of the rare patches of open land enclosed by the castle, then 2-3 miles per hour of travel, depending on conditions is appropriate.

As a new year present (and to keep roughly to my posting of about 10% content to the board) here is another Lurking Menace entry!

Happy new year everyone.

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37-40Soulstealers

Legends & Lore:

From Within the Walls:

With stroke of brush and blush of lips,
Pinch of cheek and red nail-tips,
Lady Nightshade gazes a-sure,
At the mirror on the wall,
With faint haze, her visage shimmers,
Her eyes glaze, her hair glimmers,
Gaze she does, all the long day,
'Till her soul is stole away.

Sir Bastion clearly states in his work that these strange creatures are supposed to inhabit mirrors and reflective surfaces. They slowly suck away the soul of those who gaze on their surface too long. Because of this, he surmises that Soulstealers prey on the vain and self-obsessed. Many a time a painted lady of the night or a court dandy is accused of being soulless – a reference to having been ensnared by a Soulstealer. It is quite possible that the whole legend grew up as a way for the poor to deride the manners and possessions of the rich.

How Soulstealers ensnare their victims is unknown, as is whether they have any influence over them or whether they can leave the surface in which they dwell. Is the mirror a portal to another place where these beings live?

Description: No description exists of these creatures. The reflection of the victim is all that is ever seen, albeit enhanced and beautified.