A discussion elsewhere has led me to consider choices made in designing Centurion – one of my games that was not inspired by other systems but was wholly independently designed. Centurion: Legionaries of Rome, as its title implies, is a game about Roman legionaries, and more specifically the kinds of special troops that might find themselves in a testudo facing raging barbarians, but which are more likely to be in advance of the legions, scouting out the activities of those barbarians or even infiltrating the camps or cities of rival civilizations. The development of Centurion seems so long ago (I guess 2012 was a few years back), but I had some very clear design goals.
For a simple system with a strong focus on narrative, Centurion’s dice mechanics are somewhat complex, certainly much crunchier than the other aspects of the game. This was the result of an intent to develop a relatively light game that still required a level of strategy – or, to be more true to the definitions, tactics. Since it was a game about legionaries, the idea was to incorporate the kind of tactical thinking required when you were in a legion. Legionaries had to make decisions for themselves – when to receive attacks and when to strike – but these decisions also had effects on their squadmates – when shifting a shield for a strike, one left the legionary to one’s right vulnerable. So the decisions made on who to build one’s hand to best counter the GM was intended as an extension of the decisions required of a legionary.
In a Test, the GM must assemble their hand of dice first – the character’s stats are based on a number of d6, and these can be used to buy larger dice or used as d6s, and this collection of dice is the player’s “hand” – and this gives the PCs a decided advantage. This was not an unexpected result but was the goal of that design decision. PC s are intended to have an advantage – actually, a few – and the major advantage is the ability to respond to the GM’s hand. This is one way to mirror the incredible professionalism and level of training of the Roman legionaries in comparison to almost any foe that they faced. While PCs had certain other advantages, this one was the primary way in which the training of the legionaries was modelled.
Centurion is certainly not the most popular game that I have designed, but I think it is the one about which I am most proud. This was something that I designed completely from the ground up with a very strong idea about what I wanted it to do. I really believe that I accomplished that, though others might disagree.
Starship Commandos is very explicitly inspired by the movie Aliens and the novel Starship Troopers. Recently, an individual had a bit of a disconnect between the perceived nature of those intellectual properties and the game. Basically, the interlocutor saw mortal threat as an important part of both inspirations, whereas in the default mode of Starship Commandos, there is no threat of PC death.
In regards to theme, it is my opinion that while Alien was absolutely survival horror in a science fiction setting, Aliens was not. To me, the question is not will Ripley survive but how. Elements of horror are woven into the story, and that helps to escalate the stakes. The lack of supplies provides the same, while also setting in motion the ticking clock aspect of the plot. The xenomorphs are horrifying and their use of humans in their life process is horrifying, and in this sense the movie is a monster/horror movie. But all of the Alien movies have attempted to approach the subject matter from a different angle and provide a different story – although Alien Resurrection came very close to mimicking some of the themes of Aliens – and rather than survival horror, Aliens seems much more an action movie with horror trappings.
The threat to the PCs in Starship Commandos is much the same as it is to Ripley and to Rico – there are narrative elements that can be considered a threat, but death is not an obvious outcome.
I have hit on a very interesting point. There’s an inscription on a temple in the fortress of Semna in what would become Kush, and it refers to Karimala, whom the inscription calls “King of Upper and Lower Egypt, King’s Great Wife, King’s Daughter.” While she was apparently a great wife to a pharaoh, that inscription seems to suggest she also ruled in her own right. Dr. Morkot’s assumes this is not true, even though he does not indicate a specific reason why it could not be. He does indicate that the hieroglyphs are difficult to decipher, though I do not know enough to be able to make a guess as to why.
In the end, for me, it’s a great piece of inspiration, a seed that could grow into a really interesting story. I don’t have the knowledge or skills necessary to actually ferret out the truth, but Nefertiti Overdrive is about kick-ass adventures rather than strict historical accuracy, so there’s nothing stopping us from running a game in which Karimala, an acolyte of Isis, challenges the status quo and finds herself embattled by her own subject – though maybe not all of them.
Episode 20: “The Anglo-Saxon Migration, the North Sea World, and the Birth of England” got me thinking of Great Britain in the fifth century. Now, this period has been mined pretty extensively, but generally as it relates to King Arthur. Patrick Wyman, the host, had previously mentioned Riothamus, a possible candidate for the historical Arthur, but other than an offhand reference to this being the period of Arthur, he focuses on the much more interesting – for me – topic of the Anglo-Saxon culture and the history and process of migration.
I’m thinking of a game in which the PCs arrive in post-Roman Britain around 420 or so, and follow this group of mercenaries as they rise to positions of power and prestige. This version of Britain would include the supernatural aspects that we now consider superstition, and I would be interested in referencing the religious friction of the heathen Saxons vs. the Christian Romano-British.