RPG Contest #25 Preliminary Poll Tom

[Black Six]

RPG Contest #25 Preliminary Poll TomView the contest thread here.View the full list of submissions here.Preliminary Polls will run September 23 - 11:59 PM Eastern September 25.You can select FOUR entries!

1. Violet Orange Trouble Evolved 4: Kings and Lunatics - Kal the Guardian
2. The Light Meets the Dark - Toa Levacius Zehvor
3. Claustrophobia - Kryzath
4. City in the Dark - The Lorax
5. O, Brave New Underworld - Clockwork Kineticist
6. Otherworld - Cosmic Titan

[Parugi]

Hey, Six? The polls are currently set to a single choice, not four.

Edited September 23, 2012 by Parugi

[Takanuvainika]

I can only vote for one entry

[Black Six]

Hey, Six? The polls are currently set to a single choice, not four.

Thanks - it's been fixed.

[shadow pridak money gang]

Voted 2 and 3 only.-Teezy

[25K Now!]

Voted for 1,3,4,5

[Grantaire]

1, 2, 6.

[Franco]

3. It's a magic number...

[av.]

Voted 3 and 4.

[Samus Aran-Bounty Hunter]

1,2,3,4. Not much of reasoning, but I like 'em. Yays.Zakaro

[Takanuvainika]

1,2,3,4

[Voltex]

Who do I vote for?I VOTE 4 KAL.

[The Swimming Beard]

Voted for 1 and 2 only.

[Toa Levacius Zehvor]

1, 2. And 6, just to be different....Ohai Zarayna.EDIT: Huh, I didn't notice you could vote for four. Well, 5 would have been my fourth vote, but.... I guess I'll just provide moral support?-Toa Levacius Zehvor

Edited September 23, 2012 by Toa Levacius Zehvor

[Kal the Guardian]

1, 2, 3, 4I VOTE4:KaL'Nuff said.

[Cosmic Titan]

I voted for 1, 2, 3 and 6.

[Wade.]

I voted for 1, 2 and 3.

[Burnmad]

I voted for 1 and 2.

1, 2, 3, 4I VOTE4:KaL'Nuff said.

You voted for yourself? For shame, Kal, for shame!

-

[Wyrd Bid Ful Araed]

Just three and six. I would have voted for two but I'm not a fan of powers divined from morality meters

[Toa Levacius Zehvor]

Just three and six. I would have voted for two but I'm not a fan of powers divined from morality meters

Well shucks. I thought keeping the numbers behind the scenes would be enough. -Toa Levacius Zehvor

[Havelock Vetinari]

Voted for two and some others. Mostly voted for two so I could try to subvert the heck out of the system.

[Techn0geist]

I was feeling rather confident about this contest.Oh well

[Wyrd Bid Ful Araed]

Just three and six. I would have voted for two but I'm not a fan of powers divined from morality meters

Well shucks. I thought keeping the numbers behind the scenes would be enough.

Its less the numbers, more that morality should be based on characterisation not what power you want. Not to mention saying 'good actions=light powers, bad action=shadow powers' is far too black and white. What if I do good actions for bad reasons? What if I'm a sociopath who's doing bad but honestly believes its good?

[Toa Levacius Zehvor]

Just three and six. I would have voted for two but I'm not a fan of powers divined from morality meters

Well shucks. I thought keeping the numbers behind the scenes would be enough.

Its less the numbers, more that morality should be based on characterisation not what power you want. Not to mention saying 'good actions=light powers, bad action=shadow powers' is far too black and white. What if I do good actions for bad reasons? What if I'm a sociopath who's doing bad but honestly believes its good?

I was trying to go for a good vs. evil setting rather than a more grey, between the lines one. Lots of people seem to think that having white and black morality is immediately a bad thing, but that's only when it's executed poorly. I was originally going to try to implement the system in a more high fantasy like setting, but since we had to do it underground, I had to rethink a lot of things and make the world itself a lot more neutral toned and on a smaller scale. Having a nine thousand foot long Dragon becomes impractical when you put it down on paper, but fitting it in a cave, well... that's a lot harder.And if I didn't make it clear (enough?), your own motivation for actions does come into effect. And as noted, you only gain powers as you go through character development, which is more the point of the system than getting cool powers. So a character who's a sociopath that's trying to do good while doing bad might begin to clear up in the mind (spoilers), and head down one path. Or he might start to accept that those actions are bad, and keep doing them. The other path. It's up to you how that goes.-Toa Levacius Zehvor

[Highly Suspicious Person]

Everyone needs to VOTE 4: KaL

[Havelock Vetinari]

Black and white morality makes things less interesting. Villains who are pure evulz are just boring. That and when you have a morality meter, you are going to run into someone who has a differing definition of morality. Which can bring up all kinds of debates....Which is why I voted for that RP. So I can subvert the heck out of it. Should be great fun.

Edited September 24, 2012 by Basilisk

[Cosmic Titan]

Come on people I thought it would be obvious. You can have a Makuta with an Olmak. Two things that I have yet to see even be playable in any RPG that I have been around for. You have near complete control of character creation. And it is a free roaming sandbox game too. What more could you want?Please vote for Otherworld.

[Toa Levacius Zehvor]

Black and white morality makes things less interesting. Villains who are pure evulz are just boring. That and when you have a morality meter, you are going to run into someone who has a differing definition of morality. Which can bring up all kinds of debates....Which is why I voted for that RP. So I can subvert the heck out of it. Should be great fun.

Black and white doesn't mean that a villain is just pure evulz for the evulz, nor does it mean that the characters are undeveloped. The fact is, you can have a clearly defined good guy who is good and a clearly defined bad guy who is bad and still have motivation.If you don't like black and white morality, that's fine. But saying that it immediately makes things less interesting is something I would contest greatly. It's not real life. It's a story. It has protagonists and antagonists (hopefully - I will say that any story without a conflict, and thus some form of protagonist and antagonist, would be a boring one). And they can have clearly defined morals and beliefs, either good or evil. There's absolutely nothing wrong with their beliefs being good and evil. There's nothing wrong with light vs. darkness.Heck, this is a Bionicle RPG, set in the Bionicle Universe. Which is black and white. I would hardly say that Makuta did evil just to be evil, or that the protagonists of the story were all boring.And I'm welcome to anybody debating my rulings, as long as they take it to PM rather than filling up the RPG topics, and can give a good reason for disagreeing with me. And now, mayonnaise is not a reason.

Come on people I thought it would be obvious. You can have a Makuta with an Olmak. Two things that I have yet to see even be playable in any RPG that I have been around for. You have near complete control of character creation. And it is a free roaming sandbox game too. What more could you want?Please vote for Otherworld.

Well, I could want something to keep people from having an underdeveloped but incredibly powerful character. I could want a well developed storyline and a detailed setting that gives firm options for my character to explore the world they live in. And no, I'm not saying that it doesn't have those, I'm just answering your question. Well, actually.... yeah, you need to flesh out the story and setting more. That's probably why it has so few votes. ;)Now, I did just happen vote for Otherworld, because it actually gives me a chance to tie up a few loose ends with some of my characters. I'll be blunt here - if it wasn't in the afterlife, I would never have voted for it.-Toa Levacius Zehvor

[Cosmic Titan]

That was a rhetorical question.Underdeveloped characters... Why does it matter if someone has an underdeveloped character? Does it really subtract so much from the game if a few people have underdeveloped characters?There is no storyline in the entry because the storyline must be uncovered by player character actions. This world is essentially static and only player characters can change it. Setting is similar, no one has explored it yet, you need to do that on your own.Well considering how Otherworld is doing absolutely horrible, second last place is really bad, it won't be winning regardless of how much advertising I do. Oh and all contests are also popularity contests at some level if you have not yet noticed. And I am not popular at all.

[Toa Levacius Zehvor]

I see.It matters a lot. And yes, I believe it does. It is my personal belief that you have the responsibility to give characters of some power or ability (that Makuta with an Olmak you mentioned), because any being with that much power is going to have a story to tell about how they got it. All Toa are either pretty old, or were originally Matoran, or maybe both. That's a lot of story there. That's why I have a Biography requirement derived off of the characters power and/or uniqueness.Every RPG is a story. Most stories have what we call a prologue that addresses the setting and the like. There's almost no prologue to Otherworld. And honestly, I think a story should be moving around the players as they change it. If only players changing the world does anything, then... well, I guess that's the definition of a sandbox. And there should be things going on in the background. Even if it doesn't really affect the players.Well, obviously, a well known story writer can pick up more votes. Somebody with friends on other forums can pick them up. But overall, it's the RPGs that people want to play the most that win. As for you, I wouldn't say you're unpopular, just not well known. And I wish you would quit murdering your characters in ridiculous ways that dispose of the body. If you're going to dispose of a character in a dumb way, let somebody else take care of it.-Toa Levacius Zehvor

[Cosmic Titan]

I'm not sure if this conservation goes in this topic.Personally I think character past and development fall upon the shoulders of the character's creator not anyone else. And while I think it is logical that a stronger character would have a longer past it is not always obvious to every character creator.I think I should have stuck to one idea and stayed with it. I changed my mind too many times in the creations of my RPG. Maybe next contest or farther in the future I'll try to make a better RPG but the entry period is over and I can longer change my current one.Anyway I wholeheartedly support choices 1 and 2 in this poll and would suggest people read them if they have not already. And of course vote because that is what polls are for.

Edited September 25, 2012 by Cosmic Titan

[Toa Levacius Zehvor]

Well, considering this might effect if people really want us to GM their RPG, it seems to me. Plus, this is wrapping it up for me, so we can get back on topic.What it boils down to for me is that it keeps more experienced players, or better writers, making characters that have more of an impact; players who are less experienced watch them, learn, and in time say, "I think I'm ready to do handle this, too."I like your idea of an RPG in the afterlife for a few reasons, but I believe it needs more work.I believe that this man is correct on his final statement.[/shameless]-Toa Levacius Zehvor

[Kal the Guardian]

Last I checked (I haven't checked in awhile), I'm not too popular here, except in the one RPG I always play. And in Dreamland I almost dissapeared for a bit, and, at least to me, there wasn't much story that got revealed before it was killed by the next RPGs, making my GMing skills suspect in my opinion. But I guess if I take a step back, I really have grown from what I was, from creating sentence posts and bare mininum profiles to creating RPG ideas people apparently like and thousand word profiles and posts.It also helps that the only person I consider a RPing legend on BZPower in this contest is TPtI. Llyod didn't put his entry up in time, Parugi has stepped back to take care of his Pokemon RPG, and the Captain only randomly joins in from time to time. Even ToD didn't enter this time. And then there's those who I don't even see on BZPower anymore, who had awesome RPGs years ago. Plus, subliminal messages work. This contest, so far, proves it.I sort of forgot what my point was as I wrote this. VOTE4:KaL!