1 Apr 2015

Test Run - Hacking Valiant Universe RPG

To put this post into perspective, I've been re-watching Reboot after working on Ringette and several PCs for a friend's game at CanGames.  A though occurred to me that the Valiant Universe RPG could be easily used to set a game in /Reboot/'s setting.  The game can handle everything from binomes to sprites.

Valiant has several power levels, from sidekick (as Nasty was built) through hero and superhero (as Ringette is) to legend.  Sidekick covers the likes of Mike the TV and first season's Enzo, the characters who have limited abilities.  Hero covers most of the experienced characters, like Dot, Bob, and Captain Gavin Capacitor.  Superhero handles the likes of Glitch!Bob, Megabyte, and Hexadecimal.  Legend, the ultimate power level, easily handles Daemon, who wasn't one to be trifled with.  The levels can be mixed, though a sidekick is going to feel limited compared to a superhero.  The series does show the difference, with Dot, Bob, and Enzo together in a game.  After the break, I'll create a young Guardian, just fresh from the Academy.

Step 1 - Create a Character Theme and Character Name
Guardians come from the net, through systems and cities.  Their format - to mend and defend.  They are anti-virus programs, protecting other files from being infected.  Once recruited, they go to the Academy unless unusual circumstance occur, like the last half-dozen episodes of Season 2.  Sinclair, named after an early home PC model, has gone through training and is on his first assignment.
Sinclair

Vital Factors
Name: Sinclair
Title: Guardian 1F98 (8088 in hexadecimal)
Affiliation: Guardian
Character Level: Hero
Event Points:

Tags: Guardian * defender * young * rookie
History: One of the first wave of Guardians after the defeat of Daemon, Sinclair passed with flying colours despite his unusual beliefs about viral redemption.
Personality: Curious, naive
Step 2 - Assign Stat Dice
I have four dice, a d6, two d8s, and a d10, to assign to the four stats, Might, Intellect, Charisma, and Action.  Sinclair isn't necessarily a sprite of action.  Sometimes, he believes, you can talk things to a better position than fight.  He's not useless in a fight, but it's not his first approach.
Might: d6
Intellect: d8
Charisma: d10
Action: d8
Luck: 3
He's not strong, nowhere near Matrix or Megabyte's level, but he can get clever and prevent the fight before it starts.  I selected 3 for his Luck to represent him pulling off a win when things look bad.

Sinclair's health is based on his Might rating.  With a d6 Might, he marks off two pips from Health on the character sheet.  The result will be shown in Step 4, along with armour.  If fighting does break out, he needs to end it fast before he's deleted.

Step 3 - Create Powers
Valiant allows anything to be used as a power.  Flame blast?  Power.  Martial arts training?  Power.  Snarky insults?  Power.  This means I can model Sinclair's keytool, Backspace, as a power.  Bob's use of Glitch[link] was limited by his imagination.  Sinclair will need that sort of creativity.  With Valiant, Glitch's versatility is easy to model.  Sinclair takes Backspace as a d10 power, keeping both the stat die and the power die.  Cost is 15 points out of the 30 he has total to spend.  His second power will be his disarming smile.  This goes back to his belief that talking is better than fighting.  He takes the power with a d12 and keeping the lowest at a cost of 12.  The remaining 3 points get halved and saved as 1 Event Point.
Powers
Backspace: d10, Keep Both (Keytool)
Disarming Smile: d12, Keep Lowest
Step 4 - Assign Armour
Armour is determined by adding the die types of Might and Action.  Sinclair's total is 14 points of armour and is defined as Guardian Code.
Armour            Health
O O O O          O O O
O O O O          X  O O        X: -1 to Might
O O O O          X O O    X: -1 to Might & Action
O O                  X X        Staggered
                         X        Knocked Out
(Guardian
 Code)
Step 5 - Select Weapons
Every character can have up to two weapons, but most characters in Reboot have at most one.  Bob has Glitch, Mouse has her sword, Matrix has Gun, and Dot doesn't have any.  AndrAIa is unusual having both her trident and her paralytic nails.  However, the game treats weapons as a loose idea.  Mike the TV's 800 channel line up has been used to drive users and game sprites insane, which does count.  For Sinclair, I'll give him Backspace and Guardian Martial Arts.  The latter is of my own making, but there have been times when Bob hasn't had access to Glitch, including a codeblock by the Codemaster Lens.  Being able to have something to fall back on is a good idea.

Weapons                             Damage         Range
                                                           Close  Near  Far
Backspace                                3         OK     OK   -2
Guardian Martial Arts             2          OK      --    --
Step 6 - Select Equipment
If weapons were rare, equipment was moreso.  Bob has Glitch, which has become anything he's needed.  Dot owns most of Mainframe.  A closer look reveals Bob's glitch-prone car, Dot's later headset, Enzo's yo-yo, and Mike's microphone.  Everyone has zipboards.  That gives me a place to tart.  Sinclair has his keytool, Backspace, as mentioned above, and he has a zipboard, to help get around.  Backspace can fill in for any tool he needs on hand.  Depending on where he's used, he may pick up a motorcycle; AndrAIa demonstrated how useful they are.
Equipment
Keytool (Backspace)
Zipboard
Step 7 - Create Cues and Action Cues
I skipped this and Step 8 with Ringette, mainly because she was a demo character to compare two systems.  With Sinclair, I can think of a few.
Cues
My format: Guardian, to mend and defend.
Well, that was unexpected.
I've done this, in simulation.
Of course a game cube is coming in.  How else can this get worse?

Action Cues
Not on my watch, virus
Wouldn't you prefer to talk this out?
Backspace, anything!
Step 8 - Create Dispositions
Stepping back, this is a chance to flesh out Sinclair's tags.
Disposition
Naive young Guardian                Talking is the better option
Running is always an option
Step 9 - Final Tweaking
There's nothing I want to change here.  Sinclair feels like he belongs in the Net, where he can go to systems and cities to mend and defend his friends from viruses.

Here's Sinclair's full character sheet.  Let me know if there's something you'd change.
Sinclair

Vital Factors
Name: Sinclair
Title: Guardian 1F98 (8088 in hexadecimal)
Affiliation: Guardian
Character Level: Hero
Event Points: 1

Tags: Guardian * defender * young * rookie
History: One of the first wave of Guardians after the defeat of Daemon, Sinclair passed with flying colours despite his unusual beliefs about viral redemption.
Personality: Curious, naive

Might: d6
Intellect: d8
Charisma: d10
Action: d8
Luck: 3

Powers
Backspace: d10, Keep Both (Keytool)
Disarming Smile: d12, Keep Lowest

Cues
My format: Guardian, to mend and defend.
Well, that was unexpected.
I've done this, in simulation.
Of course a game cube is coming in.  How else can this get worse?

Action Cues
Not on my watch, virus
Wouldn't you prefer to talk this out?
Backspace, anything!

Disposition
Naive young Guardian                Talking is the better option
Running is always an option

Armour            Health
O O O O          O O O
O O O O          X O O        X: -1 to Might
O O O O          X O O        X: -1 to Might & Action
O O                  X X           Staggered
                         X               Knocked Out
(Guardian
 Code)

Weapons                            Damage         Range
                                                          Close  Near  Far
Backspace                                3         OK     OK   -2
Guardian Martial Arts             2          OK      --    --

Equipment
Keytool (Backspace)
Zipboard

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