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Naruto d20: what's the attraction?

   
Imperator, that's more a fun thought exercise than anything legitimately playable. Actually playing the game, let alone making you own characters who actually fit in the tone and themes of the anime, while using D&D? It's just doomed to failure as D&D lacks the particular brand of freedom needed to accommodate the setting.

Naruto really requires a skill-based system, rather than a class-based system. Every character is going to be a ninja, so classes are superfluous and unnecessarily limiting.

Though I tried making a character with those Naruto D20 rules myself, and it was pretty ridiculously complex. If I found a supplement for M&M that covered Naruto, I'd try it in a hot second.

What about BESM? Is there a Naruto supplement available for BESM?

You don't need a supplement to run Naruto in M&M (seriously, just take out the core book and go), and BESM is a fundamentally flawed abomination.

As passionate as you are about... well, everything honestly... it's hard to have a discussion when you don't state your reasoning behind your statements.

That said, M&M could technically work, but it would take a lot of tweaking and house rules to actually make it feel like Naruto, instead of a poorly implemented, half-baked, anime-wannabe system.

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Originally Posted by Greyfeld View Post
That said, M&M could technically work, but it would take a lot of tweaking and house rules to actually make it feel like Naruto, instead of a poorly implemented, half-baked, anime-wannabe system.
How so? It's a system which works well with high-powered heroes, the combat is quick, but is well suited for long slug-fests or minion-mows, and it has powers mutable into pretty much anything you could want.

You'd probably have to limit a few things, but ultimately it'd work out quite well.

Also, Mecha and Manga had some interesting ideas regarding porting the various Anime/Manga series into M&M.

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Originally Posted by Vox Clamantis View Post
Hero or GURPS seem best to fit the needs of the universe, but I don't understand this contempt for MnM.
I think it depends on what you want, with Hero and GURPS both, anything that can go for M&M can go for them as far as I've seen, because they're very
well, Hero is, but GURPS is just GURPS
similar, but ultimately more granular than M&M, but that can also work against them when something simpler would suffice, I think this is one of those cases.

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Originally Posted by Neraagile View Post
How so? It's a system which works well with high-powered heroes, the combat is quick, but is well suited for long slug-fests or minion-mows, and it has powers mutable into pretty much anything you could want.

You'd probably have to limit a few things, but ultimately it'd work out quite well.
Well for one thing, all Naruto characters have access to a baseline of certain abilities (Bunshin, Kawarimi, Henge), which means that every character will end up receiving at least a few abilities for free before spending their character points.

Secondly, you have to develop a Chakra system (similar to mana), because ninjas in the Naruto universe can't continuously use their jutsus without depleting their own resources.

Third, jutsus in Naruto tend to be thematically aligned, which makes building all the powers available to one ninja especially difficult and time-consuming with the M&M powers system. Something as simple as an earth-based ninja might require Burrowing, Create, Damage, Deflect, Enhanced trait, Movement, Protection, Remote Sensing, and Transform just to cover their earth-based techniques. And even then, you'd probably have to house rule a few new powers just to get the proper skillset you wanted, after flawing each power out the wazoo to make sure they're all thematically correct.

I haven't seen the mecha/manga supplement, so I don't know if any of this is dealt with in that book or not.

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Originally Posted by Greyfeld View Post
Well for one thing, all Naruto characters have access to a baseline of certain abilities (Bunshin, Kawarimi, Henge), which means that every character will end up receiving at least a few abilities for free before spending their character points.

Secondly, you have to develop a Chakra system (similar to mana), because ninjas in the Naruto universe can't continuously use their jutsus without depleting their own resources.

Third, jutsus in Naruto tend to be thematically aligned, which makes building all the powers available to one ninja especially difficult and time-consuming with the M&M powers system. Something as simple as an earth-based ninja might require Burrowing, Create, Damage, Deflect, Enhanced trait, Movement, Protection, Remote Sensing, and Transform just to cover their earth-based techniques. And even then, you'd probably have to house rule a few new powers just to get the proper skillset you wanted, after flawing each power out the wazoo to make sure they're all thematically correct.
I have a lot of experience with M&M, and none of this sounds particularly difficult, if all the players are familiar with the source material and you have a GM who knows what she's doing. Source books aren't necessary, but they are especially good at making sure the players and GM are on the same page (something a good GM can do without a book, if the players are cooperative).

1. You don't need to give anything for "free." You just need to make sure everyone buys the things they are supposed to have. If this means tweaking the PL/PP ratios, easily done as well.

2. Depending on how often ninjas run out of power, you could either make it a complication (that's what I would do). Or you could just add "Limited to X number of uses without resting" to the array(s).

3. Sounds like a simple power array with the "Earth jutsus" descriptors. If there are complex limitations just write them up in however many sentences needed to describe their limitations and then assign a Flaw value to them (-1, -2, etc.).

A quick search of The Atomic Think Tank shows there are a few of the regular "builders" who are stating out Naruto characters.

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Originally Posted by Law View Post
I have a lot of experience with M&M, and none of this sounds particularly difficult, if all the players are familiar with the source material and you have a GM who knows what she's doing. Source books aren't necessary, but they are especially good at making sure the players and GM are on the same page (something a good GM can do without a book, if the players are cooperative).
I didn't say how easy or hard it would be, I said it would require a bit of house ruling to pull off.

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1. You don't need to give anything for "free." You just need to make sure everyone buys the things they are supposed to have. If this means tweaking the PL/PP ratios, easily done as well.
If you have to tweak the PL/PP ratios to compensate, you're essentially giving them for free anyway, so you're really just arguing semantics. The point is that every single character is going to have the same array of baseline abilities, so it's something that has to be hammered out for all the characters, which will effect the power level of the entire game, and needs to be compensated for in some way.

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2. Depending on how often ninjas run out of power, you could either make it a complication (that's what I would do). Or you could just add "Limited to X number of uses without resting" to the array(s).
Every character is going to be different. You can't just slap a complication on it and call it a day, or turn it into a vancian system by letting them use each individual power X number of times per day. Like mana, chakra determines the character's ability to mold their inner strength into outward force, and it depletes as it's used. Some characters have very small pools of chakra, but know how to use it with precision (Shikamaru, Sakura, Kabuto), while others have very large chakra pools but may burn it up in flashy and powerful techniques (Naruto, Sasuke, Gaara). In the end, all characters can eventually deplete their own chakra, but how much effort that takes is individual in nature.

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3. Sounds like a simple power array with the "Earth jutsus" descriptors. If there are complex limitations just write them up in however many sentences needed to describe their limitations and then assign a Flaw value to them (-1, -2, etc.).
Like I said, possible, but takes a lot of work, and a lot of house ruling.

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Originally Posted by Greyfeld View Post
I didn't say how easy or hard it would be, I said it would require a bit of house ruling to pull off.
Nothing I suggested in my post required any house rules.

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Originally Posted by Greyfeld View Post
If you have to tweak the PL/PP ratios to compensate, you're essentially giving them for free anyway, so you're really just arguing semantics.
It would be semantics if the PCs were the only builds in the game, or if every build in the game (including animals, monsters, etc.) had those powers (maybe they do; I don't know. Doggie ninjas much?) Knowing how many points a character is built out of is helpful in building appropriate challenges, hence the tweaking of PPs rather than "freebies." Though I doubt you would need to tweak the PL/PP ratios to play anime ninjas.

If the GM and the players have a good eye for balance and what is genre appropriate, PL and PPs can be more flexible guidelines than "build points." I have run several M&M games with friends where I didn't give the characters a set number of PL or PPs at all. I said build the character the way you see him, and don't worry about the points. The players did a good job of policing themselves. It does involve a high degree of trust, however.

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Originally Posted by Greyfeld View Post
Every character is going to be different. You can't just slap a complication on it and call it a day, or turn it into a vancian system by letting them use each individual power X number of times per day.
Sure you can. The GM decides when to invoke complications. There is no reason why the GM couldn't personalize that to particular characters to capture the flavor of the setting. The players could invoke their own complications for that matter; they could run out of steam when it was dramatically appropriate or when they wanted to earn a HP. Player invoked complications are my favorite kind. It my not be your preferred way to play, however. To each his own.

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Originally Posted by Greyfeld View Post
Like I said, possible, but takes a lot of work, and a lot of house ruling.
Nope, still no house rules.




 

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