OOC, Q&A, and FAQ

[Lwmons]

... And probably a few more acronyms as relevant.

Feel free to ask any and all questions you have during the character creation process here. I'll respond as quickly as I am able, and put the most relevant questions, and those I think will come up, here at the top.

The game isn't open to recruitment yet, so if anyone stumbles upon this forum, please don't drop an application. Though do feel free to drop a question or comment here!

Today marks the 25th anniversary of Digimon as a franchise, what better day to open up for recruitment? I look forward to seeing what everyone comes up with.

The game will be recruiting for three weeks, or less if I feel I've gotten a strong enough pool of applicants and new ones stop coming in. I'm looking for 3-4 players, though will likely end up selecing 5-6, with the expectation of losing at least one member to the usual PbP attrition.

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Why use the dub terminology instead of the originals?For better or for worse, the dub version is the version I am most familiar with, and I am sure is the case with so many of you as this is a primarily English-speaking community.

In the interest of remaining internally consistent, I wanted t try and use the same terminology across the board,

Won't lower level Digimon be stronger than higher level ones in they can increase their PL?Yes. Yes they can. There are multiple instances in the franchise of Digimon being much stronger than those of higher evolution. The one that immediately comes to mine is Andromon in Adventure 01, who despite being Ultimate level, was frequently described as being stronger than Mega level Digimon.

Aren't the Digimodify rules unecessarily complicated and needlessly confusing?Probably, yeah. Doesn't help that every other word has Digi in it.

Honestly being completely honest, when I first had the idea for this game a few years ago, I was trying to find a way to run it in a Megaman Battle Network fan TTRPG called NetBattlers. It incorporated a system of Battlechips that I thought translated quite nicely to the Digi-Modify cards from Tamers.

It doesn't translate quite as smoothly into M&M but I liked the concept too much to get rid of.

Why don't we need to make stats for the Baby and In-Training stages?The Digimon GO! mobile game is hard coded to prevent Digimon below Rookie level from entering into battles. Digimon can still be interacted with at this stage, and have fully developed personalities, but aren't strong enough to compete seriosly

Can I decorate my Digimon with clothing, like Agumon from Digimon Data Squad?Absolutely! Even however many years in the future you can fully expect predatory monetization practices in mobile games, so there's absolutely going to be a cosmetic shop that allows you to buy new decorations using Digibucks.

Though for our purposes, it's functionally free to add to the Digimon. Unless you feel like your character wouldn't want to spend real money on a mobile game which is what I'd do.

In this same vein, palette swaps will also be freely available for most Digimon. You can have a Green Kabuterimon if you want, but for convenience sake, this also means Digimon that are basically just palette swaps of eachother, such as Agumon and Agumon(Black) are treated as the same type of Digimon for the purposes of Digivolution and stats.

Do I need to invest in the Equipment advantage in order to have basic things like a phone?Negative! Equipment should only be taken to represent things outside the scope that a regular person might have. Most young adults in Japan, particularly in the nebulous near-future, can be reasonably expected to have things like a phone with a camera, a computer, etc...

Is this really a game about a mobile game? That seems a bit boring, doesn't it?It could be, but there's more hiding under the surface that I don't want to spoil off the bat.

All I'll say right now is that, in addition to the obvious Pokemon GO! and Digimon roots, two of my biggest inspirations for the story was Code Lyoko and Generator Rex.

Do with that information what you will.

Some Digimon are shown as having different levels across different pieces of media. Which should I use?If you aren't sure, ask! Some, like Gatomon, are depicted as both Champion or Rookie at different times, while others, like Aldamon, are nebulously defined as "Hybrid".

Believe it or not I've gone through literally every Digimon and categorized them for the Digipedia, so I have specific places for all of them.

Edited March 6 by Lwmons (see edit history)

[Smirk]

Hello! I am quite interested, big OG Digimon fan here. I watched all the series that aired before Data Squad. I loved your Andromon example about over-powered digimon at lower levels. I remember as a kid being blown away when Andromon was holding his own (at least briefly) against Piedmon... which I only this moment realized was a pun on the fact that clowns throw pies...

Anywho, I have experince with D&D 3.5 and 5e and a similar Star Wars system, but no M&M knowlege. I'm gonna watch some YT videos on the matter but I'm sure I'm going to need a hand. :)

[EDIT] Wish I'd seen this 3 weeks ago!

Edited February 24 by Smirk (see edit history)

[Lwmons]

1 hour ago, Smirk said:

Hello! I am quite interested, big OG Digimon fan here. I watched all the series that aired before Data Squad. I loved your Andromon example about over-powered digimon at lower levels. I remember as a kid being blown away when Andromon was holding his own (at least briefly) against Piedmon... which I only this moment realized was a pun on the fact that clowns throw pies...

Anywho, I have experince with D&D 3.5 and 5e and a similar Star Wars system, but no M&M knowlege. I'm gonna watch some YT videos on the matter but I'm sure I'm going to need a hand. :)

[EDIT] Wish I'd seen this 3 weeks ago!

Hey there! I appreciate the interest. Truth is I put out an interest check on here a few weeks ago and it had a bit of an unenthusiastic response, which kind of hurt my motivation to run this game, which is why I've left it idle for so long. I still plan to, I just need to polish things first before I start accepting applications. Not sure when that will be, though. Feel free to brainstorm or bounce ideas off me in the meantime, though!

[Smirk]

I feel ya. Digimon is a niche fandom these days. I only found you because I was scrolling through the recently created games list, I certainly wasn't searching for a digimon game. I have a desk job now, so it seemed a return to PbP is in order.

I love world-building and such so I wouldn't mind helping you there a bit too. I don't mind mild spoilers in that regard.

As for character creation, I was watching mutants and masterminds tutorial stuff and, man, the learning curve for the character creation is dense! I like the flexibility it seems to offer though.

I am digging through the digimon wiki just for fun, looking for lesser known digimon I might request when/if the game gets off the ground. You mentioned that alternate evolution paths are OK, so does that mean a player could have a digimon that (canonically) only has a fusion evolution to go from champion to ultimate can just be hand-waived to a different ultimate form that normal?

 

[Smirk]

So, for example this guy looks pretty cool, reminds me of a dark version of Gallantmon, but his digivolution line seems convoluted. I never played the game he is from, so I can only guess how its supposed to work.

[EDIT] Also, I haven't watch all the series so if I end up asking about some super-obvious choice like a main character digimon, let me know. I'd rather pick something off the beaten path.

Edited February 24 by Smirk (see edit history)

[Lwmons]

In regards to evolutionary lines, as long as you can reasonably justify the evolutionary line, you are welcome to choose whatever you want. Canonically, there is no specific Rookie Digimon that becomes the Champion SkullKnightmon in the same way that Agumon is clearly a predecessor to Greymon. So you're welcome to pick anything for it's Child phase that you can justify, either through similar design elements or theming. For example, Gladimon, the Rookie that normally evolves into Knightmon, could reasonably digivolve into SkullKnightmon instead, as they share plenty of design elements, like the helmet and twin weapons.

[Smirk]

Good to know. Glad you aren't ready to start b/c I have a lot of reading to do!

Do we use the powers rules for MnM to build what our mons' special moves do?

[Lwmons]

In essence, yeah. You don't need to make an exact replica of all all their specific attacks that you can find online, especially when ones like Agumon have like 20 different attacks across their appearances, but as long as you feel it's a decent representation of their powers you should be good. Remember, you're building a "generic" version of the Digimon at first. Any uniqueness will come later.

I'll try and include a sample character build at some point to give an idea of what I'm looking for.

[Smirk]

No rush. I am still (slowly) learning the system. Its a system I am interested in anyway, so don't feel pressured b/c I am doing "homework" for the game.

[Smirk]

Oh! I saw the Augumon info! I am also reading some of the other info, such as the explanation of the prevalence of AR tech. With AR's underlying tech being a closely guarded corporate and government secret, I am already spinning some theories in my brain. Your world-building and the quality of your posts is excellent.

[Lwmons]

There's a tool you might find helpful called Hero Lab. It's a character building program that tells you when you make mistakes, and it works for M&M 3e. The demo version lets you make full characters, but you can't save unless you pay for the full product. It's what I usually use to make characters.

And don't worry, you aren't rushing me. I had wanted to open this game a lot sooner, my original intention was to close recruitment on March 6th, which would coincide with the 25th anniversary of the original movie, but I think I let things idle for too long after losing my motivation and even if I opened recruitment today I wouldn't give people enough time to make fleshed out characters. So right now I'm instead aiming to open recruitment on that day.

[Smirk]

That is such a cool idea! The original movie was so hype. I was 9 and it was the coolest thing ever. Well the half with Omnimon at least!

Also super thanks for pointing out Hero Lab!

Edited February 26 by Smirk (see edit history)

[Smirk]

I am dinking around hero lab, but I cannot seem to find M&M. Also, are we using 2e or 3e?

 

[EDIT] I figured out the problem I was having with hero lab.

Edited February 26 by Smirk (see edit history)

[Lwmons]

Sorry for the delay. We're going to be using 3e

[Smirk]

No worries, I am making pretty good strides learning the system. Dinking around in a superhero discord server with some knowledgeable folks. No rush. :)