DM Nagging: It's pretty much my job

[Ebiris]

A chuuni would be good!

But it's not so much a problem having a medieval someone for 'explain what a car is' because if we jump to a modern world where cars are relevant, the medieval person can just take a non drop-in background and then gain all the life experience of having grown up in a modern world.

There are of course other culture clash issues of someone being from a radically different time period and set of social mores, mind you. But social mores are likely to be adaptive anyway because of the jump backgrounds providing life experience from all sorts of worlds and cultures as things progress.

[Iron Dragoon]

Well, if we're talking roles, what roles do we all think we need? I mean, it doesn't need to be anything written in stone, but since it was mentioned, a few ideas out there would help.

[Anastasia]

Houserules v1

While much of the details of the chain are still to be determined, I have a few things I've decided on already. I'll share these so you can make your own informed judgments about character concepts. I intend to run this mostly vanilla on the jumpchain side, but a few changes have already jumped out at me.

1. Companion recruitment won't involve character points.

In other words you won't spend points to 'buy' companions from a setting. You'll have an alternate means of recruitment if you wish to go that way. Means to get companions character points to use on their own may or may not use standard methods, if they exist at all. It's to be determined right now. I don't mind suggestions if anyone has them. Just don't expect me to change my mind on buying companions.

As for why, I don't want to go down the path of buying companions. It's an added complication for the DM and moreover, I think it's honestly creepy as written. It can be interpreted otherwise but I'd rather avoid the entire paradigm.

2. No NC-17 jumps.

Yes, these exist. We won't be using them. It's a fairly small subset of jumps and most are to porn games/worlds/doujins. This is less of a houserule and more of a DM judgment call.

3. Jump Fiat.

If you don't understand what jump fiat is, you can skim this point for now because it's not something you need to worry about. This is more to explain to people who understand the concept. In short, jump fiat for this game is going to ensure perks and related powers work, even in worlds where it might not otherwise. For example, a perk backed spellcasting ability still works in a world explicitly without magic.  So you don't have to worry about perk based powers being offline if they're not compatible with a world's metaphysics.

This doesn't mean that perks that do something that affect a being, object or material that doesn't exist in the universe works in any meaningful way. To take the previous example, your perk backed spellcasting ability would let you still cast Dominate Outsider, but it won't mandate that any outsiders exist to cast it on. Likewise, a perk from a Warhammer 40k jump that grants you the ability to manipulate the Warp won't mandate a Warp exists in a world where it doesn't. Unless the perk in question (or another perk, item or power you have) says that it does provide such a thing, but such instances are rare.

4. Perk Stacking.

Perks generally stack unless a perk says otherwise. It's generally additive. Two perks that make you stronger add together for your total strength. Two perks that make you faster add together to determine how fast you are. So on and so forth. Any diminishing returns is purely in the realm of the practical: For example, against weak opponents, it probably doesn't matter if your maximum speed is 2000 MPH or 2200 MPH.

5. Age and Gender.

These will be used, so bear that in mind in your calculations. Your age will change and gender may change as you go along the chain - or it may not, it's generally your discretion. It's worth a consideration if it impacts your character concept at all.

[Anastasia]

Well, if we're talking roles, what roles do we all think we need? I mean, it doesn't need to be anything written in stone, but since it was mentioned, a few ideas out there would help.

That's up to y'all, but some basic skills are permissible. One of you having, say, woodsman skills wouldn't be the worst idea in a void. Another with some computer skills would be sensible and so on. This stuff may or may not matter in the slightest depending on how your draw of jumps works out, so don't feel obligated to let that get in the way of a concept, either.

Iddy's concern is valid, all-modern Earth is probably best.
To take Eb's words to their natural conclusion, what we need is a chuuni PC.

I wouldn't go that far, but obviously some media familiarity would be useful. Not that you have to, it's perfectly okay to go in another direction and be the clueless one of the group, too.

What I'm saying with those two replies is that building well can help, but it's not mandatory. It's more useful if you want to go down the drop-in or always drop-in routes, though.

[Iron Dragoon]

I'll play the woodsy character. Whether that ends up being a hobby or military training is still undecided.

[Anastasia]

Test Build 2: Gauntlets

There's a concept in Jumpchain called Gauntlets. These have several unique features to them, being a specialized type of jump.

1. You lose access to all of your accumulated perks, items and abilities. In other words you're sent back down to baseline humanity. If your chain uses a body mod, you do retain access to that. Don't worry, you get everything back after the gauntlet no matter what.

2. Instead of 1000 character points to start with, you gain 0 character points to start with. You have to earn points through drawbacks alone, though a few gauntlets offer additional ways to earn character points.

3. A gauntlet usually has a specific victory condition built into it. Your goal is to reach that condition if it has one.

4. However, gauntlets do have upsides. First of all, death or failure in a tauntlet merely results in the loss of anything purchased or obtained in that gauntlet. It does not end your chain unlike in a normal jump. Should you succeed in the gauntlet you retain everything purchased and often win a special prize on top of it.

It's best to think of gauntlets as bonus stages in a jumpchain, where there's no risk of chain failure but you face a harder than usual challenge without your accumulated resources. A jumpchain isn't obligated to have any gauntlets, so you may never see one. Or perhaps it may be used as you first jump, with the feature of chain continuation even on death or failure as a safety net.

We're going to try test builds of a gauntlet here to see how all of you take to it.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1Sou9TohXRCGQV6Kx5hCAZ2NSYmuZ3JmU/view?usp=sharing

That's right, a Monopoly gauntlet. Give it a try, post a build here.

(Put down the pitchforks, it's just a demo. I wouldn't make you play Monopoly in the jumpchain. I have some limits to my DMing cruelty.)

[Ebiris]

Never been a fan of gauntlets personality. The fun of the concept is getting cool abilities from world A and taking them to world B to see what wackiness results. Gauntlets and power loss drawbacks just take away from the core conceit that draws me into jumpchain to begin with.

Also Monopoly fucking sucks. Like it's an awful shitty boring game. And this gauntlet specifically only benefits the winner of the game so couldn't really work in a multi-jumper setup.

But here's a build.

Monopoly
Perks: Fashionable Restructuring (100), Fast Track (100), Cash Advance (300), Rainy Day Fund (600), The Landlord's Game (400), Real Estate (400), Home Field Advantage (500), Savings and Loan (500), Trustbuilding (600), Winning When You Lose (700)
Drawbacks: Embarrassment (-100), Annoyance (-100), Ankle-Biter (-100), Just Make It Stop (-200), Free Parking (-200), More of Them (-200), Too Many Cooks Spoil the Soup (-300), Go Directly to Jail (-200), Do Not Pass Go (-300), Do Not Collect $200 (-300), Stop Right There Criminal Scum! (-400), Eternal Pauper (-300), Shrewd Fellows (-300), Strictly Business (-400), Trust Buster (-800)

This one is pretty exploitable, you just need to get the perk Winning When You Lose so you can earn money while in jail, then take the drawbacks that put you in jail constantly. You can load up on other drawbacks too except for the one that makes people cheat. The whole point is you're the one cheating here. Embarrassment is free points, playing with an annoying family's no big deal for what you win here so grin and bear it. Free parking doesn't matter either, you're spending all your time in jail. Having more players? That's fine, it makes it harder for anyone else to get a monopoly that way. Eternal Pauper is fine to take because again you're spending all your time in jail, passing go isn't going to happen often. Playing against economists or tycoons is no danger either because you're winning with an exploit, and the idiot family is around to farm off of.

This lets you stack up so many points you can basically buy whatever you want. 4,200 points to spend on perks.

As said, Winning When You Lose is mandatory. Take Fast Track to help grab railways early when you're not in jail. Cash Advance and Rainy Day fund so you've got some early cash to quickly buy stuff when you're not in jail since you're not getting any from passing go.

The Landlord's Game is good for sewing things up near the end. Even those tycoons will sell to you when they know it will cost them, and it's a perk that's actually good to have in the future for hostile takeovers or buying stuff people wouldn't want to sell you.

Real Estate is another one for just speeding things up when you're not in jail. Home Field Advantage gets you one of the most valuable properties for free. Savings and Loan and Trustbuilding are pretty much just because I have points to spare now. In fact that leaves me with a spare 100. Fuck it, spend it on Fashionable Restructuring to change the version. There might be a version of Monopoly you can exploit with this but I don't know them, so long as it's not that dumbfuck 'lol millenials amirite' version.

Fuck I hate Monopoly.

Anyway, that's basically it. Spend all your time in jail so you're not paying rent to anyone else and you can freely get rent from them, force them to sell to you even if they don't want to buy putting down enough money, your victory is guaranteed. Can even steal a bit from the bank if I need to, so long as I'm careful.

I'm pretty sure whoever made this gauntlet explicitly made it with this exploit build in mind so they could easily get all the goodies with minimal fuss and go on with the rest of the jumpchain as a member of the ultra-wealthy. The perks aren't really that good for the rest of the chain other than landlord's game.

[Anastasia]

Never been a fan of gauntlets personality. The fun of the concept is getting cool abilities from world A and taking them to world B to see what wackiness results. Gauntlets and power loss drawbacks just take away from the core conceit that draws me into jumpchain to begin with.

I like them as the occasional change of pace or as a first jump for a measure of insurance for a first time jumper. I do agree with your complaint 100%, but at the same time, the occasional break from that in favor of something else can be good too.

Also Monopoly fucking sucks. Like it's an awful shitty boring game. And this gauntlet specifically only benefits the winner of the game so couldn't really work in a multi-jumper setup.

All joking aside I do feel like I'm the only Monopoly fan here, so I was poking at it with my comment about not being that cruel a DM.

Anyway, I used it as a demo because it's badly incompatible with anything for our purposes except as a demonstration. It's fine enough to serve as an example and to ensure it won't see actual gameplay.

But here's a build.

Dominating build

Yeah, pretty much. It's a crushable gauntlet. I'm not sure if the exploits are intention or not. Some jumps have flaws like that, one reason I chose this one was to demonstrate that. Jump design has plenty of space for those sort of things.

[Corwin]

I do like Monopoly, though I haven't played in years.

Perks: The Landlord's Game [400 CP], Real Estate [400 CP], Home Field Advantage [500 CP], Trustbuilding [600 CP]
Drawbacks: Embarassment [+100 CP], Annoyance [+100 CP]​, Ankle-Biter [+100 CP, requires Annoyance], Just Make It Stop [+200 CP, requires Ankle-Biter], Only The Dead Can Know Peace From This [+300 CP, requires Just Make It Stop], More Of Them [+200 CP], Drunkards and Draughts [+300 CP], Can't Get In Trouble [+400 CP], Can't Catch Them, Can You? [+200 CP, requires Can't Get In Trouble]

I went into a different direction and emphasized the key drawback. Only the winner actually succeeding is lame, but the actual game might as well be fun for some value of fun.

[Ebiris]

Some jumps plainly have 'One True Build' where the jumpmaker specifically prefers a certain build and crafts the jump around it with everything else basically being filler, but gauntlets have the extra problem of having defined starting and win states rather than just being places you visit to do your own thing with a potentially limitless array of existing abilities. So rather than being a chance to grab stuff you think is cool or rounds out your character, you have to puzzle out the jumpmaker's intentions and figure out what the intended solution to the gauntlet is.

Less freeform creative exercise, more solving a puzzle within a defined box.

[Iron Dragoon]

Yeah, not super interested in Monopoly.

Perks: The Landlord's Game [400], Go Already [200], Fast Track [100]
Drawbacks: Embarassment [100], Free Parking [200], Can't Get in Trouble [400]

[Anastasia]

Okay, all of those posts so far look solid.

Starting around Monday I'm going to announce my plans going forward.  Don't expect too much until then, I'm resting up. I'm not sure when a new game will begin precisely. Some time in August? Depends on how I feel.

[Nephrite]

I don't remember enough about Monopoly to do anything complicated here:

Perks: Fast Track, (100), The Landlord's Game (400), Home Field Advantage (500)
Drawbacks: Embarrassment (100), Free Parking (200), Drunkards and Draughts (300), Can't Get In Trouble (400)

Seems simple enough, you start off owning a good thing, and can just buy everything else you need from other people quickly enough to just win. Especially since they're drunk, they won't notice your plan until you've taken your goofy pink thimble around the board enough times.

[Anastasia]

Looks solid enough here, Neph.

Glad all of you seem to have this down now.

[Anastasia]

Okay, so today's exercise is the DM seeing what sort of settings interest you. Could each of you give me a list of 5 settings you'd like to visit? Don't worry about if they do or don't have a jump, this is more to see where your interests lie rather than anything else.  There's no wrong answers here. It's also not a guarantee you'll visit any particular setting, to be clear and transparent on that.

I'm looking for particular settings, not genres. So if you wanted to go to Sailor Moon for example, list Sailor Moon, not shoujo or magical girls.
Or thinly veiled proto yuri romps. 90s Japan was a thing.
No huge hurry on this, but I'd like these done by end of day if possible. Feel free to list them as is or include a little bit of information on why. It's optional but I do appreciate the whys of it. That's useful information for me.