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Old 12-31-2018, 10:06 AM   #81
SilvercatMoonpaw
 
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Default Re: Alternate Versions of Inifinite Worlds

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Originally Posted by malloyd View Post
I think the biggest gain for the smallest change would be to ditch the mobile conveyers - every transfer requires a fixed projector that must be located on Homeline.
Personally I'd probably make it so you can't para-travel just any old place on Earth: only certain special areas will the devices allow for crossing timelines. This has an advantage that it doesn't matter if the wrong hands get a conveyor if you've got all the sites mapped and protected. Further, invasion is incredibly difficult for obvious tactical reasons.

EDIT: But that's just throwing out random personal preferences.
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Old 01-13-2019, 02:19 AM   #82
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Default Re: Alternate Versions of Inifinite Worlds

Not the most original idea I know but I've been thinking about it a lot lately. This is a version that tries to merge Space with Infinite Worlds.

UNIC = United Federation of Planets
Infinity Patrol = Starfleet
ISWAT = Section 31
Centrum = Romulan Empire

Timeline
The exact timeline is still up in the air. I don't know what but something happened between 2020 and 2070 that effectively made the UN the world government in all but name. When Van Zandt gave them conveyor tech it was a small step to have UNIC become like the Federation.

Homeline and Centrum current year is 2100 but dimensional travel was still discovered 30 years ago. They are TL8 with TL9^ shiftships. One year ago the interdimensional cold war turned hot when Centrum launched a massive sneak attack. Now fleets of the Patrol and Interworld duke it out in Hyperspace. Fighters and missiles are useful but are not the ultimate weapons. Infinity Unlimited doesn’t exist, all the corporation parts are handled by White Star Trading. This version of Homeline doesn’t have the same fear of psionics because early on they made contact with a peaceful parallel of near human psis (basically Vulcans).

Conveyor Module
When activating a Conveyor Module the shiftship vanishes from the world and reappears in Hyperspace. Hyperspace is a (mostly) empty void dimension that connects every world on a given Quantum. Getting to another timeline requires flying through Hyperspace to get to the correct hyperspace window then activating the Conveyor again. Traveling to different Quantums still requires a Projector.

Projector
A Projector is a large ring shaped station built in hyperspace that allows travel to another Quantum level. When charged it opens a portal. After a shiftship enters the portal it is surrounded a swirling bubble of energy. The portal closes behind it and the shiftship vanishes from that Quantum. Travel while inside this bubble takes time. I havn't nailed down how much time but for now changing one Quantum takes two weeks. Changing two Quantum takes four weeks. During the duration of the trip the shiftship is cut off from the rest of the multiverse. Being retrieved by a Projector works in a similar way. A shiftship waits at the coordinates and at the appointed time a portal opens. So far Projectors only function inside the hyperspace windows of Homeline and Centrum.

Hyperspace Window
Each world has a corresponding region in hyperspace where ships can enter and exit. Most have an average size with few larger or smaller. Homeline, and presumably Centrum, have an exceptionally large hyperspace window. Large enough to build many stations and Projectors inside them. Some worlds have tiny windows that makes getting to or from them like threading a needle.

Superscience
Homeline and Centrum are (mostly) Safetech cultures. Ships have force screens, artificial gravity, fusion power, the usual scifi weapons, and limited AI.

There isn’t any FTL radio. EM communications work within short range but beyond that they are distorted and lost in the unique geometry of hyperspace. Fleets communicate with each other through fast courier ships.

There are no transporters or replicators.

Other Powers
Transhuman is the Q3 timeline that replaces Shikaku-Mon as the current year world Homeline is afraid Projectors might function on. Caliph doesn’t have FTL travel but is building a machine beyond Neptune that looks like a Projector.

The Cabal is still neutral and aloof.

Reich-5 travels through dimensional airways instead of highways which are similar but located in the sky (like the bermuda triangle cloud tunnel). They have a unique gravity control technology. Their vehicles are all flying saucer or bell shaped. They are so far unaware of the war and Homeline desperately doesn’t wish to open a new front.

Non-human shiftships exist but are limited to the same Quantum. Some are neutral or friendly. Some are hostile. Due to their difficulty in interacting with humans most are restricted in which worlds they can visit.

Crossover (thanks David_Johnston2) is a group of supers that have some way to reach hyperspace and survive the vacuum. Could be Jumper, a power ring, a magic spell, or maybe a surfboard. Their base of operations is a giant shiftship called The Carrier. Crossovers main goal is to protect I.S.T. from outtime threats. So far they have not taken a side in the war.

Anomalous Hyperspace Region
These are areas where hyperspace behaves differently. Most crewmen call them nebula because they resemble false color images of nebula. Unlike the rest of hyperspace they have a Normal mana level or higher. Once inside them the anomalous effects impair ship system in various ways. Some possible effects are:
  • Sensors jammed
  • Shields inoperable
  • Engine slowed
  • Weapons backfire
The most common effects are Sensors Jammed and Shields Inoperable.

In most nebula spelljammers of the Cabal operate. Here their ships are on a level playing field with Patrol ships.

Most nebula contain hyperspace windows that lead to fantasy worlds.

A few nebula have a quantum sargasso effect. A shiftship that enters them has an almost impossible time leaving. The nebula that contains Yrth is an example of this.

Living creatures as big as shiftships make their home in some nebula. Usually referred to as beasts, very little is known about them and they appear docile but there have been a few incidents where patrol ships were attacked.

Campaign Frames
There are multiple layers to the war.
  1. The Hyperspace War. The fleets of the Infinity Patrol and Interworld Service do battle across Quantum 6 and 7. There are multiple fronts as each level is harder to access for one side or the other. Ton for ton, Patrol shiftships are more powerful than their Centrum counterparts. However, due to Centrum cloaking technology they are able to choose the time and place of engagements. So far the Patrol has not been able to draw Centrum into a large scale battle. At this layer it would be appropriate to have multiple specialist characters. You might have one character who is a member of the bridge crew and another that goes on away missions. This is also the level that ISWAT operates at. 300+ points.
  2. The Time War. On Historical Echoes agents from both factions seek to manipulate the timeline in order to shift the unfolding of events. When a tipping point is reached the world will change to a different Quantum level. Centrum seems to understand the process better than Homeline but is hampered by a lack of language skills. Their translator programs are little better than google. Characters at this layer would be members of the Penetration Service or civilian specialists. 250 points.
  3. The Technology War. Both sides are pouring tremendous amounts of resources into research and development. Shiftships are at the forefront of this effort but anything that could give a technological edge is being sought. Simultaneously, field agents are scavenging worlds for devices that could be reverse engineered into something useful. These are called Black Box Hunters or Boxxers. Espionage is also being pursued heavily. Characters could be members of Paralabs, Patrol Intelligence, or Boxxers. 200 points.
  4. The Homefront. Worlds on Quantum level 3, 4, and 5 are not directly threatened by the war. As long as the world has been classified as Open then citizens are free to visit them. Miracle Workers, Crosstime Bounty Hunters, Time Tours Ltd, and Nexus Cops operate at this level. 150 points.

Edit: One thing I forgot to mention about the Boxxers. They are not spies but sci-fi treasure hunters. Homeline has found a disturbing amount of timelines where humans have gone extinct in the 21st century. With the exception of Homeline, Centrum, and Transhuman there are no worlds where humans survive past the year 2075. Many of these now Hell Parallels were quite advanced before they burned out. It is in these dangerous ruins that Boxxers ply their trade of robbing dead worlds of whatever secrets they can.

Last edited by Starship777; 01-13-2019 at 02:44 AM. Reason: additional details
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Old 01-13-2019, 07:21 AM   #83
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Default Re: Alternate Versions of Inifinite Worlds

Huh, is it just me, or do a lot of people want to keep as much of the original IW setting as they can?
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Old 01-13-2019, 07:43 AM   #84
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Default Re: Alternate Versions of Inifinite Worlds

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Originally Posted by SilvercatMoonpaw View Post
Huh, is it just me, or do a lot of people want to keep as much of the original IW setting as they can?
There's a lot of useful and entertaining detail. It's flexibly enough designed that you can change a lot of the crunch without the fluff becoming implausible.
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Old 01-13-2019, 12:50 PM   #85
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Default Re: Alternate Versions of Inifinite Worlds

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Originally Posted by SilvercatMoonpaw View Post
Huh, is it just me, or do a lot of people want to keep as much of the original IW setting as they can?
How can you create an alternate version of IW without keeping large amounts of IW?
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Old 01-13-2019, 01:09 PM   #86
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Default Re: Alternate Versions of Inifinite Worlds

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Originally Posted by Flyndaran View Post
How can you create an alternate version of IW without keeping large amounts of IW?
But they only seem to change a few things like the existence of certain techs. Often the same kind of blocking tech.

Whereas if you read any of mine I do things like do away with parachronic tech altogether or dramatically alter the social structure.

I thought the core concept of Infinite Worlds was all the different timelines/weird worlds, not Homeline.
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Old 01-13-2019, 01:59 PM   #87
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Default Re: Alternate Versions of Inifinite Worlds

I guess that's really an issue of what one considers the foundation of the setting and what are the secondary features. Those judgments would naturally vary.
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Old 01-14-2019, 09:04 PM   #88
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Default Re: Alternate Versions of Inifinite Worlds

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I thought the core concept of Infinite Worlds was all the different timelines/weird worlds, not Homeline.
I'll take that challenge. My setting creation process is to start at the end and work backwards. I try to imagine what I want an average game session to look like then figure out how to make it happen.

Night Hunters
Characters are the local guardians of a present day city. Through being chosen or some other process they have made it their mission to protect people. At night when the PCs go to sleep they are mentally projected to the Astral Plane. Here they watch over their fellow citizens on the lookout for Darkness. Darkness is a kind of spiritual sickness. A malaise of the soul. Once they find a victim they dive into that persons soul. Each persons soul contains an entire world.

Sometimes the worlds are very much like our own. Sometimes they are vastly different. Historical worlds, fantasy worlds, sci-fi worlds, they are all unique to each individual person. These are not dream worlds like Inception or something. They are real and everyone living in them is real. When the characters first enter the world they materialize an appropriate body and equipment. Then they get to work. Somewhere nearby is a monster that is the cause of the Darkness. Either with detective work, magic, or psi they track down the monster and try to kill it.

In the morning they wake up back in their own bodies. If the mission was successful the Darkness infecting the victim is gone. The PCs find themselves in the possession of a Crystal Shard. Sages know how to use these gems to make the Hunters more powerful. If they failed, either by being defeated, giving up, or running out of time that victim soon grows worse. The victim manifests mental or sometimes physical illnesses. In the worst cases they could die. Diving into the victims Soul World again gives the PCs a second chance but the monsters are now stronger and/or more numerous.

This is an episodic Monster Hunters game with a rapidly changing backdrop. Each mission starts similar to a IW scouting mission as the characters try to get their bearings in an unfamiliar parallel world. Because MH is cinematic I would hand-wave some stuff like languages. I would try to make each game session last one in-game night. There are a few reasons for the separation between worlds.
  • While some groups like free wheeling wanderer games I prefer ones that have a home base for the characters to return to.
  • I can wring some drama out when an NPC the characters personally know is infected. Will they be able to save them? What happens if a PC is infected by Darkness?
  • No cross world contamination. Getting rich by looting treasures and tech isn't an option. The Monster Hunters have one job: hunt monsters.
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Old 01-15-2019, 03:40 AM   #89
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Default Re: Alternate Versions of Inifinite Worlds

That's interesting. It really does a good job of justifying IW adventures but also provides a secondary setting in the form of the outside world. And you could certainly adapt it into something like, say, a kitchen-sink superhero setting.

Last edited by SilvercatMoonpaw; 01-15-2019 at 03:45 AM.
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Old 01-15-2019, 06:56 AM   #90
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Default Re: Alternate Versions of Inifinite Worlds

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Originally Posted by SilvercatMoonpaw View Post
Huh, is it just me, or do a lot of people want to keep as much of the original IW setting as they can?

Infinity is a very popular target for people to tweak. The mechanics are very solid, and the world remains familiar. But I think many people who run it feel like it lacks just a couple of changes, and this is the appropriate thread for that.



A lot of my alternates were already discussed in the additional factions thread.



One technology change I've recently been thinking about including in infinite worlds is making "jump windows": limiting the times when conveyors or even projectors can travel between one world an another.
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