So, I've been GMing an IRC Dark Heresy game for a bit now. I'm up for about anything, but I really would like to run a UA game, probably from the One-Shots book. So far I've got Tehan, probably Trag, Havoc, Jon and Zombie interested.

What does this mean to YOU?

Well, Unknown Armies is a fucking epic game. It's set in the modern world, but with one big exception to normality. Magick EXISTS. You can feel it all around you, in the air, in the headlines of the newspapers, in the blurry images on television. It's a big secret, one you haven't grasped, although the first syllable has been spoken in that dream you can't recall.

You need to know more. You want to go deeper. The world that you know is not enough for you. Anything is preferable to the ignorance of this daily life. There is a place, defined by ideas if not atoms, and it holds the key to your desires.

But it's dangerous there. People vanish, die horribly, become madmen for the sake of whatever secret lies at the heart of this unseen world.

That world is the occult underground. Find it, before it finds you.

Interested?

 

Unknown Armies is NOT fucking D&D. It's a game of actual roleplaying. All of the following means you're doing it wrong:

Powergaming. In UA, powergaming means going both Adept and Avatar - the symbolic tensions of the two grating together send anyone insane within a month. This also means you are not a special forces-level marksman, or a multiple black-belt martial artist. This also covers treating Adept charges as a vending machine. It is your life's obsession, try to act like it.

Quest Log. Quest-givers are completely trustworthy. Bring the dire rat tail and you get your reward, right? Bzzt. Wrong. Anyone can backstab you. Just because they're offering money to do something doesn't mean they're unkillable, will never betray you, or can be at all trusted. Played with a group once that took the offer of a Priest Militant who had just killed their boss' contact to kidnap ANOTHER contact and bring him back to him. They did it, and were just about to head back to the boss for further orders when the GM ended it all in disgust.

Reselling. I've been guilty of this one, although I was going for kleptomancy at the time. This isn't Generic Fantasy World, this is the real world. General Stores aren't around to buy your loot. If you can't pawn it, don't loot it unless you've got a purpose for it.

Knowledge. Keep a fucking HUGE border between what you know and what your character knows. F'rinstance, I've read the sourcebook, the splatbooks, a lot of information on the 'net, from the creators and from third parties. I know a good chunk of the secrets of the Choir, the various factions, the flavours of magic out there, and so on. That just plain won't work for Street-level games. You might be able to rattle off the 333 by rote, but your character has to respond to a reference to them with 'what?'

Casual Murder. No. Just don't. Why didn't you gun down that sumbitch that cut you off on the highway last week? Because of cops and laws and shit like that, as well as morality, I guess. Killing someone's a big deal. Cops come after you. His family comes after you. His mates come after you. His faction comes after you. Why couldn't you just knock him out or something?

That's all off the top of my head, but it should give you an idea of what UA is about. You're not playing a magical version of yourself. You're playing someone completely alien to you.

 

I'm somewhat interested, but wouldn't it be hard to all join at the same time with different time zones?

 

Just takes good communication, and someone willing to keep track.

 

Not at all. We play DH with people from Aus, Cali, the East US, and even Singapore. It's not hard, if you're willing to make a bit of time.

 

If you'll set a time and a date I'll try it.

 

Does it require any physical components to play or can you just get by with notepad and pen?

 

Notepad and pen are fine. We've got a dice-rolling bot, and that pretty much takes care of everything you'd normally need. All the sourcebooks for the games we'd play, we've got.

 

Hmm sounds quite interesting. Is there a site explaining basics and such?

 

^This. I'm using the thread as a way to get the word out on the forums, but if you're super serious and would really enjoy playing drop me a PM or get on IRC and nickalert me until I realize someone's trying to get my attention. I'm happy to help anyone who wants to make a good effort at playing.

 

I'm in so long as Jon doesn't fucking shoot me again cause I forget to put [ ].

 

Sounds interesting, but I don't know if I can make the time.

Are there any basics you need to know about?

 

This is honestly probably the most fascinating and frustrating P&P I've ever encountered. I spent probably 3 hours last night researching it before I finally read the sourcebook... Not only is information practically nonexistent, but what little information was available all seemed to contradict itself.

After reading the sourcebook I've come to the conclusion that this is the most modular game I've ever encountered, there are very few boundaries and laws that govern the game world and those rare few that do exist can either be broken or bent in the right circumstances.

Magick will pretty much do what you need it to do, if you get lucky, and if not... well bad things can happen. Bar rituals and varies formulae, magick is rather flexible and will adapt to fit your situation as long as it conforms to your obsession based view of the world.

Looking at the site under the Occult Underground portion, you'll find various forms of adepts (many duplicates in name, but never entirely the same), a great number of rituals and artifacts, plotlines and rumors. And what you've gotta wrap your head around is the fact that they all exist in a wierd and completely skewed world where anything is pretty much possible with the right sacrifice and balls enough to eat your own child.

Frankly its genius.

The only issue I have is that from reading various methods of gaining charges, for the most part magick isn't used nearly as often as one would expect. Mostly only used in cases where it's actually needed rather than in D&D where you can use magic for everything from travelling to wiping your ass. Oh and Major Charges? Don't really seem like they come around all that often, and by all that often I really mean Ever.



I think this is one of those games where it starts making sense as you start playing, or it becomes a real motherfucker to get into.

Then again, I could be completely wrong.

 

I know I would be interested in this, and with a bot to roll dice that does make things easier .Trying to conduct one of these on a forum was hell, the only issue I think I'd have would be is it beginner friendly? I've played some pick-up DnD games with my friends, but nothing serious. Would it be a huge hurdle to learn how to interact within the rules beyond seperating IC and OOC knowedge, and learning what types of skills and things my character is aware of?

 

Ask for the source book from either Mindless or Tehan.

 

Ditto with Oz, interested but with no experience.