|
 After two cups of coffee, I'm finally awake. We began our 3:16 Carnage Amongst the Stars game yesterday evening, and it went on until it was getting late. Very late. So, here are my first impressions.
1) Character creation does not take just five minutes, including explaining the rules.
At least over Skype and OpenRPG. It didn't take too long, maybe half an hour, but there are some pretty steep exaggerations in actual play reports over on the internets about the simplicity and the ease of it. Come on, there are some very profound decisions to be made: Energy rifle or Slug rifle, not to mention the wording of your reputation. The trooper's whole career, short as it may be, can depend on his (or her) reputation alone.
 2) It is a bitch to translate and keep in mind all the military terms
Maybe that's because I went to the non-military service. But, come on, what's a trooper in Finnish? (I decided to use the mangled translation of a space marine, that is avaruusmerijalkaväen sotilas) How many troops are in a company, let alone in a brigade? A short term list would have made my job a bit easier and my descriptions a bit less faltering. So that's on my to-do list for the next time.
3) Combat and between the missions stuff seem rewarding and interesting
I think that most people with a traditional rpg background will want to triumph in combat. And the balance seems good, too, at the first glance. And of course they want to upgrade their weapons, stats and rank. It is the driving force of 3:16 and acn give a good basis for the things to come.
 4) Using Flashbacks seems to shift the player to a different mode of play
Just
one player used a flashback in our first session (a strength). His
comment was something in the lines of "crap, it's hard to switch to high
drama straight from a board game". We'll explore that more as we play
on.
5) One session is not nearly enough to get to the heart of 3:16
At
least it seems that way. Mch of the options the players have were left
unexplored, there's more planets to cleanse, more weapons to gain, more
levels to advance to. The GM has ways to go, too, and the GM section
will hopefully provide more insight on what to do. We had fun, but I
have a feeling this was only the beginning.
|
