I’m thinking about running an Alien test game. We’d be using the cinematic one-shot style with pre-generated characters and running the prewritten modules. Most likely the Starter Set module as the first game and possibly others later.

Fair warning: this is a test game. It’s just meant to get a feel for the game and how it plays by running a few modules.

Would anyone be interested?

I own the book, and would be interested in playing a one shot cinematic (everyone dies) scenario.

I'd definitely like to watch, maybe play if you don't have enough players.  I'm hoping to learn the system.

I'm interested in the game as I'm a huge fan of the original Alien movie.  My only issue is that I'm not a fan of using pregenerated characters.  So it'll depend on whether I'm allowed to make an original character, or at least change treat the pregenerated character as a template and not be restricted to the name, look, and personality of the pregenerated character.  Unless there's actually a pregenerated character that interests me enough to use, but I'd really rather make my own character entirely from scratch.

Edit: A big part of whether I'd participate also depends on your writing ability as a GM.  I'm not going to join a game just because it's a system I'm interested in trying, or a setting I'm a fan of.
This message was last edited by the user at 18:01, Mon 15 Feb 2021.

cries, one thing you may not know about the Alien RPG is that there are two styles of play:

Campaign games go on for a long time, they are dangerous but the default assumption is that most characters are going to survive most sessions.

Cinematic games are generally one-shots, and the expectation is that everyone or almost everyone is going to be horrifically slaughtered. Just like one of the movies. There may be a survivor, or if you are very lucky, more than one. You lean into this, and enjoy it, because its part of the theme of the setting.

That being said, Alien RPG character creation is pretty easy. Even for someone coming at it for the first time, it should take 20 minutes or less. So if you want to create a character just for a cinematic game, it shouldn't be a problem.

I am not the OP of this post, and would only be playing in this game-- so take my opinions with a grain of salt.

It's really just a question of what liblarva is willing to allow, and what the pre-generated characters are like.

Pre-generated characters are kinda good for introducing people to a new system, but they also make me skeptical of people's roleplaying abilities.

In reply to CriesofthePast (msg # 6):

All of the current ARPG Cinematic modules have pretty decent pre-gens, including back-ups for most Acts in case of early PC Death.

If the pre-gens are worth considering, then it's all going to come down to the GM's writing ability.  Are they going to copy paste some scenario, or write actual content in a competent and interesting way?

If they think Aliens is better than Alien, chances are no.  (Too early to pull my elitist card?)

Way to early ;-)

I would be interested in joining this game.  I have the book but so far have not played.  This sounds like a great opportunity to learn the game.

I could possibly be interested if there are no pre-gens.

Like others who have responded I've got the core rulebook but not yet played. Would like to give it a go - premade characters or not.

Alas, I don't have time/brain for a game right now (I would jump on this otherwise, with a little more information), but I have to speak up in defence of the pregens - since there are so few stats for broad guidelines they have plenty of room for customisation.

Also, for the Cinematic stuff the most important thing the pregens come with is built-in character conflict/squabbling, which is hard to manufacture anywhere you're not playing face to face with close friends because the risk of someone whose level of banter-proofness you're not used to taking personal offence if picked as a rival/subordinate/having conflict of interest is game-endangeringly high  - or alternatively everyone's overly nice and polite to each other and places there should be conflicts useful for dramatic tension cause the pacing to fall flat.

This message was deleted by a moderator, as it was against the forum rules, at 22:02, Sat 20 Feb 2021.

Yeah. That went bizarrely sideways real quick. If the mods could close the thread that would be great.