I've got your sheets unlocked and editable. Feel free to work up characters, let me know when you're ready for me to look them over.

While we work on that, discuss the nature of your freelance stringer group in the Permutations thread - you three are the only employees (until other players join). But do you own it? Do you work for someone else? How involved are they?

If you guys own it:

• You'll only have the gear available that you have.
• Your equity - company property - comes out of whatever % of your starting wealth you want to invest
• You keep all profits from your labors and can decide how much to keep or invest.
• I'll present you with leads and you decide which ones to pursue; these are multiple cases, and if you don't pick them someone else will probably scoop you
• Nobody has your back. It's just you.

If you're contract employees:

• You'll still be responsible for your personal gear, but you can expense stuff like travel and legal fees.
• You get either a cut of the profits OR a salary, possibly with the occasional bonus. This applies to all of you so will be a group decision about the nature of the firm.
• The firm will assign you stories. No need to make those decisions.
• You can take the firm as a patron, if you so choose, but it's not mandatory.

Today’s my Skyrim/work day, but I’ll try to catch up during breaks. Welcome, Charlotta!

Oh, and I'm not married to a modern era game. We could definitely do a 60s setting.

Does that appeal to you, Richard?

Now that's a cool timeline...

It's probably overkill, but if you can use it to create your characters, go ahead.

Welcome to the week, guys. I've turned off recruiting; new characters may be added in the future, depending.

GM Fiat:

You three are partners in an freelance news agency that sells stories to more established outlets. Your business assets are whatever you can bring to bear; you should decide what everybody's "stake" in the business is. This should be a $ amount that comes out of your starting wealth ($15,000 at TL 7).

This goes towards company assets; your business license, legal documentation, credentials, office, phone lines, secretary, etc. The more you invest, the better the business.

(Richard's plane is his personal property; it isn't part of the business but he can probably write it off on his taxes as it will see some business use)

Now, the way this will work: Contacts, Current Events skill, or Research can be used to dig up new potential 'leads'. Your secretary will package these leads up for you, and you can choose which ones to follow up on.

You don't ALL have to follow up on the same leads. You CAN split up. This is useful because leads grow cold over time, or you might get scooped.

Once you follow up on a lead the general goal is to gather information and write up a story based on what you learn - then sell that story to an outlet that can pay you for it. Pictures can also be sold (just ask Peter Parker) but won't bring in nearly as much as a story.

That income is the business's, and goes to operating cost and overhead, including your salaries. ($2,000 a month; you'll also get a yearly dividend from the business depending on profits and your personal stake in the company)
This message was last edited by the GM at 18:07, Mon 22 Nov 2021.

Sounds great. Appreciate the nudge.

With this I should also be able to finish off equipment. Hopefully Rich's sheet will be ready for polishing today.

Still busy. I'll work on my sheet as I have a chance.

Impressive timeline! I have a few questions on the timeline and exactly what gets comics/books/films and what doesn't.

The Indiana Jones stuff. Are the movies made starting in 1981? Are Indy's adventures not known prior to those movies being made?

What about the Hardy Boys and Nancy Drew? Were those books not published as semi-historical accounts of their cases?

What about Tarzan and Dracula? Lord Greystroke seems to be known, but Dracula is not. Did Bram Stoker write Dracula in 1897? Do we have ERB's Tarzan novels? I don't see John Carter on the list. Was John Carter real? Did he have stories as well? (The Marvel comics were published in 1977, but ERB's stories showed up starting in 1912.)

Mickey Mouse is on the list. Is Mickey real as well? (I'm actually surprised I'm asking this. =) ). What about Carl Barks's duck stories? Walt Kelly's Pogo?

Indy's adventures aren't public knowledge. He's probably published a few papers, but a lot of the details - particularly regarding the Ark - are buried under national security by top men.

Top. Men.

Will there be movies in the 80s? Maybe? It's 1961 so who knows what the future holds?



The books exist. Most people don't know they were based on real people; this is one of those "fun facts" people break out at parties. How biographical they are is up for debate, but Frank and Joe and Nancy etc do exist. Heck, you could even play one of them if you felt like it.



John Clayton, Viscount Greystoke, was lost in the jungles of Africa as a child. The Tarzan books were based on his story. He was quite the celebrity in the early 20th century.

Dracula was a book. Most people just think it's a book.



No. Cartoons aren't real, as far as anybody knows. That's just the date of the first cartoons.
This message was last edited by the GM at 22:35, Mon 22 Nov 2021.

The *'d stuff on the timeline is just stuff that it's possible for you to have personal knowledge of with the right family connections or involvement. Did your dad have Henry Jones Jr. as a teacher? Maybe he heard some stories.

Etc

Gotcha. What about John Carter?

John Carter's adventures were set between 1866 and 1886, so they don't fit on the timeline. Burroughs did publish the stories, however, which is how it plays out in both the real world and within the fiction of the text.

So "maybe?" but also "Barsoom isn't compatible with Marvel's Mars" so if it happened, it's not Mars.

On reflection I'll drop most of the "freelance business management" aspects as being potentially boring and just say you guys draw the salary ($2000 a month) with the occasional bonus for doing exceptionally well (finding all the details of the story, great photos, great Writing skill roll) and the rest goes back into the business's overhead.

I want the focus to stay firmly on the investigation.

I've started working on my sheet. I'm working of the Investigator template from GURPS Action Heroes and the Journalist template from GURPS Horror. Nate will have general investigative skills with some writing as well.

Do we need to have combat skills for this game? It doesn't sound like it, but I don't want to be caught unawares.

Rich's is just about done, approved but might tweak it a little before we go live.

He is probably a little too "expedition" focused instead of being tailored specifically to urban intrigue, but hopefully he will be useful.

Good question!

Well on the one hand it's a dangerous beat. You'll frequently be dealing with criminal elements, people who don't appreciate your questions, etc. Maybe the kingpin's thugs don't appreciate nosy reporters, maybe they rough you up a bit. Maybe Electro doesn't appreciate your scrutiny and decides to let you know this. Maybe the jewel thefts turn out to be a SECRET COMMUNIST PLOT.

Will a few levels in brawl or a gun help you out in any of these scenarios? Probably not. Even worse, it might give you just enough false confidence to get yourself killed. Carrying that gun might turn you from "innocent bystander" to "potential threat" in the eyes of the mutant supremacist with the helmet and magnetic powers who happened to glance your way.

Go ahead and take combat skills if it fits your character background - maybe you were on the boxing team in college, maybe you're an avid hunter, maybe you bought into the mysterious Asian martial arts fad - but this is GURPS so unless you're facing off against a single opponent of little to no skill, you're probably better off avoiding combat entirely. De-escalation is key!

As GM I can say that I won't make violence necessary to solve any mysteries, and even when it's an option the Intimidate skill would be the best way to go about it.
This message was last edited by the GM at 17:31, Tue 23 Nov 2021.

Someone asked me about Press Passes. If you're not aware, a Press Pass issued by the city of New York will smooth things over for you with certain emergency workers - cops, firefighters, EMTs - and get you more access to crime scenes and the like than normal civilians.

Most journalists don't need one, only those chasing breaking news stories. As a result, they're generally only issued to reporters who've been publishing 'Breaking News' stories for a few years.

If this fits you, and you want one, consider taking Press Pass as a perk. Won't get you places you shouldn't be, but it'll get you more access than you'd have otherwise.

Sorry, folks, for going AWOL like that, but my CO saw fit to 'volunteer' me for something so urgent that I had to leave right away and didn't get near any computer till my return yesterday evening - when I actually fell asleep at the PC. Oh, well ...

Looks like I'll have to catch up quite a bit.

No worries, we haven't really started yet and likely won't before Monday due to the US holiday.

I probably won't have my sheet finalized before Sunday, either. I'm looking forward to the game!

How are we doing with our characters, people?

I think I am there. May play with one or two points but we can start at your leisure.

Since only Richard has submitted a character, I'll start the game with him soon. The rest of you can join in as you finish character creation.

Nathaniel's character is good to go so I'll let him post himself into the game. Charlotta hasn't logged in in a few days, but we'll let her finish up her character and jump in when she can.

I'm going to give Charlotta's player until the end of the week to post.

Sounds good to me.

I'm not seeing Charlotta, so unless she shows up soon I'll just cut her from the game. For now just continue as if it's just the two of you; feel free to post yourselves all the way to California if you're ready to go; any commercial flights go smoothly.

Sounds like a plan. I'll try to get a post up soon.

Sorry for the radio silence. I'm in finals week right now, and I'll be on the road from Thursday to Sunday. I'll try to post this evening.

Also working on getting a post up.

Sorry for the delay - holiday stuff. Update soon.