We ran through some trial combat, did a little back story stuff and generally had a good time. Several people who said they wanted in have yet to make a showing, you guys still in? Are there people interested who haven't made it to a session yet?

Did you get the vocal take I sent you?

This week we got characters rolled up for Boter, BDA, and Herc. Next week we'll do characters for everyone who couldn't make this session and probably do some test combat.

I'm pretty experienced with this stuff, and I can get a good sense of a system by reading the rules, but even for me things don't entirely click until I've played it.

Ok, so far I've only got contact info for BDA and Botor, c'mon people. Owen? Herc? Fireproof? Teague? Eddie? Don't leave me hangin'.

My first introduction to D&D was 3.5 edition. The DM had pre-generated us some level 1 characters, but forgot to bring his core rulebook along, so we couldn't even give the rules a quick read to know what was up. He did his best to explain the rules to us, handed out the characters, then threw us straight into Tomb of Horrors. In laymans terms, this is like deciding to take swimming lessons for the first time, so they sail you out into the middle of the ocean, kick you off the boat, and scream at you to tread water. We didn't get very far. Somehow I still had a fantastic time.

Technically, since the podcast is done and the forum isn't really attached to a project anymore, everything is off topic.

We're playing 5th Edition, as that's what I have the books for. Here's a dropbox link for the pdf. I recommend at least reading the Shadowrun Concepts chapter (Page 44) and the Combat chapter (page 158). Don't let it intimidate you! It might seem confusing and complex at first, but don't worry, I will run everyone through some example combats before we start and make sure everyone understands how it works. It looks more complicated on paper that it is to play. People looking for some more reading and or are planning to make a decker or technomancer, a rigger, or a magic user might want to read The Matrix (page 214), Riggers (page 264), or Magic (page 276) respectively. One of the things I love about this book is it just hase several short stories interspersed between the heavier stuff, so if you're looking to just get a sense of the world, give those a read.

Shadowrun is pure D6 (six sided die). It uses lots of them though, it's a success based system (instead of rolling a few dice and adding up the numbers, you roll lots of dice and determine whether each die counts as a success or not (in this case a 5 or 6 is a success) and count up successes).

Yeah, unless you happen to be free on Tuesday mornings your time, it probably wont work out.

I've never done RIFTS but from what I've read it sounds like it's my kinda thing.

Don't worry about overwhelming me, I've done 10+ hours sessions with 15+ people, parties split into 5(!) groups, and built full dungeons on the fly with zero prep. Note: While I can put you guys on rails and run you through encounter I've built beforehand, my preferred style is more open world and improv-y. What would you guys prefer, rails or a sandbox?

I've edited into the OP, but I'll put it here too. Some record keeping:

Owen, Star Wars or Original, something beginner friendly, any time (BST)

BDA, Preference Sci-Fi (maybe cyberpunk?), something beginner friendly, not Saturdays (MST)

Herc, Preference Fantasy, beginner but down for whatever, EST evenings

Botor, Preference Sci-Fi, experienced

Teague?

Fireproof, Preference Sci-Fi (maybe cyberpunk?)

Faldor, , beginner

Dave?

Eddie?

Right now it looks like the sci-fi's have it. Looking like 7-8 people, not a bad size. Availability seems to suggest weekday evenings work best. How do y'all feel about Mondays?

Just so people are aware, Tom is not exaggerating, I've had sessions go 10+ hours long. How long we want to have sessions go is a discussion we need to have. note, combat takes more time than role play, so if we want to focus around dungeon crawling and wacking stuff we need to budget more time, if we focus more on the role play aspects we get get away with less.

I've never used it, but I hear http://roll20.net/ is good for this.