Eclipse Phase : How to Convince a Player to Try

[Vknight]

So a little background.
I have 3 different groups with very little crossover between them.

Group - A : All love Eclipse Phase as do I

Group - B : Never played it but willing to try but meet only once every two weeks and are currently doing a mind numbingly boring D&D 5e game where we are stuck behind a wall working for a facist government among other issues

Group - C : Also Never played it but. Of the 6 of them 3 would love too play it. 1 I don't know and do not care if they join or not. And then we get too the last 2.
They are the problem in this calculation.


So i have asked them why they do not like Eclipse Phase.

1. The Ship of Theseus came up because it was something about modifying humans and i asked the question at what % is too much mods because you can stop right there. But he alternatively acted like any mods and as long as your mind/soul are fine then you are fine(i.e. your cortical stack is safe).
2. The other of the 2 simply said no mods and when i said that is an option he was still super iffy. To put in perspective he's noted he would not even be willing to let his characters get cyberlimbs in Cyberpunk. Well the player which the ship of Theseus discussion came up and said he'd totes be down for cybernetics.
3. I pointed out cybernetics are an option but you do not need to have or use them. And you don't need to gene-mod yourself
4. I pointed out the game can work just fine and there are plenty of work arounds though re-sleeving would be an issue but the campaign can be just set on Mars
5. The problem seems to be more that neither of them want the others to have those options either? They were not clear and were not actually giving me any input into the discussion so it was like beating your fists on a brick wall
6. I also pointed out that we can go with that your Cortical Stack/Consciousness represents your soul and thus its your soul being moved to a new body if it was that. They then started to argue me that it could not be... except i'm the gm. They also said any re-sleeving would make a fundamentally new person. So it feels like they have set up 1 conclusion in there heads and rather then accept that I as the Gm disagree and am saying that no you are the same person.
7. I followed up with you don't even need to take the stack but you could simply be a backup. And play your character as though he thinks he's just a soulless body the mind and his soul is in X-afterlife now just doing good work
8. The more annoying thing for me is they would be fine with a normal cyberpunk game. And well one of them would not be willing to get any cyberware the other would be willing to go full cyborg.
9. So i'm now stuck trying to find a way to subtly convince them to try it or 'try' a game set on mars using some fun rules for a system. And also find what is the emotional disconnect that is causing the issue for the one player. Especially since half the group want to try it.

So yeah that is what i'm working with.
My current thought process is to say that re-sleeving is just Teleportation to get around that because why not and just jack up the price.

[Knaight]

You've already got one Eclipse Phase group, so no need to get greedy here. More than that it sounds like you have players opposed to some core tenets of the setting - Eclipse Phase is pretty aggressively transhumanist in a lot of ways. It's the core point, it's what the themes of the setting revolve around, and it's just generally there. Group C has at least 1 player who appears outright opposed to transhumanist fiction in general, and it looks more like 2.

You're not just trying to sell something weird here, you're trying to sell a genre people actively dislike - and that just tends not to work.

[caden_varn]

If half the group want to try it, it seems reasonable to give it a go. Personally, I'd just try to sort out a time for the 3 who are keen, and tell the other 3 they are welcome to join if they want to, but the full rules are in force. A group of three for me is much preferable to a group of six, especially when dealing with a new game for the players.
I don't know Eclipse Phase in any detail though, so I don't know whether a smaller group will be viable (I'd hope so though).

Having players who are unhappy with elements of the setting is likely to spoil the fu of the rest of the group - better to give the keen ones a better experience and maybe add the others later if you resolve their issues - at least this way, the keen players won't associate the game just with the others complaining.

If you need to run with the whole group, there are plenty of games out there if you want a change from D&D

[Bigmouth]

I can relate to your two 'problem players'. I really really dislike the notion of playing Eclipse Phase and I can't exactly put my finger on what about it annoys me so much.

I quite enjoy aspects of transhumanism. I enjoy the notion of augmenting and enhancing my physical body through cyberware and/or nanites. I have played as full conversion cyborgs. I've played games that were almost entirely set in cyberspace, with little if any involvement of the meatbody. So it seems like I would like at least the notion of playing Eclipse Phase...but I don't.

Is it the fact that they mention horror repeatedly when pitching it? Not a big fan of horror in any form. Don't like the books, don't like the movies, don't like it is games. (mostly. There are enough exceptions to these rules to make me wonder what I actually dislike about the genre). Loss of control? Lack of hope?

A more likely cause for EP tickling my gamer-spider-sense is the Morph thing. A selling point of the game seems to be switching morphs on a regular basis and for me this is definitely NOT a selling point. I don't want to switch out forms. Though that's not accurate. In EP it seems from my (extremely) limited experience, the morphs are shells, not extensions of yourself. Your avatar in cyberpunk/shadowrun and the like is something you carefully craft. It is definitely YOU, a highly customized you. I love them. The experience of cyberspace would definitely be reduced if avatars were generic. It would feel much more 'gamey' to me. Nor would I want to be the 'dude who doesn't morph' in a game where everyone resleeved or whatever on a regular basis. That screams 'sidekick' to me.

Offering a setting without resleeving probably would be enough for me personally to give it a try, but sounds like it wasn't for your 2 potential players. What was your selling pitch on why Eclipse Phase instead of Cyberpunk or Shadowrun or some other similar game?

[Lord Raziere]

Yeah?

I kind of lost interested in Eclipse Phase, because at first I liked all the interesting ideas in it, but then it keeps emphasizing horror and the cool custom bodies as temporary so......none of the cool morphs that they detail so much actually matter.

so all the cool transhumanism stuff becomes kind of.....transient. it sucks.

but yeah, just run the game for the people who still want to do so, even if its a smaller group. probably for the best. or you can go find a similar transhuman game that does things differently than Eclipse Phase like Mindjammer and hope everyone likes that.

[LibraryOgre]

I suppose the option to say "Strap in, mother-****ers, you're gonna be an octopus" isn't an option?

[Max_Killjoy]

EP... I want to like it, some of the concepts it explores about very different cultures, the ability to customize the body, etc, might be very interesting.

But first there's the aforementioned harping on "horror" that sometimes shows up. I got enough of the "you should be feeling horror now!" thing from White Wolf, and I get a sense that some of the "horror" is supposed to come from an "OMG what does it mean to be human?" thing tied into the body mods and transhumanism and different cultures.

Second, the way I read the system, there are things you can invest actual character points / experience in, and then just lose, or have to leave behind... and other things that you can't lose no matter what...


~~~~

OP -- it sounds like those players have some pretty deep-set "philosophical" objections to core elements of the game setting... shame they weren't willing to have a frank and constructive discussion.

[Vknight]

I suppose the option to say "Strap in, mother-****ers, you're gonna be an octopus" isn't an option?

I wish i seriously and really do wish that was an option with that yeah

And well the idea of transhumanism body modification and the ability to shift around is so cool but yeah.
And my other 2 groups are both busy doing other games 1 of which i'm running means if i want EP its got to be with these guys.


@LordRaziere & @BigMouth : Morph swapping is hugely dependent on the game and dependency on the party to not die or be injured in the process among other things its not though it certainly could come across. Its all about how a GM runs it and after all your morph is gear its also your body and its the value you and your character put into it and culturally in the setting they have had this tech for well over a century.


As for the selling pitch i need sleep so sadly gonna have to double post to answer that question
See MindJammer also has body swapping and more Raziere and well none of this 3rd group have tried FATE ever so i don't know or want to deal with that because they are all just that too tightly connected to d20 and don't see its flaws(i personally have a strong distaste for d20 most of the time)

[LibraryOgre]

For a campaign idea, since you have some folks resistant to the transhumanism aspects, what if you put the Jovians in a situation where they HAD to work with some of the rest of the galaxy, so they sent the PCs. Those who don't mind transhuman stuff can be regular characters, while the Jovians you stick in natural sleeves and give some extra equipment.

[Lord Raziere]

I wish i seriously and really do wish that was an option with that yeah

And well the idea of transhumanism body modification and the ability to shift around is so cool but yeah.
And my other 2 groups are both busy doing other games 1 of which i'm running means if i want EP its got to be with these guys.


@LordRaziere & @BigMouth : Morph swapping is hugely dependent on the game and dependency on the party to not die or be injured in the process among other things its not though it certainly could come across. Its all about how a GM runs it and after all your morph is gear its also your body and its the value you and your character put into it and culturally in the setting they have had this tech for well over a century.

As for the selling pitch i need sleep so sadly gonna have to double post to answer that question
See MindJammer also has body swapping and more Raziere and well none of this 3rd group have tried FATE ever so i don't know or want to deal with that because they are all just that too tightly connected to d20 and don't see its flaws(i personally have a strong distaste for d20 most of the time)

Oh hm.

d20 fans, I think I see the problem here, I think they just made up their mind about what system they always want to play in, and thus can't accept a system where things are different, they probably just want familiarity, and Eclipse Phase is incredibly unfamiliar to peoples experiences in more ways than one. lets not assume there is some philosophical reason behind it, that would require them to be interested enough to engage in defying Eclipse Phases philosophy.

[Vknight]

For a campaign idea, since you have some folks resistant to the transhumanism aspects, what if you put the Jovians in a situation where they HAD to work with some of the rest of the galaxy, so they sent the PCs. Those who don't mind transhuman stuff can be regular characters, while the Jovians you stick in natural sleeves and give some extra equipment.

Thanks Mark always helpful but, i don't want to reward players for picking the bad guy faction of the setting.
Being a Jovian should be a punishment or only an NPC option is my personal thought space. One of a dozen reasons i hate how they are handling the Ultimates in 2nd edition. Sorry tangent

Oh hm.

d20 fans, I think I see the problem here, I think they just made up their mind about what system they always want to play in, and thus can't accept a system where things are different, they probably just want familiarity, and Eclipse Phase is incredibly unfamiliar to peoples experiences in more ways than one. lets not assume there is some philosophical reason behind it, that would require them to be interested enough to engage in defying Eclipse Phases philosophy.

100% of the biggest issue i have found with gaming is that d20 fans think d20 is the end all be all and that it is perfect and lacking in flaws. Or that is somehow does something better or that by virtue of being something everyone knows makes it better.
Its ridiculous preconception to place.

But its not just that though or what you suggested.

One of them is jsut against it without doing any research or understanding the themes or philosophy brought up.

Well the other player comes to the conclusion that he is smart and thus knows or has gotten the answer... lets just say he's not as smart as he thinks he is.

Sorry just legit baffled because i don't know if its a moral thing or what because he just tries to shut down the discussion rather then answer a simple question. My question being what percentage of the body makes you not human? Or if its your soul in a robot body does that still make you human?
Basically he's come to some conclusion about what Percent makes you not human and that Eclipse Phase crosses that despite me pointing out there are unmodified humans.


He took a powerful npc's unwillingness to note that yes as a werewolf he's weak to silver too mean that the guy was hiding something.
In reality the npc was just so baffled by why the **** are you asking this that it just shut down the conversation because he just asked a person how is the best way to kill you.
Which has been a reoccurring theme for him is that he almost treats it like a conversation wheel or a video game i feel. I don't really know how to describe it but yeah.

Not super relevant but both of these 2 are super religious and yet at the same time neither would willingly play a cleric, paladin or druid.

[Vknight]

oh they're super-religious. *sucks in breath* heres hoping I put this delicately enough....

listen, VKnight. I don't know if you've noticed, but ttrpgs in general don't portray religions in a good light.

they're almost all invariably evil religions worshipping dark gods, or an oppressive state religion being mindwashing, or a front for some evil thing taking advantage of them, or in Dnd the "Good" religions being excuses to kill a bunch of other dudes worshipping other beliefs. basically in a lot of rpgs its used as antagonist or as tool for some other cause and not portrayed for the actual spiritual purposes its supposed to serve. this is mostly because the spiritual aspects are largely not really game-able, but at the same time it does lead to a bit of a cynical portrayal of them.

Eclipse Phase of course, treads on dangerous ground even more than most: it includes both real world religions and then says that most of them have been outright destroyed in the robo-apocalypse then says the big remaining bastion of religion is backwards and evil, then says almost everyone else doesn't really have religions anymore, while portraying a highly transhumanist, very liberal view of the future where big mega-corporations are evil and the democracy they run is a sham, that the new good guys are either anarchists, socialists on saturns moons, Scum who are basically the worst parts of the internet as a real world society, and the gooder of those good guys are a secret grassroots network made from anarchist principles who can't even agree on anything. then says some stupid people try to worship the evil machine gods that destroyed humanity.

so you can see why a super-religious person might not be a fan of Eclipse Phases setting or portrayal of religions in ttprgs in general. its simply not kind to their viewpoint due to its leanings. because a big part of Eclipse Phases atmosphere is arguably a LACK of spirituality. it has no interest in anything supernatural or spiritual as a hard line assumption and doesn't care whether it offends the beliefs and cares more about exploring the results of holding to those beliefs for better or worse, and a scientific/rational worldview generally is not kind to holding a belief that can be considered inaccurate, unproven or detrimental. this is simply because the people who wrote Eclipse Phase while smart and able to make a great setting unlike most any other, they are flawed and it clearly shows what their own beliefs are. I've no doubt that they tried their best making it, but they clearly had their biases. they kind of fixed this in later books but I doubt it be much of a fix to the people who'd care and I don't really remember where it was or what the contents the fix were. such a fix to the Jovians is not really much of a focus to most Eclipse Phase players who want to do play something crazy and transhumanist, me included.

so these two players really are "super-religious" as you say then its kind of important, because ttrpgs aren't good at portraying religions. and Eclipse Phase is more dangerous ground than most ttrpgs in this regard.

I'm well aware of that. Its honestly not been so much a problem for this group or my other groups i mentioned it more because its odd there reasoning is not attached to said beliefs

Which is where we get too the issue.
For player 1 his issue seems to be for me he's unable to accept a world where he could or would choose to body modify himself or could play a character that would. And less to do with his religious beliefs.


Meanwhile the other player
He's come to a conclusion and then backtracks to make it correct. At some point i am no longer human with body modifications so that means any of it is bad is the kind of logic as i noted.
He knows what the Ship of Theseus is so therefor what conclusion he came to when first hearing it is right. The problem there is he only knows one interpretation of it.
Its why i brought up the werewolf thing he thought the werewolf was gonna do something in the last session(despite me establishing its the last session of the campaign) the guy was just an npc introducing the party to the rest of the supernatural underworld. So you know asking how can i kill you rude.
Really his coming to a conclusion thing has been a 50-50 mix of groans/cringe and hilarious.

Side Note
When i suggested Warhammer stuff he wanted to be an Inquisitor or Commissar at which point i knew those ideas would not work because he would play the 'reasonable version of those and by reasonable i mean he'd call it reasonable and then shoot a NPC or PC because Heresy.
And its one of those things where the player gets upset at you suggesting they would do X thing where its clearly obvious they were planning too.

[Lord Raziere]

Okay...?

If you say said reasoning isn't attached to their beliefs then I guess we'll assume its true to get off more delicate ground.

the first player.....if he just can't accept any body modding period and you don't want go Jovian, what about an Earth Survivor? in Eclipse Phase there is still a population of people living on earth, doing anything they can to survive and he may be one of them, just give them a Flat morph and say they somehow got off Earth thanks to the Reclaimers or something and that are the grim survivor of the apocalypse, one of the last normal humans left after the Fall and now entering a world alien to him and asking the question with his story: can a normal human live among the transhuman? can someone from old Earth with modifications adapt to the life that is now left?

as for the second....

Meanwhile the other player
He's come to a conclusion and then backtracks to make it correct. At some point i am no longer human with body modifications so that means any of it is bad is the kind of logic as i noted.
He knows what the Ship of Theseus is so therefor what conclusion he came to when first hearing it is right. The problem there is he only knows one interpretation of it.
Its why i brought up the werewolf thing he thought the werewolf was gonna do something in the last session(despite me establishing its the last session of the campaign) the guy was just an npc introducing the party to the rest of the supernatural underworld. So you know asking how can i kill you rude.
Really his coming to a conclusion thing has been a 50-50 mix of groans/cringe and hilarious.

Side Note
When i suggested Warhammer stuff he wanted to be an Inquisitor or Commissar at which point i knew those ideas would not work because he would play the 'reasonable version of those and by reasonable i mean he'd call it reasonable and then shoot a NPC or PC because Heresy.
And its one of those things where the player gets upset at you suggesting they would do X thing where its clearly obvious they were planning too.

.....while this one just sounds an unreasonable jerk who isn't aware that his actions don't make sense. if he is shooting PC's because Heresy when given that kind of character, thats not okay. he is being a jerk and is pulling the WH40k equivalent of lawful stupid. and basically you need to talk to him about how such a thing is not okay in any circumstance unless the game is specifically like, a WH40k Paranoia game. honestly I'm not sure if you should be playing with this guy if you can't talk him into being more reasonable, because he sounds like the kind of person who'd play a paladin as a lawful stupid evil-slaughtering idiot who takes their code and alignment for granted.

[Vknight]

Okay...?

If you say said reasoning isn't attached to their beliefs then I guess we'll assume its true to get off more delicate ground.

the first player.....if he just can't accept any body modding period and you don't want go Jovian, what about an Earth Survivor? in Eclipse Phase there is still a population of people living on earth, doing anything they can to survive and he may be one of them, just give them a Flat morph and say they somehow got off Earth thanks to the Reclaimers or something and that are the grim survivor of the apocalypse, one of the last normal humans left after the Fall and now entering a world alien to him and asking the question with his story: can a normal human live among the transhuman? can someone from old Earth with modifications adapt to the life that is now left?

as for the second....
.....while this one just sounds an unreasonable jerk who isn't aware that his actions don't make sense. if he is shooting PC's because Heresy when given that kind of character, thats not okay. he is being a jerk and is pulling the WH40k equivalent of lawful stupid. and basically you need to talk to him about how such a thing is not okay in any circumstance unless the game is specifically like, a WH40k Paranoia game. honestly I'm not sure if you should be playing with this guy if you can't talk him into being more reasonable, because he sounds like the kind of person who'd play a paladin as a lawful stupid evil-slaughtering idiot who takes their code and alignment for granted.

Trust me i know it is having spent time talking with him and doing stuff RL along with a lot more i know its not religious.
I suggested an earth survivor or a precaustionist but haven't gotten much with that yet we will see. He's against the cortical stack as well so yeah but i'm thinking that those ideas may work.


I mean we didn't do 40K explicitly because i knew he was thinking about it. Its one of those denials that he would not do it where you know they player was thinking it.
And he's the one that i bet its a religious issue for him which is in part why he won't play paladin or cleric

[Rhedyn]

Eclipse Phase also has progressive political messaging. Your friends may be overemphasizing "ship of theseus" problems just so they can avoid that.

I would recommend Nova Praxis as the "more tame" transhumanist sci-fi RPG (I consider Nova Praxis more a transhuman RPG while Eclipse Phase is more of a Post-human RPG), but nearly all transhumanist sci-fi makes that argument for more socialist economies. Which your "super religious" friends may actually be "super conservative" (I'm super religious in terms of faith, but I do not have a stick up my butt).

Really the "ship of theseus" problem is not a problem for EP characters and you can RP characters with different belief sets. I could see having fun RPing a Bio-conservative Jovian even if I personally strongly disagree with the idea. Nova Praxis introduced a transhumanist view of the soul, where your God/the-universe holds your soul as all of your continuous experiences. Religious transhumanist tend to hold that view and this gets around re-sleeving and back-up problems. But forking/merging are illegal in Nova Praxis, while my EP characters would probably ego-cast a fork when they can.

Nova Praxis (Savage Worlds) also makes sleeving and re-sleeving an ego taxing event that can eventually lead to madness. I am not far enough in my EP2e book to compare the process, but they seemed to have implied that you can/should switch morphs all the time.

[sleepy hedgehog]

So i'm now stuck trying to find a way to subtly convince them to try it or 'try' a game set on mars using some fun rules for a system. And also find what is the emotional disconnect that is causing the issue for the one player.

Both of these statements are the wrong way to go.

You've already got one Eclipse Phase group, so no need to get greedy here...
You're not just trying to sell something weird here, you're trying to sell a genre people actively dislike - and that just tends not to work.

If half the group want to try it, it seems reasonable to give it a go. Personally, I'd just try to sort out a time for the 3 who are keen, and tell the other 3 they are welcome to join if they want to, but the full rules are in force.
If you need to run with the whole group, there are plenty of games out there if you want a change from D&D

I'm going to echo these guys. You're either going to need to be willing to run the game for the 3 interested players, or choose something that more people can agree on.

Secondly, it doesn't really matter what the disconnect is.
It's his decision whether or not to be interested in the game.
And at his discretion he can tell you the reasoning behind that, or not.
It sounds like you've crossed the checking interest threshold, and probably the friendly ribbing threshold. And are in the pestering zone.
If he just gave a generic, "I looked it over and really don't want to play it", would you have accepted that?

At the end of the day, everyone goal, is to play something that everyone is enjoying.

In my gaming group I'm sick of DnD, and have been itching to pull out my Paranoia rulebooks, and run that.
However, 2 of the 5 others HATE PvP in their games.
So as a group we've compromised for non-PvP, non-D20 games. It's not like there's a lack of them.
And it anyone's ever running one of those, we'll have an open invitation, but with no expectation that the others would join

[KineticDiplomat]

1) This is a Sisphyian task. You have a player who is dead set against a system. No matter what logical appeals you make, he won’t play. He is just as likely rationalizing as he is actually being stopped by whatever argument he presents. I, for instance, detest D&D as a TTRPG. It is unlikely anyone will convince me otherwise, even if they can out-rhetoric or argue a point I make against it. So write him off...he’s not playing and you have a group.

2) As has been mentioned, players who fall into the “obnoxiously unable to separate their real world devotion from fictional characters and settings” are a sub-optimal group to work with period. The only question is how many games they get you to ruin on your own accord for their beliefs before they decide to ruin one themselves.

[Vknight]

Eclipse Phase also has progressive political messaging. Your friends may be overemphasizing "ship of theseus" problems just so they can avoid that.

I would recommend Nova Praxis as the "more tame" transhumanist sci-fi RPG (I consider Nova Praxis more a transhuman RPG while Eclipse Phase is more of a Post-human RPG), but nearly all transhumanist sci-fi makes that argument for more socialist economies. Which your "super religious" friends may actually be "super conservative" (I'm super religious in terms of faith, but I do not have a stick up my butt).

Really the "ship of theseus" problem is not a problem for EP characters and you can RP characters with different belief sets. I could see having fun RPing a Bio-conservative Jovian even if I personally strongly disagree with the idea. Nova Praxis introduced a transhumanist view of the soul, where your God/the-universe holds your soul as all of your continuous experiences. Religious transhumanist tend to hold that view and this gets around re-sleeving and back-up problems. But forking/merging are illegal in Nova Praxis, while my EP characters would probably ego-cast a fork when they can.

Nova Praxis (Savage Worlds) also makes sleeving and re-sleeving an ego taxing event that can eventually lead to madness. I am not far enough in my EP2e book to compare the process, but they seemed to have implied that you can/should switch morphs all the time.

I don't got Nova Praxis. Also if it is run using savage worlds no thanks, one of the other groups is doing a savage worlds game already. Also EP has it lead to madness if you are not careful.

EP 2nd Edition so far is bleh for me its not awful but it doesn't sit with me as well

[Rhedyn]

EP 2nd Edition so far is bleh for me its not awful but it doesn't sit with me as well

I personally don't see the point in EP2e now that I read more about it. It's a rules heavy but playable system, though I think it lost the depth it had over Nova Praxis. Most of the things you can do in EP2e that are difficult in Nova Praxis can be ported over by just removing restrictions.

Nova Praxis also has a Strands of Fate edition, which is that studios personal Fate build. It's more traditional than Fate Core, but is still Fate.

[Lord Raziere]

I guess you could try Nova Praxis on them if you really want, but personally I've looked at Nova Praxis and see it as just a more disappointing, more boring take on the concept. which I guess is what you'd want to go for with guys who dislike some of Eclipse Phases stuff, but I'd rather have "Eclipse Phase, but different" rather than "Eclipse Phase but less"

while I haven't got EP2E to really say anything about it. from the preview the setting doesn't seem any different, not even their portrayal of Jovians which is one of the things I'd thought they would've changed based upon how people complained about them, but I guess they want to keep the "our normal human culture is EP's third world country" vibe.

[Vknight]

I guess you could try Nova Praxis on them if you really want, but personally I've looked at Nova Praxis and see it as just a more disappointing, more boring take on the concept. which I guess is what you'd want to go for with guys who dislike some of Eclipse Phases stuff, but I'd rather have "Eclipse Phase, but different" rather than "Eclipse Phase but less"

while I haven't got EP2E to really say anything about it. from the preview the setting doesn't seem any different, not even their portrayal of Jovians which is one of the things I'd thought they would've changed based upon how people complained about them, but I guess they want to keep the "our normal human culture is EP's third world country" vibe.

I don't have access too Nova Praxis so it doesn't mean anything too me and it so far from what is described Nova Praxis does not sound interesting or all that appealing

[Lord Raziere]

I don't have access too Nova Praxis so it doesn't mean anything too me and it so far from what is described Nova Praxis does not sound interesting or all that appealing

Yeah, I'm rereading it and its basically just "what if the Jovians were 80% of humanity and the god AI shut itself down for no reason long ago?" and even then, it still has Apotheosis, which is slowly replaces the the mind with nano-software over a long period of time. only some people may do it, but it still provokes a lot of ship of theseus questions and the settings equivalent to Bioconservatives, the Purists constantly repeating a mantra of "you're not you" to the transhumans. and the way its set up with a utopian cyberpunk prison at the hands of neo-corporations call Houses and the transhumans being this edgy freedom-loving guys hanging out outside society really implies that your supposed to be one of the rebellious transhumans trying overthrow HPA and lead others to a more transhuman society anyways.

like sure Nova Praxis has more blank space in how you want transhumanity to develop in Nova Praxis, I'd argue that the freedom to influence transhumantiy's develop exists in Eclipse Phase as well. like being realistic, changing humanity or transhumanity for the better is probably going to involve the same kind of activities, while going off to do your own thing is simply getting enough people and rep to agree and walking through a gate to found a colony on some distant world in either setting, its just that in Eclipse Phase your more likely to get people who agree with something weird and transhuman.

and over all, Eclipse Phase does the politics better by not making it so monolithic and solely determined by these jerkhole corporations that are also the government. because in Nova Praxis, you are either in the Coalition or your out, this company or that company, but Eclipse Phase has more variance on single planets than Nova Praxis in its entire setting, and if your Outer System in EP, that can mean a lot of things aside from not liking the Inner System, you could be an Ultimate, an Anarchist, a Titanian, Scum, Extropian, a criminal, all sorts of things that don't agree with each other, while Inner system has different viewpoints and people depending on whether your on Mars, Venus or Luna and even smaller groups amid those. Eclipse Phase just maps everything better and more believably, it acknowledges that the issue of transhumanity is more complex than just two sides and their extremes.

its also really weird that Nova Praxis is the more held back setting, even though their AI has no indication of being horrible or hostile and shut itself down after giving humanity all the tech. you'd think that would be an indication that AIs aren't as dangerous as Purists would think, but apparently Purists don't care and think Mimir going to sleep is scary or something and that their grey goo earth catastrophe in that setting being caused by human failing, not by god-AI maliciousness, is somehow an indication to keep themselves ignorant and "pure" rather than y'know, figuring things out and make sure you can properly use this tech rather than fearing it mindlessly. at least the Jovians have a big apocalyptic reason they can point to that makes their fear and evil believable.

[erikun]

Seven Worlds is another sci-fi RPG, one which (I think) does not involve the resleeving and so no Cortical Stack/Ship of Theseus issue. However, it is a Savage Worlds book, so might not be something you'd want to run.

Other than that, I'd just recommend running something else. Some players clearly have strong views against the particular game, and it would be a bad idea to try to push that sort of game onto them. Some players would similarly have strong views or problems with a wide variety of other topics that could show up in a RPG, and telling them that "tough, we're playing that sort of game anyways" is not a good way to go about it. Perhaps you could make a group with just the three, but it sounds like you'd prefer to keep the group of six together.

Maybe you could do something different using the same system, but you probably wouldn't want to make it in the Eclipse Phase setting if it bothers certain players so much.

Second, the way I read the system, there are things you can invest actual character points / experience in, and then just lose, or have to leave behind... and other things that you can't lose no matter what...

From what I remember, you can invest points into your body but this isn't normally how it's done. It's like investing EXP into a hideout in World of Darkness. Sure, you could do that, but if it gets destroyed those points are gone. Most EXP in Eclipse Phase is used to improve general character stats or get new character abilities. They can be invested into the body, but most people wouldn't do so just due to how frequently you'd be body-hopping for travel.

[Max_Killjoy]

From what I remember, you can invest points into your body but this isn't normally how it's done. It's like investing EXP into a hideout in World of Darkness. Sure, you could do that, but if it gets destroyed those points are gone. Most EXP in Eclipse Phase is used to improve general character stats or get new character abilities. They can be invested into the body, but most people wouldn't do so just due to how frequently you'd be body-hopping for travel.

In WOD, you're only supposed to lose that character-build-level investment temporarily. If you lose them at the "fiction" level, you're supposed to get something back at that level eventually.

Same with HERO -- if you invest points in something, any loss is supposed to be temporary.

In EP, I got the impression that this wasn't the case, that lost is lost.

[Rhedyn]

Yeah, I'm rereading it and its basically just "what if the Jovians were 80% of humanity and the god AI shut itself down for no reason long ago?" and even then, it still has Apotheosis, which is slowly replaces the the mind with nano-software over a long period of time. only some people may do it, but it still provokes a lot of ship of theseus questions and the settings equivalent to Bioconservatives, the Purists constantly repeating a mantra of "you're not you" to the transhumans. and the way its set up with a utopian cyberpunk prison at the hands of neo-corporations call Houses and the transhumans being this edgy freedom-loving guys hanging out outside society really implies that your supposed to be one of the rebellious transhumans trying overthrow HPA and lead others to a more transhuman society anyways.

like sure Nova Praxis has more blank space in how you want transhumanity to develop in Nova Praxis, I'd argue that the freedom to influence transhumantiy's develop exists in Eclipse Phase as well. like being realistic, changing humanity or transhumanity for the better is probably going to involve the same kind of activities, while going off to do your own thing is simply getting enough people and rep to agree and walking through a gate to found a colony on some distant world in either setting, its just that in Eclipse Phase your more likely to get people who agree with something weird and transhuman.

and over all, Eclipse Phase does the politics better by not making it so monolithic and solely determined by these jerkhole corporations that are also the government. because in Nova Praxis, you are either in the Coalition or your out, this company or that company, but Eclipse Phase has more variance on single planets than Nova Praxis in its entire setting, and if your Outer System in EP, that can mean a lot of things aside from not liking the Inner System, you could be an Ultimate, an Anarchist, a Titanian, Scum, Extropian, a criminal, all sorts of things that don't agree with each other, while Inner system has different viewpoints and people depending on whether your on Mars, Venus or Luna and even smaller groups amid those. Eclipse Phase just maps everything better and more believably, it acknowledges that the issue of transhumanity is more complex than just two sides and their extremes.

its also really weird that Nova Praxis is the more held back setting, even though their AI has no indication of being horrible or hostile and shut itself down after giving humanity all the tech. you'd think that would be an indication that AIs aren't as dangerous as Purists would think, but apparently Purists don't care and think Mimir going to sleep is scary or something and that their grey goo earth catastrophe in that setting being caused by human failing, not by god-AI maliciousness, is somehow an indication to keep themselves ignorant and "pure" rather than y'know, figuring things out and make sure you can properly use this tech rather than fearing it mindlessly. at least the Jovians have a big apocalyptic reason they can point to that makes their fear and evil believable.

One thing Nova Praxis does is flesh out and add some depth to the Purist/Bioconservative philosophy. Medical technology is advancing faster than humans age in Nova Praxis, so being against apotheosis (getting a cortical stack) is not consigning yourself to death and requires much less extreme beliefs to make that decision. Nearly all purist hold the belief that a person dies during apotheosis. Not all or even most Purist hate transhumans. Just because they think that person died and was replaced does not mean that they hate the new person.

Making advance AI is banned for several reasons, but the strongest would be the House of mainly SIM (purely digital) citizens. Sapient AI would throw their own humanity into question and most didn't freely choose to be SIMs but we're driven into that choice to escape a dieing planet. A planet that died after grey goo designed by a super AI didn't work as intended. See the Super AI created and left vast data filled with such technology as to make all existing technology vastly obsolete. Imagine if we had 3D printers that could make all our current technology and more 3D printers and then we gave that printer to Stone Age people with instructions written in their cave glyphs. That's the situation in Nova Praxis. Sure the super duper AI didn't kill everyone, only something it designed and told people how to use killed Earth. Not just the purist fear more AI like it.

The Nova Praxis setting is more tightly defined than what EP has going on and is set more during the melting pot stage. Most people who enjoy EP would interpret Nova Praxis as the setting where you fight against the HPA (the human preservation act) and tear down the corporation control. Other people may go the complete different way. Nova Praxis goes more out of the way to create shades of grey. Sure the corporations are oppressive by definition, but they also let the poorest citizen enjoy an abundant lifestyle free from death with higher standards of living than anyone alive today in their socialist reputation based economies. Meanwhile EP hypercorps tend to be cartoonishly evil which shows that the author attributes the wrongs of modern corporations to well thought out malice rather than the actual bureaucratic incompetency and the human ability to believe whoever is telling them what they want to hear.

[Lord Raziere]

1. on grey goo: yeah but Mimir shut down years before that happened, it was humans who used it, not Mimir. who do you blame for a murder, the person who designed the gun or the person who fired it?

2. on corporations:
thats an issue I'll not speaking of further because we clearly have two different views on that, that do not agree.

3. on immortality:
I mean, sure if you think living forever in the same body is any more "human" than any other modifications to that body. which to be honest, isn't. seems a mite hypocritical to me. and your still stuck with a boring human body, so personally I wouldn't consider that better over being able to modify that body to as awesome as you want rather than being stuck as the same boring old you forever.

[Rhedyn]

1. on grey goo: yeah but Mimir shut down years before that happened, it was humans who used it, not Mimir. who do you blame for a murder, the person who designed the gun or the person who fired it?

2. on corporations:
thats an issue I'll not speaking of further because we clearly have two different views on that, that do not agree.

3. on immortality:
I mean, sure if you think living forever in the same body is any more "human" than any other modifications to that body. which to be honest, isn't. seems a mite hypocritical to me. and your still stuck with a boring human body, so personally I wouldn't consider that better over being able to modify that body to as awesome as you want rather than being stuck as the same boring old you forever.

1. Well when I run the game, I'm going to fill in the "why Mimir shut down?" as part of the overall plan. Mimir was stuck in an off the grid computation server bank. Many Sci-fi have the God-AI just bull**** an escape plan through quantum hacking or just mystical mathing themselves into a different location. My thought is that instead of a soft-magic-science escape plan Mimir feigned benign gift leaving, shut himself down and waited until humanity was dumb enough to use a self replicating swarm of nanites (who also build robots, aircraft, mechs, etc). Then he would be more free to act.
People in the default setting are suspicious of the AI's gifts, especially after the fall. (Aside: people do blame gun manufacturers and have tried to sue them)

2. You don't know if we disagree just because I can empathize with multiple sides on this issue. In my opinion that tension is well written setting material, unlike in EP were siding with the corporations is equivalent to putting "Evil" on your alignment in D&D.

3. Purist philosophy differs. Some are totally down with body modification and are just against apotheosis because they view it as death (or some other reason). Other purist refuse even cyberware and only accept noninvasive geriatric healthcare (sure you can call this hypocritical, but you disagree with their beliefs and thus make no distinction between life extension and resleeving). The most extreme refuse even that, and these niche weirdos are the equivalent of EPs bioconservatives.

[Vknight]

Seven Worlds is another sci-fi RPG, one which (I think) does not involve the resleeving and so no Cortical Stack/Ship of Theseus issue. However, it is a Savage Worlds book, so might not be something you'd want to run.

Other than that, I'd just recommend running something else. Some players clearly have strong views against the particular game, and it would be a bad idea to try to push that sort of game onto them. Some players would similarly have strong views or problems with a wide variety of other topics that could show up in a RPG, and telling them that "tough, we're playing that sort of game anyways" is not a good way to go about it. Perhaps you could make a group with just the three, but it sounds like you'd prefer to keep the group of six together.

From what I remember, you can invest points into your body but this isn't normally how it's done. It's like investing EXP into a hideout in World of Darkness. Sure, you could do that, but if it gets destroyed those points are gone. Most EXP in Eclipse Phase is used to improve general character stats or get new character abilities. They can be invested into the body, but most people wouldn't do so just due to how frequently you'd be body-hopping for travel.

EHhhh i don't really wanna run savage worlds and cortical stacks are one of the best bits.
Indeed keep the full group together is the idea and finding a balance between the ideals will be the solution.
I mean its ok to invest heavily in a body if you know most of the campaign will let you keep it.

One thing Nova Praxis does is flesh out and add some depth to the Purist/Bioconservative philosophy. Medical technology is advancing faster than humans age in Nova Praxis, so being against apotheosis (getting a cortical stack) is not consigning yourself to death and requires much less extreme beliefs to make that decision. Nearly all purist hold the belief that a person dies during apotheosis. Not all or even most Purist hate transhumans. Just because they think that person died and was replaced does not mean that they hate the new person.

Making advance AI is banned for several reasons, but the strongest would be the House of mainly SIM (purely digital) citizens. Sapient AI would throw their own humanity into question and most didn't freely choose to be SIMs but we're driven into that choice to escape a dieing planet. A planet that died after grey goo designed by a super AI didn't work as intended. See the Super AI created and left vast data filled with such technology as to make all existing technology vastly obsolete. Imagine if we had 3D printers that could make all our current technology and more 3D printers and then we gave that printer to Stone Age people with instructions written in their cave glyphs. That's the situation in Nova Praxis. Sure the super duper AI didn't kill everyone, only something it designed and told people how to use killed Earth. Not just the purist fear more AI like it.

The Nova Praxis setting is more tightly defined than what EP has going on and is set more during the melting pot stage. Most people who enjoy EP would interpret Nova Praxis as the setting where you fight against the HPA (the human preservation act) and tear down the corporation control. Other people may go the complete different way. Nova Praxis goes more out of the way to create shades of grey. Sure the corporations are oppressive by definition, but they also let the poorest citizen enjoy an abundant lifestyle free from death with higher standards of living than anyone alive today in their socialist reputation based economies. Meanwhile EP hypercorps tend to be cartoonishly evil which shows that the author attributes the wrongs of modern corporations to well thought out malice rather than the actual bureaucratic incompetency and the human ability to believe whoever is telling them what they want to hear.

I mean the BioCon viewpoint is just wrong so making 80% of humanity agreeing with that sounds awful.
Heck its just a really lame transhumanism where your not getting awesome body mods.

The AI thing sounds incredibly dumb and boring its just oops did we do that.

Tightly defined does not mean good and i would say from what i have read and others have noted its tightly defined in that there are so few differing view points its easy to go into detail.
And yeah the fact it is pretentious and called the HPA. No thanks i don't want a 'What Ever Happened To Monday' situation.... god that movie was awful
I mean no that is just not true the reason hypercorps are evil is because not only incompetency on the bureaucratic level but the intent for earning dollar over the bottom line its a huge part of what goes into making it the way it is... you know like how real life corporations are super evil but its not malicious its them being scummy cutting the bottom line

[Rhedyn]

EHhhh i don't really wanna run savage worlds and cortical stacks are one of the best bits.
Indeed keep the full group together is the idea and finding a balance between the ideals will be the solution.
I mean its ok to invest heavily in a body if you know most of the campaign will let you keep it.




I mean the BioCon viewpoint is just wrong so making 80% of humanity agreeing with that sounds awful.
Heck its just a really lame transhumanism where your not getting awesome body mods.

The AI thing sounds incredibly dumb and boring its just oops did we do that.

Tightly defined does not mean good and i would say from what i have read and others have noted its tightly defined in that there are so few differing view points its easy to go into detail.
And yeah the fact it is pretentious and called the HPA. No thanks i don't want a 'What Ever Happened To Monday' situation.... god that movie was awful
I mean no that is just not true the reason hypercorps are evil is because not only incompetency on the bureaucratic level but the intent for earning dollar over the bottom line its a huge part of what goes into making it the way it is... you know like how real life corporations are super evil but its not malicious its them being scummy cutting the bottom line

I think the setting specifies 35% of people are transhuman. That is not to say the other 65% are not augmented or would want to be transhuman but don't have the rep for that kind of luxury. "80% are bioconservatives" is one of those exaggerations since only two of the six houses are strongly Transhumanist in political leaning.


Your politics are starting to leak out. I'm starting to suspect that some of your friends just don't want to play in worlds where you enforce that their belief is wrong.

Hypothetically, let's say I don't like chocolate. I could rp a chocolate loving fanatic. I'd be pissed to play in a world where hating chocolate = evil/dumb and every session amounts to the GM telling me I'm dumb and morally bankrupt for not agreeing with him.

[Lord Raziere]

Yeeeeaaaaaah, I'm not doing this, I'm out cya guys.