/gengen/ - Genesys General

I'm doing a plain western to start.

I may shift it to horror themes without going supernatural, IF the players are interested.

I want to start with something pretty simple mechanically. All I needed to do was put together a gear list, really.

I agree that "Fantasy Renaissance Special Ops" and "Golden Age Sci-Fi/Pulp Film Noir" are probably the two strongest ideas there. The former gives you plenty of scenarios to throw players through the meatgrinder that is fantasy politics and back-alley sedition, and the latter is an exceptionally flavorful crime serial where you can have adventures in what could pass for prohibition-era stories, just in the far-flung future with robutts and space.

I need to work out mechanically how 1's magic works. Fluff-wise, I already know. Three types:

Little charms a la Battle Magic from Runequest. Things anyone can learn that work a small bit of magic. Equivalent to Cantrips in D&D. A farmer singing the Harvest Song to sharpen his scythe as he reaps his harvest, a boy tossing a marble over his shoulder to it will roll the way to its lost mate, etc. Old proper negro superstitions from the mid 19th century would fit in there too.

Other type is witch magic. Green and Red. Green's considered the goodly kind. Somewhere between clerics, druids, and bards in D&D.

Red is your classic evil witch stuff. Hexes and curses and spitting on the church's cornerstone to make it burn down.

For your other thoughts. Steampunk isn't really my thing, but with Dishonored being so popular I could see it working.

And for the sci-fi setting, I feel like that's a pretty solid framework to work within, but it wouldn't have to be limited to JUST Venus. But I'd definitely want to stay intra-system.

My only exposure to Weird West was Deadlands some 16 years ago, so a resounding maybe.

Admittedly, those two are pretty high on the list. Unfortunately, when talking to one of my players, he latched on to the idea of playing pic related, and I know this is going to make me sound 'no fun allowed', but I'm not interested in running a a comedy game.

So tell them. Say you'd be playing the game and the genre straight as an arrow.

Yes, but slowly. Very slowly.

How far have you gotten?

I'm curious as well.

Currently working on Careers and Backgrounds. Also looking at magic and wondering just how much to tweak for flavor's sake.

The big 5 races are done, modified and borrowed heavily from the fantasy races examples in the core rulebook. Trolls probably need rebalancing, as they're tbe only one I didn't have an example to go by.

Some guy on r/genesysrpg posted a shitload of weapon stats they'd done recently. I don't agree with a lot of what they wrote but it'll be immensely helpful when I get around to doing my own take.

Take your time user! Love Shadow run, it deserves the best.