CPRed Randomly Generated Mayhem, Take Two

Welcome back to my adventures in GM'ing a Cyberpunk Red campaign, and since it worked so well last time, that I've decided to once again let a table and a random number generator create my next adventure from whole cloth. If you don't want to bother with reading through the last post to see what I'm talking about, here it is in a nutshell - instead of using someone else's pre-generated adventure, I cooked up a table that allows me to randomly create one. It worked well enough for my last CPRed session that I am doing it again for (as I type this) this weekend's session. Let's see how this one falls apart goes, shall we?

Lessons learned from last time, namely not be afraid to throw more combat at the party and give them a little more stress in the execution of their plan, and I also should do up a screamsheet for the adventure. Did I do any of that? Yes to the first part, or at least I plan on throwing more combat at the party and putting pressure on them, but the 2nd part... well, let's just say I've been lazy and haven't quite generated a screamsheet for this session. And I may not. Let's talk about what our "roll" on the table generates for us and I will discuss the screamsheet situation along with it.

So I "rolled" (the table has multiple fields that don't line up with your standard dice options, so I use a random number generator app where I can tweak the range of numbers) and got Ziggurat as who is hiring the party; the party is hired to do "defense"; against Biotechnica; in Little China; and the twist is "the target is not who they seem (roll again on To Who column to determine who they actually are)".  On the reroll, turns out the target is Reclaimers. The Hired By and To Who columns are only vaguely interesting, but the Hired To Do result is the interesting part in this table. And I've left all of the entries in that column vague on purpose to give myself the greatest latitude in what the party is actually doing in that adventure - are they physically defending a location? maybe they actually have to steal something or smuggle it to a new location or hide it to keep it away from the "bad guys"; maybe they have to protect someone or a convoy or whatever else I can come up with that technically falls under the category of "defend" - and in this case, with Ziggurat getting the party to defend something in Little China against Biotechnica (but not really them, actually Reclaimers), I went with a classic Night City tale. Ziggurat has their eye on a building in the combat zone of Little China to do something with it (I would say a rebroadcast tower, but we already did that one with WorldSat in The Apartment, so maybe just a server farm) but the Reclaimers beat them to and are trying to make the building into a (soup kitchen or a homeless shelter or whatever I think will tug on the heart strings of the party). Taking a building away from "Biotechnica" to give over to Ziggurat is not really what I would consider defending it, but with the twist of it actually being Reclaimers and not Biotechnica, I really want the party to show they have a soul and pitch in to help the Reclaimers defend the building from Ziggurat, who will just hire other mercenaries when they learn the party isn't wiping out the Reclaimers in the building. 

I typed the preceding paragraphs before the session was to take place, but as I type this part, the session has passed... and it didn't happen. For a variety of reasons, two of my players had to drop out the day off, and so we played board games instead. Board games - good fun for when you can't run your regularly scheduled session! I'll start typing this again when we get closer to the next session and see how it goes from there.

Finally, after two months of illness and small tragedies, the group got back together and we finally got to play the adventure. I messed up and didn't check my notes very closely, so when the Ziggurat rep talked to the Fixer, I used WorldSat as the fake bad guys instead of Biotechnica. It does make more sense, WorldSat had tried to take the apartment building away, word about that little caper did get around, so Ziggurat was just doubling down on their bet. The other mistake I made was thinking the party would follow their morality and not their wallets. Did they know they were Reclaimers and not WorldSat? Yes, yes they did, found that out pretty early. Did they try to tell the Reclaimers who had hired them and try for a higher bid to turn on Ziggurat? No, nor did they really care that Ziggurat had told them a lie, they went straight to hustling the Reclaimers off the property, and then calling Ziggurat with a "mission accomplished!" And then the Tyger Claws, who the Reclaimers paid protection money to get the building in the first place, they showed up and a firefight ensued, more because the players messed with one of the Tyger Claw's vehicles and then pointed a weapon at the Claws. You never know what your players will do, try to make sure they have options to do as much as they want and then let them run wild, because that is what they will do.

So, overall I think my players had a really good time. Sure two of the party started things off early with other party members out of place, twice, but the party rallied each time and everyone felt like they contributed. At least, that is what it seemed like, as everyone was smiling and laughing at the end of the adventure, and it was completed successfully. They could have earned more money and IP by talking more to the Reclaimers and working with them, but they still put a W in the Win/Loss column. Oh, and you potential or current GMs out there, never, EVER tell them what they could have gotten if they had played things differently - they got what they got, and leave it at that. Unless you want that to be the next adventure, where the party has a big investigation scene or series of scenes, tracking down all the info they didn't collect earlier, and then rolls into trying to get back what they missed out on. But still, you don't tell them outright, the party has to figure it out for themselves. 

Will I keep up with these randomly generated adventures? For the time being, yes, as I do have some more structured content further down the line, and I want the party to be better equipped when they face that content. Which means, for the time being, smaller challenges for the group to build up their funds and get some increases in their skills and Role Abilities. I'm already looking forward to next month's randomly generated adventurer. What will the table give me to throw at my players this time?

Cyberpunk Red Randomly Generated Session

 My CPRed game is going rather well, the group has bonded together and the group dynamic is, I would say, good. For the first two sessions, I ran The Apartment (yes, the adventure from the Jumpstart Kit, but with the free downloadable updates RTG published when the core book came out) and the Precious Cargo screamsheet adventure, also from the Jumpstart Kit. These two provided the right tone, first for introducing my players to the world of Cyberpunk in the fictional timeline of the Red, and the second adventure for giving them enough of a taste of what is to come - setting up a heist, all the planning and organizing, acquiring equipment, and then the execution. But what about the next session? Do I want to do one of the other screamsheets? I love the screamsheets, they make a great handout to give to the party and something they can hang on to as a keepsake after the game is done and very easy to make. However, I felt I wanted to try out something I had created a while back, when I had gotten my hands on the CPRed core book, a random session generator.

Making this generator, I kept it simple, only 5 columns - employer, hired to do what, who they're doing it to, where it's happening at (inside Night City), and what the players don't know (also called The Twist). The "employer" and "who they're doing it to" columns are exactly the same, just a bunch of organizations in the Night City area, everything from Nomad packs to Neocorps to government agencies to gangs to other edgerunners and so forth. I don't restrict my lists to 20 options or try to stretch them out to 100, I use a random number generator app on my phone so no matter what range I need ("employer" currently has 57 options, for example), I can just ask for a random number between 1 and whatever I need exactly. For "hired to do", I kept it simple, just one word descriptions of what the party is hired to do - investigation, abduction, protection, theft, smuggling, defense, etc. "Where" is just everywhere I could find in the core book in and around Night City. Then, "The Twist" is a list of twists I could come up with, everything from "this is a straight deal" to "the employer is actually someone else (roll again on employer table)". I have purposefully kept everything very vague, knowing that this is just to give me a rough, rough outline and I, the game master, need to use my experience with the setting to flesh out the adventure.

I generated my numbers for this upcoming session (as I type this, it's an upcoming session, but I won't hit Publish until after the session so my players can't get a hint before the game), and came up with the following - employer is a Corp: Continental Brands; hired to do an investigation; hired to do it to a Media: Independents; where is the Executive Zone; and what the players don't know is the target is secretly an AI, and the employer does know, but won't tell the party. Pretty bare bones, right? Here is where I earn my keep as a GM. Okay, start with who is doing the hiring and the Twist - Continental Brands is a Neocorp mostly known for making kibble, and the Twist is that the party is doing something to an AI, but CB isn't telling the party it's an AI even though CB 100% knows for certain it's an AI. The party is being hired to investigate what they are told is an independent media. To me, the background to this little dance goes like this - CB made the AI (why? who knows, corporations in CPRed are making AIs for inscrutable purposes all the time, and it doesn't really matter, so not thinking too hard about it at this point) which then made a deal with a Night City independent media to steal the AI's hardware away from CB, and since then has been posting stuff up on the local data pool lambasting CB (the Nacho Ranch Kibble is made from people! and not ones that gave consent beforehand! they were Scavved!). Also whether what the AI and this media are posting up is true or not is completely irrelevant, the party probably won't care and CB just wants to find this media and either steal back their AI or just shut them both up. 

Boom. Background done, we know what the base mission is, players must use their contacts to track down where the media's office is. Here is a bunch of non-combat role playing, let the players flesh out their characters a bit, find out who they know and who they can ask questions of. Simple enough job, and not too dangerous, so I'll offer the PCs 500 euros apiece for positive confirmation of this media's location. But that is too easy, so I'll sweeten the deal - when they call in with confirmation, their CB contact will offer them an extra 1,000 apiece if they put a hit on the media and disconnect the media's computer deck (actually the tower containing the AI) from the local network. Remember, CB still hasn't told them there is also an AI in play, and it's in the Executive Zone, the party will not want to go in armed to the teeth otherwise they'll bring down serious Militech heat, there will be extra security on the media's building just because of where it is, and then the party will have to face the AI as well as the media, which probably has some drones for protection. I'll see how beat up the party is at that point, may be a good role play opportunity if the party is in rough shape. You can always adjust the difficulty of any encounter, especially to better match the state of the party at that time, and don't be afraid to do so, because keeping the tension high (but not impossible, unless you want the party to run) is more fun when the party manages to come out on top.

Now that I have a better idea if what the party is doing, what locations are going to have combat, if any? Since I use miniatures and a gridded map that I draw on with dry/wet erase markers, I must keep in mind the physical aspects, and while I don't necessarily have to draw out a highly detailed map beforehand, I still find it useful to ponder what type of building or open space the potential combats will occur. For this adventure, since it is occurring in the Executive Zone, the party will (hopefully) track the media to a modest office building, 6 floors with a back loading dock, a security desk with 2 guards in the lobby, cameras inside the building, 2 stairways (one up front and the other in the back of the building, which also opens onto the roof), a passenger elevator in the front of the building, and a freight elevator in the rear near the dock. So we now have multiple entry points - front door, back door and dock door, and since this building is a bit shorter than the surrounding ones, the rooftop stairwell door is generally left propped open so the smokers can get back inside. Once inside, the party has some options for moving between floors. Plus, the cameras are part of the buildings network, so the netrunner can dive in and shut them down, if they so desire, with access points at the security desk, the stairway doors on each floor,  and the two elevators. Beyond that, what else is on the floor with the media's office is also important, as if it's an explosives chemical lab, that could curtail firearms use, but I'll go boring and say there is a yoga studio taking up most of the floor, and a small law firm is the only other office on the floor. If a firefight spills out of the media's office, the yoga studio is a nice open space, and the law firm, while still a small firm, is probably not someone the party wants to get on their bad side. 

I have the backstory, i have the mission, I have the general layout of the building in mind, the last thing I tend to think of is if I can provide something for each of the players to do? And I am by no means railroading here, as these are not things that have to happen to accomplish the mission, but how can each of the PCs contribute to accomplishing the mission to feel useful? Also, these are not the only things I will allow them to do, my players constantly surprise me with solutions to the problems they face that I did not come up with. At a minimum, I want to come up with a way each can contribute and feel necessary, because if I can't come up with something for one of the party, then I need to add some more detail or another requirement to include them as well. Our Nomad - he has the vehicle and they could disguise it and themselves as a repair company to pull into the dock at the back of the building to gain access. The Solo - he may have to deal with building security, but at the least the AI's security drones will need to be dealt with. The Netrunner will be key in tracking down the media office in meatspace. The Fixer - key in negotiating the initial deal and in securing disguises or other equipment. The MedTech - this is the hard one. As it is an AI, there is not really someone he can minister to in case the employer demands they be brought in alive. Maybe if the party thinks to trigger a medical emergency, this target being in the Executive Zone, the MedTech can fake belonging to Trauma Team, or at least REO Meatwagon. Of course, if anyone in the team is on the receiving end of a barrage of well-rolled-by-the-GM gunfire, the MedTech will get to their primary job of keeping that person alive and getting them back on their feet. I was hoping I could come up with better than a failsafe or insurance policy, but I guess it'll just have to do.

As I type from here on out, we have played through this adventure and the "too long, didn't read" verdict - it went well. Excepting that I did not have a screamsheet to hand out, everyone had a good time and did not seem to realize this was something I made up and wasn't just using a pre-made adventure I had gotten from someone else. And I am kicking myself a bit for not taking the time to track down the screamsheet template (here it is, the official one direct from R. Talsorian Games, took me 10 seconds to Google it... as the Brits would say, what a tosser!), having one from the AI pretending to be a Media would have made this session so much better. Le sigh. Oh well, the game went well and the party enjoyed themselves, that is all that matters.

There you go, I am very pleased with my little idea generator. I will have to see what it generates for me for next session, and see if I can't make it better than this first foray. Go play some games with your friends, roll some dice, and have some fun.

Creating a Cyberpunk Red Character

A little over a year ago, I was pining for a chance to play some Cyberpunk Red, as I just did not have the time to run a game. Here we are, mere weeks away from starting a new CPRed campaign, and I figured I would relate how to make a CPRed character based on what I have seen online. Of course, given enough time and money, I have this idea that I want to convert the fantastic Firestorm campaign from CP2020 to the new Red rules and run my players through it as an intro and then they start playing as their kids/relatives in Red proper (2045-ish). But I do not really have the time to do all the conversion right now, so we are going to start with the Jumpstart Kit's Apartment intro adventure and go from there. Long before  any of that, I always like to find sources and references to see how other people are doing what they do, and see if there are any known pitfalls I can avoid. Pertaining to that, I have joined the Night City Stories (NCS) community on Reddit, if for nothing more than just having a need to create a Red PC and exploring the system a little. 

First, a bit on NCS - it is the Cyberpunk Red equivalent of a West Marches campaign played out over the internet. I will not bore you with yet another explanation of what a West Marches campaign is, you have either heard of them, or you can follow the links and find out for yourself. CPRed lends itself so well to this concept, I am hard pressed to say that, given a choice, whether I would like to run/GM a D&D 5e or a CPRed West Marches campaign in my local area (I am not currently doing either, but it is something I have pondered). So NCS is just that, a bunch of GMs (does anyone else miss "referees" from CP2020?) post up edgeruns, and whoever volunteers for them goes off and plays on the posted date and time. As you can see, if you bothered to go look at their Reddit, NCS does have some rules for character generation, which makes it easier for those of us who have oxidized well since the last time we played Cyberpunk Red or 2020. So I decided to use their rules for character creation, and am even going with the Complete Packages like they do for my soon to be starting CPRed campaign. As an example of what this involves, I am going to create a character and relay my internal monologue and choices I made while making this. If you want simpler, go for a Streetrats template build or a fast and dirty Edgerunners build, but for my example, I am deep diving into the Complete Packages to get more fidelity and choice of making a character. Follow along in your CPRed core rulebook, starting on page 40. Also, if you want an example of what your generic anything should look like (and I am providing these as well to my players to help them choose/create a character), check out RTG's Single Shot Pack, that has pre-gens of every role available.

For me, I was having a hard time settling on one role over the others - traditionally, I have played many Techs/Medtechs (used to be, in CP2020, no distinction between the two), Nomads, Solos, Fixers, and Netrunners. I finally understand Medias these days (read the comic Transmetropolitan, or Seanan Maguire/Mira Grant's Newsflesh novels for some fantastic examples of what a Media is/does), but did not in my early Edgerunning career, and I freely admit to not liking Corpos (I'm sorry, Execs), Cops (Lawmen), or Rockers. Solo is too easy, like "human fighter" in D&D, the default when you are unsure what you want to play. Netrunners are cool, and I like the new rules that keep them in the present with the rest of the party. Techs are also great in this version, less maintenance as in the old version, and more mad scientist/inventor, like in the classic RPG, Deadlands. Medtechs are also more their own breed of beastie in this version, and always very welcome in any party.

But Nomad... Nomads have become less about the Pack (though still important) and more about driving a vehicle (page 161 in the core book). Which I resonated with. You see, recently (okay, a year and a half ago before car and gas prices went insane) I traded in my old reliable commuter, which was becoming less and less reliable and more and more in need of some major repairs, and bought what my wife is referring to as the Mid-Life-Crisis-Mobile - a 2017 Ford Mustang GT (with a 6-speed manual, the Performance Pack, and possibly the loudest aftermarket pipes thanks to a previous owner). Hey, the wife and I are not going to have any more kids, and we are in a financial position that we could splurge a little. Plus, the 'stang is more affordable than most of you realize, especially as mine comes with the Millenial-specific anti-theft device, a transmission you have to row yourself. I needed a car to get to work every day, and this does fit the bill, just a bit excessive about it. To be honest, it is excessive about everything, really.

So I chose a Nomad, but I did not start in on your typical Nomad, either. Most Nomads have decent Cool stats, as they do a lot of negotiating, but the more I tried to nail down my new guy, the more I heard this utter gearhead nerd talking about the dual-turbo setup he wanted to bolt onto his current ride, and maybe a shot of nitrous, too. Out went the typical Cool stat, hello decent Tech stat, along with the matching skills, mainly in vehicle repair. Oh yeah, I am so dual classing this PC Nomad/Tech (it is legal! page 143 in the core book) - he can drive anything with wheels, and repair/upgrade it as needed. However, starting as a Nomad and using the Complete Package to build the PC, I automatically get a four in the Nomad's Role Ability - Moto.

I had this idea I wanted this character to be related to one of my old characters I played a lot, specifically my old Netrunner, the Wild One. He was the character out of my stable of CP2020 characters that was most like me - me growing up in the CP2020 universe, with just a thin coat of paint. I am by far not the only person out there who has done this, and as long as you can recognize your own flaws in the PC alongside your (possibly inflated) attributes, then your fellow players generally do not find them too egregious. Wild One was a pretty fun character to play, the head of a protection gang in the Kansas City area (big fish in a tiny pond, when talking the Cyberpunk universe - we set our campaign in KC because we were not far away when we played), and being a Netrunner in 2020, with its datafortresses and netrunning rules, he spent a lot more time sitting back and guiding the party than he did going on jobs with them. I figured he did not make it long past the end of the Fourth Corporate War and Bartmoss's unleashing of the RABIDS on the Net. But how, then, to tie this new character back to the Wild One? One night stand before he klepped it in the fall of the Net? Vat clone? I went with something a little less strange - the Wild One's Medtech (Netrunners of the time employed Medtechs to monitor their vitals on 'runs into the Deep Net, as Netrunners were virtually comatose while doing so) had quite a crush on her patient, and when the RABIDS brain burnt him, leaving a comatose vegetable behind, she gathered a "sample" before pulling the plug on the life support and impregnated herself. My new Nomad was the result.

So Lifepath - with the above in mind, I pick everything I need from the Lifepath (starting page 43 in the core rulebook) to get me there. North American as cultural region, I could go with any of the languages as Wild One was mainly an English speaker, but "dad" was not in the picture (he was already dead) when this character was born. What did mom speak? I do not know, but I am thinking Spanish just to spice things up. I was raised in southern New Mexico and speak a bit of Spanish myself, so I could see this character's mother being of Hispanic descent and mainly speaking that language. For personality, Intellectual and Detached - as I typed earlier, this guy is not Cool, he is a gearhead nerd who is most interested in driving fast, and making whatever he is currently driving even faster. I could even go Picky, Fussy and Nervous, but I like Intellectual and Detached, so that is what I am going for. Clothing style, since this character is a new character and part of a Nomad Pack, I'll got with Nomad Leathers (yeah, I know, generic, but you can always change this throughout the life of any PC) and hair... what am I thinking? This character is partly Hispanic, so it can be about any of the options. Not Bald, this PC may be female (have not decided yet), and I do not prefer women without hair. Probably something they can fit under a helmet, but probably not too neat, so I will go with Short and Curly. Affectations I will go with Tattoos. This PC likes to get inked, already has a few (can decide this later or now, not really important quite yet) and always looking to get more to add to the collection. Most Valued - *hmmmm* I will go with Your Word. This PC is a person of their word, builds back into the Intellectual and Detached, I like it. Go easy with the next one - I Like Almost Everyone. Friendly, but detached, so not a total snob asshole. Most Valued Person - dad was non-existent (literally just a sperm donor) and mom was a bit flaky to begin with, so I will say A Teacher or Mentor. Someone in the Nomad Pack who taught young PC how to drive and wrench on vehicles. Most Valued Possession - A Tool (they want to be a Tech so badly...). The last is easiest, when making a Nomad, stick with a Nomad Pack. Oh, you could do other backgrounds that can make sense, but I'm sticking with the Pack for this one. Which Nomad Pack? I always leave this as an open discussion with the rest of the party and the GM - what fits into the game the best? I am not married for this character to belong to any one particular Pack, I can write the background around whatever fits best, even an ocean-going Nomad Pack.

Yes, yes, there are more options in Lifepath, but you get the gist of it - some of these decisions can be super important to you as the player, and some can be chosen at random. You decide what is important in making up your character and what is not so important. And the options in the core book are really good, but you can come up with anything you can think of and go with that, even if it is not listed. Like Affectations - I picked Tattoos, but I could easily have said "everything they own is neon pink" and so their catch-phrase suddenly becomes "oooh, that's nice! got it in pink?" to every bit of shiny they run across. Let your imagination run wild. Focus on telling the PC's history, but do not be afraid to be vague now (during character creation) to give you freedom to come up with better ideas during play. Decisions made on the fly, in the middle of a game while at the table with your friends can be more interesting than something you had decided months/years ago. 

Now onto Statistics (page 72) - the Complete Package option uses a point-buy system instead of random generation by dice. As a starting character (yep, you can totally create Major or Minor Heroes, whatever your GM will allow, but for this, we will start with Starting Character, as that is also what I am inflicting on my players) you get 62 points to divide between the ten Statistics - Intelligence (INT), Reflexes (REF), Dexterity (DEX), Technique (TECH), Cool (COOL), Willpower (WILL), Luck (LUCK), Movement (MOVE), Body (BODY), and Empathy (EMP). I am not going into what each of those means, just to say you can take a look at the pre-roll tables for the Streetrats and Quick & Dirty builds to get an idea of what is important, average, and less important for each of the Roles. If it has mostly 5s and 6s, that's average. If it has mostly 3s and 4s, that is less important. And if a Stat has a lot of 8s, that is important. For instance, Nomads - INT is average, REF and DEX are above average, TECH is not important, COOL and WILL are important, MOVE and BODY are average, and EMP is less important. However, I want to multiclass this PC, so I also peek in on the Tech Role, see what they think is important (INT and TECH). INT for a Nomad is of average importance, but for a Tech is very important. Similarly, TECH is also very important to the Tech, but not important at all to a Nomad. So I want to emphasize those two, but I have to give up something in return, as you cannot have everything. I have already decided that this character is not Cool - while friendly, they are just not into talking to other people (Persuasion and Trading are usually high on the Nomad's list of Skills, but not this one) - so COOL will get bumped from "important" to "not important at all". I still want this PC to remain a good driver, so I will keep REF as important, but move DEX down to merely average - they will not be a combat monster, but still be able to drive like Randy Pobst. 

With the 62 points I get as a starting character, I choose INT 7, REF 8, DEX 6, TECH 7, COOL 4, WILL 6, LUCK 7, MOVE 6, BODY 6, and EMP 5. Like I said, not at all a high Cool like you see with most Nomads, but he is going to be more Tech focused in the very near future. Empathy I also find to be the answer to the question "how much cyberware are you wanting to put into this character?" as that is the limiting factor. If I was building a Solo who I wanted to do a near-borg/total-borg transformation with, I would put as many points in EMP as they let me from the start. So here, I want some 'ware, but not a lot. This Nomad is not going to be Inquisitor level of pure, but not totally 'borged out.

I got skill... or I should say, I have bought Skills for my character. Pertinent pages in the core book are 81 for a short description of every Skill, page 85 has the Basic Skills, page 90 has how many points a Complete Package character has to spend and how to spend those points, and starting on page 130 is a deeper description of all the Skills. Complete Package characters, which is what I am making, get 90 points to put into Skills. Yes, I know, the book says 86 points, but you get 4 above and beyond that must be spent in a language related to their background. Automatically, our Nomad has Language: Spanish 4 (+7 from INT, for a Base Skill of +11). Related to your 4 free points, you have to automatically put at least two points apiece into the Basic Skills: Athletics, Brawling, Concentration, Conversation, Education, Evasion, First Aid, Human Perception, Language: Streetslang, Local Expert (home turf), Perception, Persuasion, and Stealth. You start with 90, spend four in your language, another 26 in the Basic Skills, and you end up with 60 points you can put anywhere you want (except their Role Ability - it is nominally a skill, but you cannot advance it during character creation, only by spending IP on it). Again looking to the Streetrats builds to see what is important, for Nomads we come up with Brawling, Evasion, First Aid, Stealth, Animal Handling, Drive (Land, Sea or Air) Vehicle, Handgun, Melee Weapon, Tracking, Trading, and Wilderness Survival, with Perception also getting a little bump. However, I have to be different (just like everybody else!) and so we also need to look at Tech - Evasion and First Aid are also important, but everything else is different: Education, Basic Tech, Cybertech, Electronics/Security Tech (x2), Land Vehicle Tech, Shoulder Arms, Science (your choice), and Weaponstech. Getting the balance between the two Roles and getting what I want out of the PC is fairly straightforward - you cannot have everything, pick just a couple of things you want your PC to excel at, and then, if you have anything left over, put them in Skills that you think will be helpful or that no one else will have. 

Here is what I chose, grouped how they have the Skills grouped, by category. In Awareness Skills, I put four points each in Concentration and Perception, and six into Tracking, which is INT based and i just put a lot of points into INT from the Tech side, so it makes sense to emphasize. In Body Skills, I leave the base two points in Athletics but go for six points in Stealth. Stealthy and a good tracker, this Nomad is starting to coalesce, the quiet one who would rather be wrenching, does not make a lot of noise or brag about themself, but gets the job done. Control Skills we have Drive Land Vehicle with six points, and combined with our high REF, this Nomad can drive it like they stole it. In Education Skills we have, oddly enough, Education, which I put four points into. It is not a skill high on the priority list for Nomads, but it is for Techs. I would put more points in if this PC was a Tech from the word go, but this reflects their coming into the Role sideways. Also in this group we see our two Languages, Streetslang at the base two points and Spanish at the base four points. Local Expert (Your Home) stays at the base two points, and I have not decided where "home" is or what part of Night City they call home, but that can always be changed later. Wilderness Survival I do put six points into, but this could go either way - the party never leaves the urban environs of NC and they never need this skill, or they get chased out of town into the wastelands between cities and the Nomad is the only one who keeps the party alive. I like having it as a "just in case" Skill, never know when it might come in handy, and fits with Tracking and Stealth. For Fighting Skills, everyone gets Brawling and Evasion, but I bump both of these up to six points, and also take Melee Weapon at six points. Mechanics have lots of long, heavy wrenches and breakover bars, this felt right. No Performance Skills, and for Ranged Weapons Skills, I put six points into Handguns. In Social Skills, the basic Skills Conversation, Human Perception, and Persuasion get the basic two points. Finally, in Technique Skills, First Aid gets six points, legacy of this character's mother, Land Vehicle Tech also gets six points, and Weapontech gets two points. We gonna put big shooties on our vroom-vroom! 

Now personal gear, or as CPRed calls it, Your Stuff. For Weapons, Armor, Gear and Cyberware, you have 2,550 eurobucks (eddies, EBs, euros... I do find it funny that the original Cyberpunk and Cyberpunk 2020 predicted the euro of our current reality all the way back in the late 1980s) to spend, and specifically on your Fashion, which is almost as important as the rest to a CPRed PC, you have 800 euros to spend. Most of your gear, specifically short descriptions and prices, can be found starting on page 91, but once you get into game and need the stats for most of these items, you need to go to page 340 and following, in the Night Market section of the Economy chapter, for all of those statistics. For this PC, here is what I picked up, and why on the important stuff. 

• Stun Baton, medium melee weapon. It is easy to kill someone after you stun them, but hard to bring a dead target back to life, never know when you need to capture instead of kill.
• Heavy Pistol with 100 rounds. Nothing fancy, this PC has the Handgun Skill and these are pretty good at the balance of ROF and Damage.
• Light Armorjack, leather jacket and bandana (this fits in with their fashion choices of earlier, and note you have to purchase these again in Fashionware below)
• Agent. In the grimdark future, everyone needs a pocket cell phone/computer.
• Carryall. Where you carry your stuff, this could be saddle bags on your motorcycle to a duffle bag to a military surplus extra-large field pack.
• Duct tape. This PC is part Tech, they do not leave home without this item.
• Flashlight. Even if everyone in the party has upgraded to Smart Goggles or Cybereyes with low light, IR/UV, whatever, these are a good idea as you still need a flashlight to read things written in regular ink or printed in non-IR/UV reflective inks (which is 90% of the time), or otherwise discern details in the dark. Too easy to just also bring a flashlight with you.
• Inflatable bed and sleeping bag. PC is part Tech, but also part Nomad, so sleeping on the road or wherever you can cop some floor space is the order of the day.
• Radio communicator. Until everyone in the party upgrades to the appropriate cyberware, this is too necessary for a well-oiled team.
• Radio scanner/music player. For those long trips across the Wastelands, got to have your entertainment and also be on the lookout for rival Packs that could be setting up ambushes in your path.
• Road flares (x3). Signaling source and a source of fire, lots of uses for magnesium road flares.
• Rope (10m). Never know when you will need some of this.
• Tent and camping equipment. See the inflatable bed and sleeping bag above, never know where you are going to have to make camp out in the Wasteland.
• Anti-smog breathing mask. This is the time of the Red, best to protect your lungs until you can afford cyber replacements.
• Medtech bag. This PC is good at the Medtech skill, which is a base Skill so everyone has some knowledge in it. Also, being as I personally am a former US Army Soldier, we were trained you always carry at least one bandage (and the deeper we got into the Global War on Terror, we began carrying IFAC kits, which had a tourniquet, an Israeli bandage, and clotting factor), because whenever you are wounded, your battle buddies will use your bandage on you. Their bandage is so if they are wounded, that bandage will be used on them. This is one piece of gear that I think all PCs should spend some eddies on.
• Tech bag. Yep, this PC is not officially a Tech, but already purchased their basic Tech bag so they can use those TECH skills (Land Vehicle Tech and Weapontech) from the start.
• Smart glasses with Image Enhance. This is far cheaper than true cyberware and not quite as useful, but I think it fits with the character concept. They can use these as a scout for their Pack, as well as use the magnification capabilities when working on vehicles and weapons. Less a combat useful bit of gear, but still, if you can spot the enemy before they spot you, that may not be useful inside combat but always a bonus as it allows you to either bypass the ambush or decide how you are going to deal with it. If you do not know the ambush is there, that is the worst possible option.

Fashionware is all personal choice - how important is flashy clothes to your character? For this PC, what with the low COOL score and all, fashion is not all that important. I grabbed a bunch of basic, sturdy clothes, and multiples of each. No, edgerunners never get shot, stabbed, blown up, burned, electrocuted, acid thrown or sprayed on them, tied to the bumper of a fast vehicle and dragged a mile down the road... (end sarcasm tag) One thing I will note, I love looking through the classic CP2020 books, particularly the core book and the Chrome books, when it comes to fashion choices. In fact, I am going to put those books out for the players in my upcoming Session Zero. As for housing, like the Nomad Pack earlier, I like to leave this as an open discussion between myself, the other players, and the GM. Definitely not a Corpo Conapt, but I do like to also choose a living accommodations goal at this point, as it is not quite so important where they are living at the beginning of the campaign, but where they want to end up, that helps define the PC's motivations. As for the Running Out of Cash? options (page 118 in the core book), I try to build my PCs without any kind of entanglements like this. Now if the GM and I have had a conversation where they need someone in the party to do this to provide plot hooks for the upcoming campaign, I am an experienced enough of a player that I am willing to take this on and help out.

And there you have it, what I think about when I am creating a character for Cyberpunk Red. Hopefully this helps you with your own character creation and de-mystifies the high fidelity character creation option. It is really not all that hard, and the way CPRed is built, the rules part of it, it is really hard to make a "useless" character (I like to think "less useful" or "non-maximized" rather than "useless"), so if you have any reservations, just dive in and see what works for you and your group. Remember, life is cheap in this grimdark alternate reality, and even maximally balanced PCs die at an alarming rate. Have fun, stay safe, go roll some dice with your friends.

Last Minute Preparations

Here we are. As I type this, we are under two weeks from my first game of what I am dubbing in my head, the Rotation. The second Saturday from today (again, as I type this), I will sit down and introduce a new group of players to the world of 5th Edition Dungeons & Dragons. I cannot tell you how excited I am this is finally happening. And then, at the end of the following month, we are having our Session Zero for Cyberpunk Red.  

It has been a long time since I have DM'd/GM'd any game, looking back on my posts here, it has been almost a full year. But we are almost there. I had a job change that killed all of my extra free time, and while the pay was good, it was not quite good enough to put up with no free time to speak of, and so another job change occurred. There, free time! I can run games as I had been hoping to! Wait, no, another snag - our dining room chairs, veterans of my last weekly campaign, were in dire need of repair and reupholstering. Seriously, carpentry and sewing were holding up my game. Fortunately the repairs to the chairs were not too difficult and well within the scope of the tools I possess and skills I have attained. The chairs that need repairing have been repaired, and reupholstering has begun, but that does not need to be completed in its entirety, and can be done in between sessions. The repairs did need to be done, as some of the chairs were literally falling apart and not safe to sit in. Strange what has kept me from starting a campaign back up, but sometimes you have no control over what decides whether you can do something or not.

Speaking of, my other major problem was having enough players. I have found that scheduling, the reason my last D&D campaign folded, is still a major issue, to the point that even going to a one session a month schedule that three out of six from that last group are completely unable to join in and a fourth that is still on the fence on if he wants to give up one weekend afternoon a month or not. Out of six previous players, only two of them have committed to one or more of the games in the Rotation, where all six had professed an interest in playing something with me as the GM again. But this just shows why that group perished - when I decided what days and times worked for me, and would not budge, three players were no longer interested. Gosh, I wonder why that last campaign crumbled? I get it, other things come first, as this is just a hobby, but if you are not paying your game master and your schedules are too far away from each other, you are just going to have to find a new table to play at. Would I like to get that last group back together? Yes, but as many scheduling conflicts as we had in that group, and no one is willing to change their own situation even now, that tells me that group will never exist as it once did. 

So I went to the Book of Faces, and posted on many local RPG, nerdy, and tabletop wargaming groups what I was doing and got responses. Oh, I had a few friends here and there that were interested in getting into one or more of my games, but definitely not enough for what I wanted to do. Luckily, I managed to catch a few interested folks who could meet on the established day and time, enough to max out my D&D game at six, and enough to get my CPRed to the minimum of four to get it rolling. Yes, I want just five in any RPG I am running, but six is better, as inevitably someone has to bow out of the session come game day, and so I get the optimal five I wanted in the first place. And I am okay with just four for CPRed, this campaign will eventually roll into a long term arc, but for the beginning, to get everyone (including me!) used to the rules and the world. It also allows for other players to join at later points and not feel like they have missed out on much. Very nice.

The third game in the Rotation, Savage Worlds, is still shy a few players, but as you cannot find the core rulebook in print, and only one of the three settings I want to play (a rotation inside the Rotation) are currently in print, I am not in a huge hurry to get it rolling. It will be my least accessory intensive game, because while I am an admitted tactical combat junkie, with maps and all the minis, I recently decided my SW games were going to be the true palate cleanser for me and my players - theater of the mind, beer and pretzels, sitting on the couch instead of at a table, and just enjoying a relaxing game once a month. Yes, I am sticking with 15mm miniatures and and my patented (okay, stolen idea) grid under plexiglass map for both D&D and CPRed, I already have some wonderful minis (body bags!!!) and found so many more out there. I wish I was a better mini painter as there are so many fantastic sculpts out there that deserve better attention than what I can give them.

I almost have everything ready. Binders are almost done - I splurge and get 3- ring binders for each player and fill it with handy info, character sheets, blank paper for note taking, even graph paper for mapping out those dungeons (I am an admitted old school kind of DM) or abandoned warehouses deep in the combat zone - got most of the minis I need for the first session ready, I am tidying up a few other details... running RPG campaigns is as hard as a real job. But here we are, not too long now and I will be back to describing musty holes in the ground and slinging duce. This is the fun stuff.

Cyberpunk Red in 15mm

Why can I never do anything the easy way? Let me roll this back and start at the beginning. I started playing Cyberpunk 2020 back in the mid-90s. Even though it came out first, FASA's advertising budget was much bigger thanks to its successful BattleTech franchise, and so I had been dabbling around with Shadowrun for a few years before I finally found CP2020. Remember, the internet was not a thing back in the 1980s and so you had to learn about new games through these things called magazines or advertisements sent to your FLGS (friendly local game store). What you may not realize about my childhood is that I grew up in southeastern New Mexico, literally in the Chihuahuan Desert, which was pretty far away from any other population centers. We did not have an FLGS until just before I left, and it was more of a comic book store than a gaming store, so I never really realized that was where I needed to go to discover new games to play. Okay, we did have a Hastings bookstore, but as they only ever carried D&D products, from what I remember, I do not count them. Then I moved to an even tinier town in western Missouri (seriously, there was less people in the entire county than the city in New Mexico we moved from) which, while it was closer to larger population centers than before, might as well have been on the dark side of the Moon when it came to RPGs and tabletop wargames as it was still deep in the grip of the Satanic Panic. And still no internet. Except for D&D, I literally brought with me every RPG or tabletop wargame that town had ever seen up to that point when I moved in from New Mexico. 

Suffice it to say, I truly did not run into Cyberpunk 2020 until at least 1995. Do not mistake my preference for CP2020 over Shadowrun as a hatred or dislike of Shadowrun, merely a preference for Master Pondsmith's work. Shadowrun has some interesting ideas, some I would definitely like to see in CPRed, but otherwise I could do without the medieval fantasy elements mixed in with the dystopic sci-fi elements. Anyway, I started playing Cyberpunk in 1995 and we were broke college students, so "theater of the mind" was how we played pretty much all of our tabletop RPGs. But here we are, several decades later, and I am all grown up with a big boy's job and paycheck, and I can finally afford the miniatures I have always wanted. Not to mention that due to R Talsorian Games's partnership with CD Projekt Red and releasing CPRed at the same time Cyberpunk 2077 came out, there are more than a few companies suddenly making and selling Cyberpunk-specific minis, but in 28mm scale because that is what the majority of folks prefer. There has not been a better time to be playing a Cyberpunk tabletop RPG, but here I am ruining it for myself because I just "gotta be different". 

As has already been revealed by the title of this post, I have chosen to portray my CPRed tactical combats with 15mm miniatures. Why? Okay, usually us nerds sharing our hobbies on the internet with the Great Uncaring Masses would spend the next paragraph trying to convince you that my decision is obviously and logically the one true way, and everyone who is not doing it this way (for example: doing it the way everyone else is already doing and has been for at least three decades) is utterly, horribly wrong. But I am going to be honest, merely telling you I am going with 15mm minis in my upcoming CPRed (and Dungeons & Dragons and Savage Worlds) game because I want to, as I like being different. I think there may be a psychologic tic that I have that I just "gotta be different!" but I am not seeing a medical professional about any mental defects I may or may not have, so I cannot say for sure. Do not mistake me, I have a laundry list of reasons why I landed on 15mm minis - they are easier to store more of because they are smaller; they are cheaper and easier to buy more of, because they are smaller; the battlefields are automatically bigger; and let us be completely honest, my miniature painting skills are laughable so I do not have to make these Golden Demon entrants, just get some paint on them to make them a little more visually appealing, which is easier to do because, again, smaller - but I came up with those reasons AFTER I had already decided to switch scales, and not I decided to switch because I recognized those attributes. So why not 10mm? Or 6mm, 3mm, or even the miniscule 2mm scale miniatures? Why 15mm? And I am not making those scales up, there are companies making miniatures at those sizes.

Quick primer on scale sizes, without going too far into the weeds - the metric scale sizes (28mm, 15mm, 10mm, etc) are the measure of a 6' tall person with normal human features, measuring from the bottom of their feet to the middle of their eyeline. So the bigger the number is, the bigger the miniature is. And remember, it is in millimeters, which it takes a little over 25 millimeters to make one US/British Imperial/why are we still using this stone age measuring system? inch. If that last comment made your blood boil, answer me this without Googling it - how many feet are in a mile? I admit I have to double check myself because it is so easy to swap the digit order in the answer to that question. Now, how many meters in a kilometer? Here is a hint - the "kilo" in "kilometer" means one thousand!!!

Digression over with, back to the party - so why did I go with 15mm? Most of my reasons seem to tout lack of size as being advantageous over 28mm, why not go even smaller than half scale? And yes, 15mm is "roughly" half the size of 28mm, as most model makers tend to make their "heroic" 28mm scale models in 30mm or 32mm scale. There has been a lot of swelling going on over in miniature land, and not even 15mm is immune from it, most of the miniatures I have sourced so far are a bit bigger than I expected them to be. So half the size of the commonly used 28mm, so everything (the measurements you use on the table, if you measure rather than use grids; or the grids themselves if you do use grids; the terrain I 3d print to use on my table; etc) is just scaled down 50% of the original. If I went 10mm, everything would have be roughly a third the size of the original, and have you ever tried dividing by 3? Lots of repeating decimal points roaming around. 6mm is one-fifth the size of 28mm, which is easy on the math but is screamingly tiny, and 3mm and 2mm even more so. I may like smaller models as they are easier to paint, but there is a point where it flips from "easy" to "painful". 6mm scale miniatures are at that point of pain, and I just do not want to pull out the giant stand magnifier every time I want to slap some paint on a mini. Plus, the further you get away from the popular 28mm scale, the fewer options you have for your various games. Buying minis for D&D is easy, medieval fantasy is one of the biggest, most popular genres out there, so those are available no matter what scale I settled on, but I am also starting up cyberpunk (which is a blend of modern, sci-fi, and dystopic wasteland genres and themes), a modern theme game, a caped super heroes game, and a cowboy/Wild West game. Not a lot of options once you step outside of 28mm or 15mm land. If I had just settled for "normal" and went with 28mm, the sky would literally be the limit, as in I could have piled all of the minis I could use in that scale into one big pile and it would reach into the sky. The selection for 15mm is noticeably smaller, and 10mm is noticeably smaller than 15mm's selection, and on down the line. 15mm scale miniatures sit at that sweet spot for me of "smaller than 28mm" but still "having enough range to choose from". As in, I do not want to proxy EVERYTHING on the table. Some things I will have to find convincing stand-ins, but for a solid 75% or more of what I could possibly have my players run into in all of the above games, which makes 15mm the winner in my book.

All of that out of the way, if you too are thinking you want to go with smaller miniatures, here are some manufacturers I have found so you do not have to go deep diving the internet on your own search. Remember, this article is centered on Cyberpunk Red, and while I have mentioned the other games and genres I am playing in, most of what I am about to share is for CPRed and not the others. The other thing to keep in mind is that I live in the continental United States, so I tend to stick to US suppliers and manufacturers, even though there is greater variety in the UK/European manufacturers of smaller miniatures. Rebel Minis has an excellent selection of modern and sci-fi minis, as well as a decent variety of fantasy, but their fantasy line is more aimed at their tabletop wargame, Mighty Armies, and less on fantasy RPGs. Splintered Light is my go to for fantasy, as they focus heavily on that genre and especially for tabletop RPGs, and they also have an extensive medieval historical line. Khurasan Miniatures has a wide range of sci-fi and fantasy figures and vehicles, but is more boutique in nature rather than bulk offerings. Their website is not the best, so expect to do a lot of digging, but there are diamonds to be found there, if you spend the time. Clear Horizons is a newer shop in the US, and they do not have much, but what they do have, all sci-fi themed, is very impressive. Darkest Star is another small shop focusing on sci-fi minis. Old Glory is the last of the American domestic mini makers I am sharing, and while they mostly have have historical figures (including Wild West and Civil War figs, which will come in handy) they also have horror and superhero lines, which will make an appearance on my table at some point. Outside the US there are many different makers in this scale, which I am not going to type out a comprehensive list, but I will share Alternative Armies specifically because they have some cool pieces that are utterly necessary for a CPRed game, as I will share with you shortly. Let me encourage you, if you are in the States, and you can only find what you are looking for in Europe/UK, browse their entire catalog and make the international shipping a lot more palatable with a big order. Global commerce should not be discounted lightly.

The first thing when I am acquiring miniatures is what are the players going to want to represent their characters? Yes, I encourage my players to buy their own minis, but I still like to have a decent range available for them to pick from the first couple of sessions they play, see if they like the game enough to want to invest in a miniature they like better. For CPRed, that means futuristic or modern weapons and cyberware, with a few exceptions - most modern and sci-fi military and law enforcement will fill the majority of your typical CPRed roles, as they have plenty of big guns and modern/sci-fi helmets and body armor, and if they are not exactly sculpted to have cyberware, you can fix that by splashing silver metallic paint on a limb or otherwise exposed patch of skin, bam, instant cyberlimb. Especially at 15mm and smaller, this becomes easier than trying to find someone with sculpted cyberware, but still looks convincing. Here is what I am looking for in each of the different roles.

SOLO: The easiest of the bunch, get big guns or lots of guns, lots of body armor, lots of cyberware, or you could even go old school and make sure they have a katana, sheathed or in their hand ready to swing. A lot of modern military folks with helmets and goggles and full size rifles and body armor work great for Solos, like these Special Forces troops from Rebel Minis. If you want more personality there are two options here from Khurasan - the Hero and Resistance Leader have two good minis, but I like the guy in the armor but would still have use for the lady with the pistol; and the Teacup Tornado is a good option for those playing female Solos, and I think the back support is a katana. Sci-fi troopers also work well, like these Earth Force Marines or any of the figures from the Khurasan Forever Wars range.

TECH/MEDTECH: Pretty much like a Solo, but less focus on big weapons, in modern military lines look for medics and radio operators (also designated RTO), and techs or technicians in the sci-fi lines. Medtechs are easy to make from military models, simply pick a pack they are carrying, paint it white, and then paint a red cross on it, bam, instant Medtech. Yes, modern military medics are armed, only the chaplains are allowed to be non-combatants and not carry/be trained on a personal weapon. Unfortunately, Games Workshop does not make their tech priests in 15mm scale, as it would be very easy to steal their back-mounted helper claws to put on your own mini to make an instant Tech. It helps if they have goggles of some kind and lots of antennas, which you can make from toothbrush bristles and black dye or paint.

LAWMAN: Almost as easy as Solos, as you can basically use the same miniatures, just change your color pallet from green/camo tones to more blue/gray ones. If you are looking for specific LEO (law enforcement officers), go for SWAT models in the modern lines instead of police miniatures, as the SWAT minis have the guns and armor your average Lawman would be wearing in the Time of the Red. Rebel Minis has two separate sets of SWAT police (here and here), and a set of police in riot gear, if you are looking for shields and batons. 

FIXER: This one is both easy and hard - hard because there are so many different types of Fixers out there (hands-on/hands-off, young and spry/old and fat, armed/unarmed) that I cannot really pin down one style for you, you have to find it on your own. However, because of that variety, whatever you pick to be your Fixer, pretty much will fit in well with the CPRed setting. I like these Gun Clerics from Rebel Mini's sci-fi line, but you could go with one of the minis from Rebel's Civilian Hunters pack, as long as it fits what you envision for your Fixer. Lots of options out there.

EXEC: To me, an Exec calls for a suit and a tie. Rebel Minis has their Men-in-Black line, and Khurasan has their Paranormal BI Agents, which you can see here. Or maybe your Exec could never be bothered to carry an actual firearm, how bourgeois! Try out these Modern Civilians. But again, like the Fixer, what does your Exec look like. Make sure to browse all the miniatures of your domestic manufacturer and see what strikes your fancy.

NOMAD: The whole time I have been playing Cyberpunk 2020 and now Red, when I think Nomad I see Mad Max in my head - lots of leather, buckles and spikes, and improvised weaponry. Look for anything with "post-apocalypse" or "bikers" in the title, and you will be 90% of the way to finding your perfect Nomad. And if your Nomad has a motorcycle, there are a few minis on and off bikes out there as well.

MEDIA: This is where the options, at least in the States, start getting slim, but both Rebel Minis and Khurasan have options for you, Rebel Minis with a News Crew and Robber (I am unsure why this includes a robber mini, but you can always use it for rando in the background or gang member), and Khurasan has a sci-fi Info-Corp News Team and Federal Officials (seen here). You can see what they have in common - someone with a video camera, and someone else with a microphone. You can do a Media without a mic or a vidcam, but this is the classic option for me.

ROCKERBOY: This is where I thought my plans would come to a screeching halt. For the life of me, I could not, COULD NOT, bring enough Google-fu to bear to locate a suitable Rockerboy/grrl mini. So I asked the 15mm sci-fi tabletop folks over on Facebook, and sure enough, Alternative Armies, a UK mini maker, has an appropriate offering. You just have to make sure to search for "entertainers". 

NETRUNNER: Like Rockerboy above, this was another big problem. None of the US manufacturers had any miniatures carrying what looked like a keyboard, a cyberdeck, a computer, anything like that. While I was building an order with Alternative Armies for my Rockerboy/grrl minis I ran across a set of sci-fi minis that one of them was crouched over what looks like a keyboard, and they even look like they have some cyberware built into the sculpt. 

I am so very thankful there are enough talented folks out there doing the strange, esoteric sculpts that I could find Rockerboy and Netrunner minis. If I had no options at all for two whole roles, I would have probably given up on the whole project and just stuck with 28mm scale minis. Oh, one bonus of having to go with Alternative Armies - because they are in the UK, I was not going to just order those two packs of figs and call it good. Since I was ordering from them anyway, I scoured their site for anything else that would be useful, to justify the shipping costs if nothing else. In addition to some sci-fi cars and motorcycles and bunches of good sci-fi random folks, I also located something I would have never thought to look for, but now cannot imagine running a modern or futuristic game without - body bags. Yep, body bags. Admit it, for half a second you could not believe I was excited by body bags, and then you just pictured putting a couple down on the table in your game, to create a morgue, a crime scene, an atrocity of war, a cannibal's storage locker, the rejects at the cloning lab... the uses for these just go on and on. I am using these in as many games as I can, they just became my most favorite miniatures in the collection. And I also got good cultists from AA, you know, robes, cowls, very creepy cultists who should be yelling strange languages at the top of their lungs to summon an Elder God or something, those cultists. For CPRed, they will be Inquisitors. For other modern day games, they will be cultists, which is good, because at least one of my Savage Worlds settings needs cultists as bad guys. 

Vehicles are another area I focus on. A good CPRed game has gun fights in the streets. A great CPRed game has gunfights on top of a long haul dirigible, while a pack of scavengers and Raffen Shiv drive Mad Max-inspired vehicles screaming after them across the hard pan below. For 28mm scale games, you can easily use Hot Wheels and Matchbox die cast cars - the scales do mot match, but they are close enough that it does not matter. However, for 15mm, there are plenty of same scale options out there, both in modern-ish vehicles and sci-fi ones. Rebel Minis has their MATV Apache, that is basically a lightly touched with the sci-fi brush version of the US Army's HMMWV, as well as the MATV Commanche, and again, just a version of the US Army's JLTV, which is the successor to the venerable HMMWV. In fact, they are so lightly brushed with sci-fi-ness (I am unsure if that is a word, but work with me here) that I am going to use the Apaches where I would use a modern HMMWV in my modern Savage Worlds setting. The big problem with all vehicles is that most of the available stock from the wargame/RPG manufacturers are military vehicles, whether it is sci-fi or modern, they are covered in guns and armor. Which is cool, when you need that stuff, it is available. However, if you want just basic, civilian vehicles, your options are pretty much find a 3d printable file and scale it appropriately (if it is 28mm scale, 50% works pretty good), or search for non-copywrite infringing 1:100 scale models of civilian vehicles for miniature dioramas or model trains. Yes, they do not look like real vehicles (they would infringe on someone's copywrite if they did, and if you think I am joking, you have not been paying attention), but vaguely like real vehicles, which is actually good. Because they do not look like real vehicles, but vaguely like modern vehicles so your players think they are sci-fi/futuristic. You can also remove their shells and paint them in crazy, dystopic futuristic paint schemes, like you were making a Gaslands fleet, just to further enforce that this is not the world as we know it. There are a bunch of sci-fi and modern motorcycle minis out there, which is the other major vehicle in the grimdark future of CPRed. Aerodyne Vehicles (or AVs) were very big in CP2020, but in CPRed, they are not as prevalent. However, they are so iconic of the setting that I am still happy that I found a decent mini to stand in for the venerable AV-4, which is the dystopic's future version of the minivan - it is not swoopy or sexy, it is very blocky, very weapons-free, and very utilitarian. Clear Horizon has their Universal Shipping and Heavy Industry (USHI) Transport, and it is almost, ALMOST, exactly how the AV-4 has been pictured in the rulebooks since the 1980s. Sure, there are plenty other armed military VTOLs out there in the 15mm sci-fi realm, but you only need a few of those and it is doubtful you will have to use them very regularly. Or maybe you will run that type of game and you will need lots of them, all the time. Plenty of options out there for you to choose from. 

Terrain is the last thing I have been thinking about, mostly because I play almost all of my tabletop RPGs on a grid. I am going to do 1/2" vs 1" for 15mm scale, which is not necessarily something you have to do, but I want to so I can get bigger areas, especially for CPRed and modern/futuristic gun battles. Yes, most gun battles happen in less than seven yards, but come on, I want some of the longer ranges to be an option for my players and NPCs. I do not think that I will be able to put 800 meters worth of range on a normal gaming table (if each half-inch grid square is 1 meter, 800 meters is 400 inches, or 33 and a third feet... even if I turned that to each grid square being 2 meters, that is 200 inches, or 16 and two-thirds feet, a little much for most tables that are usually only six to ten feet long), but I can get somewhere in the neighborhood of 100 to 200 meters down the long axis of the table space available. If you could not tell, I do plan on playing tactically with miniatures and a grid. I currently use a chunk of Plexiglas over a grid (tape some pieces of cheap poster board together, and grid it yourself with a long, straight ruler and a Sharpie marker) and dry/wet erase markers on the Plexiglas to give vague outlines of what the players are facing. I am torn on if I want to go ahead and upgrade to fancy vinyl mats, but I really want to upgrade the table itself to one of those fancy gaming tables (covered, dropped gaming surface; USB charging ports; cup holders and book shelves for the perimeter; and Plexiglas gaming surface), I just do not have the space for one currently. Or, honestly, the money. I could afford it, I would also have to be able to use it to commute back and forth to work, five days a week. So for now, a slab of Plexi, some gridded poster board behind it, lots and lots of wet/dry erase markers, and 3d printed terrain. Is there any good cyberpunk-themed 3d printer files out there? I literally cannot put enough links in one spot to just the free stuff, much less the volumes of pay for files. Thingiverse has some really nice Collections of cyberpunk themed stuff, but those are curated by the users, so depending on whose stuff you are looking at, your mileage may vary. 

Now I am going to talk about something hardly anyone wants to talk about when it comes to miniatures - storage. We all have to deal with with it, but none of us wants to talk about it - if you have miniatures, where do you keep them in between games? Okay, so you leave them out on the table, you obviously do not have cats or children or anyone else living in the same space as you do, but do you seriously keep ALL of your miniatures on the table in between each game? Do you use all of your miniatures every game? Unfortunately, I cannot do that, as I have a wife, and daughter, and three cats, and more miniatures than I can use in one game (and multiple genres, to boot). Many other players and GMs out there cannot do that. What I have done in the past, especially with all my printed out and coined A Monster for Every Season monsters and NPCs was to use half-gallon and gallon-sized Ziploc bags and a storage cube with fabric holders. Yes, I needed that much space, because, well, see for yourself.

That above, by the way, is four sets out of six. I did print up and coin set number five, and I purchased the sixth set (and will do so for any other sets Master Burlew puts out, because I thoroughly enjoy his work) but have not printed them up yet. I kept all of those in a 9-cubby cube storage shelf with fabric bins (you know what I am talking about, they have become popular in recent years, the shelves have 1-foot cube openings, come in a variety of flavors - 1, 2x2, 3x3, 2x3, 2x4, etc - and the soft little bins that go in the cubbies come in wide range of colors and patterns) and that works for light weight paper and some coins. Yes, as I am transitioning from 28mm to 15mm scale, I am getting rid of the paper cutouts, but I am not just going to recycle them, I plan on donating them and my 28mm 3d printed terrain to a local high school's RPG club. My daughter will be attending there soon enough, maybe I can convince her to join, but I am trying to let her live her own life and decide what hobbies she wants to pursue (at the moment, it is watching YouTube videos and playing Minecraft and Among Us). I plan on keeping the shelf, and using the cloth storage bins until they fall apart, but fall apart they will, because while the 15mm miniatures I am switching to are smaller (so I can get more of them in the same space), they are mostly metal miniatures and therefore much heavier than the paper cutouts. When the bins (and eventually the cube shelf itself, as it is just cheap particle board, not real wood) die on me, I am already working on sourcing plastic replacement bins and I have already been working on upping my carpentry tools and game to add more shelving into our home, anyway. Also, since I will have to paint these minis, I do not just want to throw them into a Ziploc bag and plunk them into a bin to rattle around and rub off whatever level of paint job I give to them. I may be a crappy mini painter, but I do not want to see that work, however poor, wasted. I foresee an investment in many sheets of pluck foam in the near future. Yes, a sheet of cardboard for the base and to be a separator between the layers, and the foam glued to it, that is my plan for now.

That is going to be my bulk storage plan, but for the special minis, like all of the PC minis for each of my games, I have another option. I backed this Kickstarter (well, multiple ones, really) for a product called Wallhalla. Wallhalla is a portmanteau of "wall" and "Valhalla", an ode to your special miniatures sitting on the wall in their own Valhalla, and it is a series of interlocking, 3d printable display pieces you can mount on your wall or other flat surface. And it gives a cool diorama effect, so you are not just storing your miniatures, you are displaying them. Yes, again, this is meant for 28mm scale minis with 1" round bases, so I am again scaling them to 50% and seeing how that works. Maybe 51% to give just a little extra room. 

There are many other options out there for you folks who want to keep your collection mobile - I will be GM'ing my games from home and do not plan on travelling with the entire collection, ever, and only with small portions of it rarely - you just have to realize that most of the options out there are for 28mm figures and not 15mm. However, a popular scale for wargaming miniatures is 15mm, so go past the RPG specific trays and bags, and go to the wargaming section. Tons of bags and foam tray systems out there for your needs.

That is pretty much my plan for CPRed minis, as well as D&D and Savage Worlds, with minis and 3d printed terrain appropriate for every setting, using pieces across genres where appropriate. One special project for D&D is in the works, as I do plan on making one small set of minis, 3d printed terrain bits, and paper grids into a portable kit so I can inflict, er, take my favorite intro adventure on vacation with me. Yes, vacation. Oh sure, I would be willing to take it to a public setting and use it to teach folks how to play here locally, but I have this other crazy idea that will probably never happen. See, Thanksgiving is big in my family. Yes, it is big in a lot of American households, but my family, being not terribly religious anymore because of reasons (trust me, the story behind that is a soap opera unto itself), we really do not celebrate Christmas as much as we celebrate Thanksgiving. I have one living aunt still left, and her family and my family love playing all kinds of board and card games while we are at her house for Thanksgiving. I would love to get them to sit down, push minis around the table, and roll some dice. It will probably never happen, but since I am working on creating the majority of this anyway, I will go ahead and do the rest and bring it with me for this year's Thanksgiving. You never know.

That is it for now, I hope this article was informative and entertaining, whether you plan on joining me in my glory/lunacy (it could go either way, let us be honest) or sticking with how you are playing the game right now. Either way, get out there and roll some dice, have some fun, and share the stories with the rest of us.

Starting a New RPG Campaign

I am looking at starting up three separate campaigns in the near future, and wanted to share my process. This may work for you, this may not, just understand that if this process does not work for you that does not mean I am wrong, nor does it mean you are wrong. But maybe something you see in here will help you, or strike a bit of inspiration. Whatever works for you and your group is the important part. 

Starting a new RPG campaign for me starts with the rules and the setting. What rules do I want to play with? And yes, it does matter, as there are some rules out there that are just... ugh. Like Palladium's Rifts - do not mistake me, I love the Rifts setting, the history, the lore, but cannot bring myself to play it because the rules are way too complicated. And while I love the setting, the power creep that was in every successive Rifts book was way out of control. While there are a bunch of folks out there who will claim every set of RPG rules is equal, they are completely wrong. Does that mean you should ignore all of the rules that I do not like? Only play the rules that I do like? No. Rifts does not work for me, and these others that I am about to talk about do, but that does not mean Rifts cannot work for you, or that these other systems will absolutely work for you. You have to be willing to peruse rules that are out there, give them a try, and see for yourself if they do or do not work for you. So, rules - obviously Dungeons & Dragons 5th Edition, as my last 5e campaign died a while back and I need to start a new one, at some point, and with the new Eberron book just taunting me with all the tasty lore, I know what particular D&D setting I want to run; I have talked a bit about Cyberpunk Red since it came out (before it came out, to be honest), and I really want to throw some cyberpsychos, some corporate security types, and maybe even some plague-ridden puppies (thank you, Uncle Mike) at a bunch of edgerunners and see how they handle it; and a new interest, Savage Worlds universal role-playing system. The others I have talked about, because the internet needs another old gamer grumbling about the good old games that never were, but Savage Worlds is not quite as new an interest of mine as I mentioned, I have actually been thinking about using that ruleset for a little project of mine for more than a few years. That project, well, I will save that for later, but I have a new interest that uses the Savage Worlds rules - Monster Hunter International. Yep, an RPG based on a bubblegum pop series of action/adventure novels. What can I say, I am a fan of the novels and, well, I will talk about the idea I had for the game in just a bit.

What story do I want to tell? That is the usual thing you see from those aspiring creative types, trying to convince themselves and the world they are five seconds away from writing that next great Lord of the Rings style epic, but for me, asking this question is simpler. For D&D and specifically Eberron, the story I want to tell is Indiana Jones with magic, swords, and airships. Trips into the Mournland to retrieve ancient artifacts, discussions with warforged on what the meaning of life is, chasing rivals across the air bridges and passages of Sharn. What pieces of fiction have I seen or read lately that feel like this? Red Notice on Netflix, that heist kind of movie (it was okay, but not worth getting Netflx just to watch) with the humor and the action beats. For Savage Worlds and Monster Hunter International, the books the world setting is based on are what I want to emulate - hunting monsters, getting paid lots of money from the government (you have to be familiar with MHI, it makes sense), and generally trying to fight the forces of evil while retaining what sanity PTSD allows. For Cyberpunk Red (CPRed), it is shows like Altered Carbon (at least the first season, which is worth getting Netflix for) and movies like Johnny Mnemonic and Blade Runner 2049, and books like Neuromancer by William Gibson and Altered Carbon by Richard Morgan (the book series is excellent, if you like the show, read the books). But for story, just surviving in Night City after the Time of the Red is usually enough. Or maybe I want to visit my old CP2020 playground and take the edgerunners to Kansas City in 2045. Story wise, a bunch of street rats trying to accomplish edgeruns just so they can pay the bills, get that next meal, pay for their flop, and maybe get some new cyberware. 

Okay, so I have an idea of what rules I want to play, what worlds and settings I want to play in, and a "story" (theme, really) I want to tell. What else do I want to throw in on top of this? Do I want to play in real life or virtually? IRL is my choice, but could I go virtual in case this global pandemic springs back up? Yes, but seriously folks, go get vaccinated for COVID (and all the rest of your vaccines updated, in case you have not had a chance to get them updated in a bit while you are at it), and quit making it about politics. *feh* So, IRL, which then begs the question of logistics, something near and dear to my former military heart (amateurs talk tactics, professionals talk logistics). Which books do I need to run these games? What books do the players need? As you probably well know, I like using miniatures and a grid under plexiglass for my tactical combats, am I using that for this? For my three games, I need the classic D&D DM books - PHB, DMG, MM, XGtE, TCoE, and then the base Eberron: Rising from the Last War book. Do I need anything beyond those? At this point, no, but I am always on the lookout for new things to toss into the mix of my D&D games. Can I use Matt Colville's Strongholds & Followers or Kingdoms & Warfare in this campaign? I have not had an excuse to pick up Fizban's Treasury of Dragons, do I need to acquire it? These are all things I am thinking of as I type out the campaign document (more on this in a bit). As for the players, they will need their own copy of the PHB (I require my players to have a physical copy, D&D Beyond is neat and all, but hard to quickly find the info you want, and electronic devices are flaky at the best of times) and E:RftLW, plus any other supplement (specifically XGtE and TCoE) they want to use classes, subclasses, spells, equipment, whatever. CPRed is easier, mostly because there is basically the core rulebook available. R Talsorian Games does have a new book that just got published, and I will grab that shortly, but I doubt my players will need it, just the core book. RTG has been teasing a Chrome book for CPRed (the Chrome series were where all the fancy gear for CP2020 that did not show up in the core book appeared) but with the pandemic (GET VACCINATED! GET A JOB!) the whole dead tree publishing industry is in slow down mode, so no telling when Chrome will be out. For now, then, CPRed core rulebooks for everyone. Savage Worlds is also easy - Savage Worlds Adventure Edition (SWADE, the latest edition of the Savage Worlds rules) and the MHI world book for myself, and both for the players, but not at first. Why? The nature of the game - I want to gather a group of five players who are interested in playing SWADE and a modern action/adventure setting, and then run an intro game, sight unseen. One of the cool things I like about the MHI books and world setting is that most folks who get into the monster hunting business do so because they were attacked, as the governments of the world keep the existence of monsters a secret from the populace at large. I want to do that for the players, give them some pregenerated characters and then spring a monster attack on them, to introduce the world and the rules to the players. After the intro, if the players want to continue playing MHI, they can pick up SWADE and the MHI book, even create new characters or keep the pregens, but this one I want to be a surprise.

Miniatures. For the longest time in my D&D 5e campaign, this was yes or no question, a set schedule of supplies that I would divide out the necessary ones from the pool, ready for that session, rinse and repeat. But now I have to be difficult and different and change everything up - for all three games, I am going to 15mm scale. Practically half the size of the traditional 28mm (which has been known to stretch all the way to 32mm scale, depending on the sculptor), 15mm is smaller and less expensive, and your battle grids automatically double in size. I am already working on 3d printed terrain to place atop the grid, and have begun collecting minis. Yes, I know, I have built up quite a collection of paper standees and 3d printed terrain for my 28mm game, and I do feel a bit guilty for setting all of that aside to switch my whole operation to a different scale, but I have a tentative plan to get some use out of those in a different project. Anyway, I am still making the jump. Why? I like big, sprawling battle fields with lots of room to maneuver, plenty of bad guys out there to deal with, and I could care less about looking fantastic on the gaming table. Yes, the downside of smaller miniatures is you do not get as good looking a paintjob as you do with bigger minis, but painting minis is my least favorite portion of the hobby, and I would gladly play with bare metal and plastic minis for the rest of my days, so I am not disappointed by that downside. One of the bonuses is that, since I do not have a lot of minis or 3d prints for modern or sci-fi cyberpunk settings, I am not really replacing a bunch of stuff for two of my three games. And the another bonus is that a few of the models I am getting for MHI work for D&D, and some others work for CPRed. Hey, I try to be efficient, especially when I luck into it on accident.

While all of the above is going on, because let me be honest, all of the above is happening at the same time, odd thoughts rumbling through my head at all hours of the day and night, this is not a process I can provide a Standard Operating Procedure (SOP, and yes, the Army really does write them for EVERYTHING) for, it just kind of happens. Anyway, once enough of the above has happened, I create a Google folder in my Google Drive for the game I am thinking about playing and a folder inside the first folder that is where I will toss all the things I am going to provide to my players. Why Google Drive and Docs? Many folks have smart phones and some internet access (and I spend enough on a monthly basis for my own 'net access that I provide my players with my wifi password, so they at least have internet when they are at my house for the game session) and can access Google Drive. Is that the best option out there? For me, yes, well, maybe. I do have an Obsidian Portal account, and I have long toyed with the idea of actually using it as it was intended, but even with my last campaign that lasted most of three years long, I do not trust that I can get players (or even stick with, myself) who can last in a campaign long enough that OP would get properly used, even the basic free version. If you are looking for a Wiki-style campaign management tool, that you can share with your party and they can submit articles and notes and maps and images to, OP is pretty good and one of the first of these aimed specifically at TTRPGs to come out. But I do not use it, because I can barely get players to show up to sessions on time and regularly, and OP is definitely for those whose gaming groups are very invested in the campaign. No, I am not bitter at all, why would you ask that? I have also used Facebook, by creating a private Group and inviting all of the members into the Group, and that is how I organize my Team Yankee in 6mm Escalation League, which you may read about more here on my internet journal (I hate the word blog... hate it, hate it, hate hate hate it). But FB is good as it does provide a communication channel, somewhere to post announcements, great for scheduling sessions, but not so good at sharing documents that multiple people can work on collaboratively. For my RPG campaigns where the sessions are held at my house, I like having the file sharing that Google Drive provides more than the scheduling and communications that FB offers, but nothing saying I cannot combine them together and use both. Back from the detour, I create a Google Doc (specifically a Sheet, which is a word processing document) and start typing all the information I want to pass to the players in the document - this is the world, here is the rules we are using, here are the classes and races you can use, here are the books that are acceptable to use stuff out of, that sort of thing. And much like this post, I just start typing whatever comes to my brain first, total stream of consciousness type of info dump. Before I share this document with any players, I for sure go through and sort everything out into sections, and give it a very real editing pass, actually several passes like I was planning on putting this out for the public at large to view, and I am updating this document throughout the campaign and discussing those changes with my players whenever I do them. Also into this folder goes anything I think the players will need - if I am allowing a certain Unearthed Arcana from WotC, in it goes, but mostly maps and any other computer file I think the party can use. That is all in the players' folder, and in the primary folder, the one that does not get shared with the players, goes all my notes and files that I think I will need for the game - a main document where I type in any notes, or if I am using a pregenerated campaign, my conversion of that campaign, plus anything else I might need, like digital copies of the rules and campaign so I can review them anytime I have a thought about the campaign.

Next I start looking for players. I post on local Facebook Groups, local gaming store internet LFG/LFP forums, and even just talking to old players to see if they are interested or know someone who is looking.  At least, that is what I try to do, there are so many ways to get players out there these days - Reddit has an entire sub dedicated to locating groups and players; there is an app called GameFor (at least there was, then the COVID hit, and they still have not turned it back on) (again, GET VACCINATED!!) that was, as the Penny Arcade guys portrayed it, like AirBnB except for D&D (which I think we have needed since PA posted that comic, over six years ago); and I am sure there are more options out there that I, as a crotchety old bastard, do not know about. Did we have these when I was a younger man and wanted to get into more games? No, we were lucky if we had friends who played or were close enough to a gaming store that we could check out their cork board, and that was all the choices we had. Even after the internet came out in 1994, it was a long time before anyone was organized enough to make it easier to find games and people to play them with. So I hope you young 'uns appreciate the slog we had a mere two decades ago and before, so you could be enjoying finding players and games with all of these tools today. Why go through all of the trouble, why not just ask my current group if they want to play a new game or games? If your current group of players is up for it, then you can skip the party creation stage, but as it sits right now, I cannot do that. You see, besides some guys who show up once a month to push tiny tanks around a table, I do not have a current gaming group. And no, my last party did not stop because they lost interest in the game, but because everyone in the group had such wildly divergent schedules that it was good the game or kick half the group out to be replaced (and I was not going to play favorites and choose which half to keep and which half to say goodbye to, so we stopped altogether).

Which brings me to a related item I am cogitating on - when and where will we play? I am, by dint of the sweat on my brow, a homeowner so I tend to run my games out of my home, but you may not be that far along in your life journey and do not have enough room in your living space to have the size of party you want. If that is the case, start making plans on where you can play. I have thought on this a bit, and I do have some options to share with you. Local gaming stores are an option, but do they charge a fee for the space that your group can afford (and is willing to pay), and do they have an opening in their schedule that matches up with your schedule? How about your local library, do they have meeting rooms available to use? Does the group have a local restaurant that they like that does not see a lot of business the night your party meets, and would they mind having a regular group in, as long as you do not disturb the other customers and you get all your food and drink there and leave an extra big tip? Does anyone in the group belong to or work for an organization (school, charitable organization like the Elks or VFW, even a church) that has unused meeting space the party could use? My dad was a minister for most of my life, and I had a key to one of the churches he ministered, and it was empty most afternoons and evenings (though this was still during the Satanic Panic, that would have been fun explaining what we were doing in the church after hours). One of my local geek-centric groups that organizes over Facebook meets regularly at our local Mall's food court and plays board games. If you live somewhere that the weather is generally nice and you plan on playing Theater of the Mind instead of with minis, try a shelter at the local public park. There are tons of options out there, you just have to look around and not be afraid to ask (worst they can do is say "no"). Do not forget to define for yourself what times you want to be running this game. If you already have a group and a place to play, then you probably have a time as well, but if you do not have a time, remember that if the time is difficult for you, the game master, then it is not conducive for you to run that game for very long. Take into account your work schedule - unless you are charging your players (if you are, I am so jealous), gaming will not pay your bills, so make sure you still have a job. If some of your players cannot make the session time that works for you, you generally can find a replacement. Trust me, it is far better to set a session time that fits your schedule the best and then see who is available at that time. Yes, our players are generally our friends, but if you have to adjust just to make a small portion of the group happy, then no one will be happy (yes, even the one(s) you adjusted for will not be happy because it will spread from everyone else) and the group will fold prematurely. You want to make your friends happy and play games with them, but you are the one running the game - players can be replaced but the GM is harder (especially if the game is at their house). You are better off setting a schedule you can keep, with a bit of wiggle room to help those just on the edge of being fully able to play at your optimal time, instead of adjusting to try and meet a happy middle ground that just does not exist. Short term, some of your friends will be miffed, but overall your game(s) will last longer. This does not take into account if any of the players' or even your own schedule changes mid-campaign - that is going to happen and you have no control over it, and cannot even plan for it at this point in the process, all you can do is discuss with your players what will happen to the session schedule and the group when the question comes up, because either or both will have to change. 

That is about it, to be honest, but that is merely the beginning. Some of the things I dig deeply into you will barely have to skim, depending on what type of game you want to play, who is going to be in your group, and how long you plan on playing (each session and for the entirety of the campaign), while other aspects you will need to dive much deeper into than I did. Or not at all. Every game is different, and so is every group and every game master. Hopefully this helps someone out there. Keep rolling dice and having fun with your friends!