Again, I've got lots of info for this game, and it's another game with a real 'mood' about it, and can be played pretty much as an urban dungeon crawl, the characters employed to keep the streets clear of 'monsters'. But with big guns and a camera crew filming their successes. But first, a word from our sponsors.
Summary: What's SLA Industries? It's a role-playing game of extreme violence, cunning investigation, and corporate greed in the far future, with a simple game system, but the character creation and combat systems are very complex.
Sometime in the far future, the galaxy is at war, with every species fighting every other for supremacy - the Conflict Wars. Into that war comes an arms merchant named "Mr. Slayer" and his company, SLA Industries. He starts selling guns, then armor, then bioengineered soldiers (Stormers). Then, when everyone relied on his products, the guns stopped working, the power armor shut down, and the Stormers turned on their buyers, while Mr. Slayer's own forces took over. All but 7 species were eliminated: Humans, Frothers (Scots-based Humans who do too many drugs), Ebons (psychic weepy goths), their offshoot race, Brain Wasters (psychic heavy metal headbangers), Stormers (bioengineered soldiers, but fairly controlled and sane compared to most species), Shaktar (big lizards obsessed with honor), and Wraith Raiders (hunters from an ice planet).
The game is set in the city of Mort, on the planet Mort, capitol of SLA, 900 years after the Conflict Wars. Rain falls constantly on Mort (city) due to the pollution and inversion layers. A giant arcology in the center of the city that collapsed through the ground is now half (the underground half) inhabited by squatters, serial killers, Carriens (possibly the native species of Mort), cannibal pigs, and accountants. Vicious place, that.
The player characters are SLA Operatives, a cross between freelance FBI agents and professional athletes. Missions are offered on a contract basis through "Blueprint News Files" - essentially a Paranoia briefing (i.e., all lies) reduced to a 3x5 card. The ops carry out their mission, get hosed down, get paid, and go up in security clearance. They can call on the Shivers, civilian police/emergency services, for support, and subcontract with others if they need additional expertise, or indeed do whatever it takes to get the job done. As they go up in security clearance and reputation, they can get corporate sponsorships (with branches of SLA, naturally).
The Ops are often violent, immature, and not very effective law enforcement, but they're the only thing available, which can put a nice burden of responsibility on the players (or they may ignore it completely, which lets the GM have some cruel fun at their expense).
There are no classes, as such, but Operatives will have studied various 'training Packages', to give them specific skills - some based on combat, other based on technical skills and knowledge. As Ops, though, the characters have a very similar 'job' - it's most likely their race that makes them distinct as individuals.
Everyone else are SLA Employees, Shivers, unemployed, or they're terrorists working for the Rival Companies. SLA is the only legal company. All legal products and jobs are with SLA. The other companies, like Thresher (power-suited mercenaries), Dark Night (drugs, weapons, and media subversion), and Tek Trex (little combat robots), can only sell their products on the black market and try to rip down SLA Industries.
Later supplements introduces the chance to play as Contract Killers, basically psychopathic Gladiators, as seen on TV, who are paid to both fight each other for sake of entertaining the masses, and rid the streets of the usual serial killers and creatures escaped from the Cannibal sectors - and they're the sorts of people who enjoy doing such violent and life-threatening work.
Admitedly, it's not a happy world, but it's more like a futuristic Gotham City than a trek into mind-blasting Cthulhoid horror. And at the end of the day it's about getting good ratings, a promotion, fame and fortune...
Anyone interested?
dead
Played it before and would be interested in playing again. Depending on my other commitments. Its very good fun
simon
Looks like this will be a goer after Matt (of M&S) runs his Dragonlance seige scenario - too many people tied up in Paz's D&D to jump into Cthulhu or Unknown Armies. Orpheus is also an option, but since Ian has expressed some interest in (and experience of) SLA, I'm thinking this will probably kick off first. Besides, it's not got such a rigid metaplot story arc, so i can run one-off scenarios, kill off people here and there...
Having lots of resources I have a number of options available. I can run Convention style scenarios, ready with pre-generated characters to throw you in at the deepend - but then you might die before the end, or I could ease characters into the World of Progress and work them up to a nasty confontation.
Also you might want to choose between cool and flashy (lots of media attention, city-based adventures), or cold and gritty (slumming it downtown or in the cannibal sectors - or even off-planet).
Best thing I can do to plan ahead is get an idea of the sorts of characters people would like to play.
The main races are listed in the initial post - humans are the main race and society is based around their needs, and Frothers aren't far off, being a mutant strain of human dependant on drugs and culturally leaning towards kilt wearing clan berserkers. The two 'psychic' alien races are Ebons and their cynical violent cousins the Brainwasters, the closest you'll get to angels and demons in this world (except for the monsters they can ultimately become). Shaktar aren't a million miles away from Predators, but motivated by honour rather than sport, and Wraith Riders are maybe cats crossed with elves, and look like they're from some sort of Anime cartoon. Finally Stormers are genetically engineered soldiers, stupid, horrendous looking monsters but pretty damn tough.
Characters don't get classes, as such, but they get a Training Packages. These are the basic ones that will be available, and will suggest the sort of adventure the characters want to get wrapped up in:
Business Package – best for working the system
Death Squad Package – guns and tactics
Interrogation and Investigation Package – detective style skills
Kick Murder Squad Package – martial arts style combat
Mechanics Package – computers and machines
Medical Package – first aid and related sciences
Media Package – best for working the TV washing masses
Pilot and Navigation Package – driving multiple vehicles
Scouting Package – survival and surveilance
Strike Squad Package – standard soldier, some hand combat skills, some gun training, some vehicle experience
In short, pick a package, pick a race other than human if you're particularly intrigued by one, and I'll have an idea where to go from there.
simon
I can run a SLA Industries scenario where the characters are a unit on a war world, far away from the bright lights and corporate sponsorship of Mort. This would be a gritty one-off game, which hints at a fair bit of the game's metaplot - at the same time, war is pretty lethal, so there's no guarantee anyone's getting out alive.
If people are interested in that sort of thing I could run the adventure as a really nast intro to SLA, and then jump to the players playing Operatives in a relatively more comfortable setting the following week.
