Anybody here played in or ran any previous Alien RPGs, maybe have some greentext stories to share of interesting, strange, or funny moments?

so can you run a colonial marine campaign with this or is it just call of cthulhu in space where weapons are useless

Okay, let's say you play a Marine with an Agility 4 and Ranged Combat 3, you got 7d6 to roll. A Pulse Rifle adds +1 to that for 8d6.
You need one 6 to succeed and every extra does +1dmg (you can also use successes for a stunt like knocking them prone or similar). The Pulse Rifle also does 2dmg base and armour is halfed with it.
You can do full-auto, adding +2 to your pool, though you also get +1 stress dice added and i you roll a 1 on that you can panic. So 8d6 goes up to 11d6, though that stress dice you want to avoid rolling a 1 on.
The adult neomorph has 6 health and 10 armour (so it's reduced to 5 when hit with the pulse rifle).
Armour is essentially a conflicted dicepool, when you take damage you roll that many d6 and any 6s reduce damage by 1, so if the neomorph gets shot with the pulse rifle, it rolls 5d6 to attempt to reduce the damage a successful shot does.
If a math anon wants to work it out, it seems the xenos are tough, though in the most ideal circumstances go down for sure.

>>66449437
So is this going to work like the GOOD Alien movies, ie: Alien and Aliens, or is this going to be like the shittier overall universe?

Also Aliens VS Predator when?

>>66451574
Alien 3, Gibson’s Alien 3, Promethean and Covenent are mentioned but like the rest of the movies they are only in passing.

File: AFMBE Blood_reducedquality.pdf (5.55 MB, PDF)

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>>66450020
Used the Alien fanbook for All Flesh Must Be Eaten.
Ran a one-shot where the synths in a refuelling depot went berserk, murdering the human inhabitants. Players were convinced there was a xenomorph in the airducts and very surprised when the urbane synth workers all went psycho at once.

>>66451574
>Aliens VS Predator when?

When licensing deals from two competing movie studios and two different production companies attempted, continually sought after, begged for, and two competing studio execs both agreed to allow it.

But FL isn't pursuing any such licensing at this time.

>>66451665
>Alien 3 ... mentioned in passing

Survivor of the film plays a critical role in the setting.

>>66449437
is there really enough in the alien franchise to make a whole ttrpg out of it?

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>>66450020
Once, not much of note outside of everyone dying in horrible ways.

One player was a Synth Named Mr.Helpful though and that always gives me a chuckle.

Game ended with Mr.Helpful floating in the vastness of space as the last “alive”.

>>66452569
>Floating through space, alone.
>"...And I helped."

>>66451776
Morse's novel was originally mentioned in the Alien: The Weyland-Yutani Report book.
The book also references Out of the Shadows, which had Ash take over the AI on the Narcissus shuttle, River of Pain which expanded Newt's tale of survival at Hadley's Hope and itself referenced the Fire & Stone comics, the Report also references Alien: Isolation which I think right now we can all agree is firmly canon right now.
LV-178 from Out of the Shadows is on the starmap, it's 4 right, -6 down, at the edge of the Outer Veil.

>>66450419

Well, it's called the ALIEN roleplaying game, not the ALIENS roleplaying game. So there's a clue.

>>66451756

Look, if Prodos Games can get an Aliens Vs Predator license, anybody can.

>>66452709

Isn't some of that stuff openly contradictory?

>>66452873
There are some continuity goofs, though the main one people think of is the Earth War stuff. Bionational Corp from that is actually name dropped in the rpg, though it's set well after the rpg is, timeline-wise (Earth War is where Hicks and Newt were renamed to Wilks and Billie and declared non-canon to the movies).
I think the rpg is really just picking and choosing cool things from the EU to world-build, not everything is canon, though there's fun in finding the references and doing 'what ifs' around them.

>>66452679
He wasn’t actually too helpful to his dismay

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>>66452966

I'm now trying to think when the AvP Arcade Game was supposedly set.

>>66451951
They made 30+ years worth of comic books out of it, so if they tap into that...Yes.

>>66452798
Actually the game states it'll have rules for three different campaign styles: space truckers, colonial marines and frontier colonists. So it will support both.

I imagine the last one will be a mix of Hadley's Hope corporate drones (and sleazy middlemen) and Alien 3's Fiorina prisoners.

WHY DID NO ONE TELL ME THIS WAS A THING

I'M GOING TO MURDER MY WALLET, FUCK

One more, Anchorpoint Station, the main setting of the Gibson Alien 3 script (now comic series and upcoming audio drama) is also on the starmap, it's at -6.5 left and -6 down.

The script can't coincide with the actual Alien3 (which is canon to the rpg setting), though also you can still likely have it as a setting where WY is experimenting with xeno dna causing an infection with your own OC PCs.

>>66453186

Honestly, the only problem is trying to come up with a scenario that hasn't already been done in one of them.
But luckily, the easy answer to that is you only have to worry about what comics your group has read.

Like, I know Deep Sea Aliens has been done somewhere, but my group don't.

>Deep Blue Sea meets Aliens with some Bioshock thrown in for style.

>>66453402

What were the other stations the PDF mentioned next to Sevastapol that also shut down, do we know them from anywhere?

>>66453407
They better include all of the old Kenner Alien types. GORILLA ALIEN, MOTHERFUCKER.

HARAMBE'S REVENGENCE.

>>66453456

MANTIS ALIENS. HOW THE FUCK DOES THAT EVEN WORK?

>>66453423
The Seegson station and Wright-Aberra fuel depot are both from the Aliens: Defiance comic series.
Looking more through the timeline and the Archangel incident from the Late 2100s was captained by Dallas though I can't find anything on it past this wiki page.

https://avp.fandom.com/wiki/UAS_Archangel

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>>66453407
>Like, I know Deep Sea Aliens has been done somewhere, but my group don't.

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>>66453177
Holiest Capcom Arcade Dubs.

I believe Earth War since it has formerly inhabited cities leading to a Xenomorph hive in the final levels. A real neat touch might be statting the lead cyborg and android in this system to satisfaction regardless of starting points.

>>66450951
Yep. Which honestly just tracks with the films. In Alien, it was just space truckers dealing with xenos. Placing a bunch of non-combatants against it, you get what you expect. In Aliens, you had actual combatants with actual combat gear, and they managed to drop xenos like rats up to a point.

>>66453804
No, no, no, no, no.

>>66454208
Yep, that's not even going the other way, with the attack capability of a Neomorph in Engaged range with an unarmoured human.

Neomorphs can attack twice in a round, though it's a randomised attack on a d6 table letting you know what it does.
However it rolls 7-10d6 to hit, has either 1 or 2 base damage and using it's tail it's armour penetrating.
Humans outside of gear have around 2 to 5 Health, it's equal to your Strength stat. You don't insta-die at Health 0, though you are out of action and you roll on the Critical Injury table which is full of Dark Heresy style nastiness.
The Marine armour is Armour 6 also.

One Neomorph attack if it causes any damage actually pierces the heart and outright kills the poor sap hit with it.

>>66450419

Ignore this commentary >>66452798 as they clearly have no read the Alien rpg.

The answer to your question is Yes, you can run a Colonial Marines campaign with the full game, but with the starter kit, you'd have to homebrew until the game's full release.

>>66450419
>where weapons are useless

However, this is incorrect.
As seen from the very first film, weapons ARE useful. And in the rpg, they are certainly useful.

>>66452835
Tell that to Free League. They are not currently seeking a license for it.
And, if you have ever read a contract for licensing, you would rationally understand that no, not everyone can be granted a license.

>>66453186
>>66453407

I've not touched the comics and have 4 different scenarios already for the game. Just as Call of Cthulhu scenarios rarely, if ever, have Cthulhu in them, an Alien scenario does not need an appearance by Giger's exquisite critter to be interesting, deadly, fun, and memorable.
But YMMV.

>>66449437
Could you use this to run a tabletop version of Space Station 13?

>>66453470
According to the little comics the figures came with they usually weren’t literally those animals, but alien species that were effectively big versions of those animals.

>>66455151
I mean the things the face huggers attached to to result in the different Kenner species

>>66450020
I ran the original Aliens game back in '87 or something like that, when it came out. Was fun, but had a glaring problem: smartguns. Like, a smartgun and ammo and you can practically walk through an installation filled with aliens. No challenge.

Pulse rifles weren't that much worse. Seriously, without the ammo deficiency, Hicks and Company lay waste to the entire facility and make it home in time for dinner. That said, it was still fun as hell. Of course, RP games weren't nearly as sophisticated as now and I was younger than some of the people posting here now so that should color the understanding of it some too.

>>66455238
To be fair even in the movie it was implied that they probably wouldn’t have had nearly as much trouble if they were allowed to use most of their usual ammo, which they couldn’t because of some reactor issue that would have blown up the entire place if one stray armor piercing explosive tip round went astray.

>>66454801
More important question: can you play a Clown?

>>66455431
Honk.

>>66455387
Yep. For a well-trained company of marines being allowed to operate at full efficiency, a small infestation is something that honestly should be pretty much a cakewalk.

Xenos win because most of the time they're preying on weak targets unware of the threat facing them, without the equipment needed to adaquately deal with the threat.

>>66455542
>go into Chemistry and cook up some lye and something super slippery
>coat the floors with the latter, and put the former into your flower sprayer
>bait a xenomorph into chasing you over the slippery floor
>then spray them with lye once they fall over

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>>66455565
Xenos mostly win because horror movie tropes make everyone go full retard.

>UH OH SOMETHING MAKE SOUND IN BIG DARK PLACE
>BETTER GO ALONE
>ALSO NOT TELL ANYONE
>ALSO NOT TAKE WEAPON
>SURE 5 OTHER GUY DISAPPEARED THIS WAY, BUT SURELY I BE FINE
>HISSSSSSSSS
>UH OHHHHH

>>66456672
Pretty sure nothing like this happens in either Alien or Aliens. Only the newer movies shit the bed like this.

>>66456672
I mean, there hasn't been a single movie where we had Colonial Marines able to operate like they wanted. First movie was truckers, second movie they weren't able to use real boolet because of the reactor, third movie was penal colony, fourth movie... I honestly can't remember, Prometheus was scientists that were bad at science, Covenant was explorers that were bad at exploring.

There hasn't been a single movie that was just
>Colonial Marines are dispatched on a combat mission, are allowed to use their weapons as desired, and don't have to deal with corporate fuckery
And the reason for that is then you don't really get a movie. Or at least not an Alien/Aliens movie. You just get some jarheads landing, pulping aliens, someone dies because of acid, someone dies because of ambush, queen gets fragged, credits.

>>66456761
Also because the ideal situation would just be to "Nuke the site from orbit" since it's the only way to be sure.

>>66456761
>Prometheus was scientists that were bad at science, Covenant was explorers that were bad at exploring.

Sooth.

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So who else in this thread has a copy of this bad boy?

>>66457300
Physical or PDF?

>>66457258
What does that mean, millennial?

>>66457378

Physical, of course.

>>66457386
Pick up your Ye Olde to Current translation guide and find out.

What is there to talk about, exactly?

Not trying to sound like too much of a shitter here, but what kind of rules can the ALIENtm RPG do that you can't do in another horror system with an alien coat of paint?

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Bolaji Badejo was, of course, the actor who (mostly) played the Alien in the first film.

>>66457518
>Not trying to sound like too much of a shitter here,

Yeah, ya are.

>but what kind of rules can the ALIENtm RPG
>do that you can't do in another horror system with an alien coat of paint?

What kind of rules can Classic Traveller do that you can't do in another sf system with a Traveller coat of paint?

What kind of rules can Call of Cthulhu do that you can't do in another horror system with a Cthulhu coat of paint?

What can Alien do that others can't?

The kind of remarkable rules that the Year Zero system has, tweaked to setting perfection and instantly useable for scenarios like The Thing, They Live, Europa Report, Cargo, Pandorum, and a slew of other pop cultural touchstones.

A claustrophobic, grimy, working man's used future owned by megacorps that, despite high tech level of science and industrial military, are more equivalent to coal mining companies of Harlan County than the techno-fashion self-aware cool of cyberpunk.

With Giger's Alien.

>>66457908
Can it do Space Station 13?

>>66454639
One of the attacks is also a throat bite which is fatal if not treated within one round. The attack table is also full of Panic Roll triggers that can really fuck over a character.

And that's not even the "real" xenomorph with acid-for-blood and everything. These things are really tough and scary, which I like.

>>66453860

Yeah but that puts me in a quandary. Do I give my players Cyborg AvP Dutch, or do recreate beat for beat the proposed final scene of Predators where Dutch is now a Predator Elder who comes down at the end of the film to congratulate the survivors and tell them that they're ready for the next stage?

>>66459213
A Cyborg Elder Predator Dutch, perhaps then?

>>66455387
> some reactor issue that would have blown up the entire place if one stray armor piercing explosive tip round went astray.

Which is, y'know, exactly what DID happen.

>>66459227

..yeah there's literally no reason I can't combine the two now that I think about it.

>>66451756
>two competing movie studios
Wut? Alien and Predator are both 20th Century Fox (now Disney). There's no problem there. They've already smoothed out any production and licensing issues as we've had multiple comics, games and films with both Predators and Aliens in them.

The only reason there's no Predators is because FL wanted focus solely on the Alien aspects of the universe right now. But they haven't ruled out Predators down the line.

>>66458184
Depends on what you mean. If you mean running a game about bunch of people in a space station with (not necessarily) conflicting agendas, then absolutely. Agendas are even mechanically encouraged.

The goofier aspects? Probably not. But I suppose that depends more on the players rather than the game.

>>66456761

You could always read the novels. At least one of them has marines going full ham on a hive. They even have special armor that protects them from acid.

when is the deadline for preorder?

Anyone know if its going to have rules for being implanted? I have an idea I've been toying with

>>66459634
"The pre-order will end on August 4."

per a moderator on their forum

>>66459652
As in by a facehugger?

I'd say definitely. The pre-order PDF didn't have the original xenomorph stats (which will be in the full book), but had Prometheus/Covenant critters. And those had rules for their particular brand of infection.

>>66459904
yeah by the huggybuggy
I was just curious if the preorder pdf had like basic rules for time limit, symptons etc
im still blowing my pay on preordering this anyway

>>66459975
According to the PDF, for the Covenant style Bloodburster, the timelimit from infection to birth is one Shift. A Shift is a timeframe of 5-10 hours, used for stuff like recovery, using supplies and such. And one day has 4 Shifts.

So it gives the GM room to decide when to pop the character so it's dramatically appropriate. I assume the eventual xenomorph incubation is something similar, probably with a wider range of time if we go by the movies.

>>66459196
For sure, when you get into the full rules of combat, there's lots there. I'm still reading everything in all honesty, including Panic.
I think both fully armoured and armed humans and the xenos can really wreck house, though the rolling a 6 on a limited pool to succeed is pretty scary odds.
Each combat has as much chance as being your last.

>>66459975
The pdf for sure covers rules for infections and diseases. It also in the pregen atop of the Neomorph sporepod infection gives the rules for getting infected with the strain of black goo that turned Fifield from Prometheus into a raging pseudo-xeno zombie. They're called abominations, mutants and beluga-heads in the pdf and the stages of mutation sound pretty horrifying to experience.

Can any of you post the PDF? I'm keen to read it, but I am not yet convinced to preorder.

>>66460117
And if not instant kill, or fatal after a round or so, the critter still rolls attacks with 8-10 dice with 1-2 base damage, some of them Armor Piercing. Plus the attacks tend to cause character to drop their weapons and cause Panic. And it attacks twice in a round.

A space trucker with 3 Health ain't shit against that.

>>66460240
It was posted in the previous thread, should still be in the archive.

>>66460240
Thanks, I didn't see that!

...goddamnit, I just realized that Disney now owns the Alien franchise.

>>66460344
I can only assume they'll have Xenomorphs in Kingdom Hearts 4.

>>66457300
Sure. Just dug it out from closet. Always liked lore stuff, and that one is pretty great.

>>66460157
And im sold. Goodbye paycheck
This really isthe game to torture the players

>>66460078
Yeah the films had the incubation period just short of 24hrs

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>>66460442

>>66450419
The preview PDF has only one Colonial Marine NPC, so you only get one military specific Talent in the game now (though nothing stops you from using the other Talents for other Marine characters). But the PDF does have all the Marine weapons and gear from the film, so you're good to go on that front.

No stats for vehicles or ships, though they were more set dressing and means of transportation in the movie too rather than actual elements in combat, so you can probably wing it in the game as well.

>>66451951
As an introduction to the setting I plan on running various mission from the AVP: Extinction game. That's gonna be at least 9-18 sessions without touching the overtly weird parts of the franchise.

Reverse-engineered character creation from the PDF, if you want to create your own characters:

>All Attributes start at 2. Distribute 6 points on top of that. Only one Attribute can be at 5.
>Distribute 10 points on the Skills. Skill maximum at character creation is 3.
>Health = Strength
>Starting Stress = 0
>1 Talent (Career specific in full game, but for now, pick what fits)
>1 Trait (a one word description of the character's personality)
>1 Signature Item
>1 Buddy (optional)
>1 Rival (optional)
>1 Agenda (given by GM, changes every Act)
>Starting gear and Supplies is up to the GM, whatever fits the adventure

>>66461278
thanks anon
this is the best thread on /tg/

>>66461278
Also, the Attributes (in caps), Skills, and Talents for those who don't have the PDF:

>STRENGTH - Heavy Machinery, Close Combat, Stamina
>AGILITY - Ranged Combat, Mobility, Piloting
>WITS - Observation, Survival, Comtech
>EMPATHY - Command, Manipulation, Medical Aid

>TALENTS:
>Pull Rank - Can roll Command vs. Manipulation to force non-officer PCs and NPCs to follow your orders (even if it is dangerous), if they belong to the same organization as you. Use increases your Stress by 1.
>Reckless - Can Push any Agility skill twice.
>The Long Haul - Can ignore all 1 Stress Dice results from a single roll, once per Act.
>True Grit - Can Push any Strength skill twice.
>Personal Safety - Can force another PC or friendly NPC at Short range to take an attack or fatal danger aimed at you by making a Manipulate roll. Use increases your Stress by 1.
>Overkill - Allows to replace certain Panic roll results with an Overkill effect. You basically must immediately start attacking enemies within sight and won't stop until they (or you) are Broken.
>Compassion - Can Push any Empathy skill twice.
>Beneath Notice - Whenever rolling Critical Injury, you get to roll twice and pick whichever result you want.
>Analysis - Can roll Observation to gain insight on strange and alien artifacts or creatures. Can ask GM several questions from GM, number depending on the successes in the roll result. Success reduces everyone's Stress within Short range by 1, failure increases it by 1.

Also, since all the other Attributes got a Talent, I assume Wits will also get a "Push twice any related skill" Talent. It isn't in the PDF, though.

>>66461278
Also, Android characters:

>Create a normal human character.
>Add +3 to both Strength and Agility. This can take those Attributes above 5. Also affects Health.
>Androids can't Push skill rolls.
>Androids don't suffer Stress or have Stress Level.
>Androids never make Panic Rolls.
>Androids have a separate Critical chart.
>Androids don't heal, but can be repaired with a Comtech roll.
>Androids don't make Death Rolls. But if they suffer System Shutdown critical (basically, a total destruction), they can still be "revived" and repaired. This gives the Android a permanent mental trauma.
>Androids don't need Food, Water, Air, or Sleep. They are immune to Vacuum, Cold, and Disease.

All this is for revealed or "public" Androids (like Bishop). If you play a "secret" Android (like Ash), you simply create a regular human, and follow all the human rules (can Push skills, gain Stress etc.). If you are revealed by suffering a Critical Injury, or choose to reveal yourself at any time, you immediately get that +3 Strength & Agility boost and follow all the other Android rules (can no longer Push, ignore Stress and so on).

>>66461672
>secret Androids
That's pretty neat. Also, I like the fact you get that permanent mental trauma in the android stats. David, here we come!

>>66461672
One thing I forgot:

>Androids do not get a Talent

They still have one if they're in secret mode, and can use it, but they are revealed or reveal themselves, they lose it.

so looking at the map and the existence of the UPP and one of the planets you went to in alien infestation, they're treating alien Infestation's version of events post alien 3 as more canon than Aliens Colonial marines?. maybe what we'll end up with is a fusion of both games as a single canonical version, seeing as free legion is allowed to make actual canon in this RPG

>>66461796
That kinda sucks. So non-hidden-androids can't have analysis...

>>66461796
>>66461854
i see nothing in the book that would indicate a PC android or synth would not get a talent

the only way you could make that assumption is because of the android npc from the adventure, but the android rules make no mention of it, nor does the "player who is a secret android starts using android rules" mention the loss of a talent.

>>66461854
Not if use these reverse engineered and hacked from the PDF rules. This is based on the fact that the only revealed Android NPC in the booklet doesn't have any Talents.

But, I'm sure Androids in the full game have their own set of Talents. And while many of the Talents listed in the preview PDF won't work (the ones related to Pushing skills particularly), I'd probably allow Talents like Analyze. After all, Bishop and David seemed to be both pretty good at that.

>>66461930
>>66461943
Aaah, I see. I'm guessing the revealed Android NPC doesn't have a talent simply because there's no need for them to have one as an NPC, then...

>>66462002
Nope. All the human NPCs have a Talent. And they were designed to so players can pick one of the NPC as a new PC if their original character got splattered in the adventure.

>>66462002
>>66462048
it might be because she has a lesser role, or because she was pretty damaged and also spent the last almost 80 years the ship was adrift out of hypersleep (in a damaged state, but still)

>>66462122
>>66462048
or they straight up forgot, like nerds. who knows.

>>66462122
>>66462189
>>66462002
They probably simply didn't want to go into specifics in a preview PDF.

It's a complicated situation. Anyone could be a secret android (that's part of the paranoia), but not all the Talents are compatible with Android rules. So either a secret Android character could have a Talent that will eventually be useless, or players will be immediately suspicious of any characters with a "Android approved" Talent.

Another complication is that, again, a secret Android could be anyone - with any Career. But looking at the characters in the PDF, Synthetic seems to be its own separate Career for the public Androids.

Who knows how the full game will handle things. I guess right now, it's up to the GM how their game deals with various Talents, on any character - Android or not - as we don't have Career specifics either.

>>66461853
>free legion is allowed to make actual canon in this RPG
Wait, really?

>>66457386
Never heard of that myself. Sounds like some faggot is upset you don't like the shit movies.

>>66462377
it was mentioned in summaries of interviews they've done. i've not yet listented to the interviews myself so i can't confirm.

Is there a "hero" archetype for high level play? Like a Ripely or Bishop tier character?

>>66462377
Ehhh, canon is a pretty loose concept when it comes to the Alien franchise. There's not really a strict overseer who dictates what someone can and can't do with the setting. Comics do their own wild shit, Ridley Scott does whatever the hell he wants, and sometimes Predators appear. And that shitty Aliens Colonial Marines game was also trying to declare itself as canon truth, even if no one gave a shit.

This RPG just tries to stitch together a cohesive whole out of wildly different, and often contradicting, sources. In this, you'll have material from the films, from games, the scrapped William Gibson Alien 3 script, even stuff from the never-happened-according-to-the-films Earth War storyline. All mashed together to create a single setting to play in.

>>66462503
>There's not really a strict overseer who dictates what someone can and can't do with the setting.
Expect that to change now that it's a Disney franchise.

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>>66462503
>canon is a pretty loose concept when it comes to the Alien franchise
for real

>>66462587
Fun fact: Lance Henriksen and Bill Paxton (R.I.P.) are the only two actors to have been killed by all three of the Terminator, the Alien, and the Predator.

>>66462503
>Ehhh, canon is a pretty loose concept when it comes to the Alien franchise
Actually, its pretty simple. There's the part it that doesn't suck ass. The first two movies and a few video games, and then there's the rest.

>>66462471
ripley and bishop and friends aren't exactly superior to other humans/synthetics in the setting by any real mechanical measure, aside from "you're a pc so you generally have control of yourself" and being main characters

I have read a few pages of the starter kit. According to the rules so far the successful rate of a dice roll
Is pretty low. Sure you can Push it but you will gain Stress. I can only assume the spiral goes downward pretty fast. And I think we can make a PredatorS or similar survival style game, those consumable rules could come in handy.

>>66462471
Just be an independent woman with short dark hair. That pretty much guarantees you survive your film.

>>66462648
Yeah, but that's my point. Are there any PC's that gain a luck mechanic to avoid instant death.

>>66462471
Why would there be? All the other characters in the franchise (and in the RPG) are as capable and skilled as Ripley or Bishop. Ripley survived because she kept her cool and made smart decisions, not because she used some higher tier special ability at the last second.

Sure, by the second movie, she had earned extra XP, so she was a bit more skilled in that regard. But that's just normal, PC on her second adventure progression.

>>66462704
Alright, here's a better question then. How strong can you get?

>>66462751
So far the stronger character are Androids. They get free Strength and Agility boost, immune to most of the effects in the game. I guess there are some downsides but I am not getting there yet.

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>>66462610
that is a fun fact, thanks

>>66462769
>I guess there are some downsides but I am not getting there yet.
No civil liberties and you're nothing more than a toaster?

>>66462769
>>66462751
not being able to push or gain the benefits of stress is pretty big
it's a decent trade-off really

>>66462751
Skill maximum at character creation is 3. But the cap is 5. So with maxed Stat + Skill at 5, a human character rolls 10 dice on an average difficult roll. One 6 is a success, extra 6s are used for additional effects (like bonus damage). Stress adds to the dice pool, but that risks backfiring if you Panic.

Androids are a different story.

>>66461278
>>66461492
>>66461672
So a Combat Android could have...
Strength: 8 (3 points)
Agility: 7 (2 points)
Wits: 3 (1 point)
Empathy: 2 (0 points)

Making for one monster in combat. Probably max out Ranged/Close Combat, then distribute further as you want to specialize...

>>66462751
Definitely not strong enough to go 1 on 1 with a xenomorph using your stats, skills and talents alone.

>>66463002
Well of course you're not going to be a naked human wrestling with a Xeno, but a Colonial Marine in gear with his pulse rifle should pretty reliably be able to kill a Xeno with one turn of shooting.

>>66462969
Add armor and a Smart Gun, and yeah, you can be pretty effective against the critters.

They still have 2 attacks each round, have attack dice pools of 7-10 with 1-2 damage, depending on the attack. They also have a 1-in-6 chance to do an attack that, if it lands, kills you instantly. And another that rips out your throat which is fatal, but you get to roll Death save to survive each round. Hopefully you hang on long enough for a medic to arrive.

Though I'm unsure how to apply those special killing attacks on Androids, as they refer to special Criticals on the regular human crit chart.

>>66463121
Possibly. Let's look at a starting Marine character, with no Stress added:

Strength 5, Ranged Combat 3
Pulse Rifle gives +1 to attack.
At Short range, no modifier

That's a dice pool of 9, with Pulse Rifle damage of 2.

Against a Neomorph (we don't have xenomorph stats yet) with an Armor Dice Pool of 5 (already halved from 10 by Pulse Rifle's Armor Piercing). Neomorph has 6 Health.

If you manage to do 6 damage (from base damage + extra successes from attack - xeno's armor dice successes), you roll a special xeno crit chart, D6. 5-6 are instant kill, and 4 is death after one Round. Others have more granular conditions, though 1-2 don't kill him.

Someone else can do the math how effective an armed Marine is against a Neomorph.

>>66462587

The main problem with that book I have is that they had a chance to have Kyle Reese meet Corporal Hicks and they didn't take it. Instead it's a sequel to Aliens Ressurection more than anything.

Honestly, best Predator crossover book Black Horse ever did was the first Batman Vs Predator one.

>>66463364
Oh, I forgot - the Marine gets +2 to Attack if he fires at Full Auto. Though that increases his Stress by 1.

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>>66463379
Is this any good?

>>66463418

I can't say for certain. But what little of it I read, it's pretty much exactly what you think it's going to be.

>>66463433
>>66463418

Also, I'm not sure if this is even the weirdest crossover Archie has ever done. But it's down to this or Archie Meets the Punisher for sure.

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>>66463463
believe I can top punisher

>>66461278
One thing is missing:

>Encumbrance = 2 x Strength

The Encumbrance is the # of "slots" your character has. Regular items take 1 slot, heavier items several, and you can fit several lighter items into one slot. Tiny items take no slots.

>>66463418
Yes

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D'you think the full release will bring in stuff like the Deacon and the Trilobite/proto-Facehugger? I mean, the black goo and the neomorphs are already here, so I don't see why not...

>>66460561
Looking at the Neomorph motes, if they infect you, it's a Sickness roll (roll your Stamina) with a Virulence of 9d6 rolled against your Stamina, the more successes win's over.
Seeing as a human will usually have a Stamina of 3d6, they're kinda screwed. Within one Shift (5-10 hours), they go to Stage 3 of the infection...
Which is immediate death as the burster rips it's way out of the poor soul.
Luckily the rp references different ways to destroy the pods and mote clouds, fire seems to work wonders on them. The mote cloud has no stats past their virulence, so given as touching them is insta-kill, the GM should allow the PCs to defend themselves against it past their weak Stamina.

>>66465068
Probably, I can't imagine Fox/Disney didn't push them to include all the content from the newest films that they could.

>>66462820
Another fun fact:
this quote ifrom your pic is based on true story . Vasques, that is, Jenette Goldstein when auditioning for Aliens thought it was going to be movie about ilegal imigrants, so came to the audition dressed as social worker .

>>66465068
I would think it's almost certain given the neomorphs

>>66461492
Yeah, essentially in Year Zero games the classes are playbooks, you're assigned a defining attribute (the one you're allowed to put up to 5) and also you have a few Talents to pick from, picking one at character generation.
This Talent is usually something you roll using your defining attribute or your unique skill (this rp seems to have done away with the unique skill though, unless they'll get introduced in the main corebook when released).

>>66465182
>the classes are playbooks
Okay, question from someone whose TTRPG experience to date is basically D&D... what's a playbook?

>>66465255
More or less ignore that anon, as classes in the Year Zero games aren't playbooks at all.

>>66465102
>Seeing as a human will usually have a Stamina of 3d6, they're kinda screwed.
It's a normal Stamina skill roll. So it's Strength + Stamina, not just Stamina. Still not great odds, though.

>>66461853
Despite the game of Colonial Marines being mechanically a total train-wreck, the story is great for expanding the universe and gives us a surviving Hicks.
Really the opening to Infestation and Colonial Marines is similar, they both have the Sephora and Infestation has UPP instead of WY, plot-wise they're very similar outside of CM getting Hicks involved later, they're marines trying to take out the experimentation of xenos by the Company and in the end confront a company man boss that dies.
You can hold an adventure/campaign all around that, though I feel Colonial Marines feels more canon and linked more to the films.

>>66465102
So it appears Androids are immune to these effects, though in the comics we see the black goo can indeed effect them. Think they'll keep this immunity or was it an oversight in the beginner game?

>>66462622
The comics that centre around the novels Earth Hive and Nightmare Asylum are pretty great despite dubious canonicity they're still great reads.
Then I think Aliens:Rogue and Aliens:Labyrinth that go more into the creepy science experiments and mad scientists has some deep disturbing stuff that makes for good inspiration.

>>66465580
I think the comics fucked up. In Prometheus, David interacts with the goo barehanded and nothing happens to him.

>>66465580
Why would the black goo effect an android?

>>66465646
>>66465707
https://avp.fandom.com/wiki/Elden

>>66462663
Yeah, there's no max on Stress, though the more dice you roll, the more chance you'll roll a 1 and need to do a Panic roll, which if failed can lead to your character acting out in ways you may not want.
That has worse effects if you have higher Stress, a Panic roll is rolling a d6 and adding your current Stress, then checking on the Panic table for any effect.
Though if you roll a 13+ for Panic, there's a chance at the end of the session your character gets a permanent mental trauma.

>>66465707
>>66465646
>>66465580
With Elden it got injected directly into him. Maybe whatever kind of "skin" the androids have is impermeable to the bioweapon? That's why David could handle it on his skin with no effects.

>>66465636
Dark Horse generally did some pretty cool stuff. Some of it was probably never intended to be taken seriously (Lovesick, Herk Mondo, the monochrome short that had Alien-worshipping Cthulhu cultists, Havoc), but some of what they put out was superb. The first AvP, for instance. The one-shot with the priest. Pig.

>>66465707
I guess it would only happen if there was an organic component...

>>66465452
>Despite the game of Colonial Marines being mechanically a total train-wreck, the story is great for expanding the universe and gives us a surviving Hicks.
Also some pretty decent Syd Mead-infused expansion for those USCM ship interiors, and W-Y PMCs.

As much as I like both Alien 3 and Resurrection, for all their flaws... how many anons would take Alien, some/all of Aliens, and bits of the EU material in preference? And given that FL have put Tartarus on the map, are we taking bets on the appearance of Harvesters in-game?

(Oh, and being both young and !American at the time I first saw Aliens, I had no idea what "Arcturian poontang" was...)

>>66465580
>>66465779
>>66465816
The wiki says Elden is a Construct, not a typical Android. He is mostly biological, so that's why the goo affects him.

>>66465285
In Year Zero games you pick a general archetype and you're given the attribute you can max based on that, atop a small list of exclusive Talents noone can have.
They're playbooks in that they have typical names your archetype goes by, sample words to pick for your character's apperance, fill the blank sentences for you to put PC/NPC names in describing your relationship to them, a list of character goals to pick from and some set gear for the archetype you picked.
You can pick and assign the attribute points and skill points freely, though the class sheets in the Year Zero rpgs are more like those found in PbtA games than say D&D or Call of Cthulhu.

How is that not a playbook for a character? Yes you get a character sheet to fill in, though you're essentially spoonfed what fits best on it.

>>66465844
Alien, Aliens, and Alien 3 (I think the Assembly Cut is fantastic) all the way over the expanded material. I didn't care for Resurrection, but fortunately it happens in so far in the future, I can ignore it for gaming purposes.

But the RPG takes *everything* - all the films, comics, abandoned scripts, books, games, whatever - and squeezes them together, so a either/or conversation is a bit moot. They're picking and choosing stuff from everything, trying to weave a coherent setting out of it all.

>>66466058
Because it's just a class, you mong.

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>>66466110
>all the films, comics, abandoned scripts, books, games, whatever
dibs on being superman

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>>66466220
I call the big titty vampire chick.

This cracks me up. D'you think they just got bored and set up a dartboard at some point?

>"Okay, who should we cross Aliens over with next?"
>*THUNK*
>"Vamprella. Nuts, I was hoping for Red Sonja."

>>66466110
>I think the Assembly Cut is fantastic
Ditto. To be honest, I didn't even mind the theatrical release too much. It tried to go back to Alien rather than being a "more dakka" movie, and I think it largely succeeded. I'm not the biggest fan of Resurrection (in fact, it's the one I didn't own on VHS or DVD, and only grudgingly bought on Blu-Ray) but for all its flaws Sigourney Weaver has fun, and it's a very different film. Besides, Ron Perlman and Winona Ryder.

>They're picking and choosing stuff from everything, trying to weave a coherent setting out of it all.
See also: "Aliens Fuzion" by Chris Dias.

I'd love to get my grubby little talons on some more of that EU stuff. LEG, DH, novels, mock nonfiction (Tech Manual etc), anything in script form... oh, heck, even vidya (Alien Doom!?), fanfilms, anything fun. Giger art, for inspiration, and the Book of Alien.

And yet..

>>66466220
>dibs on being superman
Dibs on being Kara.

>>66466277
>Nuts, I was hoping for Red Sonja.
Now that'd be fun.

They've done Terminator, Judge Dredd, Animaniacs, French & Saunders... Is there any universe the Alien hasn't invaded? (I have an unfinished Star Trek vs Alien fanfic on my hard drive, that I started in around 1998 or so. I blame First Contact. Noteworthy for Worf being on DS9, and the Enterprise-E's new head of security is a thinly-veiled Bruce Willis cameo.)

There is a part of me that feels, however, that the whole Alien thing is almost too familiar to players - a problem that Isolation had to work hard to circumvent - and that its canon is so dissonant at times that it can't become a cohesive whole. As a result I'm almost inclined to strip away 90% of it and start over.

>>66465844
I agree, Dark Horse was great, I'd even say overall in their 90s heyday.
I for sure enjoy their comics too. Alien 3 can stay, though let's keep Hicks alive. Morse is still alive too, so I was thinking it'd be interesting to bump into him as an npc in one adventure.

Also the rp names the Church of Immaculate Incubation (page 10), which was Salvaje's xeno-cult from Earth War.
The other cult named on that page I couldn't find any source on.

>>66466277
>Red Sonja
Oh man Alien Vs Predator Vs Conan the Barbarian plz.

>>66466123
Like the classes in any PbtA game that are called playbooks, you mong.

>>66466363
The PDF also mentions Bionational, which is from the same comic.

>>66466394
Would you two please quit calling each other mongs for long enough to explain wtf a playbook is? Google is no use whatsoever.

>>66466363
>Church of Immaculate Incubation

>>66466422
>Bionational

Now all we need is Daniel Grant's company, a little Xeno-Zip, and Herk Mondo (hell yes I want him as NPC) and we're all good.

>>66466220
>>66466277
I'm sure people start making stats for their favorite crossovers pretty soon after the game is out.

I imagine Predators being the first fan addition. And it would be extremely simple, seeing how weapons and xenomorphs work in the preview PDF.

>>66466385
>>66466318
>Is there any universe the Alien hasn't invaded?
Tomb Raider I think, which is a surprise considering that thematically they'd come together quite well (y'know, strong female protagonist exploring forbidden locations, fighting monsters through guile and dakka, so on and so forth). Might be because Dark Horse only got the licence in more recent years rather than back in the 90s when they did loads of this stuff.

I know what you mean about how it's almost too familiar, a lot of the trouble I've had trying to come up with plots for fanfics of my own is that I have a lot of trouble breaking out of the Alien/Aliens formula. I do agree that Isolation did a good job at breaking out of that, though.

>>66466318
In all honesty, it does the rpg is going for an either/or thing and letting canon fall into the GM's hands as much as what they can dictate in released material.
That they have locales from the Alien 3 Gibson script (which can't fit into canon if the events on Fiorina 161 happen, which the rpg has locked in their canon), references aplenty to Earth War and Hicks may or may not be still alive as a Schrodinger's Cat right now.
I think the starmap is a really neat toolbox, if you didn't like one way the timeline went and want to do something different, the map still allows you to do that. Or you can mix and match, whatever makes the adventure/campaign work for you and your group. Which I think honestly is for the best. I think we can all agree that we all like and want different things outside the first two movies when it comes to this franchise.

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>>66466277
>2015
I could see doing this crossover in the 90's but 2015?

>>66466318
unlike most aliens/wildcats crossover was actually canon in the wildstorm universe

>>66466515
>Tomb Raider
I thought a different company had that licence. Then again what do I know, I haven't set foot in a comic shop since before Obama was elected.

>>66466487
>I imagine Predators being the first fan addition.
If they're not a FL addition early on. Beat the fans to the punch...

>>66466535
>That they have locales from the Alien 3 Gibson script (which can't fit into canon if the events on Fiorina 161 happen
I like that they're doing stuff like this. Just because the events may not happen, doesn't mean that the places and people have to not exist.

>>66466515
>rather than back in the 90s when they did loads of this stuff
anon, this >>66466277 says 2015!

>>66466486
A playbook is essentially a fill the blanks character sheet that gives you open choices and more closed ones where you can tick/circle what ones you want out of ones handed to you.
Year Zero has open stat distribution and then when it comes to bio, Talents and gear, they're usually more locked in based on the class you chose.
Its the type of rpg like most that supports you all have different classes to each other ideally.

>>66466602
So like a pregen character with a small amount of customisation? Got you.

(Sorry, just... not a term we use in my part of the world, with the exception of the defunct BlackBerry device and the Bradley Cooper movie. I was a bit baffled by Google's insistence that it was a collection of sporting tactics.)

>>66466591
The 90s was the heyday of Aliens crossovers. Doesn't mean it wasn't still going on a few years ago. (Even the fanfilms did it. Batman: Dead End...)

>>66466545
>>66466544
>I could see doing this crossover in the 90's but 2015?
That's what I meant. If Dark Horse had got the licence from *checks* Top Cow back when they were doing loads of these crossovers in the 90s then I think it would've worked fine, Classic!Lara wouldn't have batted an elegantly-plucked eyelash at a xenomorph nest. Reboot Lara would probably just hyperventilate at a xenomorph (either that or eviscerate one like they've got their scripts mixed up and she thinks *she's* the horror movie monster).

>>66466591
Those were both me, I was mistaken and thought the Vampirella comic was from back in the Dark Horse heyday like the rest of them. In fact I'd kind of assumed that Vampirella was one of those 90s heroines who was a thinly-veiled (heh) excuse for fanservice that got quietly forgotten about once all the cocaine wore off. Like Gen13.

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Screw crossovers, or weak monsters from the prequels. I think I'll use other Giger art for the creatures in my game. He painted a *lot* of weird shit, and not just the original xenomorph.

And since my RPG group isn't dictated by the MPAA, I can go all the way with the psychosexual stuff. This one was one of the tamest I could find, and post on a blue board.

>>66466773
Oh Vampirella is an institution going for donkey's years to this day even...
Though for me my highpoint with her sure was the 90s 'Bad Girl' era of comics, including Witchblade, Chaos Comics, Lady Death and Angela from Spawn to name a few.

>>66466912
Much agreed, anon. No idea what I'll be doing quite yet with the rpg, though I greatly enjoy the strange and body horror.
Aliens: Labyrinth is one of my faves.

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>>66466937
>Witchblade
stat me please

>>66466773
>I'd kind of assumed that Vampirella was one of those 90s heroines
... anon, you know Vampirella is older than I am, right? (And I'm an oldfag, as /soc/ keeps pointing out.)

I suspect Reboot Lara would end up like Hicks, or (worse) Drake - quick shotgun blast at point-blank range, and take a nice molecular acid shower.

>>66466912
>Giger
The acceptable face of gynaecology in the art world.

>>66466937
They must've done Witchblade vs Aliens at some point. Lady Death was just 4ch's fabled big tiddy goth waifu, but definitely not blue board material. Spawn... ooh, there's an idea. Spawn vs Aliens? Probably better than putting them in the Marvel universe. (They didn't do a crossover with Spider-Man or the FF, did they?)

>>66466971
Ah, I see they did indeed do Witchblade. What next - Fathom vs Aliens? Guardians of the Galaxy vs Aliens?

>>66466960
>the strange and body horror
... is what the Alien universe does best. Although, as the average CoC game proves, even if murderhobo'ing the eldritch horrors is a terminal pastime, horror is tough to run.

>>66466960
>Aliens: Labyrinth is one of my faves.
Mine too, though that's mainly because of that one bit that always turns up on the fetish boards. I'm pretty sure you know which bit I mean.

I did actually read the entire comic at one point, very chilling. You wonder how a man like Church could have ever come about, and then you find out. I thought the idea of the xenos being telepathic rather interesting, though, as it explains why they seem to lack sensory organs yet can even find cloaked Predators.

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>>66466971
Might as well stat this bad boy from MKX too, whilst you're at it.

>>66467030
>... anon, you know Vampirella is older than I am, right? (And I'm an oldfag, as /soc/ keeps pointing out.)
Argh, no, I just saw "big titty vampire waifu in something a swimsuit model would feel shy in" and thought "oh, this is obviously a contemporary of Tarot Witch of the Black Rose or something". Seemed like that sort of thing, so I never looked into it further.

Teach me to judge a book by its cover, literally.

As for Reboot Lara, my thoughts exactly. Plus Classic!Lara got into such daft situations sometimes that finding a nest full of fossilised xenomorph eggs would fit right in. Though, thinking about it, Reboot Lara might do better against the Predator, considering how much covering herself in mud, crawling around jungles and shanking people in the kidneys she does.

>>66466912
>And since my RPG group isn't dictated by the MPAA, I can go all the way with the psychosexual stuff.
Oh yeah? Do tell.

>>66467186
>Tarot Witch of the Black Rose
And now you've jogged my rusty memory, anon. It isn't Lady Death that's unsuitable for blue... it's Tarot, which was a title that was its own r34. (I used to work in a comic store back in the day, and we had this one degenerate who was always trying to order generally objectionable stuff. He got a visit from the police over his attempts to get hold of Alan Moore's Lost Girls, and I quickly learned not to read stuff from his pulls.)

>>66467275
>It isn't Lady Death that's unsuitable for blue... it's Tarot, which was a title that was its own r34.
No kidding. I saw some of that on /aco/ once, it was too porny for even me to take seriously, and for a period a few years ago I used to write erotica for a living.

>He got a visit from the police over his attempts to get hold of Alan Moore's Lost Girls, and I quickly learned not to read stuff from his pulls.
Yikes. I've never even heard of that one, but I'll take your word for it.

While we're still vaguely on the subject, which of these crossover comics are actually worth reading, if you know? I don't have a great deal of experience with Aliens comics aside from Fire and Stone, which I actually really liked.

>>66467388
>for a period a few years ago I used to write erotica for a living.
The scary thing is, between Giger's art and some of the undertones of the Alien movies (watch the tail before it kills Lambert... or read an essay on Alien 3's intersectionality with Queer Gothic), I can imagine Alien erotica is a thing. You really don't want to know what it does to your mind to see the underside of the facehugger before you've tried dating...

>>66467388
>which of these crossover comics are actually worth reading, if you know?
Only one (aside from AvP) that I read and enjoyed was the first Superman miniseries. But there are plenty online at the obvious sites to sample.

>>66454639
what the fuck is a neomorph

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>>66467388
>which of these crossover comics are actually worth reading, if you know?
not that anon but my favorite was always aliens/wildcats, it was written by one of my favorite writers and had big ramifications for the series it was crossing over with. I can't say if it still holds up though

batman aliens had batman against an alien t-rex

>>66467523
The not-a-Xenomorph from Prometheus.

>>66467388
My favorites:

>ALIENS - Simply called that. The original Dark Horse Aliens continuation. It got retconned by Alien 3 but the RPG still uses elements from it. The black and white art is also fantastic.
>ALIENS: LABYRINTH - A fucked up mad scientist experimenting with xenomorphs. Probably the only Aliens comic that dares to go the creepier sexual and body horror side of the franchise.
>ALIENS: DEFIANCE - A sort of continuation of Aliens: Isolation game, but with different characters. I like the art in this one.
>ALIENS: SURVIVAL - A smaller scale story about a cowardly guy dealing with the guilt of surviving a xenomorph attack that killed everyone else.
>ALIENS: SACRIFICE - A one-shot story of a community that uses questionable methods to keep a stalking xenomorph at bay.
>ALIENS: DEAD ORBIT - Pretty standard story about xenomorphs loose on a station, but the art is great.

I might have forgotten a few, but those I remember liking.

>>66467615
Oh yes, and also:

WILLIAM GIBSON'S ALIEN 3 - The adaptation of Gibson's Alien 3 script. The RPG also uses elements from it.

>>66467615

>ALIENS: LABYRINTH

that one was disconcerting.
crossed, for all its gorn and 13 yo boy tire writing, never reaches this level

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>>66467522
>I can imagine Alien erotica is a thing.
It 300% is, and I know because I've written some of it.
>You really don't want to know what it does to your mind to see the underside of the facehugger before you've tried dating...
Huh, that explains a lot about my sex life, or the lack thereof, now that I think about it. There is this one woman I know who's a total teratophile and is into stuff like this, but she doesn't like me very much because I said her husbando Nyarthelotep (no, really) was shit. Maybe I deserved it, I'unno.

>>66467615
>>66467637
>ALIENS: LABYRINTH
Oh, no, I have read that one. As my first comment might indicate, the creepier sides of the franchise that get explored therein were in fact an incentive for me. Most of the others sound a bit meh, but I might check out this Gibson one. Probably be easier than waiting for the audio to come out.

>>66467582
Covenant, actually.
The Deacon was the xeno at the end of Prometheus. Neomorphs are the tall lanky white ones with sphincter mouths.

>>66467697
I'm going to regret this, but now I want to read some of that. Also, you just taught me a new fetish. ("I'm the monster's mother...")

>>66467697
It's the curse of the franchise. The first idea an Aliens comic or book writer has is a boring rehash of Alien or Aliens. Very few do anything interesting with the xenomorph, or actually venture out and use ideas other than usual the critter. But if the comic is called Aliens, then we need to have xenomorphs, I suppose.

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>>66467803
I doubt I can link you anything on here, but look me up on hentai foundry, the name I use there is "Anonymaus". My two main bits of xenofiction are there along with some other bits. I'd suggest not going for Sue's Story unless you can deal with a bit of guro though.

>>66467822
For sure. That's why I kind of liked Prometheus, because it at least tried to play around with the formula a bit and widen the scope of what could be done with them. Probably why I liked Fire and Stone too, since it hewed closer to Prometheus than Covenant, which I didn't like much at all. Plus the trilobite's creation and what happens to it is totally my fetish.

>>66467786
Right, fuck. My brain went neo - new - must be Prometheus.

>>66467822
To be fair, that's kind of a universal franchise problem. 56 years later and Doctor Who still won't get rid of the Daleks. Star Trek still insists on shoehorning in the Enterprise, Klingons, Vulcans, and 20th-century pop culture references.

I guess the only way to move away is to slap a new name on things, and say "Okay, there are strange creepy creatures out there, and they're a small part of the universe" - but then, people play the Alien RPG, they expect aliens, not corporate slimeballs. I guess that's why LEG tried (despite the title) to have more of a Colonial Marines RPG, as some of the fan materials have.

>>66467920
Nice art. I'll try that, if it's possible to browse unregistered.

>>66467980
First time I saw "neomorph" was in a Dr Who tie-in book in about 1993... and that was to do with "new design" Cybermen.

>>66467615
I enjoyed the Aliens comics, though when they crossed over with Predator, things got weird in a way that left me at odds as a tween in the mid-90s, like Aliens Predator: Deadliest of the Species, with genetically engineered trophy wife Caryn Delacroix.
Though even before then you had the weird creeping in with the Reapers treating the xenos like they were nothing and eating them as a delicacy.
Oh also the rpg mentioned sex-synths and there was one of those in Aliens:Advent/Terminus.
Honestly there's tons of comics, Dark Horse went pretty crazy in the mid-90s releasing them in all honesty at one point.

>>66467645
tl;dr?

>>66466058
Compared to PbtA games, would you say this game plays similarly?

>>66468736
Not the same anon, but I think they're pretty different.

PbtA is about push and pull. "You succeed, but..." type of choices. You choose a side effect or the GM does. Alien is more straightforward, roll for a strict success or failure. Extra successes grant additional benefits depending on the skill.

Combat too is more traditional. Initiative, roll to attack, roll for armor, apply damage to Health. Basic stuff. No PbtA's "cause damage but suffer damage" or other such variations.

The unique thing in combat are the xenomorph attacks. Each xeno type has its own D6 table of attacks the GM rolls randomly. Results range from the xeno running away to instantly killing you, with a lot of other things in between.

So in summary, Alien is a more straightforward, conventional RPG than narrative PbtA games.

>>66456754
It happens once

>>66468736
>>66469069
Year Zero as mentioned is a different system to PbtA.
Though the Alien rp does mention to keep a narrative flow and dice rolling to a minimum. It makes sense when the dicepool system seems quite flaky, you roll a single 6 and you get the success. However I've honestly not played in too many Year Zero games to say I got tons of experience rolling the dicepools.

It's more the formation of your character that reminds me of stuff like Dungeon World's method. Once you're in-play it is more traditional rpg yes. I'm feeling more a Genesys vibe if I had to compare the Alien rpg to another system.
WoD being another dicepool game, though Year Zero is less crunchy for sure.

>>66469288
The whole 'playing music over the sirens as the couple make love in the shower so they don't know what's happening' scene in Covenant actually make me cringe and pulled me out of the film when I saw it in the cinema.
It was one of the more cliche things in a whole lot of things to question in that film. I couldn't even tell you the names of those two characters either and that's another thing wrong with these two prequels.

>>66461278
Who or what is a buddy?

>>66469452
A social mechanic.

>>66469452
In Year Zero, ways you can get xp are interacting in specific ways with PCs/NPCs you have noted you have a bond to, wish to protect or hate/have a rivalry with.
The GM will likely ask:
> Did you risk or sacrifice something for your Buddy?
> Did you risk or sacrifice something to mess with your Rival?
For each Yes to those, you get an XP, atop of what other questions the game and GM may pose come the end of the session. This is done in an end of session 'debriefing' usually for Year Zero where the GM and players can discussion how the session went for everyone.
Usually, it's 5xp to raise a skill or add another Talent, also you may decide to change your Buddy and/or Rival for the next session given how the session you just left played out.

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This might be straining the limits of what an RPG really is, but do you think the full release will have stuff that allows for ship-to-ship combat in? Or, at least, enough that'll allow you to homebrew ship combat rules?

so, given the relative similarities between the various year zero engine systems, you think we can blend or bolt on mutant/coriolis/etc stuff into alien and vice versa?

>>66470149
Don't see why not, the system isn't that different from the vanilla Mutant Year Zero.

Okay to pose a thread question:
> Pitch an Alien rpg adventure/campaign to the thread (bonus points for thinking outside the box).
I've been thinking on it and got nothing so far, though I'm more a stats-guy and player than a GM. I know my film tropes though, so perhaps something might come to me later or if one of you anons inspire with your pitch.

>>66471630
>Pitch an Alien rpg adventure/campaign to the thread (bonus points for thinking outside the box).
Race against time as a religious fanatic threatens to pull the metaphorical pin out of a xenomorph egg in a capital city.

>>66457300
yeah, I picked mine up off amazon a few years ago. The reprint is pretty cheap on Amazon.

>>66470129
>This might be straining the limits of what an RPG really is
Definitely not outside the scope for RPG's in general. A lot of space games have rules for ship combat (although their quality varies).

My first reaction is to say that might be outside the scope of this particular game, but the quickstart does mention vehicle rules and there are already rules for rooms on star ships being explosively decompressed so their could be, but I'd expect them to be pretty minimalistic since Alien's focus is more on horror.

>>66471720
What kind of people would the protagonists be, anon?

>>66472123
Corporate-backed security officers. Like the cops in Robocop, they're technically independent but fully rely on the WY dollar for equipment and manpower. They have to prosecute this maniac without letting any hint of his doomsday weapon get to the press or the public at large.

>>66471630
You play as Xenomorphs attempting to break containment on a research station. Starting as facehuggers and working your way up the life cycle

>>66471992
>but I'd expect them to be pretty minimalistic since Alien's focus is more on horror.
Clearly you've never seen that clip from LotGH that comes around here sometimes. Space combat can be plenty horrifying.

>>66471630

Adventure 1: Ocean world undersea colony finds a flooded spacedock facility once used by the Space Jockeys. The company sends a science team to investigate, the party can be a mix of scientists, corporate overseers or the submarine crew hired at the colony.
The dock is massive and descends deep enough down that the pressure was high enough to kill Xenomorphs. There are however several areas still airtight, and full of eggs and hibernating Aliens.

Adventure 2: Facehuggers infect the local marine life. Xenomorph sharks, Xenosquids and gigantic Xenocrabs with weakspots you can hit to cause massive damage abounds.
The colonists have to survive and find a way to get offworld. The usual corporate stupidity rears it's head as well.

Adventure 3: Depending on how the last adventure went detirmines on how things go south in the Space Station. Corporate could try to smuggle eggs or Facehuggers in the Shuttle with entirely predictable results, the Queen could have smuggled herself aboard (since Alien Queens, like the T-Rex from Jurrassic Park, are secretly ninjas. Believe it.) or one of the survivors could have been implanted at some point and not said anything.
Things then go varying degrees of Sevastapol. With the players making a last stand to try and survive long enough for the Marines to respond to your distress calls. Of course, whether it's them or the Company, wondering why their science team hasn't checked in, that actually arrive would be up to the GM.

>>66471720
Sounds fun. But what is the story?

>>66467563
One of my childhood favourites. Had so many good elements to it.

>>66462442
>never heard of it. must be bad.
The evidence you provided shows you to be ignorant and stupid.

>>66469452
Someone who is not your guy nor your pal.
They're your buddy.

>>66466912
His art for the infamously unproduced film The Tourist is ripe for the game. Already adapted some critters from that to use in the published scenario instead of the black goo neomorph.

>>66473296
_Almost_ stopping them.

>>66473296
>Corporate officials working to contain the incident and downplay the impact to the public/government.
>Government sanctioned 'combat synths' are sent in to terminate with extreme prejudice, even as the disaster begins to unfold.
>Space Truckers who delivered the cargo past ICC quarantine without realising what it was, and while they're counting up their space bucks, an egg inside a misplaced crate opens up.

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>>66465126
I like that.

>>66451665
I was hoping the shitfire that was Prometheus wouldn't influence this game and the lore

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>>66466110
>>66466220
>>66466277
Let's not forget one of the best Alien crossovers.

>>66465068
Hopefully not.

>>66453804
Not like I needed to sleep or anything....

>>66467920
Too bad it fucked up the backstory.

>>66475200
so the great things with dredd crossovers, is that every single one of them, no matter how stupid, is canon in dredd.

>>66471630
yeah i'm thinking shoving mutant/animal/robot/elysian human or coriolis or forbidden lands/etc characters into an aliens adventure or have them run through the campaign for a fun time. Someone with the boss archetype from mutant sounds like it'd be funny. "So my special thing is i got like. ten dudes"

So with Covenant are the AvP films non-canon now?
Am glad this thread exists bc I just saw the latest Predator movie.

>>66475866
yeah, covenant has cemented that AVP stuff is a separate timeline/canon

>>66466912
>>66473924

William Burroughs critters from Soft Machine/Nova Express/Ticket That Exploded...?

>>66467058
If we are adding MK then we should include the shokan xenomorph too

Can somebody ballpark what a Predator's stats would be? Would they even experience stress? Also, what would be a good way to represent the "original" predator as apposed to the Klingon/Power Ranger they became later in the series. Jacked up Space Marine? Robot rules with a few tweaks?

Use the signature kill rules but replace it with predator gadgets

>>66475185
I'm sure you can ignore it if you want for your games. I think they're throwing in everything to give GMs more options to do stuff with though it doesn't make sense if everything is called canon.

>>66476627
If they'd be statted as antagonists like xenomorphs, then they'd only have a couple of skills (probably only Mobility and Observation), speed rating, armor and health, possibly a special non-combat ability, and then a D6 table of unique attacks.

>>66476604
Sounds good to me. Though, would it be different enough from the regular ones to be worth it?

>>66477429
My take on Predators as antagonists:

>SPEED: 1 (I figured they're slower, more tactical, than xenos. Though one did wipe out a room of thugs in seconds in Predator 2, so possibly Speed 2)
>HEALTH: 10
>SKILLS: Mobility 8, Observation 6
>Armor Rating: 8 (impervious to acid)
>PREDATOR TECH: Predators are armed with various technological gadgets to aid them in their hunt. A cloaking device adds +4 to Mobility, and forces any enemy targeting it beyond Short range to roll Observation vs. Mobility to be able to attack. Multi-spectrum visor allows the Predator to spot life-forms (humans or xenomorphs) and technological traps (mines, IR sensors etc.) without rolling Observation, also ignoring lighting, smoke and other obstructions. Solid objects (e.g. walls) block line of sight as normal. The visor is also paired to the shoulder mounted cannon, allowing the Predator to use the Plasma Caster attack.

That's what I got so far. I imagined the attacks in the attack table would be a Predator roar (induce Panic Roll), a Plasma Caster attack (that is re-rolled if tech is damaged), and maybe an insta-kill wrist-blade/spear skewer.

I also imagined the crits would be something like, Predator tech damaged, Predator is killed, Predator is killed but manages to activate self-destruct, or something like that.

>>66460262

Someone willing to reup the pdf? The old link has expired

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>>66467822
>Very few do anything interesting with the xenomorph, or actually venture out and use ideas other than usual the critter.

The critter itself isn’t all that interesting. In the extra materials for the original movie, the xenomorphs eggs were alst remants of peacefull aliens who died out when the host species they depended on for reproduction perished due to unspecified catastrophe, you could make something interesting out of that. But the xenimorth was eventually reduced into just a dangerous animal that want to eat oyu or inject its larva inside you, you can only make so many stories abotu that and that is if we ingnore the shitty Prometheus movies which furhter reduce it into a terror weapon made by ancient aliens.

I mean you could add hyperxenomorph that injects its larvas into fresh chestbursters, that has a basis in real life biology.

Reading the Gibson Alien 3 comic, it seems like it can be squared with Aliens Resurrection with only a limited amount of changes to both. And the welding spots can be easily hidden from a PC crew with limited information.

>>66478054
3 I mean 3 not Resurrection

Ripley is shot off from Anchorhead Station in an escape pod while unconscious in Gibson's script. In the beginning of Aliens 3, she crash lands in the Sulaco escape pod alone. Maybe she just believes Newt and Hicks to be dead and the hole solves itself.

Resurrection/4 I have no idea

>>66457386
It's Ye Olde Talky for "god's truth".

I hope this doesn't fall into the trap of every adventure and book revolving around a space monster jumping out of a closet.

>>66478530
The Campaign Mode tries to mitigate this with its campaign concepts moving away from horror, towards military games, space trucking and explorer/colonist life, and corporate shenanigans. So they're at least aware of the issue. Cinematic Mode seems to be geared towards straight up horror games, though not necessarily against only the usual monsters. The sample adventure in the preview PDF was definitely a traditional monsters-on-a-spaceship joint, so GMs might have to think a bit outside the box to come up with inventive horror scenarios.

Then again, Call of Cthulhu games can be, and have been, a lot more than stock evil-cult-tries-to-summon-a-monster adventures, so I'm sure there's room for a multitude of different space horrors that aren't the xenomorph in an Alien game as well.

>>66478768
Now that I think of it, I'm sure many of the Cthulhu adventures could be ported to Alien with some work. Beyond the Mountains of Madness, for example, can be turned into a grueling expedition to a hostile planet, with the elements, criminals and rival corporate interests taking their toll on the characters. With whatever setting appropriate horror waiting them in the end.

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Does anyone plan on using the engineers/space jockeys in their games? How?

>>66479181
Indirectly, at most. Maybe characters come across one of their artifacts, or explore some of their ruins, maybe. But never meet them, because big albino dudes aren't that interesting or scary.

>>66479181
Speaking of, are Engineers still alive and active? The one in Prometheus had been taking a really long nappy-poo, but then David strolled up on to an entire planet of theirs that was still alive and chilling in Covenant.

>>66479181
Space Jockeys, yes. Indirectly. Because they were mysterious and scary.

Engineers? No. If we need any uninspired big bald white guys players can make their own characters as such.

>>66479253
it's going to depend on what david does in the sequel to covenant but I get the feeling he's going to xenocide them

>>66479315
I mean, I think David's got more fun to have than that. He's got an entire ship of sleeping human colonists on their way to paradise and all the time in the world to experiment on them, kill the only two people that are aware that he isn't their android, and then sit back and watch as people start exploding.

>>66479253
I suppose it's up to Ridley Scott if he does a third film in that prequel trilogy. But I'm guessing not. They wanted to genocide humanity in Prometheus, but almost a hundred years later, mankind has spread all over the place and still hasn't had any real contact with them. I'm sure the Engineers - if they were alive - would have done something to humans by then, especially after what David did to them in Covenant.

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>>66479253
Possibly? If Planet 4 was their homeworld then it seems as though they might have been hanging on, but judging by the wreck on Acheron and the abandoned facility that they find in Prometheus, I think it's safe to say that their starfaring days are over.

>>66479315
I kind of hope at this point that there *won't* be a sequel after how naff Covenant was. But in any case, I fail to see how David *could* prosecute any kind of genocide against the Engineers, considering that last we see he's out of the black goo, and no longer has access to one of their spaceships. In fact, judging by the challenge he sends to WY before he departs, he might be more interested in what he can do with humanity now.

>>66479181
>>66479253
>>66479315
>>66479387
>>66479391
Do you guys actually *like* how the Space Jockeys were ruined?

When I saw Prometheus it seemed like the biggest disappointment of what Scott could have done with them.

Not judging if you like it, it just surprises me since a few years ago /tg/ was about unanimous in its dislike for Prometheus.

>>66479387
I thought it was just a facility that wanted to genocide humanity; I dunno if it was ever made clear if it was a species-wide agreement to exterminate all life on Earth.

>>66479391
One thing that I personally sort of wondered was if they hadn't already more or less had their civilization collapse. Planet 4's civilization seems noticeably more primitive, the people are basically just dressed in rags, and they appear sorta confused/enthralled by the appear of one of their own spaceship, along with no really appearing to have any of their own. Kinda curious if Planet 4 might have been 'feral' Engineers, primitives whose spacefaring civilization had regressed to the point of just being Dudes in Dresses.

>>66479430
Very fortunately, Covenant is so isolated from the game, like Resurrection. That it can be mostly ignored except for monsters to steal.

Promethean is harder, but still isolated to one mentioned so far.

>>66479387
>>66479391
https://screenrant.com/alien-covenant-sequel-writer-director-ridley-scott/
can always be cancelled but it's looking like it's a go. I'm leaning towards xenocide because like >>66479387 says nobody worries about engineers in the future, and nobody is really worried about killer androids so david's actions towards humanity can't be too far reaching

>>66479430
I had always hoped for better but what can you do

>>66479430
>Do you guys actually *like* how the Space Jockeys were ruined?
I thought they were okay in Prometheus- though on reflection all the religious symbolism related to them got on my wick- because they were still mysterious, very dangerous, and most of the details of their relationship with the xenomorph were left to the imagination. It was only in Covenant that I thought they got ruined, what with their homeworld being wiped out with ease by their own weapons, then what's left of them being experimented on for donkey's years until they're all gone. Oh, and the xenomorph actually developed totally independently of them, which *really* annoyed me.

>>66479478
>Kinda curious if Planet 4 might have been 'feral' Engineers, primitives whose spacefaring civilization had regressed to the point of just being Dudes in Dresses.
That's a good idea actually, if it wasn't their homeworld and instead just a colony that'd gone feral from being cut off for generations. Though I kind of feel it still has the same problem as Covenant what with taking all the mystique and menace out of them.

Maybe that could work for anyone wanting to build games around xenoarchaeologists studying their civilisation, coming across either sealed up facilities like in Prometheus (where the surviving Engineers are few in number, but inexplicably homicidal and very dangerous to all concerned) or feral worlds like in Covenant, which have maybe either gone to hell because of ignorant descendants messing around with old technology or whatever.

>>66479554
>totally independently
Not according to the novelization, actually. David credits the Engineers with creating the eggs in the novelization, and even examines a fossilized one.

>>66479581
Oh yeah, I remember that. Wonder if it was Foster trying to close the plothole that David's creation of the xeno leaves the derelict on Archeron in.

>>66479534
>Scott has indicated he wants to continue moving away from the Xenomorphs and make artificial intelligence beings like David the main antagonists in future Alien movies
Dunno, feels more likely that we're going to get malevolent puppet master Androids using mankind as unwitting lab rats.

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>>66479430
>>66479554
>>66479581
Prior to Prometheus, what was the canon (or at least some prominent theories) behind the Space Jockeys and their connection to the xenomorphs? Considering the Giger architecture of their ship, I always assumed some relation, possibly as inhabitants of the same planet.

>>66479711
Because Prometheus, there wasn't even the idea that they were just giant naked blue men inside a spoopy suit.

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>>66479711
>Prior to Prometheus, what was the canon (or at least some prominent theories) behind the Space Jockeys and their connection to the xenomorphs?
Not a lot, I think. It was generally assumed by most that the derelict was some kind of bomber, intended to deploy the xenomorph eggs on an enemy world as a bioweapon, only something got out and impregnated the pilot, who crash-landed the ship on Acheron and then set up his distress/warning signal.

Aside from that I'm not sure, though I have a vague recollection of a comic somewhere that had a living Space Jockey in, ages before Prometheus, which got facehugged and spawned a four-armed xenomorph.

Anyone else remember what I'm talking about?

>>66460344
the alien queen is now a disney princess

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>>66479650
>using mankind as unwitting lab rats
we could still get that as the means, towards the ends of xenocide

>>66479711
there was no canon, but as >>66479750
said it was mostly thought they were an escaped bioweapon

>>66480004
What an absolute unit.

>>66480004
>pic
Shit, I think I'd prefer them being suits instead of that. Looks like an elephant that's spent its entire life chain-smoking and had its ears fall off as a result.

>>66480004
>There's got to be more to life than xenocide.
>I want to go home to my elephantbros.
>This suit is uncomfortable.
>I wish I was a tall albino with a jacked body.
>My trunk hurts.

>>66480231
>>My trunk hurts.
Why was it that one, out of all of them, that made me crack up?

Anyone else feel the Supplies system is a tad too unpredictable? You can hoard six water bottles, but with a bit of bad luck, your character chugs them down in a day or after one combat encounter.

>>66480769
It could just so happen you can’t find any supplies or something went wrong during the time you consume the supply.

>>66480769
The probability of getting all sixes on a 6d6 is about 0,002%. That's, like, one in a fifty thousand.

>>66480769
>>66480881
I think it adds another level of resource management into the equation. It's no longer just about how much water you have to spend, to becomes about whether or not you want to risk exerting yourself at the cost of your supply

>>66480769
The Supply system is fine, but I did notice a bug in the Ammo system. Since you run out of ammo only when you roll a 1 on any of your Stress Dice, Sentry Guns and Androids both have infinite ammo as they don't roll those.

>>66481203

Are PC controlled Androids allowed to use guns? I remember Bishop famously wasn't armed.

>>66481623
They would need to play a synth who hasn't been programmed like Bishop (read: highly illegal combat synthetics).

>>66481203
I'm not sure I really see that as a bug, desu. Incredibly disciplined combat synthetics would be masters of ammo conversation, and a sentry gun has a 'sufficient' amount of internally-fed ammo.

>>66475958
>>66475866

It's a good thing that the xenomorph skull exists in Predator 2 then lol

>>66478033
>furhter reduce it into a terror weapon made by ancient aliens.
even worse, covenant says Xenomorph is modern weapon made by dickless android nutjob.
What the fuck are you smoking, ridley?!

>>66481754
>and a sentry gun has a 'sufficient' amount of internally-fed ammo.
The big problem there is that in Aliens, the most important thing about sentry guns is that they do in fact run out of ammo - And fast, when the Hive can send nigh-unlimited numbers at them. Though on that note, why the fuck weren't those hallways completely fucking melted through by all the alien blood? They should have melted out the floors into oblivion.

>>66482188
And this is why too much prequel "screwing around in the backstory" risks demystifying things, and making your once-cool franchise look hokey.

>>66482188
Xenomorph as an animal still left you thinking: "How does their homeworld look like?"

Now they are just another boring boogiemen.

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>>66449437

Is the lore really there to support an entire game for Aliens? Just pick any other sci-fi RPG and have the aliens make a cameo.

>>66478106
Hicks was also out of the EEV and replaced with another marine in Aliens: Colonial Marines so he'd be alive for a Gibson Alien 3 take.
Newt is hard dead in Alien 3, though she is barely in the Gibson script, essentially put on a bus for most of it like Jones the cat was in the 2nd film.

>>66482658
6 movies, 2 crossover movies, and 40 years of books, comics, and video games, there's a fuckload of lore

>>66482849
>there's a fuckload of lore
And that's without getting into some of the really weird stuff. (Unlicensed imitations, fan films, and Kenner action figures...)

>>66479356
I know Scott originally planned out that The Engineers were going to return in Covenant's sequel seeking revenge on David for him wrecking Planet 4.
I also heard that David would meet Ripley's mother in the film and it was going to be a three-way war with whatever that entailed.

Though now Disney owns Alien, not Fox.

>>66479391
I think in the canon that David would have reached Origae-6 or he's using the Covenant as a mobile base for himself.
If anything his broadcast to WY certainly is a challenge and it is likely through sending them coordinates that he would have settled on Origae-6 and there may be even wilder xenogenetic experimentations awaiting those who may reach there.

>>66483343
>Though now Disney owns Alien, not Fox.
Technically Disney owns 20th Century Fox, who owns the Alien franchise. I'm not sure how much independence 20th Century Fox has in these matters though, some subsidiary companies are pretty much allowed to run themselves so long as they remain sufficiently profitable while others exist essentially in name only.

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>>66483343
>I also heard that David would meet Ripley's mother
I really hate when they do this bloodline shit

>>66483473
>bloodline shit
... *cough*Isolation*cough*

Which is dangerously close to Die Hard 2's line about how the same thing happens to the same guy twice.

>>66483473
Yeah I'm not a big fan myself. Isolation had this too, with Ripley's daughter. Her encountering the Xenomorph in between Alien and Aliens doesn't make much sense, given the company's general cluelessness about the creature. This only gets worse with the tie-in comics, which establish that Weyland-Yutani has full access to the Xenomorph, doing extensive research, integrating that research into synthetics, using entire colony ships to breed more in secret hives... There was no reason for Aliens to happen if any of this is canon.

>>66479478
I'd like to know more on their actual numbers and how widespread the Engineers were. They seemed somewhat centralised in government (it was supposed to be that the Engineers wanted to destroy humanity as they crucified an Engineer two thousand years ago, the agreement seemed somewhat unanimous as we never see any split factions and the only reason it never happened was the outbreak on LV-223 messed up the Engineers there).
However then the Engineers had this off-planet military base (the plot points to this being the lone one of theirs as there are ancient murals in Prometheus all pointing to that particular moon) and it's still up in the air if Planet 4 was their homeworld or just a capital colony. It only had one city that we know of on it, whereas LV-223 seemed to mention those pyramids dotted a line around the moon.
There was a deleted scene though in Covenant where under the wrecked city is a hangar filled with Juggernauts, so they did have ships there, atop that 'Mother Juggernaut' docking array that David dumped the black goo near.
Whether those Engineers treated them as tech they use regularly or weird relics of a past age beyond their current thinking, we can't know. They don't seem all that wide-spread thinking on it, perhaps they were more into their terraforming and legacy planet building using their black goo to seed worlds than traditional colonisation.

>>66483746
>using their black goo to seed worlds than traditional colonisation.
You know, the more I think about it, the more I'm convinced that the black goo is a HIGHLY DANGEROUS base compound that their scientists would then refine and focus to engineer the planetary ecosystem and biology that they wanted, and that the black goo itself was never meant to be used in the unstable base form we see fucking everything up.

>>66479750
There was a lone surviving Space Jockey in Earth War that was going to terraform Earth for it's own ends until it's Juggernaut got missiled.
Also the Jockey-Xenomorph was totally a thing in the comics. It appeared in this series:

https://avp.fandom.com/wiki/Aliens:_Apocalypse

>>66483812
>that the black goo itself was never meant to be used in the unstable base form we see fucking everything up.
Then why was it all stacked up inside the ship in Prometheus like shells in a magazine? Or why David could deploy them from *his* ship in Covenant like he was dropping bombs on people?

Actually, this reminds me of a fanfic I read not long after Prometheus itself came out, I think it was called, er, Forbidden Gifts (very original) by someone called Ardath_Rekha. It's kind of an AU where Shaw changes her mind at the last moment and attempts to reason with the Engineer, and surprise surprise she succeeds. It was mostly okay, the author had clearly given some serious thought to Engineer society, including their language, and there's a lot of Shaw boning the Engineer (each to their own, I guess). But, most importantly to this conversation, it established that there were actually different kinds of the black goo-type stuff, one of which just broke people down into nothing and then sort of rebuilt them (the stuff you see one drinking at the start of the movie, that's what they did their Engineering with), the stuff that just broke people down/mutated them (that was the bioweapon) and then this one last thing that was kind of a panacea. Look it up if you like, I'd say it's worth a read.

>>66483812
I think that was obvious since they used the goo to create humanity on Earth in the opening of Prometheus.

>>66483957
>Then why was it all stacked up inside the ship in Prometheus like shells in a magazine? Or why David could deploy them from *his* ship in Covenant like he was dropping bombs on people?

Oh as a weapon, yeah, it should totally be used that way. But I don't think they'd just go to a barren or low-life planet, drop a few puddles of goo, and then come back to see what happened and go "Oh, this isn't what we wanted, damn."

However if you have a planet you want to destroy because fuck those guys or whatever, then yeah, dropping the raw goo on them and then coming back in a couple hundred years to a completely feral planet, then sure, do that. There's enough planets in the galaxy that you aren't going to miss that one, and just blacklist it on maps as "These guys were shitters and we goo'd them."

>>66481770
David won't have been THE creator of xenomorphs in my games, instead he just reverse engineered his own type.
The xenomorph in Covenant had a totally different chestburster style and as another anon mentioned, in the novel David even says he's just copying what came before.
Thinking that xenos were only created 18 years before the first film given how fossilised the Derelict was is crazy talk.

Anyone have a new link to the book by chance? The old one expired and I could really use this in my life. :/

>>66483812
David's dialogue in Covenant on the goo does essentially confirm it's nanotech that reacts dependant on the dna and how it's introduced to said dna, so I'd say it's essentially confirmed.

>>66483957
As the other anon says, that ship and those containers came from a militarised base.

Now the more I think on it, why even before they were pissed at humanity when you see the dates on some of the murals that Shaw found, were the Engineers pointing humanity to their military base moon?
The hints seem to be an invitation once we're spacefaring to get there, though I suppose the easiest explanation is it was a warning, 'follow as we teach or this place shall judge you'.

>>66484329
>Now the more I think on it, why even before they were pissed at humanity when you see the dates on some of the murals that Shaw found, were the Engineers pointing humanity to their military base moon?
>The hints seem to be an invitation once we're spacefaring to get there, though I suppose the easiest explanation is it was a warning, 'follow as we teach or this place shall judge you'.

Maybe it was just a regular colony back then, or some place to receive enlightened races.

Could have been us pissing them off that changed things, or it could have even been some other race that came in and attacked them and they changed their mind from welcoming to "Fuck everyone else, we need better weapons."

>>66484081
>But I don't think they'd just go to a barren or low-life planet, drop a few puddles of goo, and then come back to see what happened and go "Oh, this isn't what we wanted, damn."
I could be wrong, but isn't that kind of what happens in Fire and Stone? The crashed Juggernaut from Prometheus leaked the black goo everywhere, and as a result like a hundred years later a habitable biosphere had developed there? Albeit one covered in xenomorphs.

>>66484563
Yes but it wasn't intentional. Like you said, crashed. It looks like an industrial accident - Big ass oil tanker hits something, oil leaking everywhere. Except in this case the oil is some sort of primordial mutagenic compound that turns things into slightly less sexy Giger paintings.

>>66484625
Hrm, fair.

Whilst we're still on the topic of the black goo, I was fascinated by the ruleset that lets you play as one of the Abominations, them that have been contaminated with the black goo but not enough to die instantly. Though, I was somewhat put off by how the player loses control of them very quickly, I felt like it could've been a good opportunity for them to play as an antagonist for a bit, hunting down the other players. Or would that not be fair to them? What do you think?

>>66484134
I can bypass David entirely in my games. The movie was a case of when my spine detached from my body to bitchslap my brain for allowing the rest of me to sit watching that shit. Then I got up and left.

>>66484693
I'd have liked the Mutant stage (2) to play out more, though the PC can at least play out who they attack first, which can give some cartharsis, though like with the Neomorph motes, if you fail that Sickness roll, you're done.
At least it's more of a chance you can stave off the effects of the black goo strain than the motes.
The rules are interestingly similar to the strength and agility buffs that the androids have, whilst losing the ability to use complex tech whilst roided reminded me of some homebrew rules someone did for using Xeno-Zip in an rpg I read somewhere once.
And linked to that, the comics went fairly nutty with the Xeno-Zip/Royal Jelly stuff, including the Bug-men, people turning insectoid after taking too much of the xeno-drug.

>>66484871
>Xeno-Zip/Royal Jelly
I do hope shit like this makes it in. It was a surprisingly frequent sight in the comics for a while there.

>>66484693
The same rule applies the secret Android character - one attack, and then you're NPC. I can see why the writers are wary of giving a very powerful character to a player, to be unleashed against other character. At least with NPC monsters, the GM can ration out the tension and drama by drawing things out, giving the characters small glimmers of hope, and not gunning straight for a total party kill.

A player character with an Agenda to kill others, and has no restrictions, is going to be very efficient at it. He'll know to play his strengths, go for the characters that pose the biggest threat first, and use his (player) intelligence to plan and play tactically. Some space trucker character with 3 Health and no armor isn't going to stand a chance.

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I wonder if there's any in-universe reason for Joseph Conrad's memetic status in alien works. Maybe there's something in theme of his stories that resonates deeply on gut with people working space-related professions?

It would not even be completely unheard of - 19th century burgers were crazy about shakespeare, to the point where bearded grizzled gold diggers and trappers in middle of godforsaken wildland would casually shoot quotes at each other and argue about plot points and stories... (oh, and then there was that time rivalry between fans of two famous shakespearean actors litearlly led to massive streetfighting riots in New York, with multiple casualities, and military having to break the crowds of angry theatrea coinesseurs) .

It could be an amusing bit of background, like spacestation having a dramatic reading of say "Lord Jim" and all tickets being immediately sold on the spot for outrageous prices.

>>66485103
Good point, I didn't consider that. I suppose it makes sense, thinking about it, considering that the Abominations are supposed to have lost all their higher reasoning abilities and are purely driven by fury.

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>>66461796
>Androids do not get a Talent
Ah hah, I figured this out. Page 25 of the prerelease book.

>Playing an android
>Androids can have any career

>Career
>You also get a special talent unique to your career.

So, every indication is that Androids should have a Career other than just being Androids, and should have a talent associated with that Career.

Speculation: Androids that are listed with no talent have selected a career that provides a talent that would be useless to android characters and thus it isn't listed. Or, they're made as NPC androids that are specifically not as high-tech as "normal" androids in the series/game. This explains Ava 6, as she's an outdated model and presumably not nearly as advanced

>>66485096
I was never really a fan of the concept, as nothing in the films really showed jelly as a thing and it was always weird shit involved with it in the comics, though I remember it being in the old AvP TCG and I really loved that old cardgame.
Some people played Magic, me I put my alien hive deck against my mate's marines and predators, lol. I remember I even made my own tokens for it to keep track of what chestbursters and such I had in play.