Alien Menace Game Prep

A quick post.

I’ve been getting ready for the follow-on session to the incomplete Alien Menace starter this weekend. We had to cancel last time due to sickness, ComiCon, and general beat-down-ness.

Some things I realized:

• It’s really handy to have pre-planned encounters. +Eric hil walked me through how to generate those, and there’s a specific order to it. Follow it in +Fantasy Grounds and you will do well. They show up by holding the CTRL key.
• Each type of bad guy should have a characteristic behavior when they attack and defend. That speeds up your choices by restricting them, and creates patterns for the players to detect and exploit
• Slow, steady advancement with lots of Waiting and waiting in GURPS requires a unique, yet to be determined “speed up the clock” mechanic. I think I have one. I’ll publish it when I do.
• Along with characteristic fighting styles, I need to make a note about what each bad guy will do when confronted with sensory input. How will they react to seeing a PC? Hearing footsteps? Hearing explosions? What about other senses?

All my baddies are placed, but I need to get their behaviors settled in my head before we start on Saturday. That just requires a bit of time.

I also need to start carrying around my Book of Pretentiousness again. I have had a few ideas slip away that shouldn’t have, and it was way better to capture them in that journal. Plus, the babes dig it.