I would use Star Wars D6 for both oBSG and nBSG since its just Star Wars with the serial numbers filed off (I would also use it for the a RPG based on the Buck Rodgers TV show of the same period). Seriously you don't need a new or unique system to model drama, just roleplay it like you are supposed to.

Quote from: Dr Rotwang!:rimshot:

Ah, ok, yeah that was pretty cheesy. And in fact in my rabid glee to point out the Mormons in Space connection (because oBSG sucked. Seriously.), I provided nBSG RPG info but not oBSG info.

OK, jokes aside ("You need a system like Exalted, so that you can jump really high with your wrist-bracelets and help neighborhood kids win their softball games" (actual plot of an episode of BSG:1980)), if someone held a gun to my head to run oBSG, I'd run it as a pure end-to-end Military Operations game.

All the PCs would be pilots. And the game would use minis and Savage Worlds as a rules base: Fast and cinematic piloting/dogfighting without all the crunch and "reality" of 3d space (no real need for it, this is BSG not Homeworld). I'd have it as a series of missions against the Cylons, with "scramble moments" in the middle of the role-playing drama. And I'd turn up the character death. Make some missions (not all, but some) hard where it's expected that 1-2 PCs are going to kick it in order to complete the overall mission... but with a light system making a new character wouldn't be hard.

I'd turn down the testosterone and turn up the military weariness. The out-of-cockpit roleplaying would be about soldiers interacting with each other (team rivalry, inter-team competition, taking leave/vacation, etc).

To get prepared, I'd have the players make their PCs. Then I'd have them make a roster of other pilots on their team (3-4), then other notable pilots in the fleet (about 5-8), including "The Best Pilot" (which won't be a PC), "The Worst Pilot" (which won't be a PC). Then make a roster of about 3 lieutenants/higherups and give them names and personalities. Then come up with the names and simple description for about 3-5 civilian PCs, including love interests, kids-with-robodogs, etc. None of the above would be pre-statted, because if one PC kicks it, they can draw on one of the other characters in the above pool and make it their own.

-Andy

Re: the excellence of british TV- yeah some of it is great, and then there are things like Are you beinbg served?.

Now, I think we should get back to talking about the robot dog; not nearly enough attention has been given to this aspect of the old BSG.

Quote from: Andy KOK, jokes aside ... if someone held a gun to my head to run oBSG, I'd run it as a pure end-to-end Military Operations game.

All the PCs would be pilots. And the game would use minis and Savage Worlds as a rules base: Fast and cinematic piloting/dogfighting without all the crunch and "reality" of 3d space (no real need for it, this is BSG not Homeworld). I'd have it as a series of missions against the Cylons, with "scramble moments" in the middle of the role-playing drama. And I'd turn up the character death. Make some missions (not all, but some) hard where it's expected that 1-2 PCs are going to kick it in order to complete the overall mission... but with a light system making a new character wouldn't be hard.

To totally steal someone else's idea (and I won't even tell you whose), the characters' flight team would be Blue Squadron, the fellows who launch and land on the pod on the opposite side of the Galactica from the more famous Red Squadron shown on the series.  Every now and then the GM would treat the players to some R&R scheduled at the same time as Red Squadron so they could put the beat-down on Starbuck and the make on Sheba.

!i!

Quote from: AosRe: the excellence of british TV- yeah some of it is great, and then there are things like Are you beinbg served?.

Now, I think we should get back to talking about the robot dog...

Which might just make Are You Being Served? worth watching without benefit of a bottle of Bacardi and a fist full of Percodan.

!i!

Quote from: KoltarStill haven't seen that one....
 Reality I live in the current BSG is better written and acted than the earlier one. I even discuissed it with Richard Hatch. He reluctantly agreed that he is getting better material as Tom Zarek than he ever did as the original Apollo.


- Ed C.

There is no question that the original BSG was a flawed jewel, and that it suffered often from muddled writing and cheesy lines.

It doesn't follow that the new BSG was the way to solve that, by going all "dark" and postmodernist and no one is really "bad" or truly good.

I would have vastly preferred to see the sequel series that was originally being planned, where Hatch and Benedict would be back as Apollo and Starbuck and you'd get a more serious, more together version of the original series, but in the same original universe and with the same themes though, rather than themes that utterly betray the original's outlook.

RPGPundit

Quote from: Tyberious FunkI think you mean Face, not Phoenix

I believe that in the spanish dubbing of the A-Team ("Los Magnificos!") he might have been called Phoenix...

RPGPundit

Quote from: SettembriniI´ve only seen the pilot, but in that, Adama is holding a speech that basically says: "I´m not sure if we humans do deserve to live at all."

If that´s "realistic" to you, I pity you.

That´s not military thinking, that´s Starbucks-sitting-sixteen-year-olds-with-
che-guevara-t-shirt-who-ponders-if-he-maybe-stops-eating-meat.


Alas, I´ve only seen the pilot, but that speech (and the childish treatment of alcoholism and pathetic wannabe portrayal of military goings) was enough to kill the franchise for me.

For me it didn't get that far. I was enthusiastic about a new BSG, until they announced that Starbuck was going to be turned into a woman.  At that moment, I knew right away that the only thing they were going for was to purely shock and impress people with how much "this isn't like your father's Galactica", not to mention some stupid idea of "women can be tough too" (as if we didn't already fucking know that, or they couldn't have done that with some other character, it HAD to be Starbuck), and just to be iconoclastic and break down everything about the old series as much as possible.

So the utter inanity and direct assault on the existing fandom that was that decision was more than enough for me to be convinced that this show didn't bear watching. Not a single fucking episode.
I have read up quite a bit about it since then, and nothing I've read has convinced me to watch it, quite the contrary. The cylons aren't bad guys, the humans aren't good guys, Adama isn't sure humanity deserves to live, and they made Richard Hatch come back to play a scumbag politician instead of a hero; because of course, making him a hero would somehow validate existing real BSG fans, and why would they want to do that? Their entire point in the new is that there are no Heros.

RPGPundit

Alas, for all those who want believability and military sci-fi:

Aliens.

And even the quite illogical Space: Above & Bexond is far, far, far better at the exact same stuff BSG tries to do.

Old Cylons



New Cylons



Compare this with...

Old Cybermen



New Cybermen



There are LOTS of shows with pretty girls in them.  There are NOT a lot of shows with cool robots in them.

Why are there no cool robots in Battlestar Galactica?

The comparison is apt!

Quote from: RPGPunditFor me it didn't get that far. I was enthusiastic about a new BSG, until they announced that Starbuck was going to be turned into a woman.  At that moment, I knew right away that the only thing they were going for was to purely shock and impress people with how much "this isn't like your father's Galactica", not to mention some stupid idea of "women can be tough too" (as if we didn't already fucking know that, or they couldn't have done that with some other character, it HAD to be Starbuck), and just to be iconoclastic and break down everything about the old series as much as possible.

I didn't know anything about it before I saw the pilot. I was trying to figure out what was going on. Is this 15 years later? Is it not connected? About halfway into it, I turned it off. It was so dumb and poorly directed. When they aired it again on NBC, I gave it another shot. It wasn't any better. The space scenes was so dull, the music and sound effects were crap, and all the characters I liked from the original were ruined. Why does everyone think that humanoid robots and that making former men into women are cool. The original cylons were the best. The thing I did like from it was how the cylons took control of the new technology, and that's why the Galactica could function.

Quote from: StuartWhy are there no cool robots in Battlestar Galactica?

There are, its only some of the Cylons that are made to look like humans to infiltrate. The actual 'robot' cylons in new galactica are pretty neat.

The New Cybermen look like the old Iron Man without a paint job.

-clash

Quote from: RPGPunditI believe that in the spanish dubbing of the A-Team ("Los Magnificos!") he might have been called Phoenix...

RPGPundit

Man, I love those Spanish translations, don't you?  

HEAVY METAL = Universo De Fantasia = "Universe of Fantasy"
TOTAL RECALL = Vengador Del Futuro = "Avenger of the Future"
BABY'S DAY OUT = Cuidado!  Bebe Suelto! = Caution, Baby On The Loose!

...uy, que la chingada.

EDIT: Corrected spelling, MISTER Bowley.