I've been kicking an idea around in my head for an open ended crafting/skill leveling system where players could gain expertise in any skill they want, and build anything they can dream up. The concept was inspired in large part by Thinks' Lair of the Mountain King. The idea of a Girl Genius inspired game came up in another thread, and Wears suggested one based on sparks sentenced to repair Castle Heterodyne.
If you aren't familiar with Girl Genius, it's basically a steampunkish world where the normal populace lives in fear/awe of sparks... those individuals with a touch of madness accompanying a frightening intellect. These mad scientists build everything from a better mousetrap to a steam powered death ray, and within the story, Castle Heterodyne is the semi sentient home of the Heterodyne family, among the most powerful of the sparks. It has fallen into disrepair with the absence of a resident Heterodyne, and potential sparks have been rounded up and 'fed' to the castle with the task of repairing it instead of letting them run amok.
The setup for this game would be that the players are all emerging sparks that have been dumped into a disused section of the castle, and their goal will be to survive the castle's attempts to kill them off, while building various devices to improve their ability to cope with challenges. Various events such as building devices will give them practice in a particular skill, and as they gain levels in that skill, it will increase their ability to construct more complicated devices. Pretty much whatever they want to attempt, I'm willing to let you try. I should mention that this game will be mostly description/writing based, just to be able to keep a good pace and not slow things down... If you build something particularly awesome, I may draw up a sketch of your new device...
What I need from potential players:
Name:
Description:
Backstory:
Innate Skill: I'll start each player with level in a discipline of their choice... after all, they must have shown talent in something to be collared and shipped off to the castle.
Regarding skills: This will be pretty open ended, but if it's too narrow, that skill likely won't be commonly useful. If it's too broad, I'll work with you to narrow it down to something more balanced (Making Stuff would be too broad...)
I'll still be working on finding a balance point for this game, so things will be subject to change in the early going.
I think that 4-6 people would be a good start... after 6, I'll cap it for the time being.
Characters