Ad Astra
The ideas in contemporary science fiction excite us. We want to tell stories about transhumanism, space exploration, artificial intelligence, uplifts, x-risks, and social change. If the implications of these ideas for the people of the future excite you, too, you should run a game of Eclipse Phase. There are many good resources out there that can provide the basics on how to run a roleplaying game; this section contains advice for running Eclipse Phase specifically and is useful for both novice and experienced gamemasters (GMs).
The Elevator Pitch
If you want to run Eclipse Phase, you’ll need players to join your game. This may present your first obstacle — the bane of every outsidethe-box GM: many gaming groups are reluctant to play anything other than the leading-brand fantasy roleplaying game. Science-fiction games are a hard sell in particular; everyone has a rough idea of what living in a fantasy setting is like, whereas not everyone groks sci-fi concepts like resleeving or how cylinder habitats work.
The key to overcoming this isn’t just to tell them what you think is cool, but to identify what they will think is cool about it. Pitch them on that aspect of Eclipse Phase, and you’ll have a new player.
Some players get into Eclipse Phase because of unusual character opportunities like octopi or incorporeal AGIs. Some people love the “save points” created by backups. Others geek out on the mesh, nanotech, exoplanet exploration, or some other hard sci-fi aspect of the game. And still others are interested in the ability of transhumans to switch bodies andappearances — and the drama and questions around identity raised by this fluidity.
Think about your friends, the characters they like to play, and the stories you’ve seen them have fun with in the past. When you pitch them on Eclipse Phase, emphasize parts of the game and setting that dovetail with what they love in an RPG. Just remember to keep those promises when you run the game.
Also consider how long you want your campaign to run. Players are often more willing to commit to a campaign if it’s closed-ended, with the promise that the plot will play out in a certain number of sessions, with an option to start a new story arc if everyone is loving it.
If you think your potential players might be interested in reading about the setting first, don't forget that we release our material under a Creative Commons license. Feel free to share any of our electronic titles with friends so they can check them out for themselves. The Eclipse Phase Quick-Start Rules, available on our website, is designed for this purpose. Some people respond better to visual stimuli, so you might also want to show them some of the cool art, available in our hack packs or online wiki.
The First Session
It’s a lot easier to make an Eclipse Phase character after playing the game once. We suggest that new groups start with one of the introductory scenarios published by Posthuman Studios and play it using the sample character teams in this book. Some players might get attached to those characters and want to continue playing them, while others will prefer to make their own for the coming campaign.
Using the Sample Character Teams
If possible, stick to a single team of sample characters — Firewall, Gatecrashing, or Criminal. Each team has a complementary mix of abilities. If you mix and match, notice that each team has a fighter, a hacker/techie, a social networker, and a specialist (often with investigative skills).
If you have more than four players, simply choose extras from one of the other teams. The specialist characters (Dante, Killjoy, Pivo, and Whisper) are the best extras to add to a group, as they have less overlap in skills than the other characters.
Not every sample character is loaded with weapons and combat skills. Although all of them can dive for cover in a firefight, some are mediocre combatants — they excel in other areas. Make sure the players understand that combat is deadly.
If you have fewer than four players, make sure someone plays a hacker. It’s possible to solve many Eclipse Phase scenarios without firing a shot, but a team without infosec is at a severe disadvantage. Your friend who’s always the wizard in the fantasy game is an ideal candidate if no one else wants to learn the mesh subsystems.
Review the skills that the characters need to get through your planned introductory scenario and make sure the team has those skills covered. If they don’t, suggest they tweak their skills — or tweak the scenario so that they don’t get stuck.
In Media Res
Avoid the inclination to comprehensively explain all of the rules in advance. For now, just tell the players the core mechanics: how skills and roll-under percentile tests work. You can explain the other rules as they come up during game. As the GM, this does require you to anticipate the characters' needs and provide helpful tips. For example, the players may know they need to track down information, but may not know that they can use the mesh for Research Tests or rely on their rep scores to acquire intel from their social networks. Situations like this provide the perfect opportunity for you to make suggestions and explain more of the rules.
The same guideline applies to the setting. You may have an encyclopedic knowledge of Eclipse Phase, but providing a full info-dump to your players is likely to make their eyes glaze over. Just cover the basics — you are immortal, you can switch bodies, everything is networked, AIs and uplifts exist — and detail the rest during game. The sample characters have short backgrounds with enough history to get most players started. Have each player describe their character’s look and general focus, and then just go. Ask if they have questions, then dive in. Avoid pausing play for more than a few minutes to explain a new aspect of the world; then get back to the action.
Tech Talk
The best way for players to get comfortable with the tech in Eclipse Phase is to use it. In the first few sessions, prompt players when using a given piece of tech would advance the game. This will gradually familiarize players with the ways in which tools like their mesh inserts, augmented reality, enhanced senses, muses, and the like can be used. Be patient and don’t penalize players for not knowing how everything on their sheet works. Becoming fluent in everything an Eclipse Phase character can do often takes players several sessions.
Prepping Your Campaign
Your demo of the system was brilliant, and now your group can’t wait for the next game. Nice job, fam. You probably have an idea of what kind of campaign you want to run, but it’ll go better if you have a conversation with your players about what they’d like to see more of. The campaign can grow from the intro scenario you played or it can be a new story. If you finish your first session early, discuss the following with your players right away. Alternatively, host a campaign creation session where you hash out these questions and make characters.
Where’s Home Base?
The variety of locations in Eclipse Phase can be a lot to take in. Rather than having players learn about life on the Martian suface, in a Venusian aerostat, and in an outer system cluster hab all at once, it’s useful to anchor the campaign at a home base. The less your group is immersed in hard science fiction, the more you’ll want to stick to planetary environments like Mars and Venus. In the more Earth-like locations, players aren’t overloaded with details like accounting for microgravity, visualizing what space habitats look like, or figuring out how to get around.
What’s Your Theme?
Find out what your players are interested in. Corporate black ops? High-tech dungeon crawls? Detective stories? Most Eclipse Phase games are centered around Firewall missions but this is not a requirement. The sample character teams are designed around specific themes and environments; an effective PC team will also be focused in terms of what types of jobs they’re good at. If you decide to go with a Firewall campaign, one important question to ask is: are the PCs already Firewall members? If not, your first scenario should be constructed around introducing them to the conspiracy and having Firewall recruit them during or after.
What’s Your Team Composition?
Once you’ve figured out a general description for what the team does, have the players discuss which roles they want to cover. Hacking and social networking are vital skills to complete any investigation, so make sure the team has a social character and a hacker. Violence is inevitable in most games, so at least one combat focused character and a few with combat as a secondary ability are needed to win fights. A “rogue” in this game is a stealthy techie with hardware skills, drones, and nanoswarms for breaking and entering.
The usefulness of other roles depends on the themes of the campaign. Scientists, asyncs, and genehackers get to shine if a scenario requires untangling scientific puzzles or interfacing with alien technology. Medics and mindhackers should encounter challenges where they’re more than just the team’s healer. If a player’s character concept seems like it wouldn’t give them much to do within the campaign them, first think about whether you can tweak your ideas to make things interesting for that character. If you can’t, suggest a different focus to the player.
Creating Characters
Collaborative character-creation sessions are ideal for making sure the PCs cover a good range of skills and abilities and don't overlap too much. They are also useful for establishing shared backgrounds and history.
Eclipse Phase is designed to be played by 4–6 players. You might consider giving players more CP at character generation if your group is smaller.
As GM, your job is to determine how many Morph Points and Gear Points get assigned for each mission. For starting players, we recommend starting at the default values (6 MP, 20 GP). You should wait to assign the full Gear Points until after the PCs receive the pitch for the first mission (or otherwise get drawn in). Give them a short period of prep time to pick out the specific gear pack or gear they want for that mission (pre-printed gear pack lists or cards are ideal for this purpose), but don't linger too long. Remind your players not to focus too much on their starting morph and gear, as it’s likely to all change.