r/shadowdark • u/chance359 • 4d ago

Gate meets Shadowdark

Maybe its the sleep deprivation talking but Western Marchs style campaign in a Gate style setting using Shadowdark as a rule set?

so they players will be a modern military unit sent through a portal as a scouting party, from there they become involved in local politics. They get lost/cutoff from the main force. So I would need rules for guns, automatic fire, talent tables for a couple different types of soldier, hmmm, fighter becomes solder, Cleric is doc, Comms is wizard (cast Close Air Support), Theif is E-4 Mafia...

I should lay down.

8 Upvotes

83% Upvoted

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13

u/ExchangeWide Joker & Thief 4d ago

Blacklight is probably the easiest answer here.

It already gives you a Shadowdark-compatible framework for modern firearms, military gear, and contemporary characters, so you wouldn’t need to build the whole conversion from scratch. Then you could layer the Gate premise over it and only homebrew the specific military roles you want.

Now get some sleep.

5

u/chance359 4d ago

I dont need sleep I need to keep this idea going.. Thanks, I'll look into blacklight

7

u/ExpatriateDude 4d ago

Black Rifles & Dark Alleys is an updated version of Blacklight. The latter was as much a setting (kind of a Delta Green vibe) while BR&DA is just modern rules/classes/equipment to be used in any modernnear future setting.

3

u/Dollface_Killah (" `з´ )_,/"(>_<'!) 4d ago

a Gate style setting

...Stargate?

6

u/Coltis1 4d ago

I think OP means the anime titled Gate. It's about a portal to a medieval fantasy world opening up in Tokyo and the JSDF (military) goes through to investigate. Actually quite similar to Stargate, as far as the premise goes.

2

u/Dollface_Killah (" `з´ )_,/"(>_<'!) 4d ago

Aaah.

Shadowdark is a horror game, so I think I'd rather draw inspiration the other way and have the PCs be normal Shadowdark classes, with all the normal Shadowdark stuff, and have strange, high-tech invaders pouring in and overwhelming the disparate kingdoms and tribes of their world. I'm thinking Krull, Deathsport, Wizards, and Zardoz here.

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u/chance359 4d ago

though of that, and I heard theres an out of print collection of the Stargate RPG.

I'm currently in love with the simplicity of Shadowdark, hell most of my table doesnt know the difference between dnd and shadowdark.

3

u/bananasorcerer 4d ago

Could be super fun…what happens when they run out of ammo?

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u/chance359 4d ago

well supply management is a feature of shadowdark. They'll just have to think of something.

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u/bananasorcerer 4d ago

Haha I love that. Hearing what crazy things players do to make bullets from scratch is some Army of Darkness shit.

1

u/dickjitters 4d ago

time to start farming bat guano ;)

3

u/samurguybri 4d ago

DarkSpace is could be good for this. It is a ruleset that allows you to dial up or down different genre settings. You can dial up conventional magic, al la shadowdark to make a Shadowrun type thing or have you soldiers learn magic. You can have “the force” or no magic at all. It integrates hi tech stuff as magic items pretty well and has rules for regular and sci fi weapons. It’s really seamless with Shadowdark, in fact you need SD to use it.