Hell is Suite: New Reservation

New Reservation's promotional and album art.

Hell is Suite: New Reservation is a Hell is Suite game hosted by Phantomsurf and co-GMed by Wolfywoo. The game ran from March 16, 2020 to May 17, 2020 until it was finally cancelled on July 16, 2020.

Blurb

Welcome to the Surfsong View Terrace, the newest up-and-coming resorts, built on a synthetic, floating island by the world's most imaginative geniuses. Travelling between the coast of California and the archipelago of Hawai'i, who wouldn't want to laze around such a lovely place? Sparkling, clear waters and welcome sunlight will do any body good.

But that's not why you're here. You're here for the first ever New World Convention, the biggest meeting of the minds in all of Earth's history. People from all around the world are being brought to Surfsong View Terrace to display their unthinkable intelligence, influential charisma, and firm leadership in the face of the post-apocalyptic world. And you are one of them! A revolution awaits you in this ocean resort, and it's time to show the potential that is dying to burst out of you!

Plot

See also: Hell is Suite: New Reservation/Logs

Gameplay

The Hell is Suite TTRPG system was overhauled from past appearances to streamline and re-balance certain aspects. Players roll on their own and can improvise actions while Game Masters overlook those actions and guide improvisations.

Dice System

New Reservation uses d20 rolls for actions. There are environmental DC checks decided by the GM. Rolling a natural one is an automatic failure; rolling a natural twenty, a critical hit or automatic success. Players have hammerspace for the sake of storing and drawing items. Characters are unconscious at zero hit points and dead at negative fifteen hit points.

Ability Scores

There are six stats modeled after Dungeons and Dragons's 3.5th edition. These are modeled off of the Hell is Suite and Gate of Dragons stat systems but function as dice-roll modifiers to certain actions.

Strength: Melee attacks, ranged thrown attacks, damage for those attacks, grapples, forcing things open, carrying teammates or heavy objects.

Agility: For all ranged attacks (can use agility instead of strength for thrown), sleight of hand, stealth, and physical AC.

Defense: Your general endurance, constitution against physical effects like poison and blindness, as well as damage reduction for attacks that target physical AC.

Intelligence: Not necessarily school smarts, but more of high-end knowledge and experience. Think college-level science and computer science. Brain development. Stabilization checks, healing checks, identifying dead bodies and causes of death, working with technology and robotics, and most of all, using ESP, if you have it.

Willpower: A measure of a character's sense of courage and self-discipline. This is how players stand up to ESP effects and their deepest, darkest fears. It also determines a character's mental AC.

Momentum: This is a completely new stat. Mood Momentum, or Momentum for short, is for making and sustaining combos. Characters with positive momentum who succeed on a check will be given bonuses to their next check of the same type. If this action is an attack, then they get the bonus to accuracy and damage. This bonus stays on these checks until a character fails, takes a different action, falls unconscious or asleep, or arrives at a safe place.

Momentum debuffs apply when a character with negative momentum fails. If the failed action before was an attack action, the negative bonus will apply to both accuracy and damage. This debuff stays on these checks until you succeed, take a different action, fall unconscious/asleep, or you get to a safe place.

Action Economy

The action economy is simple in Hell is Suite: New Reservations. Every turn is six seconds. You have one standard action and 20 ft. of movement. Talking is free. Players can take an improvised action as their standard action, but here are general ones to consider that have specific effects if you so desire:

• Attack: while there are no penalties on hand-to-hand combat, there are penalties to improvised weapons depending on what they are.

• Load: firearms must be loaded, and it takes a standard action to do so during combat. Other ranged projectiles do not require loading.
• Coup de grâce: if someone is unconscious or asleep, players can take an attack action as a coup-de-grâce. Players must announce that they are doing so in order to receive its bonus. The attack automatically hits and receives the maximum die value. A roll will still happen to see if the attack lands critical, where the damage will be doubled.

• Guard: +3 to all AC types, damage reduction of 5.
• Use an item.
• Dirty tricks: these include sundering a weapon, sleight of hand, hiding, and anything else to mess with the target.

• SLEIGHT OF HAND and STEALTH. Roll an agility check against mental AC.
• GRAPPLE. Strength check versus Physical AC. On a success, an opponent is grappled.
• SUNDER. Strength check versus Fortitude AC. On a success, the opponent's weapon breaks.
• DISARMING FEINT. Agility check versus Mental AC. On a success, the opponent drops their weapon.
• THE GARBAGE COMPACTOR. Your foot sails through the air into the opponent's sweet spot. Roll a combat check with your higher stat versus the opponent's fortitude + 2. Only deals 1d4 + 1 damage, but the opponent is stunned for a turn and loses their Momentum bonus if it's active (regardless if positive or negative).

• FLEE. Take 20 ft. of extra movement to withdraw. Need to roll an agility check of 8 to successfully flee and take your movement. If you fail, you can choose to take an opponent's attack (randomly selected opponent if there's more than one possibility) and still flee, or stop fleeing and take no movement at all.
• STABILIZE. Prevent an ally from bleeding out. DC 15 Intelligence check if you have no tools.
• HEAL. Once between safe zones, you can attempt to heal. DC20 for a heal of 1d8 + Int modifier. This will automatically stabilize if both attempted and succeeded on a downed target.
• REST. Takes one turn to activate, you will fall asleep the next turn. Every turn, starting on the one you fall asleep on, you will heal 4 hit points at the start of your turns. Of course, you cannot take any actions while asleep. People can use a turn to wake you up, you will wake up if an attack hits you (or the opposing weapon makes enough noise), and you are weak to COUP-DE-GRAS.
• INVESTIGATE. Check for an item in your surroundings or get a read on an opponent.

Status Effects

Status effects target Fortitude AC mostly, though mental effects will target Mental AC. For the most part, they are self-explanatory. There might be improvised ones if necessary, but for the most part, the list below are the effects.

• UNCONSCIOUS. 0 HP, but stabilised. You're unable to move or take actions, but still counted in the game. Vulnerable to coup-de-gras.
• BLEEDING OUT. 0 HP, not stabilised, if you aren't stabilised in a number of turns equal to your defense (minimum one) after you've fallen, you die. Taking a coup-de-gras in this state automatically kills you.
• POISON. Take 2 damage on your turns. If the target is also asleep, they take 5 damage on the start of their turns.
• STUNNED. You can't do any action besides your basic movement, which is also halved.
• SLEEP. You can't take movement or standard actions, but you restore 4 HP on the start of your turns. You also become vulnerable to coup-de-gras.
• GRAPPLED. You cannot move or flee, but you can still attack or do other actions that would be sensible. You can also take a standard action to try and break free against your opponent's previous grapple roll. The DC lowers by 2 every attempt you make.
• GRAPPLING. You can move up to half of your movement, but cannot flee. You can let go of an opponent as a free action on your turn. You can still attack and do other actions that are sensible. You can also take a standard action to steady your grip, which adds 2 to your previous grapple total (would counter an enemy trying to escape).
• FEAR. You can only use your movement for the turn. You have to try and run from the thing causing you fear. You do not have to use your movement.
• DESPAIR. You cannot do any actions at all for the duration of the condition.
• BLINDNESS. If you're trying to do any action that requires sight, you have to take a -4.

Off-times

Off-times have been revised for quality of life. There will be two new features to offtimes: Introvert/Extrovert Channels, Offtime Tasks, and the Dare Board.

Introvert/Extrovert channels are simple. There are now options for you and anyone you choose to be safe from disturbance while interacting. You tell me when you want to make an Introvert channel, which means that until you are done with that offtime interaction, you will be unavailable to other players outside of the channel, and even if a player goes to the same location, they cannot interact with you. If it's with an NPC, they will be accessible to both players, but they will not acknowledge the other interaction going on (see it as two different people interacting with them at different times) Otherwise, there will be public Extrovert channels for any public locations to go to whenever you wish, where NPCs will be available on ping. You can call to switch between the two settings at any time and respective channels/redirects will be done.

Offtime Tasks are global goals that apply individually to players. If enough players complete the goals, new things will be unlocked. These are not mandatory, but there will be rewards for players who participate.

The Dare Board is back from HiS1 and HiS2. It hangs on the lobby wall in front of the Medbay. It is still optional, but instead of me creating one for every character every once in a while, there will be a choice to Generate a Dare or Post a Dare for Someone Else.

• Generating a Dare means Stitches giving your character a dare with a small reward. You can generate two dares between official sessions.
• Posting a Dare for Someone Else can be done once between official sessions per target, which means you can Post a reward seven times for each other player. You attach a reward (or Stitches can provide a reward), and post it in #dare-board, leaving a ping for the other player. Please do not shame players for not taking your dares and do not pressure them.

Cast

New Reservation features eight players with nine characters as well as five non-player characters.

Player Characters

The official art of the New Reservation cast.

• Pierre, played by Qlonever
• Callie and Noel Nightingale, played by Asian Trash
• Kota Falcon, played by Crying
• Silvia "Flurry Borealis" Grey, played by Kestrel
• Celosia Lucerne, played by Liminori
• Ace Oldem, played by Jack Frost
• Chloe Schwartz, played by Satomi
• Haruki Suzuki, played by Fafnir

Non-Player Characters

Official art of several New Reservation NPCs.

• Mars Beryllio
• Lily Cecidimus
• Verity Gaines (cameo)
• Lars Holt (cameo)
• Geoffrey King
• Kalei Kusamoto (cameo)
• Novus Malem
• Todd Nightingale (cameo)
• Stitches / Shuff Oldem
• Evie Renelle
• Kotone Suzuki (cameo)
• Sparky Tempest (cameo)

The original cast of Gamble Your Life appeared in the Surfsong View Terrace, Stitches captured them all and assembled them to participate act like they were playing Gamble your Life on a higher floor at the same time as New Reservation. The truth was that the Renegades were planning on ganging up on Novus on the higher floors, while the hostages would be kept down below as backup.

Several other recurring NPC characters were revealed over time. Stitches was next to be revealed, masterminding the game; then, Evie and Lily took over the medical bay and shop; following them was Mars, running the detective's office; last was Geoffrey, who, after being reclaimed from the Archibald King pinbot body, became the shopkeeper.

Trivia

• This is Sad Otters's first role-play to support switching character identities using Tupperbox.
• Skylar Morrigan was planned to make an NPC appearance and would have been the first dedicated lifeguard on staff in any Hell is Suite game.
• This game was intended to be the first Hell is Suite game without necessary deaths.

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