Now, why After Sundown, you ask? Simple. I'm lazy and self-aware enough to not think myself capable of writing a core system, as I consider Parabellum & Pagliacci to be failures. But I'm also crazy and deluded enough to think I could eventually & successfully do a major conversion. After Sundown is a proven system for what it does, and is one of the few that doesn't totally screw up its attempt at social mechanics and personality drivers. The combat system feels like it would recreate SU's combat flow reasonably well. What concerns me the most is whether I can successfully identify what needs to be addressed in this conversion.Shatner wrote:Premise in 30-words-or-less: a boy is being raised/trained by a trio of aliens who are working to clean up the mess their own people made thousands of years ago.
The Crystal Gems should be considered our En Media Res power level, which is rather potent in comparison to After Sundown's En Media Res. The specific powers need to be written up, and undoubtedly will be the lion's share of the word count. The different gem models seem reasonable analogues to the various supernaturals, including standard abilities each type start out with. Amethyst, Peridot, and Pearl are actually excellent examples for how nominally standardized models can differ from each other while still following an otherwise standardized build.
Fusions of various types should at least be considered, because what group of players isn't going to have at least one person desire to be a Garnet or Steven? For campaign purposes, it should be assumed that any player who chooses to play a fusion like Garnet must be the product of low-power gems, whether it be a standard low strength like a Ruby or a runt like an Era 2 Peridot. While the mechanics would undoubtedly be similar, there is and should be a distinct difference between Garnet and Opal at the table - as the first is played by a single player while the second is a potent battle tactic reserved for special occasions between two or more players.
Due to lack of information, the conversion is going to be focused on Earth (after the rebellion) and players are Crystal Gems. To avoid the frustrating issues surrounding canonical NPCs, I'm just going to nip that problem in the bud and outright state that this is an alternate timeline where the characters in the show are not assumed to exist.