Binary Star Games

Alchemist

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Alchemist #

An alchemist is someone who invents, creates, and uses technology, or a crude approximation of it. This usually manifests in the form of thrown explosives, applied oils, or varying potions, but can take other forms. Years of experimentation have given them expert abilities with regards to usage and resistance to these dangerous objects and substances.

Some alchemists come to their profession from an inability to perform magic but a desire to help people with similar effects, or through their profession in an area such as medicine or mining with explosives. Others are more intellectual in their pursuits, and carry them out for the purpose of either general advancement or their own research goals. And others are simply daredevils who delight in pushing their bodies to the limit in any way possible.

ANOINTED

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

ANOINTED #

ANOINTED by Binary Star Games

Fragments of Memories #

A king facing otherworldly destruction accepts an occult boon from an obscure church, and with it, anoints immortal champions who would drive ruin away. As peace reigned and more were created to maintain and grow the Kingdom of Volinn, they became known as the Anointed. Thus began the Age of Legends.

Armor Types

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Armor Types #

Your Armor Type determines your base defenses based on your class. You can also use the type of Armor you have to Embrace your Flaws if you think it would make sense in the scene (like wearing Heavy Armor while swimming or No Armor while passing through a thorny forest).

Any class who doesn’t have Heavy Armor listed can wear it nonetheless. They gain +1 to AC from the Light or None/Light Armor entry, but gain 1 Disadvantage on all attack rolls.

Augmentation Description

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Augmentation Description #

Augmentations are priceless items, experiences, specialized training, or breakthroughs that improve a character’s capabilities in a specific area. These come in Adventurer, Champion, and Epic tiers, and can be Standard (gives a static bonus) or Signature (gives a Recharge power).

Praxes and Augmentations #

Each Augmentation is associated with a Praxis. For item-based Augmentations, a Praxis is an exclusive type or slot of magical item (helmet, necklace, bracers, etc.) while an Augmentation would be the item itself. For non-item Augmentations, a Praxis represents a certain flavor of improvement, related to a change in how the character has found a way to bring something intangible to fruition, while the Augmentation is specifically what was learned. In either case, you can activate their abilities and assign/change them during a full rest.

Barbarian

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Barbarian #

A Barbarian is a warrior who doesn’t adhere to traditional discipline. They use raw power and emotional outbursts in combat, often putting themselves in more danger in pursuit of glory, honor, obligation, or simply due to rage or desperation.

Barbarians are often outlanders and people on the edge of society. Most of them aren’t used to cities - or at least weren’t raised to be - but some Barbarians are city toughs who are more resilient than they are prudent.

Bard

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Bard #

A Bard is a performer and storyteller. Bards use performances to aid allies through inspiration, and sometimes through more potent means.

Some bards are musicians, singers, or orators. But others are performers by deed instead of song - through blade flicks, quick steps, and poses, they can strike an inspiring figure. Some do this intentionally, but others simply live their performance.

Basic Mechanics

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Basic Mechanics #

Dice and Rolling #

This game requires you to use several kinds of dice in various quantities. The kind of die is indicated by dX, where X is the number of sides and the die values go from 1 to X. If something is indicated by either YdX or 1dX x Y, roll a dX Y times and total the result of each die (so 3d6 and 1d6 x 3 would both indicate adding the results of 3 d6 rolls). The dice used in this game are typically d4s, d6s, d8s, d10s, and d12s, but the most common dice used are d6’s. If using physical dice, you will likely want at least 3 of each kind and at least 6 d6’s.

Beasts

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Beasts #

Animals #

Rat Swarm #

1st Level Mook, Fast Initiative
Reckless, Targets most recent

AC 16
PD 14
MD 13

HP 7 (mook)
4 Mooks

Infected Bites (Melee, +6 vs AC)

Characteristics

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Characteristics #

Every enemy’s characteristics are put in a block like such:

Name
Xth Level (Role), (Initiative Band)
(Strength Indicator)
(Self-Preservation Behavior, Targeting Behavior)

AC XX
PD XX
MD XX

HP XX
X Mooks

Action Name (Range/Type, Provokes, Action Type, +X vs Defense, Number of Attacks or Targets)

Hit, Miss, Natural X, Special

Class Characteristics

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Class Characteristics #

Attributes and Proficiency #

Each class has a base set of attributes listed. This includes a choice between several Attributes. In addition to the attributes highlighted elsewhere, each class also sets a recovery die, which sets their recovery amount. It also lists Stances available to the character and their bonuses. Ranged stances are listed with (N) or (F) to indicate that they can be used without penalty at the listed range (N for Nearby, F for Far).

Cleric

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Cleric #

A Cleric is someone who has been supernaturally chosen by a patron, divine or otherwise, to represent their will. Someone chosen in this way is bestowed power through Domains, explicit representations of a portfolio or agenda, and Miracles, which express themselves as direct representations of favor.

Oftentimes Clerics are trained priests (hence the name). In some cases, though, they’re less created unintentionally. Sometimes a Cleric is a person who didn’t so much volunteer as get conscripted. Sometimes a Cleric is a person who got offered the job after doing a deity’s bidding better than official priests. And sometimes a Cleric is a person who is serving penance for past deeds against their current patron.

Combat Rules

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Combat Rules #

Attacks #

In general, every attack involves rolling 3d6 + Level + Volition + Escalation. Various effects can give bonuses beyond this as well, but they’re rare. You compare your total to the target’s AC, PD, or MD as specified in the attack. If your roll matches that value or is higher, you hit. If you roll a Natural 17+, you Crit, which typically deals double damage. If you roll less than the value, you miss. If you roll a Natural 3, you Crit Fail, meaning you have no miss effects and might cause some other negative thing to happen.

Commander

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Commander #

A Commander is someone who uses excellent judgment and a quick eye for exploiting tactical realities to give orders and inspire others. Most Commanders use tactical knowledge and charisma alone, but some might include magical prowess in that equation.

Commanders are sometimes explicitly the military kind: many former officers become adventurers after their tour of duty. Sometimes they’re simply mentors, staying back and giving advice and encouragement. And sometimes, they’re people who simply have a strong sense of their own assuredness, through birthright or by other means.

Conflict Basics

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Conflict Basics #

Conflict of some kind is very likely the meat and potatoes of any Total//Effect game.

Danger: Environmental, situational, and societal peril.
Duel: 1 on 1 clashes, or pursuit and escape.
Skirmish: Traditional group combat.

Do I need this in my game? #

I am going to assume you want some kind of conflict, drama, or something in your game, regardless of how low the stakes are. If you think you don’t, what exactly is your game anyway?

Druid

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Druid #

A Druid is an envoy to the natural world. Druids have a special relationship with nature, in much the same way as a Cleric has to their deity and as a result they often have mixed feelings about civilization.

Some Druids were intentionally installed as such by tradition of a shamanic culture. Not all Druids got that way intentionally, though. Some are the way they are due to fey heritage or a wild upbringing. Some started life as animals, and were drafted into service by another Druid. And some turn their skills to serve nature after recanting a former dedication to dark arts.

Fighter

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Fighter #

A Fighter is an eager pupil of combat who’s well on their way to becoming a master. They’re necessarily not self-taught: these are people whose skill, grit, and discipline separates them from any common warrior. A Fighter is an artist, and their canvas is the battlefield, be it a tavern, a dungeon, or a literal battlefield.

Nobody becomes a Fighter by accident. A warrior, possibly…but to be a Fighter requires dedication to the craft. Fighters commonly come from military, mercenary, or knightly orders, but just as often come from less regimented backgrounds. Dedication to the arts of battle and warfare can strike at any stage in life if the will is strong enough or the need is great enough.

Freelance rates

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Freelance rates #

I’d love to do work for you! Contact me at binary.star.games@gmail.com or binarystargames on discord if you’d rather keep it informal to start. Some general notes:

I typically request at least half payment up front.
All prices here are negotiable (to some extent) based on personal circumstances and in USD - let me know what your budget is and I’m happy to talk.
These rates are for small teams only - if your company has a typical yearly revenue of $100,000 or higher, please send a proposal via email.
Depending on my schedule I may not be available immediately - if so, I’ll let you know and provide a timeframe when I’ll be available.

Layout #

I’m happy to do layout work for you! My layout portfolio is here. For further examples of my work, I’ve been responsible for layout for everything listed as not-third-party on my itch page and I’m partially responsible for layout for Celestial Bodies.

Goblinoids

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Humanoids #

Goblinoids #

Some common effects or qualities that Goblins and Hobgoblins employ include:

Shifty: Enemies with this ability gain 1 advantage to disengage checks.

Shaking Curse: A condition applied to enemies. Whenever an enemy engages or disengages the target, the target takes damage equal to the engaging/disengaging enemy’s level.

Introduction and Overview

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Introduction and Overview #

Goals #

This is what I want Total//Effect to be and accomplish.

Fast//Efficient #

Resolution of any resource expenditure, roll, or other mechanic should ideally be quick and, where it would be interesting, produce multiple separable results.

Why does this matter? Because it’s a lot easier to slow down a game if desired than speed it up.

Layout Portfolio

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Layout Portfolio #

Here’s a sample of some of my favorite covers and spreads!

My current rates are available at: https://binarystar.games/docs/freelancing/#layout

Feel free to drop me a line at binary.star.games@gmail.com if interested.

NULL_SPACE #

Links to other sites

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Links to Other Sites #

Enjoy some other great sites! They’re (mostly) TTRPG or video game related in some fashion.

The Wall #

Others without buttons #

Link to mine #

If you want to link to mine:

Monk

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Monk #

A Monk is someone who has transcended the limits of what’s possible through extreme training and study of hidden techniques.

Monks are often very different based on their monastery’s focus. Some focus on self-perfection, sometimes through self-denial or suffering. Some focus on studying and preserving ancient texts. And some focus on preserving and protecting a community.

Necromancer

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Necromancer #

A Necromancer is someone who’s followed a forbidden (or at least socially unacceptable) path towards magic dominance. Their purview is death and undeath, and their command over both leaves many uneasy.

Necromancers often make a point of hiding their abilities, often disguising themselves as wizards. Some were wizards, in fact, and use that knowledge well. While many Necromancers simply crave power, others were cursed in such a way as to lead them down that path, were raised from the dead themselves and maintained control, or got there through veneration of a deity whose purview is death. Some might have come from a different priestly tradition that isn’t well understood by the commonfolk.

NOVA: BURNOUT

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

NOVA: BURNOUT by Binary Star Games

The sun exploded. Hundreds of years later, humanity rebuilt. The sunwells were tapped as an endless source of fuel. With the power of those sunwells, humanity created Sparks to keep the flame lit. One City in particular thrives, in spite of it all.

Paladin

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Paladin #

A Paladin is someone who’s devoted themselves to martial service. This is usually devotion to a specific deity or Icon, but could also be a group, a philosophy, or an ideal. They draw power from their devotion.

Some Paladins were born into service, either through induction into an order at a very early age or from being born into a family sworn to their patron. Others, though, found their path through less formal methods: some took up religion or a cause while working in a less savory field, while others were converted.

Praxis of Courage

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Praxis of Courage #

Items: Melee weapons.
Training: Drills with an elite force appropriate to your tier.
Experience: Went toe to toe with a significant threat.

Standard Augmentation #

Once per turn, you may spend 1 Power as a free action on or outside your turn to gain 1 Advantage on all Melee Attacks during a turn. This can be performed after making an attack (or series of attacks) but before resolving it as a hit, miss, or crit. The first time during an encounter that you use this while staggered, it costs 0 Power.

Ranger

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Ranger #

A Ranger is a fierce hunter and a proud warrior who is most at home in the wilderness. They fight well at any range, but often either specialize in one or another.

Rangers are usually well-accepted. In small communities, they’re often tasked to take down dangerous wildlife or monster incursions. They’re frequently employed by militaries as scouts or snipers. Many, however, choose to pursue a nomadic lifestyle.

Relations Basics

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Relations Basics #

Beyond conflict, there are often mechanics and traits that tie a game together thematically: relating characters to setting, characters to each other, characters to society, and so on. For lack of a better term, I’m calling these relations.

Relationships: The pull of a character on another character or a faction, for better or worse.
Reputation: The perception of the setting at large on players, and what players can do with that.
Party/Faction: Uniting player characters into an explicit, mechanical concept independent of each individual player character.
Economy: Gaining and spending of currencies, abstract or otherwise.

When putting these into your game, you’re going to want to keep a few general questions in mind.

Rogue

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Rogue #

A Rogue is someone who’s learned to use their wits and reflexes to get by. Not all Rogues are lawbreakers, but all of them employ underhanded tricks and tactics that prioritize neutralizing threats quickly and avoiding reprisal.

Typically, a Rogue is an average person on the edge of polite society who nonetheless has learned to interact with it - and whether or not society interacts back is another question. This could be because they were never there on account of poverty or hardship. It could be that they were driven out for personal, political, or ancestry-based reasons. It could also be by association with unsavory people - either former or current. And often, it’s because they did something to deserve it, regardless of the initial reason.

Rolling Dice

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Rolling Dice #

The Basic Total//Effect Roll #

When attempting to do anything that has a chance of a variable outcome, roll 3 six-sided dice.

The total of all dice added together is used for a broad range of general outcomes and is styled as Total.
The individual dice used - Low for the lowest of the 3, Mid for the middle of the 3, and High for the highest of the 3 - are styled as Effect.

For example, for a roll where the dice are 4, 1, and 6, the Total is 11; the Low Die is 1; the Mid Die is 4, and the High Die is 6.

Sorcerer

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Sorcerer #

A Sorcerer is an anomaly and a fluke. They’ve got magic, not from study or by being granted it by an outside power, but from chance or lineage.

Many Sorcerers find themselves torn from normal, mundane lives when their powers manifest themselves, and seek out their heritage for answers or more understanding. Sometimes their powers manifest early, and they’re raised as gods by a cult. Sometimes they’re sent to a Wizard to be apprentices (often with disastrous results). Often, though, they’re hunted as active dangers to everyone around them, and can fall in with unsavory elements easily.

Wizard

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Wizard #

A Wizard is someone who can invoke magic through careful study. Some Wizards have done the calculations and, through extended experimentation, have managed to isolate properties of the arcane in the world to invoke specific, repeatable phenomena known as spells.

Most Wizards who leave their towers, though, aren’t the ones researching spells. Some of them don’t do it by choice - there are very few Wizards who finish their training, and many get drummed out. Some of them are sent out by their master for outside experience. Some of them join professional or mercenary organizations and lend their knowledge to a cause (or profit). And some of them were never enrolled - while theft of a spellbook doesn’t happen often, it’s not unheard of.

Building an Encounter

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Building an Encounter #

A typical encounter is intended to involve a number of single-strength enemies equal to the party’s level, with four encounters per Quick Rest. However, most encounters shouldn’t just be this: use mooks and double/triple strength enemies regularly to keep things interesting, in addition to enemies from lower and higher levels. For different-level enemies, see the chart below.

Character Creation

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Character Creation #

Overview #

Follow the steps below in making a character.

Constraints. Your GM (with the consent of your group) might come up with constraints for characters in the game. Any given game will have an intended setting and starting level as a constraint, but based on the game there may be other qualifications on Concepts, Backgrounds, Skills, or Classes you should consider. At this stage you should also consider any safety concerns as a group - go over anything that anyone doesn’t want in the game.

Constructs

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Constructs #

Servants #

Gargoyle #

5th Level Troop, Slow Initiative
Cautious, Targets least threatening

AC 20
PD 18
MD 17

HP 72

Furious Claws (Melee, +10 vs AC, 2 attacks)

Hit: 6 damage.

Escalation

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Escalation #

Escalation is something that represents an overall indication of momentum, tension, a situation heating up, or some similar sentiment.

Escalation ranges from 0 to 6. It should increase when things start getting more intense and decrease when the situation is less intense.

Escalation was heavily influenced by the 13th Age mechanic of the same name, in which it was almost purely a measure of how long combat took, added to attack rolls, and gated certain abilities. I’ve chosen to make it more foundational here because it’s such a useful tool in general!

Kobolds

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Humanoids #

Kobolds #

Every Kobold has the following ability:

Evasive: Kobolds take no damage from missed attacks.

Kobold Archer #

1st Level Mook, Fast Initiative
Cautious, Targets least threatening

AC 15
PD 15
MD 13

HP 9 (mook)
3 Mooks

Knives (Melee, +6 vs AC)

Praxis of Cunning

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Praxis of Cunning #

Items: Ranged weapons.
Training: Scouting exercises with a hunter or ranger appropriate to your tier.
Experience: Outsmarted or outwitted a dangerous foe. Used an enemy’s weak point to neutralize them.

Standard Augmentation #

Once per turn, you may spend 1 Power as a free action on or outside your turn to gain 1 Advantage on all Ranged Attacks during a turn. This can be performed after making an attack (or series of attacks) but before resolving it as a hit, miss, or crit. The first time during an encounter that you attack a staggered enemy after using this, regain 1 Power.

Relationships

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Relationships #

The most obvious kind of relation based on the name is, well, a relationship. I’m defining it in this case as a mechanical linkage between two entities - player characters, non-player characters, factions, concepts, etc - in fiction.

A relationship is a kind of resource, though in my imagining, not one that gets “spent” as such. Discrete means that a connection either exists or not, while Metered means that how strong the connection is matters.

Running the Game

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Running the Game #

This is a chapter on how best to run the game in the GM role. The GM is responsible for a lot, but not everything - every player should be involved in many of these decisions.

Session Zero #

It’s almost always a good idea to establish your game with a Session Zero. This is a kind of pre-session Session where no (or limited) gameplay happens, but instead everyone establishes their expectations for the game. This is a good time to establish some of the safety tools in the next section, as well as the campaign Constraints.

Skirmish

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Skirmish #

A group of player characters fights a group of non-player characters. This is what most games just call “combat”, but to distinguish this from Duels (which are also a kind of combat) and Danger (which can also be combat-adjacent depending on the scope) I’m calling it a Skirmish.

Do I need this in my game? #

Unlike the other two kinds of conflict laid out here, this has limited flexibility. It’s going to be some kind of groups fighting each other. If your game isn’t really about that, don’t include it.

Stances

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Stances #

Different weapons and types of armament usage are divided into Stances. These can represent different kinds of weapons or different fighting styles, depending on the character. Each class has different properties for every Stance they’re proficient in, which can change both the damage die of basic attacks and attributes in general. Ranged stances always have the same range associated with them irrespective of class.

Summary of Classes

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Summary of Classes #

Alchemist: An innovative technologist who uses explosives and tinctures to hamper enemies and aid allies.

Barbarian: An undisciplined berserker who uses fury and strength to strike down enemies.

Bard: A flamboyant performer who inspires allies and confounds enemies.

Cleric: A messenger of the divine who supports allies and excoriates enemies with power granted from a patron.

Ballad of Industrial Gods

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Ballad of Industrial Gods: An expansive mission for APOCALYPSE FRAME #

Ballad of Industrial Gods by Binary Star Games

Salvage the Old World #

An independent survivalist community has identified a Republic base set up in the ruins of a well-stocked auto factory, and has made a proposal to the Collective: engage in a joint raid to ensure the salvaged metal falls into better hands. The Collective has promised the use of their Aces to ensure the assault’s success. Strike hard, strike quickly, and be prepared to pivot - anything can happen!

Building an Enemy

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Building an Enemy #

In general, when creating an enemy from scratch, consult Enemy Stats by Level and pick out a statline according to level.

Level and Type #

An enemy’s level and type (single-strength, mook, etc) indicate how much of a threat they are and how much of the encounter budget they take up. Here are some considerations for changing the level/type of an existing enemy:

Demons

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Demons #

Roll 1d10 for every non-mook demon. If your roll is less than or equal to the demon’s level, pick from or roll 1d6 on the below chart (or 1d8 for nastier abilities).

d6 or d8	Description
1	True Seeing: The demon ignores invisibility and illusions.
2	Fireproof: The demon has Resist Fire 15+.
3	Invisibility: The first time the demon is staggered in an encounter, it becomes invisible until the end of its next turn.
4	Energy Resistant: The demon has Resist 12+ for all energy types.
5	Fear Aura: The demon has a Fear Aura (as the generic ability).
6	*Teleport: 1d3 times per encounter, the demon can teleport anywhere nearby as a quick action.
7	Demonic Speed: The demon can take an extra standard action each turn while the escalation die is 4+.
8	Demonic Momentum: The demon gains Escalator.

Dretch #

3rd Level Mook, Medium Initiative
Reckless, Targets most threatening

Duel

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Duel #

Two parties collide, playing off of each other as they try to get an advantage over each other. We’re going to call this a Duel.

For lack of a better term, I’m going to call each party a duelist going forward.

Do I need this in my game? #

This works best in games that intend to involve a lot of conflict between two specific parties: obviously two duelists is a clear answer, but this could just as easily be a debate, an argument, two lawyers arguing over a court case, or some other kind of competition, regimented or otherwise. You can also use this for more asymmetrical competitions, like chases. This also doesn’t have to be two characters specifically either: the crews of two ships, for instance, might fit the bill. (For games where there’s less extended individual-character spotlight, though, that might be a tough fit.)

Measuring Time

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Measuring Time #

Time measurement is an important component in a lot of games. In particular, tracking and assigning timing and time values affects a lot of things like periodic events and makes it easier for you to set up more explicit gameplay loops.

In the broadest sense, I would largely advocate for abstract measurements of time over concrete. I’m eschewing counting in-character hours, minutes, seconds, that sort of thing. This is definitely for reasons of simplicity and an aversion to number-tracking. Also if you want to get more concrete with it, you don’t need my advice in that regard.

Minor Magic Items

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Minor Magic Items #

These are single-use items that either apply instantly or last for one encounter. If the form of something makes more sense to be something else in your campaign, feel free to change it.

Potions #

You can buy or find potions of a given tier in an environment of that tier. Drinking a potion or applying one to an ally is a move action.

Orcs

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Humanoids #

Orcs #

Every Orc has the following ability:

Dangerous: While unstaggered (or for mooks, while half or more of the group is up), Orcs treat every enemy as Vulnerable.

Orc Warrior #

1st Level Troop, Medium Initiative
Brave, Targets most threatening

Praxis of Wisdom

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Praxis of Wisdom #

Items: Wands, Staves, Symbols, Instruments.
Training: Research in a prominent library or university. Participation in a religious ritual.
Experience: Used superior knowledge or tactics to navigate a dangerous or important situation.

Standard Augmentation #

Once per turn, you may spend 1 Power as a free action on or outside your turn to either gain 1 Advantage on all Spell Attacks during a turn or add 1 target to a multi-target spell. This can be performed after making an attack (or series of attacks) but before resolving it as a hit, miss, or crit.

Reputation

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Reputation #

One kind of relation is the perception of a character by the setting as a whole, or some subset of it: this is a reputation. It’s pretty similar to a relationship, but “player in relation to everything” is distinct enough to merit its own section.

A given reputation is usually a single adjective: Honorable, Tricky, Dangerous, Stubborn, and so on.

APOCALYPSE ReFRAMEd

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

A Reframing of the Apocalypse #

APOCALYPSE FRAME allows a lot of flexibility to players and GMs. But sometimes a group may want to take their game somewhere that isn’t really supported by the rules. Enclosed in this supplement is a set of those kinds of possibilities.

Frame for Hire: In the standard setting, the Collective is always working for their own interests: they’re trying to carve out a place to be free in the ruined world. But what if it wasn’t so simple? This variant ruleset explores a more mercenary Collective, existing under the tension of working for groups who would see them destroyed.

Backgrounds

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Backgrounds #

When considering what your character’s Background, think about the most major non-unique thing that defines them. This could be their culture, a former home, or their past career or station in life. In any case, every Background grants a Background Skill and a Background Ability.

Background Skill #

Like One Unique Thing and Class, your Background provides a Skill. It can be used in the same ways, including Pushing your Limits and Embracing your Weakness. Consider a few uses for your Background Skill.

Danger

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Danger #

An environment or a set of obstacles presents a threat while player-controlled characters try to accomplish a goal. We’re going to call this Danger.

Do I need this in my game? #

The things presented here take typical non-combat activity a bit further than normal. If your game’s not really about that, don’t include it. However, they’re flexible enough that you might want to steal elements of them even if you aren’t really focusing on it as such.

Dragons

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Dragons #

All dragons have Flight and Escalator.

All Ancient Dragons have Regal Tendency:

Regal Tendency: The Dragon rolls saves at the beginning of its turn instead of the end. If it’s gaining the Escalation die to its attacks this turn, it adds Escalation to any saves rolled.

Roll or pick from 1d6 for every dragon with a distinct personality (usually Double or Triple Strength), 1d8 for stronger effects (or if they’re campaign-important), or 1d10 if campaign implications should be possible.

Other Humanoids

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Humanoids #

Lizardmen #

All Lizardmen have the following abilities:

Snap: Make an Opportunity Attack on an engaged enemy when Staggered for the first time.

Spend 1 Threat: For the rest of the encounter, Frenzy gains 1 advantage when the Lizardman is staggered.

Lizardman Savage #

2nd Level Wrecker, Fast Initiative
Reckless, Targets most recent

Party/Faction

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Party/Faction #

Sometimes we care as much about the group of player characters as a whole as we do each individual player character, or how they fit into something else. I’m going to call this a Party (as in adventuring party, not the other kind) or a Faction.

Do I need this in my game? #

There’s a nonzero chance you already have this as an assumption in a game concept and you just weren’t thinking about it as such. This is a good opportunity for you to think about making it a little more intentional, if you want.

Praxis of Decisiveness

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Praxis of Decisiveness #

Items: Offhand weapons, quivers, bandoliers, talismans, holy relics.
Training: Sessions with a duelist, hunter, or assassin appropriate to your tier. Initiation into an extreme political or religious order.
Experience: Defeated an enemy who’s a significant threat, assassinated a high profile target, or won an important duel.

Standard Augmentation #

Once per turn, you may spend 1 Power as a free action on or outside your turn to add 1d10 x Tier to damage you deal after a hit or miss as long as damage is dealt. This damage is not subject to Resistance, but is multiplied on a crit. The first time in an encounter that this is used to add to critical damage, it costs 0 Power.

Resources and Abilities

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Resources and Abilities #

Just about every game of a certain level of complexity has an “economy” of sorts - a series of numbers that go up and down, advantages that dwindle, and such - that set pacing. I’m going to refer to the tracked things as resources and encourage you to think about them no matter what you intend to make with this framework. Most games also have some mechanical way in which characters interact with the world. Sometimes this is as simple as a kind of roll everyone has in common, sometimes this is an ability that lays out exactly what it does when you use it. These are abilities. These two concepts are often extremely intertwined in a given design.

The Infected World

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

APOCALYPSE FRAME: The Infected World #

APOCALYPSE FRAME: The Infected World by Binary Star Games

Explore the Ruined World #

Years ago, The Collective rebelled against The Republic, turning their own factory against them and creating a resistance. Since then, we’ve managed to carve out enough from The Republic to survive. But there’s more to survival than gaining independence.

Advancement

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Advancement #

Characters in this system are not generally static. They are intended to grow over time, and one method of that growth is through formal advancement.

Linear advancement #

Traditional, linear advancement can bebroken into two kinds of concepts.

A character’s Level represents experience, level of proficiency, degree of mastery, etc. At each level, characters can gain extra active or passive abilities. Levels typically range from 1 to 9. You might also introduce a Level 0 for a kind of “introductory” level, or a level 10 to represent characters beyond the apotheosis for characters in the scopes provided.
A Tier, correspondingly, is a bigger category: it’s a cluster of 3 Levels that indicates the scope in which the character is operating. There are 3 Tiers: Level 1-3, Level 4-6, and Level 7-9. At Tier increases, characters should gain some more noticeable increase in ability.

In general this works really well with more “heroic” games, where you’re expected to advance steadily as events progress. I would not recommend having two sets of linear advancement (like expected equipment by level in addition to character qualities): just pick one and put it all in there. Save everyone the headache.

Challenges, Threats, and Goals

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Challenges, Threats, and Goals #

The baseline “what do you do” in a Total//Effect game is going to come down to something here. More detailed applications of these are in Conflict.

Simple Challengess #

I’m defining a challenge here as some adverse thing that is intended to be overcome. A simple challenge is something that can be overcome by one action: a spent resource, a roll, or just a smart way of approaching it.

Economy

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Economy #

You know what currency is, generally, I hope. Currencies can be extremely material: money is the obvious one. But there are more currencies than money, such as experience, favor, debt, and so on. This section relates to how it can factor in as a meaningful concern to and resource for characters, and some interesting ways to track it (or avoid tracking it).

Fey

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Fey #

Spend 2 Threat: All Spell attacks against unstaggered Fey during this encounter gain 1 Disadvantage until the end of the encounter.

Dryad #

5th Level Blocker, Slow Initiative
Cautious, Targets most threatening

AC 21
PD 18
MD 19

HP 72

Manicured Staff (Melee, +11 vs AC)

Praxis of Vigilance

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Praxis of Vigilance #

Items: Shields, secondary layers of armor.
Training: Shield wall training with a legion of a prominence appropriate to your tier. Time spent on guard duty.
Experience: Spent more than your maximum HP’s worth in a fight. Intercepted an attack on an ally that crit. Ensured no harm came to an innocent in a dangerous situation.

Standard Augmentation #

Once per turn, you may spend 1 Power as a free action on or outside your turn to give yourself Temporary HP equal to half your average recovery. This can be performed as a response to being attacked and seeing the attack result but before being damaged. If you can already do this, instead, the first time done per encounter costs 0 Power.

Giants

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Giants #

All Giants have Large 9+ or 11+ (popping off requires a save of the listed amount or higher).

Spend 2 Threat: A Giant treats staggered enemies as if they’re Softened and Vulnerable for the rest of the encounter.

Ogres #

Ogre #

3rd Level Troop, Slow Initiative
Double-Strength
Reckless, Targets most recent

Praxis of Toughness

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Praxis of Toughness #

Items: Armor, clothing.
Training: Parading in armor. Large-scale drills with a professional force.
Experience: Sustaining a hit (or crit) from something that can stagger you from full HP. Solving a problem by putting yourself in physical harm.

Standard Augmentation #

Once per turn, you may spend 1 Power as a free action on or outside your turn to give 1 Disadvantage to an attack against your AC. This can be performed after being attacked but before the attack is resolved as a miss, hit, or crit. If you can already do this, instead, the first time you do it per encounter costs 0 Power.

Praxis of Hardiness

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Praxis of Hardiness #

Items: Cape, Cloak.
Training: Long guard sessions.
Experience: Enduring harsh weather or environmental conditions.

Standard Augmentation #

Once per turn, you may spend 1 Power as a free action on or outside your turn to give 1 Disadvantage to an attack against your PD. This can be performed after being attacked but before the attack is resolved as a miss, hit, or crit. If you can already do this, instead, the first time you do it per encounter costs 0 Power.

Praxis of Willpower

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Praxis of Willpower #

Items: Helmet, Headband, Circlet.
Training: Engage in long tactical games with others. Practice resisting a mental probe from a telepath.
Experience: Stood up for an ideal against significant social pressure and/or a real threat.

Standard Augmentation #

Once per turn, you may spend 1 Power as a free action on or outside your turn to give 1 Disadvantage to an attack against your MD. This can be performed after being attacked but before the attack is resolved as a miss, hit, or crit. If you can already do this, insteadthe first time you do it per encounter costs 0 Power.

Undead

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Undead #

All Undead are Weak to radiant.

Skeletons #

All Skeletons have Resist Weapon 13+.

Decrepit Skeleton #

1st Level Mook, Medium Initiative
Reckless, Targets most recent

AC 16
PD 14
MD 13

HP 8 (mook)
3 Mooks

Rusted Sword (Melee, +6 vs AC)

Praxis of Swiftness

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Praxis of Swiftness #

Items: Boots, Shoes, Some Pants.
Training: Instruction on getaways from a Thieves’ Guild.
Experience: Escaped some major threat or avoided harm from some natural catastrophe through quickness.

Standard Augmentation #

Once per turn, you may spend 1 Power as a free action on or outside your turn to gain 1 Advantage on a Disengage roll. The first time during an encounter that you use this while the enemy you’re Disengaging from is engaged by an ally, it costs 0 Power.

Praxis of Perseverance

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Praxis of Perseverance #

Items: Necklaces, Pendants.
Training: Holy ceremonies.
Experience: Blessed by a significant messenger of a deity. Faced necromancy. Made a show of great faith.

Standard Augmentation #

Once per turn, you may spend 1 Power as a free action on or outside your turn to gain 1 Advantage on a save. The first time during an encounter that you do this while Staggered, it costs 0 Power.

Praxis of Toil

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Praxis of Toil #

Items: Gloves, gauntlets.
Training: Manual labor.
Experience: Consigned to a working prison.

Standard Augmentation #

Once per quick rest, you may spend 1 Power to gain 1 Advantage to a skill roll to do something based on strength, endurance, or agility.

Signature Augmentations #

Ambidexterity
Adventurer, 11+ Recharge
You may use this when you roll a Natural 13+ when wielding a weapon in your offhand. Make a basic melee attack against the same target as a free action.

Praxis of Knowledge

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Praxis of Knowledge #

Items: Tome, scroll, manual, grimoire.
Training: Long, hard research.
Experience: Solved a problem solely through knowledge of facts or ability to analyze a situation.

Standard Augmentation #

Once per quick rest, you may spend 1 Power to gain 1 Advantage to a skill roll to do something based on intelligence, perception, or charisma.

APOCALYPSE FRAME Press Kit

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

APOCALYPSE FRAME Press Kit #

Fact Sheet #

Developer: Binary Star Games
Digital Release Date: January 24th, 2023
Platform: Tabletop Role-Playing Game
Price: $20 Digital (or free to anyone who had the in-development version). $40 hardback.
Available At: https://binary-star-games.itch.io/apocalypse-frame

Game Description #

In a ruined and terraformed world where most of humanity is under the yoke of a brutal regime, the former workers of a once-remote factory - now known as The Collective - have risen up to create a future of freedom from oppression. You are an Ace - a highly skilled pilot referred from a Division in The Collective and assigned a humanoid combat vehicle known as a Frame. You and your Strike Team of fellow Aces must take on The Collective’s greatest threats, ensure its survival, and carve a path for its continued success.

Celestial Bodies Press Kit

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Celestial Bodies Press Kit #

Fact Sheet #

Developer/Authors: Binary Star and Charlotte Laskowski
Digital Release Date: November 6th, 2023
Crowdfund Dates: March 4th, 2025 through April 3rd, 2025
Platform: Tabletop Role-Playing Game
Price:
- Just the book: $25 digital, $40 softback and $70 hardback
- Bundles with zines: $30 for just the digital zines without the book, $50 for the digital zines and digital book, $125 for physical zines and a hardcover.
- Addons: $30 to add digital zines, $60 to add physical zines, can add an extra softcover or hardcover.
Available At: https://selkie.itch.io/celestial-bodies

Game Description #

Celestial Bodies is a game about humanity’s long struggle to colonize the universe, and what will become of them. It’s about those who will continue to the next generation — and those who will not. It’s about endless destruction and death in the name of continuation, and those who wage it. It’s about the great titan corpses that lie where the stars end, and what lies beyond them.

Character Sheet (on fari.app)

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Character Sheet #

NULL_SPACE Press Kit

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

NULL_SPACE Press Kit #

Fact Sheet #

Author: Binary Star
Crowdfund Dates: February 3rd, 2026 through March 2nd, 2026
Platform: Tabletop Role-Playing Game
Prices:
- DIGITAL; $15, PDFs of the book and a few pamphlet adventures.
- PHYSICAL; $20, DIGITAL, and you’ll get a paper copy of the book.
- DIGITAL++; $30, DIGITAL, and you’ll get digital keys to further supplements.
- PHYSICAL++; $50, PHYSICAL; + DIGITAL++; paper copies of the pamphlet adventures.
- PHYSICAL+=VOID; $70, PHYSICAL_PLUS and a physical copy of VOID_SHIFT.
Available At: https://binary-star-games.itch.io/null-space

Game Description #

NULL_SPACE is a game about freelancers being forced to carve out an existence in the solar system of the 24th century. Having a ship and not being permanently employed allows a lot of freedom, but the universe is not kind to anyone trying to strike out on their own.

Valiant Horizon Press Kit

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Valiant Horizon Press Kit #

Fact Sheet #

Developer: Binary Star Games
Release Date: Itchfunding started July 25th, 2023
Platform: Tabletop Role-Playing Game
Price: $20 digital, $25 physical.
Available At: https://binary-star-games.itch.io/valiant-horizon

Game Description #

Valiant Horizon is a heroic fantasy game about regular people chosen to gain the powers and mentorship of departed heroes through magical means, learning from and bonding with other fledgling heroes, developing their own legend, and eventually becoming enshrined in legend themselves. It’s about meeting new friends and growing with them, vanquishing enemies, discovering ancient secrets, developing a world together, and making a mark on the world.

Legal and Licensing

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Legal and Licensing #

Summary/Layman’s Terms #

The mechanics of 36th Way are fully Open Game Content (OGC). This means that you can make settings, adventures, your own game, etc. based off of them. Just make sure that you follow the OGL’s restrictions on what you’re required to put in your product and be sure to protect what you don’t want to be Open Game Content with Product Identity if you so choose.

A clock with discrete faces

Thu, 18 Jun 2026 00:00:00 +0000

This post is written for Prismatic Wasteland’s Random Blogwagon. I rolled an 18 on the first table (post on June 18th), a 4 on the second (one plain paragraph with no bolding, bullets, or similar nonsense), and pulled a Jack of Diamonds for the third (must reference Luke Gearing’s blog). So let’s get going.

Clocks have been a staple of indie TTRPGs for the past what, maybe 10 years or so? I’ve gotten kind of bored with them as-is for a number of reasons, but that’s only partially their fault. One thing that got me more interested in them again is the prospect rolling under them: for example, if it’s a 6-segment clock, for instance, roll a d6 every time it increments; if it rolls under (equal/under if ya nasty) then the promised outcome happens. This way there’s always a little immediacy to it. What really gets me going nowadays, though, is making each “face” of that clock its own distinct thing. Luke Gearing’s Reputation Tables is a great example of this. I’ve used this in both Corpslayers and NULL_SPACE for bad things: whenever something bad has a chance of happening but isn’t quite there yet, add it to a segment of (or multiple segments of) the “clock”. Periodically you roll against it: if it rolls the number associated with that bad thing’s segment, that particular bad thing is the one that rears up. It gives you both a target number for anything happening and a specific outcome when it does happen, and I love compressing multiple data points in one roll to death so this is like catnip for me. Give it a go! (PS: I’m sure someone’s written about this before and I’m fine with that, there’s nothing new under the sun and so on.)

Violence Without* Combat

Fri, 15 May 2026 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there! Did you know that not only is NULL_SPACE out, not only is it out in physical form, and not only does it have a printed job packet…it has its first official supplement, called Supplement #1: Violence?

What’s that, you maybe didn’t know that because I suck at promoting it? Well let’s fix that and talk about it then.

VH Tactics Devlog #3: And now for something completely different

Mon, 09 Mar 2026 00:00:00 +0000

The Binary Star Promise is that I will get a great idea for a prototype, start something, and put it on the backburner for a bit if it’s something I don’t owe people and would need a lot of legwork. Valiant Horizon Tactics is, indeed, no exception to this. But thanks to having a genuinely atrocious week and needing a little pick-me-up, I decided I’d start thinking about it again because I do like the concept a lot.

On Space And Cyberpunk (NULL_SPACE Devlog)

Sat, 21 Feb 2026 00:00:00 +0000

What is the intended vibe of NULL_SPACE?

“Cyberpunk-esque” #

Shannon at The Novel Gamemaster described NULL_SPACE on bluesky as having “a low-powered mothership feel but leaning towards more cyberpunk-esque rather than space horror”, and then I spent like twenty posts in a thread meandering on what I was trying to do with it. This is a paraphrase and extension of that thread.

2025 Year in Review (not by numbers)

Fri, 02 Jan 2026 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there! It’s once again that time of the year. Every year I take stock of what I accomplished, go through my numbers, chart what I did and how well it did, and try to draw some conclusions. Here’s last year’s, for reference.

I have too much stuff for one post going on nowadays, and also I’m very tired, so I’m splitting this up into three posts: this one has a general overview, the next will get into numbers (aiming for next week/weekend, but don’t quote me on that) and the last one will have my called shots for 2026.

Conflict as Motivation and Resolution

Thu, 04 Dec 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Or: Everyone always says what combat is doing, but nobody ever asks how combat is doing.

The TTRPG community (well, the blogging part of it) sure does love to define combat as one specific pithy thing. Sport, War, My Balls¹, there are others. Save for the last of those, I don’t really care for any of these definitions! For one, I think they very quickly lend themselves to being derisive - Sport vs War in particular feels like it was designed for posts rolling their eyes at people who like interfacing with capital-C capital-S Combat Systems. I would also say that it can also feel a bit thought-terminating in the ways that many labels can. As much as that can hit the broad strokes of why we might do something, I think we can go a bit deeper than that.

Devlog Has Come to This Town

Mon, 20 Oct 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Content warning: This is a game about a plague. There’s basically no way I can’t talk about the current, ongoing one.

Every year I try to do a little something indulgent for Minimalist Jam, or at least try to stub something out that’s been on my mind. So last week, out of nowhere, I dropped Death Has Come to This Town. This was an idea I’ve had for awhile that I held ransom behind hitting milestones on other work, and when the time came to put it to paper it kind of forced itself out of my head and onto the page. I slapped that thing on itch and prepared to not think about it for like a month, and even then as more of an art piece than an actual playable thing.

An (incomplete) Appendix N

Mon, 08 Sep 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Created as part of Prismatic Wasteland’s Appendicitis Blog Bandwagon.

Influence is a very hard thing for me to specifically quantify a lot of the time. I don’t usually think of an Appendix N - an explicit list of influences - going into a game. Sometimes I go into a game thinking I’m going to be influenced by one thing and then come out influenced by another thing by accident and have to piece it together after the fact. So a lot of my influences have to be kind of backed out after the fact by thinking about what I was thinking of to get to a certain point. Also most of them are other games because ~~I’m an uncultured cretin, but also~~ I’m trying to pull more directly game-influential stuff rather than stuff that generally gave me good vibes because otherwise we’d be here all day.

The hole at the center of the mech, or: why isn't it about the people?

Wed, 16 Jul 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Created as part of Prismatic Wasteland’s Holes Blog Bandwagon, in which we all write about holes. Some holes are more literal than others, I suppose. And maybe one of these days I’ll get out of the hole that is “devlogs/retrospectives about my own games”, but not today.

“When you get right down to it, (mech game, show, etc etc etc) is about the people.” If you’ve done anything remotely adjacent to mecha stuff, you’ve read some variation on this. I roll it out as a halfway-joke every time someone brings mecha up because it’s such a combination of “cliche” and “John Madden statement-obvious”. Like, yes, it’s not literally about the walking war machine itself, it’s about the interactions of various people, much like every other story ever that involves people clashing against each other. And yet…APOCALYPSE FRAME is not “about the people”, at least not by focus. I barely touch upon the Aces at all, to the chagrin of a lot of people. What an oversight!

Combat without Combat

Tue, 27 May 2025 00:00:00 +0000

NULL_SPACE #

Liminal Void is has been consigned to the void. Well, the name has, anyway. Going forward, it will be called NULL_SPACE!

When I spoke about it last, I said both of the following:

(in the context of priorities for the game:) De-emphasize combat. Over each edition, the degree to which anyone can easily do combat has been relegated more fully to explicitly chosen weaponry and combat-ready outfits - which was the goal from the start, but at the time I’d been coming off of LUMEN so I was still kind of thinking in the combat-game sense.

Religion is too good for Clerics.

Wed, 07 May 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Created as part of Prismatic Wasteland’s Blogclave 2025, in which we all write about clerics during the papal conclave.

I don’t love almost any of the “core four” D&D classes - Fighter/Fighting Man, Rogue/Thief, Cleric, Wizard/Magic-User - if I’m going to be honest. Each of them feels simultaneously too vague and too specific, kind of thrown in there based on an initial reference that quickly became a reference to itself. But if I had to rank them with that caveat, I’d say cleric probably comes out 2nd to last.¹

Staring into the (Liminal) Void, 2 years in

Thu, 13 Feb 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Liminal Void received another update, somehow, bringing it to its 4th distinct iteration (not counting sub-iterations and tiny fixes). It’s a neat little subset of a game about how much it sucks to live in space under capitalism, largely at this point in its development through the lens of “what if your employer just sucked at keeping you alive”. It’s also been kicking for more than 2 years, periodically updated, never completed. Honestly even the name is a work in progress, if I get a better one I might change the name.¹

Valiant Horizon, Magic, Nature, and the Elements

Fri, 07 Feb 2025 00:00:00 +0000

In Valiant Horizon, crystals and the magic from them are a big part. Drilling further into that, though, magic itself is further expressed through the 4 -Magus classes. Each of those represents one of the 4 elements. Why is it like that and where did I go with this?

Crystals and Magic #

Crystals in Valiant Horizon hold the souls of ancient heroes. This is one of the handful of setting elements explicitly expressed that the game is written around: it serves as the foundation for player characters. Crucially, a crystal is the source of all magic in the game, as lesser magic is intended to come from the souls of less prominent but still powerful heroes.

2024 Year in Review (by numbers)

Thu, 02 Jan 2025 00:00:00 +0000

This also went out on my newsletter, by the way! Sign up if you want periodic digests of posts, updates, musings, and so on.

Hi there! It’s once again that time of the year. Every year I take stock of what I accomplished, go through my numbers, chart what I did and how well it did, and try to draw some conclusions.

WARNING: I do go into money stuff in the middle of the article. I include a large header like this before it starts in earnest, so if you don’t want to read it, you can skip to “Overview/Meandering” at that time.

Process Optimization in TTRPGs, or How I Learned To Start Worrying and Love the Operation

Fri, 08 Nov 2024 00:00:00 +0000

So one thing where I feel like I don’t have like…authority in but at the very least have thought about is the concept of performance loss (and specifically avoiding it through process optimization) in TTRPGs: the kinds of things that bog down a situation in a process.

WARNING: This post started as me making a little comment on a great, concise post on Fool’s Pyrite. Then I decided to make it a fun little post on its own. Then I thought about it some more. Then I drilled down and kept drilling. This starts simple enough but quickly becomes a True Sicko Post. You have been warned.

Phipps23 and Demonstrating Themes in Celestial Bodies

Fri, 18 Oct 2024 00:00:00 +0000

I’ve been meaning to try to post more on my blog/site following the death of Cohost, which made it very easy for me to toss design thoughts out. Writing into VScode and pushing to my site via git has no juice at all by comparison. But we press on anyway.

Phipps23 #

On November 27th of 2022 - a little less than 2 years ago as of writing this - Dan Phipps (of Gem Room Games, go check them out, they’re cool folks!) posted a neat approach to worldbuilding based on Gygax 75. I don’t know how long cohost links like the above are going to last so I’m going to reproduce the post here for general preservation’s sake, at least until I’m confident it’s been posted up somewhere else (drop me a line if and when it is):

Valiant Pilgrimage

Fri, 13 Sep 2024 00:00:00 +0000

_{Last time I did a brainstorm session like this was for Persona: 1, 2, 3. This one's way shorter though. The idea is to flesh out some kind of specific JRPG-inspired campaign structure for Valiant Horizon.}

So let's say there's these crystals, right? Used to be 12 of them - nowadays there's, uh, let's say 3-5 ~~PCs~~ crystals remaining. Each of them has the power to maintain the last few villages that stand in the world and prevent them from being swallowed up by the darkness that has consumed the rest. The crystals' power is not infinite. Every decade since the beginning of known history, each crystal chooses a Hero: someone to carry on its legacy to perform the Ritual of Rebirth at the origin of life, which imbues the crystal with their soul for the sake of all. The herald of life then returns their crystals to their village to maintain it until next time. There's never been any resistance on the road of rebirth: it's still hallowed ground, after all.

The Grid™️ 2: Hypergrid (Or: Home-Ship Construction)

Tue, 23 Jul 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Last time I made a post about mechanics I talked about the Grid. Now I’m…still talking about The Grid, kind of! But it’s a different one this time.

Home-ship construction is something that had been on our minds since the beginning. Originally it was going to be kicked to the final version! But we had a lot of backer items created that we wanted and so this was a good opportunity to make an initial system out of it.

v1.1 released!

Tue, 09 Jul 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there! v1.1 of Valiant Horizon is out!

This includes:

Tweaked Create an Opening downward because it was Too Good By Far.
Clarification of interaction of inverse with resist/vulnerable (it does the thing you’d expect and reverses the step to do less or more Harm respectively).
Clarification on if moving to far counts as two near movements for the purpose of anything that cares (yes).
Clarification on encounter composition and scaling: Upgraded composition to its own page with an example and some extra advice and dedicated an entire page to scaling to make it clear what’s going on there.
A bunch of enemies stuff.
- Enemies can no longer use the same ability more than once in a turn.
- New enemy action type: Prepare, which gives them advantage on their next roll this round.
- Elites all have 2 abilities to account for the above. This should make them a bit more interesting to play against (and run) at higher tiers especially when they have 3+ actions.
- Fixed/tweaked a few enemy abilities while I was there.
Pulled out the most important Narrator advice onto its own page.
Character sheet is now in the document! As it should have been from the start, frankly.

Until next time!

Devlog #2: Stamina

Mon, 10 Jun 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Stamina is a resource I bolted onto both the RUNE engine and the NULL/CIPHER healthless idea for Valiant Horizon Tactics. It’s a very major change to how a RUNE-like does things.

Notably it’s also not really a Valiant Horizon idea, it’s kind of something that came off of neither game. So what’s up with that? One prior that bears notice is that Stamina was in the earliest Total//Effect prototype version I made: it was going to be like 13th Age recoveries/4E healing surges but also usable for restoring used abilities to form a kind of generic “dungeon attrition” resource. It also made it into VH briefly but I cut it early (like, a month into active development/testing) because it was kind of useless there, as it was only for recovering (which people don’t do enough for it to be worth tracking). So it’s been on my mind for awhile in relation to Valiant Horizon. (It might return in a future Total//Effect game. Who knows, stay tuned.)¹

v3.1 and the 3rd Scenario are released!

Fri, 31 May 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there!

First off, a little update to this quickstart. A few big changes:

Gaining your Background doesn’t give you a smattering of Attributes anymore. Instead, you get to grab another Trait. This can be another Profession’s thing, something from things that hint at a less savory Profession, or things that indicate where you came from.
- To support the latter two categories, there’s 7 more traits now. More Attributes is something you’ll gain by proper leveling later past this level-0 quickstart.
Escalation and combat have a different interaction. Escalation now adds to all Toughness-coded actions and subtracts from all Focus-coded actions (which was in v3) but crucially, all combat actions are coded to Toughness (melee by default), Reflexes (ranged by default), or Focus (usually “steady aim” style weapons).
- You’re not trained soldiers by default, you’re regularish people, being good at shooting isn’t a thing that adrenaline helps you with. If it’s something that means your hands have to be steady, it’s probably the opposite! One of those aforementioned Background traits (Combat training) makes it work the old way again: if you ARE a trained soldier, well, that’s a bit different, isn’t it.
Energy Harm/Resistance no longer exists. Anything that was Energy is now just a gun (laser pistol -> pistol), is now a smaller amount of Hazard Harm (Supercharger used as a weapon), or is now Kinetic (Peacekeeper.)
- This one is for a handful of reasons: it had a huge overlap with Hazard conceptually and having too many Harm types made getting resist armor a little cheaper. If someone has Kinetic or Ballistic Resist armor now, it means a bit more as a result, and Hazard Resist/Vulnerability is going to come up in combat more as well: if someone has a big laser now, it’s an immediate threat, as a big laser should be in a hard-ish sci-fi setting!

Secondly, a third quickstart has landed, courtesy of the Indie NASA TTRPG Adventures and Sci-Fi One-Shot Jams! Escape from the surface of Europa as the twin forces of corporate maneuvering and corporate malfeasance threaten to squeeze you out.

Added commentary edition!

Wed, 01 May 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there!

I added a commentary edition of the game. This is exactly the same as v1.2 except I added 2” of margins on either side and added a bunch of red-text notes, development history, commentary, and self-criticism. Get it in the downloads!

Until next time!

(Read the original on itch here!)

Devlog #1: Healthless*

Tue, 23 Apr 2024 00:00:00 +0000

_{(This is a companion piece to Gila RPGs/Spencer Campbell’s recent stream about healthless TTRPGs, which is well worth your time if you have an hour to spend and goes into VH tactics a little itself, because the original impetus was based on his idea of healthless TTRPGs prior to this video. It would probably also be good to be a little familiar with RUNE! But I think everything makes enough sense if you aren’t.)}

v3 released!

Sat, 24 Feb 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there! I made a big update to how Liminal Void works! You can see some previews of what I did in my newsletter post here. The big changes are:

Static Assets from Profession/Background are out, attribute spending is in.
- You have 3 Attributes, of which a Profession gives you 5 and a Background gives you 3 more. You can spend them to use them as Assets and regain them by taking various painkillers and stimulants and supplements, which is probably extremely healthy and good for you.
- The previous ones that basically just always gave you +advantage bonuses were not really in keeping with the rest of the game’s “constant attrition” vibe, and these ones better answer the question of “why don’t they apply to combat rolls” (because now they can, if you want!)
Tools and Weapons work completely differently.
- Some tools still have some low-key combat stuff but it’s not much. Mostly they’re just…well, tools. All of them have a capital-A Ability - kind of like a PbtA move or something - that highlights a specific thing that tool was designed for. You can also just spend Charges use them as incidental Assets as before too.
- Weapons are a bit less uniform as far as 1-ammo/3-ammo spends. There’s a generic “Fire” action now and all of them call out how it’s used in addition to having (usually) 2 moves. In general they feel a little closer to like, actual weapons instead of things that give you powers.
- Instead of 3 Ammo/Charge abilities, we now have the concept of Let Loose. This represents stuff where you push your tool’s battery to the limit or hold down on that gun’s trigger a little too long to do something stronger - use that exoskeleton to do a hulk-leap, bore through a metal wall with your drill, spray and pray with your PDW, etc. You spend a random amount of charges/ammo (d6), which can explode (on a 1-2, so you’re spending at least 3) and disable your weapon/tool if you’re super unlucky.
I updated the two scenarios to match (and the second scenario, The Graveyard Buckle, has been combined into this page). Because I took the liberty of licensing the incredible Victor Merino’s sci-fi portraits last summer for commercial use, Escape from CICP-1 now looks a LOT better too - all of those names in the module have faces now!
A relayout!

Hope you enjoy. Let me know if you give it a shot!

v1.1 released!

Mon, 12 Feb 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there! v1.1 is here! It brings a few major changes:

Formatting

Increased page size slightly.
Various typo-fixes.
Tightening up of layout.

Combat Rules

Missiles.
- Deploy now states the deployment range for missiles (0-1).
- Direct now lets you move 8 missiles by default instead of 5.
- Direct now states clearly when missiles count as “armed” (i.e. when they automatically attack if their target gets within range 0).
- Missiles are now slightly easier to shoot down by default (3+ instead of 4+).
Disabled is now a called out thing that Electronic Warfare weaponry does (alongside Damaged and Destroyed), and explicitly states its interaction with crits.
The interaction between armor and crits is now explicitly stated.
Electric is now Shock, because while Electronic and Electric are in fact different words, we have been hard pressed to convince anyone of this.
By default average encounter difficulty is stated, and Scavengers and INFINITY now have a 1-6 roll-table from which to construct encounters with them.
Added a little more clarification about Zones/Ranges and added a second note in the Combat section to make all grids public information.
Tackle lost its +/- for size difference but has a crit effect now.

Frames/Builds

Mechs

Just about everything except Light//Nerve had some kind of Frame or Build tweak. This is because Light//Nerve was born perfect and doesn’t need anything changed about her.

Revising Liminal Void, 2024 Edition

Sun, 11 Feb 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Liminal Void quickstart cover

Liminal Void's quickstart has been around a little more than a year now. It's the first Total//Effect thing I put out and it's...fine. It's fine. Total//Effect is a strong backbone, the vibe carries it pretty far in my opinion, and again in my humble opinion, my two quickstart scenarios are decent. (Read it yourself and see if you agree. It's free. Click that little liminal void tag at the bottom if you want to see me everything I've written about it here, which is quite a lot.)

Valiant Persona, Part 3 of 3*

Mon, 05 Feb 2024 00:00:00 +0000

*Before I release the extra edition that tacks on like 2 more posts.

In Part 1 we established what kind of game we're using. In Part 2 we tied together Valiant Horizon's class system with the tarot thing Persona has going on. In this final installment (because at this point more beyond what I'm covering here would involve just making the thing) we're gonna think about using what we set up in part 2 for a session and campaign structure.

Valiant Persona, Part 2

Sun, 04 Feb 2024 00:00:00 +0000

So we started poking at turning Valiant Horizon into Persona in Part 1 by establishing initial premises of what even this kind of game is like. It's got a lot of the DNA of urban fantasy/masquerade style games (WoD, Unknown Armies, etc) but with a very different emphasis, and especially the fact that there's a harder divide between the two "halves". Now we start digging in to what we want to do with that.

Valiant Persona, Part 1

Sat, 03 Feb 2024 00:00:00 +0000

I'm thinking about Persona* a lot lately, partially because P3 Reload is out and I kind of want to play it but also it's $70 so fuck that shit. But partially it's because I realized while putting together the playlist for Valiant Horizon how well the two concepts overlaid with each other with only a little reflavoring/stretching:

Normalish people given extraordinary power
Powers come from discrete beings with archetypical distinctions that are intended to match with the character
Huge emphasis on relationships and building both towards understanding that archetypical power better and being closer to the person who wields it, is associated with it, etc.

_{*3-5. I know 2 has its fans but I've never played it and honestly it's a little longer in the tooth than I have patience for nowadays. I'm sure 1 has its adherents too but I don't know them.}

Machinations of Amirus Intro+Act 1 Postmortem*

Fri, 02 Feb 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Machinations of Amirus A Machination of Court and Frame Binary Star Games

*Does it really count as "mortem" if only like 1/3 of the game is out? I don't know but I'm sure going to post about it!

About 6 months ago I put out the intro and first act of a visual novel, Machinations of Amirus. (It's free and will take you about an hour if you want to run through it before reading this. I am simply not going to worry about spoilers, either for Act 1 or for my plans for Act 2/3 going forward.) My goal here is to think out loud about what I was intending to do, what I did, what works in my opinion, what could be improved within the confines of this basically-a-first-draft, and what's worth keeping an eye on going forward.

Valiant Horizon is out for real!

Tue, 23 Jan 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Valiant Horizon v1.0 is finally out! Some big changes:

12 incredible illustrations by Charlotte Laskowski!
Editing and revision by Marx Shepherd!

And some smaller ones:

Swarm enemies don’t exist anymore and Prime enemies are a bit different.
Relationship rolls are now reversed so high rolls are good.
Various little fixes, typos, and tweaks.

Thanks so much to everyone who backed the game! I’ll have news about a season pass soon. And for everyone’s generosity, I added one community copy for everyone who bought it (and a few more on top).

Class Overview #6: Meet the Tactician and Windmagus!

Sun, 21 Jan 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there! Last class overview devlog, because after these two we’re out of core classes! Introducing the final two, Tactician and Windmagus. Just in time for the full release on January 23rd!

The Tactician

From the start, I wanted one full-support class - not just for mechanical reasons, but thematically, I wanted someone whose almost exclusive role was to support and boost allies. As mentioned in the Commander overview, I’ve had the idea of Tactician via 36th Way Weigh the Odds Commander via 13th Age Commander via 4E warlord in my head for awhile, and I knew I wanted something like it here - so tying it to full-support made sense. I styled it as kind of the “brains of the operation” or the “puppetmaster” - a lot of its abilities focus on planning, logic, tactics, strategy, or unexpected preparedness.

Class Overview #5: Meet the Knight and Ranger!

Thu, 18 Jan 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there!

Valiant Horizon v1.0 is coming out on January 23rd! So we’re devlogging fast now.

As noted in #1, all role/sub-role talk is referring to Total//Effect’s role and sub-role concepts.

The Knight

Once of the martial ideas I wanted to replicate was someone who is just absolutely steadfast in every sense: physically and otherwise. I knew I wanted a Knight somewhere too - I just inherently like the idea of a warrior defined by dedication. (Not in like the historical sense, of course, but in the fantastical/romantic sense.) It seemed like a good pairing, and all of its tales and much of its skillset pertain to one or the other. (One of its suggested Exhaust abilities, “Swear an oath that anyone will believe”, is probably one of my favorites that I’ve written.)

Class Overview #4: Meet the Earthmagus and Frostmagus!

Tue, 16 Jan 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there!

Valiant Horizon v1.0 is coming out on January 23rd! So I’d better get moving on these devlogs.

As noted in #1, all role/sub-role talk is referring to Total//Effect’s role and sub-role concepts.

The Earthmagus

All of my mages (the -magus classes specifically) are just a little off from what people expect. “Earth” is probably the most skipped element in video games on top of that - you see fire/ice/lightning a lot, and earth sometimes comes in as like “acid” or some similar cop-out like that. This makes sense if you’re only making up elemental attacks and not trying to hit something more core to the concept/trying to make something that feels like it belongs to the world. But I don’t want any of the magic in this world to be solely for combat - they all had to feel like they were like, part of the world in some way. So Earthmagus’s Tales are about understanding, addressing and nurturing the land, and their iconic portrait is a farmer or tender of some sort.

2 Stats 2 Rolls

Tue, 02 Jan 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Written for Prismatic Wasteland's "make a new mechanic and give it a name" challenge.

You have two approaches to a situation on either side of a spectrum. For example, let's say... Soundwaves and Emotions. Decide which is "high" and which is "low", then define your Number between 1 and 10, inclusive. A number skewed towards one side means that you'll have high chances of success but also high chances of consequences for the other side, and vice versa.

Class Overview #3: Meet the Commander and Dark Knight!

Thu, 21 Dec 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there! Long time no see!

Now that Valiant Horizon is nearing full release, this is #3 in our design series. We’re back with the Commander and Dark Knight.

As noted in #1, all role/sub-role talk is referring to Total//Effect’s role and sub-role concepts.

The Commander

To get the elephant out of the room, yes, I came at this starting with the 4E warlord by way of its less acclaimed distant cousin, the 13th Age commander. More specifically, I took a crack at this idea starting in 36th Way. 13th Age/36th Way’s Commander have two resource-generating class features indicating focus: Weigh the Odds, which lets you reliably generate the resource you need, but is purely non-offensive; or Fight from the Front, which is a melee attack that generates the resource on a hit. (More on Commander here.) So we had two concepts of:

Objective Game Design Axioms

Tue, 19 Dec 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Make something that you'd want to play.
Or wouldn't want to play, I guess, if that's your goal. Basically try to make something that holds your interest.
Just feel it out, you know? You probably know what you want to do, practically speaking. Trust your instincts, they probably came from somewhere.
Unless you don't have any clue where you're going which is fine too. Sometimes it's about the journey. Sure helps to have a destination in mind though.
Be an absolute sicko about something in your work. This isn't really game design specific but it's good practice.
Design offensively, not defensively. Whenever you think you went a little too far, suppress that instinct and double down.
Every person posting about game design like they absolutely know what the fuck they're doing is a goddamn liar or has their head up their ass, including me. Just make the fucking thing. You got this.
You should always have 10 things on a list even when you can't think of 10 of them.
FREE SPACE
Your game needs at least one more railgun than it currently has. Get on that.

(Read the original on cohost here!)

v1.01 released!

Thu, 09 Nov 2023 00:00:00 +0000

We released a slight update to Celestial Bodies this morning.

Fixes

Refigured the layout to A5.
Fixed a few typos, copy/paste errors, bad labels, and wrong icons.
Fixed a few examples.

Changes

Ultra reactor now has the Reliable quality.
Tackle is way more accurate (and Force can be used for it now).
Direct rules now specify how missile speed works a little better.

Thank you so much for your support thus far! It’s been truly overwhelming.

The Grid™️

Sun, 05 Nov 2023 00:00:00 +0000

I know what you’re here for, mechanically. Let’s talk shop about The Grid™️.

Loadout and Construction

Every mech in this game is defined by a grid like this:

When I say defined, I mean fully defined. First, the basics:

Every frame (basically a chassis for a kind of mech) has HP (Hull Points!) equal to its grid size. So the one you see above has 12HP.
Every frame has a unique trait based on its grid’s size and shape. (This one gets more movement for having oversized thrusters, for instance.)
Each component you see listed there has a specific designation as to what it does (some of them relative to the mech’s size) as well as a shape and size. Weapons can’t be rotated but can be flipped.

And then the advanced stuff.

The sixth backer class is here! Meet the Shaman!

Tue, 26 Sep 2023 00:00:00 +0000

The sixth backer class has arrived! Meet the Shaman!

The Shaman is an attuned, receptive hero.
It focuses on supporting others by boosting their abilities, drawing attacks against them, and healing them.
It’s a full-support class that can be played without taking any offensive actions!

It’s in that backer classes PDF. Enjoy!

(Read the original on itch here!)

The fifth backer class is here! Meet the Arcane Knight!

Wed, 06 Sep 2023 00:00:00 +0000

The fifth backer class has arrived! Meet the Arcane Knight!

The Arcane Knight is a multifaceted, balanced hero.
It focuses on the interplay of bladework and magic, and benefits from alternating the two.
It’s extremely mobile! I love making extremely mobile classes.

It’s in that backer classes PDF. Enjoy!

One more backer class left after this, so stay tuned!

(Read the original on itch here!)

Class Overview #2: Meet the Blazemagus and Champion!

Tue, 29 Aug 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there! #2 in our design series, meet the Blazemagus and Champion!

As noted in #1, all role/sub-role talk is referring to Total//Effect’s role and sub-role concepts.

The Blazemagus

I wanted to go elemental for explicit “magic user” types - just the four basic elements, earth/air/fire/water. It felt very on-brand. And the first one of those four that I made was Blazemagus.

v1.2 released!

Tue, 15 Aug 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there!

v1.2 is up! I added two things:

There’s now a little more on campaigns and running them.
I expanded a bit on the mission prompts, changing crises into modifications on those prompts.

HOPEFULLY this is the version that will be the last one because I’m going to be doing a print run soon! Stay tuned for that.

Until next time!

The fourth backer class is here! Meet the Steward!

Mon, 14 Aug 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there!

We cracked $2000 last night, which is well beyond any expectations I had for this crowdfunding period. Thank you all so much for your support!

The fourth backer class has arrived! Meet the Steward!

The Steward is a cultivating, budding hero.
It’s a support class focusing on healing and protection.
It’s very concerned with the land itself: setting up “safe” areas for allies to stay in or areas that mess with enemies.

It’s in that backer classes PDF. Enjoy!

Class Overview #1: Meet the Bard and Berserker!

Tue, 08 Aug 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there! I’m gonna reveal class art every week and talk about their design as I do. I’m gonna go start to end alphabetically, so meet the Bard and the Berserker!

On roles and sub-roles

I’m going to be talking about roles a lot in these posts. This is because I designed every class using Total//Effect’s role and sub-role concepts as a basis. Each class has three sub-roles: two from one role and one from another. The sub-role indicated in text with bold is the “primary” focus, and each class has a primary sub-role that no other class has. I also have an image highlighting them for each class!

Third backer class is here! Meet the Astrologer!

Sun, 06 Aug 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there!

I’ve uploaded the third new Class, made possible by a very generous backer. Meet the Astrologer!

The Astrologer is a stargazing, prophetic hero.
It can easily provide full support via re-rolls, Advantage, and Disadvantage.
It has a lot of effects that mark or apply to locations, letting it shape the battlefield.

It’s in that backer classes PDF. Enjoy!

(If you want to up your pledge to get one of these, itch doesn’t really do that unfortunately. But if you just buy Just The Game again, add enough to it to get to the higher tier, and let me know on discord/social media/by email, I’ll count it.)

Mechanical choices: Diceless, Roll for Magnitude, and Roll for Success

Thu, 03 Aug 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there!

This post is about the various mechanical choices made in Valiant Horizon at a very high level. I group these into three categories: Diceless mechanics (stuff that works), Roll for Magnitude mechanics (stuff that works but you roll to see how much), and Roll for Success mechanics (stuff that works if a roll goes your way).

Diceless

The simplest kind of mechanic. This is what Assets, Exhausting Assets, and Burdens are:

Valiant Horizon post-itchfund-launch devlog #1: Diceless, Roll for Magnitude, and Roll for Success

Thu, 03 Aug 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Valiant horizon logo

Diceless

The simplest kind of mechanic. This is what Assets, Exhausting Assets, and Burdens are:

Second backer class is here! Meet the Assassin!

Tue, 01 Aug 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there!

I’ve uploaded the second new Class, made possible by a very generous backer. Meet the Assassin!

The Assassin is a deadly, subtle hero.
It can choose to gain bonuses to its Total against debuffed enemies, with the caveat that the debuffs are removed afterwards.
It’s a great combination of deadly and mobile, with debuffs and “finishers” - moves that cap out at extremely high Totals, but provide incredible rewards if met.
It’s technical and really shines with good teamwork!

It’s in the now-updated backer classes PDF (labeled 7-31), along with the previous backer class, the Adept. Enjoy!

First backer class is here! Meet the Adept!

Fri, 28 Jul 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there!

I’ve uploaded the first new Class, made possible by a very generous backer. Meet the Adept!

The Adept is a skilled, highly-trained hero.
It combos off of self-buffing/taking self-targeting utility actions.
It gets a lot out of taking/being given extra actions.
It’s the most mobile class I’ve written thus far!

It’s in that backer classes PDF. Enjoy!

Adapting Machinations of Court and Frame to a VN-ish format

Sun, 02 Jul 2023 00:00:00 +0000

For @liananana's Narrat Jam 2, I'm poking my ideas for a political, intrigue-based mecha game that cares deeply about ties between people with power into a little linear VN storyline. A TTRPG designed for PVP troupe-level play is pretty different from a story following one person! So I'm gonna think out loud about what I'm changing and why.

Ah no I'm writing another dicelessness article by accident oh god help

Off the bat, one of the technological aspects I ran into is that Narrat is very particular about skill rolls. They're binary in nature, you have to define how they work up front, and you don't get the roll value on a check, just pass/fail.

ANOINTED v0.2 is out, I made a tutorial for it, and I want to talk about it.

Thu, 22 Jun 2023 00:00:00 +0000

ANOINTED v0.2 cover

So ANOINTED just got a big update. Part of that is that I added a Tutorial region! I wanna talk about it.

The region

ANOINTED's premise is that you are an immortal warrior (an Anointed) who has been locked away for years following ages of glory, intrigue, war, and disillusionment. When you emerge, you have no memories, but are called/drawn/etc to return to the side of the (long dead) king to whom all Anointed are beholden by ritual bond.

v0.2 release!

Thu, 22 Jun 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there! I’ve just released ANOINTED v0.2! This has:

A revamped combat system that removes dice entirely. (You can see a preview of my initial formulation here, I changed a few things from there but that’s the general idea.)
At long last, rules for exploration!
A tutorial region. If I did it right, it should hopefully give you some idea of how to play the game!

Give it a play, let me know what you think. It’s solo-friendly!

Machinations of Court and Frame pre-production notes: Noble Houses and their Agents

Tue, 20 Jun 2023 00:00:00 +0000

I don't have an actual cover for this one yet so for now you get a screencap from the SRD title. This one's still at pretty high level. But I did some of that high level work and I wanna talk about it!

Speaking of the SRD, this is the third Total//Effect game I initially proposed/outlined/etc on the Total//Effect SRD. My general (self)-pitch was:

As promised, the compilation is (finally) here!

Wed, 14 Jun 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there!

I’ve uploaded the PDF compilation of all 4 season pass modules into one coherent book. Everything should be up to date with v1.1 (hence the title).

Epub version coming soon.

Until next time!

(Read the original on itch here!)

TTRPG Quarterbacking part 2: Solutions, kind of? Mostly vague ideas about solutions.

Mon, 05 Jun 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Somehow this one didn’t make the great cohost migration! I’ve converted and back-dated it appropriately, and lightly touched up a header or two, but otherwise it’s intact. - Binary, Sep 22, 2025

So I outlined the problem (as it is) in part 1. This is the part where I think out loud about what to do about it as a designer.

Foreword #

I’m going to put this as the first thing because it can’t be stressed enough ~~and because I don’t really want to hear about how this isn’t an issue at anyone’s specific table or whatever because that’s not the point~~. Communicate with your players. If someone’s doing it a little too much you can probably just ask them to cut it out and they probably will. Folks are generally pretty reasonable.

v1.1 release! Some extremely preliminary diceless rules!

Mon, 29 May 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there! v1.1 is out. It’s nothing big:

A few clarifications in a few spots.
A few typo, bad reference, and bad copy/paste fixes.
Some layout normalization on Frame spreads re: right-page spacing.

I also made a chost about how I’d convert APOCALYPSE FRAME to diceless here. (At some point I’m going to clean that up and add other variant rule ideas I’ve been kicking around. Compiling The Infected World and updating Ballad of Industrial Gods come first though for APOCALYPSE FRAME work.)

Thinking about (a very broad definition of) quarterbacking, especially as it relates to TTRPGs (part 1)

Wed, 24 May 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Somehow this one didn’t make the great cohost migration! I’ve converted and back-dated it appropriately, and lightly touched up a header or two, but otherwise it’s intact. - Binary, Sep 22, 2025

This is going to be a bit meandering and I’m not going to have answers at the end of this post because it’s already too fucking long. Bear with me.

Disclaimer/preface: I’m mostly spitballing based on my own experiences as someone who has both seen and done this. I’m sure there are better terms for what I’m saying and that I’m probably reinventing the wheel. I’m fine with that. I know about the killer/explorer/socializer/roleplayer model for multiplayer games already, it’s useful and there’s definitely an intersection point on a venn diagram of where it interacts with this but it doesn’t 100% map to where I’m going with this.

Diceless but it's APOCALYPSE FRAME, or: I Do Love The Token But I Am Now Worrying In A Different Tangential Existential Way

Tue, 16 May 2023 00:00:00 +0000

apocalypse frame front cover cropped

Same idea, different game. I'd considered dicelessness for APOCALYPSE FRAME first, actually, but decided it wasn't worth putting it in the core game because I wanted it to come out ever. The big reason I'd do it is that rolling dice actually does slow things down quite a bit and for the most part players usually just reroll with Tension in combat so it's not like consequences come up that much unless folks are using low-die Armaments with low Tension or rolling low Attributes for some reason.

Removing/Reducing Dice in ANOINTED, or How I Learned To Stop Worrying And Love The Token

Mon, 15 May 2023 00:00:00 +0000

ANOINTED cover cropped

I had been thinking about the topic of randomness when writing entries for Regions for ANOINTED23, but Spencer Campbell (GilaRPGs, creator of LUMEN/RUNE/etc) wrote two blog posts (with a third on the way) that got me thinking about it. Specifically, I'm wondering if I could/should just remove dice almost entirely from ANOINTED, my GMless or GM'd/group or solo soulslike game in development.

Liminal Void: Professions (like Classes but not really). What are we doing here?

Wed, 03 May 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Liminal Void cover

So I'm thinking about what I'm doing with Professions in Liminal Void. A Profession is like...a class, kind of/sort of? It's got a starting skillset (basically a broad Skill category), a little passive ability that differentiates it, a few changes to being able to recover/reload/recharge in combat, and a starting equipment package (which includes an outfit, a capital-T Tool, and two consumables).

Dungeon23/ANOINTED23, March and April roundup (oops)

Tue, 02 May 2023 00:00:00 +0000

The Tower of Godfrey map (March)

The Village of Plainswall map (April)

Updating has been pretty spotty for reasons of "I wrote basically 150 pages of Game in these two months"! But as I had time to catch up on Month 4 and finalize it, here's my two.

v2 released!

Thu, 20 Apr 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there!

I just released version 2 of NANO after a little testing and tweaking. My main takeaway is that it needed to be a little more play-to-lose.

Surviving 7 days is framed closer to a partial victory (and can also be a loss). (This encourages people to go for Breakthroughs rather than only putting out fires.)
All actions ding you on at least Fatigue on anything but Harmonize. (It was far too easy prior to lean on Prepare/Progress especially, but also I wanted to preserve the general flow of “you can do however many things you like as long as you think you can keep it up” to encourage people riding the razor’s edge of an Error.)
- All Resists now have Gain 1 Fatigue as their Harmonize (Sustain is now 2/3 for its Synchronize/Interfere).
- Prepare’s Synchronize is now +2 but gains Fatigue.
- Progress’s Synchronize now provokes a Resist.

Until next time!

Liminal Void updates: Advancement is hard and weird

Thu, 06 Apr 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Liminal Void cover

Advancement in a game is tough. Or rather, like all things in game design, you can kind of just do whatever with it but it'll have long-ranging implications as to player behavior. As much as we don't like to admit it sometimes, numbers going up very frequently provide a throughline and driving force for campaign-length games, but how those numbers go up matters. If you give XP for gold, guess what, your game is now at least partially about making money. If you give XP for killing things, guess what, you're going to see a lot of killing. If you don't have XP but just give out character levels when important milestones get finished, they'll frequently beeline to those milestones. And so on.

ANOINTED23 Week 9

Thu, 09 Mar 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Well, "week" because it's actually for just March 1st through 5th. You know what I mean.

Wednesday, 3/1: This month I'm making The Tower of Godfrey, a prison that was originally built by the Academy to house Godfrey, a rune sorcerer who did something egregious that was lost to time. Over time, it was expanded outward to house other inhabitants. It's going to have two Region clocks: Time, a 12-segment clock that ticks with every action/point movement, and Alert, a 6-segment clock that ticks every time Time rolls over, every time a fight lasts 5+ rounds, or on specific events. Alert mostly raises Dispositions to be nastier and adds more enemies on encounters.
Thursday, 3/2: Drew the map above! 1-2-3 are the main hallway, 10-11-12 are the tower, 4-5-6 are the Warden area, and 7-8-9-13 are the newer cells. This one's going to have two entrances (I'm thinking you get to each depending on the Region you come from: one at the front door and one through a hole in a cell. The 1 -> 4 and 3 -> 10 routes are locked by default: 1 -> 4 is a "soft" one that can be broken down or lockpicked if you don't find a key, while 3 -> 10 needs a Warden's key.
Friday, 3/3: I wrote up the sanctuaries, points 1 and 13.
- Point 1: The shoddily-constructed stairs loom before you, pitted with age and weather. A small receiving station is here, with a very small but stately sanctuary and a carefully carved dedication: "Pray for those who reach beyond their grasp. They will find only fleeting rewards in this life, and none in the next."
- Point 13: This cell has a sanctuary carved into its wall, worn down by weather let in from the gaping hole leading outside. Carved into the wall, barely visible and actively defaced in a few places, is the dedication: "Pray for those who defy the faith. They will find no reward." There is, however, no trace of the prisoner who escaped from here.
Saturday, 3/4: Did some planning for enemies. Aside from Godfrey himself, I'm going to use:
- Existing: Dregs and Apprentices. The former for prisoners, the latter for guards.
- Some secondary Academy enforcer-types. (I have some Inscribed folks in core but this is more something orthodox, as inscription is supposed to be taboo.)
- Another kind of prisoner.
- This might be a good time to introduce a Warden as a midboss.
Sunday, 3/5: Wrote up an Academy Enforcer. They're a melee magic type.
- Health 6, PD0, MD2, Poise 3. Kind of like a Spearman but a little more magic-resistant.
- Dagger Sigil: Rng 0, Mag 1, Combo 3, Advance 1
- Shield Glyph: 1 PD, 3 MD, and 4 Poise until next round. Retreat 1.
- Targets sorcery/incantation users first.

Next week (aka this week that's already started) I dive deeper and start filling in (more) points.

Liminal Void rambling: ships, ship combat, and ship “combat“.

Thu, 02 Mar 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Thinking out loud about Liminal Void ship stuff because that's on my docket alongside Valiant Horizon and VH is mostly in the "the thing's constructed, just gotta tweak it around the edges" stage. (If you're not familiar from previous posts, basically it's a space game with an Expanse-ish level of hard-sci-fi-ness, give or take a bit, but more centered on survival in shit space capitalism than interplanetary politics as such. I have a free quickstart here! for ground-level, Level 0 rules if that sounds like your thing!)

v2 released!

Wed, 01 Mar 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there!

I put out a v2 of this quickstart. It has the following changes:

Has a slightly more proper cover now for both the rules and quickstart scenario!
Made a few typo/clarification fixes
Added a few things to the quickstart that came up in play (nothing big, just “you can try doing this” kind of stuff)

Until next time!

(Read the original on itch here!)

ANOINTED23 Month 2 roundup: The Eternal Battlefield of Karus

Tue, 28 Feb 2023 00:00:00 +0000

January 30 through February 5th notebook entries

February 6th through 12th entries

February 13th through 19th entries

February 20th through 26th entries

Valiant Horizon dev: what even are basic actions anyway?

Sat, 25 Feb 2023 00:00:00 +0000

So some of my early playtest feedback is that melee feels less good than range which...yeah, tactics games are sure like that, huh! I'm fixing to handle this in a few ways right now.

The obvious moves first:

Lower the utility of Far range attacks. (This is even more pronounced because 3/6 of my players have abilities that hit to Far - basically almost all of the ones in the book. It's a good stress test at least!) Far range support is probably fine.
Add movement to a lot of powers. I'd done this with some of the later classes I designed (self-buff powers, for example, are usually move + buff) but the older ones could stand to have that energy too.

Now for the weird moves.

v0.1.4 release!

Wed, 22 Feb 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there! Been awhile.

I’d been iterating on ANOINTED briefly over the past 6 months or so, and thinking about it more recently because of Dungeon23/ANOINTED23. As such I’ve finally gotten enough done that I’ve released a v0.1.4.

Brief list of changes:

Defenses are all now wildly different.
- Armor is now subtractive rather than the previous situation, and all Armor now has a Poise to it.
  - The old system was fine but created a bunch of weird problems.
  - This gives it a little more going on than previously.
  - Shields are now basically “you gain a better PD/MD/Poise while blocking, but drain stamina”.
- Dodge’s 4-5 result now lets you reroll but spend another Stamina instead of its previous thing. (Gets that good “mash dodge button” feel to it.)
- Parry now only works on a 6. Makes it way more uncertain for what you get.
Stagger is way less bad than it was, now it just strips defenses.
Rebalanced all equipment/spells/enemies based on this (and gave them little outlines so they pop a bit better). They’ll probably need another pass once I do more testing.

You can see all my ANOINTED23 stuff here! I’m making a region per day. (I’m also putting dailies on my discord.)

End of week 6

Tue, 14 Feb 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Feb 6-12 continued this trajectory.

Monday, 2/6: Point 5, the Camp A siege engine. If you get here, you can use it on any adjacent point - 4, 6, 7, or 9 - to (hopefully) instantly kill several enemies there. If you get a direct hit on the ballista at Point 7 (we'll get to it in a few days, but it prevents travel to/from point 7 except via point 9), it's destroyed. You can use this to soften up a few difficult fights.
Tuesday, 2/7: Wrote up a Holy Knight, a variant on the standard Knight enemy in ANOINTED, to differentiate Camp B a little bit. It has a single-strike attack instead of a combo and uses Invocation of Vigilance to add stagger resist instead of having a Guard ability.
Wednesday, 2/8: Point 6, midfield skirmish. A Knight and some Spearmen are squaring off against a Holy Knight and some Spearmen. Disposition by default is that they attack you, but a good roll can make half or all of them keep fighting among themselves instead of you. There's a Bonfire here, so you can reset the freeze clock without taking Harm if you clear the point.
Thursday, 2/9: Herald's Flagpole. A heavier than usual polearm, it has a Stance move that allows the user and nearby allies to regain Health and shake off Stagger.
Friday, 2/10: Point 9, Camp B forward command. A Holy Knight and some archers are picking off a few spearmen and guard dogs here. Once the dust clears, you can get that Flagpole here.
Saturday, 2/11: Point 7, the Ballista and crew. As noted, this makes travel very difficult between 7 and any point other than 9 (it's a "roll and if you don't get a 6 you die" situation). Two Holy Knights and some archers are here. Once combat is done, you can permanently destroy the Ballista.
Sunday, 2/12: Point 10, the far sanctuary. Very similar to Point 1's, and it bears the same exact inscription: A stone altar sits here, largely untouched with time, with the inscription: "Pray for these warriors, that they may achieve victory over their foes for the cause of righteousness." I like parallelism.

This week I'm tackling the area boss (General Ingrid, Camp B leader) as well as the remaining Point 8, and then doing cleanup for the rest of the month.

v1.0.2 is out! And a little something extra!

Thu, 09 Feb 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there,

v1.0.2 is out! A few more typos fixed, and the character sheet should print a little better (stuff is further from the edges).

Also, have a setpiece on me! This is one I made to end out my home campaign - feel free to use it for yours!

A flying fortress big enough to blot out the sun, its pointed prow clearly designed for intimidation. On its underside, enormous energy cannons create brief light sources of their own as they crackle violently to annihilate anything that would dare to stand in its way. This is the Republic’s Jupiter-class platform. It’s designed to destroy cities.

ANOINTED23, 2/5 (end of week 5)

Tue, 07 Feb 2023 00:00:00 +0000

February 1-5 brought us the start of the Eternal Battlefield of Karus.

Wednesday, 2/1: Point 1, the Sanctuary. I didn't fuck up this time so it's first day. A stone altar sits here, largely untouched with time, with the inscription: "Pray for these warriors, that they may achieve victory over their foes for the cause of righteousness." (This is obviously talking about the eternal battle but also I'm doing a thing. Get back to me at Point 10.)
Thursday, 2/2: Point 2, the southern gate of Camp A. (I'll come up with some names later.) The flank of this camp has not been guarded strongly in quite some time. This has an intro fight: 1 + #Anointed Spearmen/Archers, split half and half. Disposition is Default Aggressive, 5-6 Distracted: as mentioned, it's not very well guarded.
Friday, 2/3: Point 4, Camp A's center. The narrow camp is heavily guarded. A catapult is visible to the north. There's a fight here with 1 + #Anointed Spearmen and 1 + #Anointed Knights: Knights are tough, so this one's pretty rough, especially solo; however, there's an "escape" hex on the far end of the camp. Disposition is Default Defensive, 4-5 Aggressive, 6 Unaware: each Unaware gives you an opportunity to either launch a surprise attack or move up 2 hexes towards that "escape" and ticks the area clock once. (If you make it to the catapult at Point 5, you'll have a better shot at defeating this group.)
Saturday, 2/4: Wrote up a Guard Dog. It's similar to a Dreg but a little stronger and more aggressive at range 1, but similarly frail.
- Health 4, no defenses/Poise
- Leap: Rng 0, Phys 2, Advance 3, Quick 1
- Bite: Rng 0, Phys 2, Advance 1, Combo 2
- Savage: Rng 0, Phys 2, Combo 3
- Prioritizes least armored.
Sunday, 2/5: Point 3, the far end of Camp A with kennels. It takes 4 ticks to travel to or from here from Point 2, 2 ticks from anywhere else. (Might make this 2 across the board, it's an 8-tick clock so 4 might be a bit much.) 2 Archers + #Anointed guard dogs are here: the dogs are in kennels until they take their turn, which makes it harder to attack them directly.

So far so good! (And I've done two since then, obviously, but we'll get there next week.)

ANOINTED23, 1/31, week 4 + January wrapup

Tue, 31 Jan 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Week 1, 2, 3

So this week, I pretty much just did cleanup.

Tweaked Saint Gratien a bit: reduced MD to 1 and Poise to 4, and changed Invocation of Sanctity (spell parry) to Invocation of Vigilance (can't be staggered). This makes him a much more approachable threat as a mage while still being dangerous.
Added Dispositions to Points 5, 6, and 9.
Added more formal descriptions to every point (except 1, which was pretty good).

And on the 28th I decided month 1 is wrapped! Got The Delta Sinkhole, a nasty little swamp region with 9 points, two new enemy types, some nasty ambush stuff, an optional boss, and an NPC! Makes a nice transition area.

v1.0 release! (v1.0.1 patch.)

Fri, 27 Jan 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there!

At long last, v1.0 is out! Featuring:

A reorganized body text, with a manuscript edited by Marx Shepherd
A full relayout
Art by Galen Pejeau and Mykell Pledger
A few minor additions and rules changes

If you have the game, you now have the final release version as well!

As per tradition, there was a release-version typo found on Efficient which has now been fixed in v1.0.1. (I’ll have the epub updated as well in a bit.)

ANOINTED23, 1/22 (end of full week 3)

Sun, 22 Jan 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Week 1, 2

Day 22! At the end of this week, it's mostly all sketched out.

Monday, 1/16: Point (7), the shallows. Last week we defined Saint Gratien, the Major Threat of the area. This is where he is, shuffling around mindlessly. He can be attacked here, or potentially bypassed (Default Aggressive, 5-6 Occupied).
Tuesday, 1/17, Point (8), the detritus pile. A mountain of materiel and bodies, piled into the back corner of this area. You can grab a Poleaxe here...however, it's harder to sneak back, because approaching the pile makes it shuffle around - meaning Gratien is more likely to be disturbed (Default Aggressive, 6 Occupied).

ANOINTED23, 1/15 (end of full week 2)

Sun, 15 Jan 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Picture of my planner, week 2

(Previous)

Day 15! Halfway through. Here's the daily for that:

Monday, 1/9: Point (1), the Sanctuary. (I'm going to be using the Sanctuaries to do two things. First is re-emphasize the Anointed's connection (via ritual) to the Church; second is to give some way to foreshadow some themes of the area. This is done from the description of it and a prayer set at each.) The place is new, but hastily-erected: it's half fallen apart. This Sanctuary's prayer is: "Pray for the forgotten, those left in the wake of disaster and war. May they find refuge and stillness." (If you're keeping score...nothing here has found refuge and stillness.)
Tuesday 1/10: Point (6), the walkway north. There's an encounter with 2 + 1/extra Scavengers on the way: by default half of them start behind you, but if you do something tricky on the approach you can avoid being surrounded. You can find a Wakizashi further up the walkway afterwards.
Wednesday 1/11: Saint Gratien, part 1. (This is the Major Threat in the area - because this is an interstitial region, he's optional, but you get some good stuff. Based on the Attribute combo, he's a Conviction/Knowledge enemy: relating to faith and corruption.) A tall, gangly man with no arms and desiccated skin. His clothes are half-rotted, revealing a carved lump under his skin under the right side of his chest.
- Health 40, PD 1, MD 2, Poise 6. Pretty tough to stagger, pretty resistant to magic.
- Trait: Any Mag. Harm received splashes to all nearby (at range 0B)
Thursday, 1/12: Saint Gratien, part 2. Gratien's actions are all Incantations. I pictured him as one of the original Anointed from the Age of Legends/Daggers, so he gets to have one of each kind: he learned Storm before it was a Blasphemy. (Will probably revise some of these in whatever cleanup pass I do, he's a little too anti-caster focused at the moment.)
- Prayer for Wrath: Range 0T, Mag 2, Mighty 4, Forceful. (Uses when something's at Range 0-1.)
- Invocation of Sanctity: Evade 3-, Spells only, reflects back at caster. (Uses when targeted by magic.)
- Channel Storm: Range 2-4, Mag 2, Multi 5. (Uses when nothing is at Range 0-1.)
- Dangerous Action: Projected Wrath: Range 1B-2B-3B-4B, Mag 4, Mighty 6, Forceful. Immediate: Move back 2, adds 1 to Encumbrance of all swamp tiles. (He'll initiate this at the end of a round when put below 30, 20, or 10: the Immediate thing happens, and then at the end of the next round the rest happens. It can be canceled by dealing 10 Harm or staggering him in the interim.)
- His default Behavior is that he goes after anyone with Talismans.
Friday, 1/13: The Talisman of Saint Gratien (a reward for beating him) is a mass of bone embedded into his breastbone, carved into the symbol of the ancient Church. The corruption leaked into it causes it to repel magic in its vicinity.
- Weight 3
- 1 Tier 2 Slot: Prayer
- 1 Tier 2 Slot: Invocation
- 1 Tier 2 Slot: Blasphemy
- Parry (Spell)
- Having 1 of each is unusual, but less flexible than most talismans, and most don't have Parry of any kind. Most are also Weight 1-2 instead of 3.
Saturday, 1/14: Invocation of Implacability. (This is another reward for beating him.)
- Tier 1, Conviction 3, 4F
- You're immune to anything that would add extra encumbrance (beyond Encumbrance from your equipment Weight). Lasts until the Region Clock advances.
Sunday, 1/15: Made an NPC. Barnabas is a pious low-country sanctuary tender. He'll ask Anointed to put Gratien to his final rest, and teach them the Invocation of Implacability in exchange for it. He also unlocks all Tier 1 Invocations/Prayers for selection between Regions - my plan is to allow players to choose 1 thing from a list that starts with "everyone's starting equipment" and expands out as they meet NPCs or find things.

Next week, I'll put Gratien and Barnabas in points 7-8-9 and assess what we're doing from there. Might use that last week as a polish week if I run out of content to fill. We'll see!

ANOINTED23, 1/8 (end of full week 1), some rambling on planning for Attributes/Regions for ANOINTED

Sun, 08 Jan 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Pointmap from 1 to 9.

A bunch of chicken scratch writing from January 2 to 8.

(Previous)

So we're at day 8 for this Region. Here's the breakdown of what that looks like:

ANOINTED23, 1/4

Wed, 04 Jan 2023 00:00:00 +0000

The Delta Sinkhole entry as above, now with a little map.

The Half-Dreg entry and two points, as well as two combat maps.

Three entries so far. Map is going on that first grid for space reasons. ~~I definitely didn't screw up and write Point 1 on Jan 9th already. Ignore that (1) on the map for now.~~ Combat maps for fights go on the grid on the right (they're hexes in the actual game, but the way I have it set up is basically hexes).

Part 2: Escape from CICP-1 Scenario Teardown

Tue, 03 Jan 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Ok. This is the part where I talk more firmly about the scenario. (See the map above.)

The goal of this scenario, as repeated from above, is the same goals as Level 0 in general:

Establish some "starting points" for characters, and give some playstyle options.
Figure out, through play, what kind of people your characters were and are. (The Background mechanic is the obvious version of this, but even more subtle decisions inform a character.)
Make sure the party is a persona non grata in some way.
Get the party a spaceship. That's a major part of the game going forward.

I had more to do here than just present a fun adventure. I was tasked to present a jumping-off point for the rest of a campaign! And I think it worked.

ANOINTED23, 1/1

Sun, 01 Jan 2023 00:00:00 +0000

The Delta Sinkhole entry.

For my first Region I’m making the swamp.

The idea I have is basically a downriver swamp that was enough of a crossroads to build walkways over it. Over time, it’s been clogged with the detritus of centuries of war from upstream: materiel, corpses, undying warriors left as waste. The near-constant flow had attracted scavengers, making it hard to maintain; and eventually there was nobody left to maintain the walkways.

Liminal Void Quickstart and Scenario Teardown, Part 1: Background, Quickstart rules

Sun, 01 Jan 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Map of CI Central Processing Station 1 (CICP-1)

I'm in a posting mood ~~because I'm putting off finishing writing a press release/kit~~ so I figured I'd ruminate a little bit about how I put the Liminal Void Quickstart rules and scenario, Escape from CICP-1, together. Mild spoilers for the scenario under the fold if you care about that sort of thing, but most of the big scenario stuff is going to be in a follow-up post, but also it's just long and this seems polite.

Dungeon23 tech showcase: cyclic dungeon generation

Thu, 29 Dec 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Figured I'd get a little into the sausage on one particular thing I found that I'll be using quite a bit.

Cyclic dungeon generation is a really, really cool thing that I saw posted about on twitter (from @riseupcomus I believe?), and from there I've seen other people posting about it too. In general it's a great read just for picking out good design patterns for making little moments in a level, dungeon, etc - Zelda is described as the big influence but you can see this kind of technique for design going pretty clearly into a lot of soulslike areas, for instance. So I decided to give the randomization from it a shot! I'm intending a mix of bigger "destination" regions and smaller "interstitial" regions so I'm not terribly worried about the size at this juncture, but it's built such that you can pretty easily compound on it if you want.

Liminal Void Phipps 23 Worldbuilding, Part 3

Fri, 09 Dec 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Ok, no more icons. Here’s the next step:

Integration

Name the following

Two Factions

A Settlement

A territory

A Dungeon

A Season

Your Icons and Inspirations should help a lot here. Be explicit about how your icons relate to these larger organizations or areas. You don't have to use all of them.

Given that this isn’t really a fantasy thing as such, “Dungeon” and “Season” are going to have liberties taken with them. And Factions are going to be very loose because I’m actively trying to avoid faction tech for this game: as fun as a more explicit Expanse-like game of Great Powers would be, the biggest players are mostly intended to be out of reach, these will be mostly groups of broad-strokes similar corporations.

Liminal Void Phipps 23 Worldbuilding, Part 2d

Thu, 08 Dec 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Origin, 1+2a, 2b, 2c

Part 2d: Icons for “The wildly disruptive nature of independent ship ownership”

Event: In the early days of the Jovian colonies declaring independence from Mars, Mars had shut off all wormhole beacons in an attempt to starve them out. One lone sympathetic freighter, however, brought enough supplies via off-network beacons to keep them supplied so they could maintain their resistance. That ship is long since gone, but is celebrated yearly on the Jovian Independence Day on June 1st.
Landmark: The Deimos Travel Consortium’s logo which still emblazons that tiny moon. The Consortium collapsed after independent investigators with their own ship used it to uncover evidence that a mass transit disaster due to improper maintenance was covered up. Rumor has it they were paid handsomely by a competitor to look into it.
Person: Josiah Flake, the current CEO of Translunar Water, was once declared legally dead. It turned out that he had faked his death and, with the help of a ship’s crew, used the opportunity to turn the tables on a would-be assassin - and the only other person in line for the executive position once his boss retired.
Peril: If you’re supplying workers with the means to secure a better deal with themselves, watch your back. Businesses watch closely for pro-labor ship captains and find ways to make them disappear.
Treasure: It’s said that there are still the husks of ill-fated stations in orbit around Venus, but no company in their right mind would take the chance to salvage them. Which means they’re ripe for the picking if you’ve got enough thermal shielding.
Secret: A Terran shipyard has made a prototype of a nearly self-sustainable ship: it has a new kind of engine that requires no fuel and its air and water recyclers run at an absurdly efficient rate. It could change the limits of the galaxy forever if made at scale.

Icons done! Time to move onto phase 3.

Liminal Void Phipps 23 Worldbuilding, Part 2c

Tue, 06 Dec 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Origin, 1+2a, 2b

2c: Icons for "Being thrust suddenly onto the fringes of society and having to figure out how to deal with that."

Event: When the Terran and Martian beacon networks were merged, a lot of stations became redundant. Everyone manning those stations were fired and reactors were deactivated as soon as the merger went through. The stations who had suitable engineering knowledge to restart them did so for the sake of everyone on the station, but for their trouble, they were blacklisted from all future corporate work.
Landmark: Adrastea station was the source of one corp’s experimental “study” into worker efficiency in high gravity conditions. When the study ended in a drastic failure, workers there were all forced to sign non-disclosure and non-compete agreements before receiving medical care. After receiving the bare minimum, they were all promptly fired.
Person: Barnaby Russell was a pilot who got fired from ferry duty due to having a management inefficiency pinned on him. On his way out, he stole a security patrol fighter and used it to hijack several freighters. He’s still at large, along with a few old friends he managed to recruit, and occasionally his crew will disrupt an ore shipment leaving the colonies.
Peril: Every once in awhile, someone decided to give a little too much control to an automated system. When that happens (and when it goes wrong), it’s quite standard for everyone involved in programming or maintenance to be let go and the mark put on their permanent record in spite of whoever made it happen.
Treasure: If your station gets attacked or cut loose, strip the place clean, then hide it well. What are they going to do, fire you twice? Just make sure you don’t take anything traceable…
Secret: A lot of corporations cut people loose or mark them as falsely dead on purpose. There’s a lot of things you can hire someone who doesn’t exist for.

(Read the original on cohost here!)

RUNEvember Summary

Sun, 04 Dec 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Session 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15

As you can note by the big ol' index above, I played a lot of RUNE last month! As someone who has both made a few Realms and played a ton, here are my opinions (not rules or anything! Just my observations) on what helps make a good realm.

Liminal Void Phipps 23 Worldbuilding, Part 2b

Fri, 02 Dec 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Origin, 1+2a

2b: Icons for "The farther out a station or colony is from any of the centers of corporate power, the more exploited and extracted they are, but the easier it is to achieve some kind of independence."

Event: The first corporation to set up a headquarters in a colony. It's how you know a colony is about to become a proper hub, and that everyone living there is about to have their lives permanently changed.
Landmark: A few decades ago, the first Martian worker housing unit was a deeply inhumane honeycomb-like structure with awful conditions. It's long since been demolished, and only a tiny museum exists in its place. Mars is now a thriving center for commerce, and anything that reminds people of its roots isn't suitable.
Person: Joe Reyes, an organizer who was the public face of victories for workers in Callisto Station. He now lives in Ganymede and works as a fundraiser for similar efforts, but he's frequently accused of enjoying his relative fame and the comforts of the city while other stations and colonies languish.
Peril: Diseases don't often hit colonies, but when they do, they spread like wildfire due to cramped, awful conditions. If it's something that's a serious risk, it's very common for the founding corp to quarantine the colony entirely to prevent spread, regardless of how well the colony can withstand that.
Treasure: If you've got a ship and want to make salvage money, what you need to do is head to Earth and dig up old records of existing colonies and compare them to known ones. If you see one that doesn't show up on current records, head that way. There's a chance it's been completely abandoned and there's something worth salvaging there. Who knows what condition it's in, though.
Secret: The destruction of the Enceladus commune. By official records, no colony could possibly exist without corporate sanction, and yet one did, for a surprisingly long time, exist. They were destroyed outright by Jovian corporate navies, and all official records were scrubbed. But some people remember.

(Read the original on cohost here!)

RUNEvember Session 15: Cogrealm of the Mechanist

Wed, 30 Nov 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Session 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14

For the final RUNEvember Realm, I entered the Cogrealm of the Mechanist!

RUNEvember Session 14: Shrouded Hamlet

Tue, 29 Nov 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Session 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13

This time, I entered my own Shrouded Hamlet. (CW: alcohol, fungi)

The village of Cammillon was once known as a vibrant fixture in river trade, famous for a rich, exclusive liqueur that bears its name. Export of barrels and bottles had increased greatly as it became well known, until they suddenly stopped completely. A thick fog had slowly crept over the village, and none who entered afterwards returned.

Liminal Void: Phipps 23 (24?) Worldbuilding, Part 1+2a

Mon, 28 Nov 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Working off of this list because it sounds like a good way to put a loose, anti-canon setting together. (Anti-canon is definitely something I'm aiming for for Liminal Void so I'm game.)

Step 1

(mostly a repost from here so it's in a useful place, made slight changes here and there)

Inspirations

The Expanse
Cowboy Bebop
System Shock
Alien/s
FTL

About

If I had to narrow it down to statements would probably come out to something like:

Liminal Void Phipps23 start

Mon, 28 Nov 2022 00:00:00 +0000

(For context, originally this was a reply to this post).

This is a pretty cool idea! I'll give this a shot because I'm starting to sketch out a new thing (Liminal Void) and I'm trying to give it a little more to work with setting-wise than I normally do for a game.

Inspirations

The Expanse
Cowboy Bebop
System Shock
Alien/s
FTL

About

If I had to narrow it down to statements would probably come out to something like:

RUNEvember Session 13: Echo Crater

Mon, 28 Nov 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Session 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12

This time, I explored/am exploring/will explore Echo Crater!

Approaching the edge of the crater you pause to rest and oversee the challenge ahead. An entire realm, sunk into the earth years ago and no record of what happened. You however feel the pull of a rune towards the old sorcerer’s tower. You carve your sigil into the rock, and swear to defeat the rune-lord who desolated this land.

RUNEvember Session 11: Dread Manse

Sat, 26 Nov 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Session 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10

This time, I approached the Dread Manse!

Its owner was a well-respected lord, until one day he was never seen again in daylight. Rumors of horrifying vampirism persisted, which were soon confirmed as fact. His newfound dark magic was powerful enough to shade his mansion from the sun and he has not been seen in decades. Rumor has it that he hunts when night is darkest.

RUNEvember Session 12: The Scourged City

Sat, 26 Nov 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Session 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11

The city of Giernan was a place of ambition and prosperity, as well as poverty and despair. Widening social castes gave way to hatred, and something truly abyssal was brought into the city. Unrest became disorder, and men became monsters. The city was sealed off from the outside and you were trapped. Then everything began to burn.

Core mechanic: a painfully thorough examination of every part of the 3d6

Fri, 25 Nov 2022 00:00:00 +0000

(Originally posted on Cohost: https://cohost.org/binary/post/162256-total-effect-core-m )

So this is my first public post/design blog/etc about a system I’m developing as a SRD/toolkit, Total//Effect. It includes a bunch of probability stuff at the end if you’re into that, but I do sum up the important bits if you’re not.

I’ll start with my initial forays into the humble 3d6 (and the originator of some of these mechanics), 36th Way and LUMEN.

Subsystem overview and the three games I'm sketching out with it.

Fri, 25 Nov 2022 00:00:00 +0000

(Originally posted on Cohost: https://cohost.org/binary/post/173316-total-effect-subsys )

I realized I barely described what the rest of the system is in favor of being a Probability Weirdo. Let’s do that. I also didn’t describe, or even mention any of the three games I’m outlining while I’m writing it somehow. Let’s do that too.

The Subsystems

What’s a core system for the system? Like what parts do you need? You need the core mechanic, which can in turn be expressed through any of the subsystems listed. Basically aside from how to roll, the concept of escalation, and some concepts around level/tier advancement, there isn’t any one system that’s “core”. My big intentions for this system/toolbox/SRD/whatever are modularity and configurability, which I’m defining as:

RUNEvember Session 10: Abrus Island

Thu, 24 Nov 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Session 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9

This time, I washed up on Abrus Island!

Agonizing coughing. Heaving expulsions of salt water. Then, finally, a laborious inhale. You live. Wiping sand and blood from your face, you try to piece together the events of the previous night: a sudden severe storm, a giant waves, the crack of the ship’s hull, pain, darkness. You’ve washed ashore here, wherever that might be. Standing, there’s a familiar pull on your soul – a Sigil nearby. Although carved by unknown hands, you feel linked to it. You lash together a simple spear and grab a piece of driftwood as a crude shield before heading off into the dense forest ahead.

RUNEvember Session 9: Coral Rock

Sat, 19 Nov 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Session 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8

For this session, I returned to Coral Rock:

The sigil seared into the ground shimmers like the bright, crystalline sea that laps against the coastline. A gulch between two hills fills with water, turning the north end of the peninsula into an isolated landmass.

RUNEvember Session 8: The Cracks Betwixt

Wed, 16 Nov 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Session 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7

This time, I ran through The Cracks Betwixt, another pamphlet Realm!

When something shatters, it leaves behind cracks. Over time, those cracks fill with all sorts of interesting things. All sorts of filth. All sorts of riches.

RUNEvember Session 7: Cragcliff Reformatory

Mon, 14 Nov 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Session 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6

For this session I revisited my first Realm, Cragcliff Reformatory!

The very name elicits an involuntary response: it conjures up an image of a horrible, nightmarish facility designed solely for the purpose of detaining magic-users of all kinds, run by the infamous former mage-hunter, Inquisitor Tremain. You had thought it to be nothing but legend. You were wrong.

RUNEvember Session 6: Obsidian Brink

Sun, 13 Nov 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Session 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5

Next up is Obsidian Brink, another pamphlet Realm.

You are being followed. The instant you set foot in this Realm, something caught your scent.

It’s been hunting you ever since.

The runes carved into your being hum within you, not resonating with a source of power, but urging you to escape this place.

RUNEvember Session 5: Castle Blanchard

Fri, 11 Nov 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Session 0, 1, 2, 3, 4

Fifth on the list was Castle Blanchard.

This fragment of Obron is like something out of a fairytale: rolling hills provide the backdrop for an imposing castle on the banks of a gorgeous river. But strife rules this Realm: smoke drifts from the green hills hangs over a castle overrun with thorny vines and twisted trees beckon with gnarled branches across the river. Something has gone terribly wrong here.

RUNEvember Session 4: World's Grave

Wed, 09 Nov 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Session 0, 1, 2, 3

Fourth on RUNEvember, we're entering the World's Grave.

You wake in smothering darkness and claw your way out of a shallow grave. The air hangs heavy with humid decay. In the distance the land cracks into a cavernous maw. You carve the Sigil into your tombstone and set out.

Overview and Realm Mechanics

Another horror-ish one, this one has a unique mechanic: Remains. When enemies die, they (mostly) drop a Remains tile on the map. Enemies interact with these sometimes (consuming them, mostly), and after combat they can be collected for use if they're still on the map. This is a pretty interesting mechanic and gives you reasons to be more aggressive against otherwise not terribly threatening enemies (because sometimes they'll gobble up your precious Remains).

RUNEvember Session 3: Obran Express

Mon, 07 Nov 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Session 0, 1, 2

On the third stop, we've hit our first pamphlet realm, Obran Express! There are 4 of these right now if my memory serves. These are Realms that fit on a sheet front and back, usually they have 4 points and take like half an hour to play tops.

Glass shatters and screams echo across the Obran Express. Your journey to another realm interrupted, you sigh, scratch a hasty sigil. and draw your weapon. Nothing is ever easy.

RUNEvember Session 2: Bulwark Hollow

Sat, 05 Nov 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Session 0, Session 1.

Second stop in RUNEvember is Bulwark Hollow:

A stiff breeze stirs the trees around you, the only sounds are that of the rustling leaves, the creak of wood, and the nearby rush of water. Towering mountains, tallest to the north, sweep across the horizon, their peaks snatching at the clouds.

With your Sigil carved into the rock, you head out to find the Rune Lord of Bulwark Hollow.

RUNEvember Session 0: Ground Rules

Fri, 04 Nov 2022 00:00:00 +0000

I don't feel like writing a novel this month. I've done enough writing lately. What I do feel like is doing something I've been putting off for months: playing @gilarpgs 's RUNE a bunch. And now that the backer copy is out, throughout November, I'm going to play RUNE. I'm going to play so much RUNE. I'm going to play all of RUNE that currently exists.

RUNEvember Session 1: Great Serpent Tree

Fri, 04 Nov 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Session 0 (and a description of what's going on here).

I started off RUNEvember by playing through the Great Serpent Tree:

Standing in a petrified half life, the Great Serpent Tree balances impossibly on the tip of its own tail, scales falling to the ground as branches burst through serpentine flesh. Blood and venom flows down its length, as distant figures move about its stretch, carving up the still breathing beast.

Total//Effect subsystem overview (aka, the actual game bits) and the three games I'm sketching out with it.

Wed, 02 Nov 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Follow-up to my post about Total//Effect core mechanics.

I realized I barely described what the rest of the system is in favor of being a Probability Weirdo. Let's do that. I also didn't describe, or even mention any of the three games I'm outlining while I'm writing it somehow. Let's do that too.

The Subsystems

What's a core system for the system? Like what parts do you need? You need the core mechanic, which can in turn be expressed through any of the subsystems listed. Basically aside from how to roll, the concept of escalation, and some concepts around level/tier advancement, there isn't any one system that's "core". My big intentions for this system/toolbox/SRD/whatever are modularity and configurability, which I'm defining as:

Total//Effect core mechanic: a painfully thorough examination of every part of the 3d6

Mon, 31 Oct 2022 00:00:00 +0000

So this is my first public post/design blog/etc about a system I'm developing as a SRD/toolkit, Total//Effect. It includes a bunch of probability stuff at the end if you're into that, but I do sum up the important bits if you're not.

I'll start with my initial forays into the humble 3d6 (and the originator of some of these mechanics), 36th Way and LUMEN.

3d6 and 36th Way/LUMEN

Total//Effect's resolution is a kind of combination of two different resolution systems I've used in the past: 36th Way and LUMEN.

Postmortem

Fri, 02 Sep 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there! I’m just going to go over the general history of this project, where it went, what state it ended up in, and takeaways going forward. This is going to be fairly rambly in parts.

How did we get here?

To put it bluntly, the primary reason this exists is because I tried running Pathfinder 2E in late 2019 and hated it. It’s not the only reason though.

Alchemist, why Occultist/Chaos Mage don't exist, and grab bag of the rest

Mon, 29 Aug 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there! Long time no see! I’ve been thinking about 36th Way a bit recently and realized I never finished my class redesign rundown by talking about Alchemist. So let’s do that, then I’ll do a rundown of other stuff. But first…

Why isn’t there a Chaos Mage?

To be perfectly honest, because I don’t like it at all. Having seen it in play, it never seems to have interesting choices and the concept isn’t that interesting. I like wild magic in theory but practically speaking it really slows things down when you’re expected to be engaging with it constantly. Reading through the talents, it’s a pretty bad sign when more than half of them are “take this other class’s spells”. Just not a lot to work with.

1 year anniversary! Let's talk about v1.0.

Tue, 09 Aug 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there!

We’re coming up on the 1 year anniversary of APOCALYPSE FRAME v0.1 (which was also my first published game)! So let’s talk about AF v1.0, which I’ve been pretty quiet about up until now. (And especially who I’m working with!)

Book Contents

First off, what’s going to be in it? This seems like it has an obvious answer: the core book has been out for a year. And that’s mostly right, but my plan is to add on some ACES HIGH stuff at the end as Advanced Rules. (Having them as separate documents made more sense for a digital-only release but that’s not going to be the case forever. Plus I think AH has a lot of stuff I consider “core” to the experience, like Crisis Advances and Tyrants.)

Framed by the Apocalypse

Fri, 05 Aug 2022 00:00:00 +0000

If you’ve ever wanted to take a crack at making your own third-party APOCALYPSE FRAME supplement, now’s your chance! Framed by the Apocalypse, a third-party license for APOCALYPSE FRAME, is now available. In the weeks to come I’ll be releasing more content for it as well, including layout templates and design guidance. Hope to see some cool stuff made with it soon!

(Read the original on itch here!)

v0.4.1 release!

Mon, 01 Aug 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there!

v0.4.1 is out. This should hopefully be the last update prior to v1.0. (Exciting stuff in store for v1.0, I can’t wait to show it off!)

This includes:

Core

Backup Armaments are now less specific, you can link any armament with any backup. The previous system was fine but too easy to miss and honestly not very interesting.
While on the topic of backups: Shiv (2 dice, 4 Harm, Close) has been replaced with Sword (1 die, 5 Harm, Close, Piercing). Shiv was a little too reliable and boring as a backup, 1 die with no +die mitigating tags feels better as a backup and 5 Harm means it’s still quite useful. (I’ll wait for the compilation to update Infected World sheets with the new Backups/etc.)
Hazards are now 1 Harm on entry, 2 Harm if you end turn on it by default. (Previous Hazards are preserved as Minor Hazards.) This lets things like Incendiary do what they’re intended to do (wall off areas) a little more effectively.

ACES HIGH

Backup Plan didn’t do as much on account of the Backup Armament change, so it now adds +1 die/Harm to the first attack with a Backup Armament per combat in addition to allowing you to add tags to backups.
Distracting+ was different between Systems and Armaments for some reason. They’re the same now.
Overheat, instead of preventing Tension use when activated, deals 1 Harm whenever you use Tension. Walling off Tension use led to a weird situation where players were basically taking every other turn as a cooldown turn, being too out of range to do much with 0 tension available for use, and that’s not really the vibe of the game. This makes it a lot more of a tradeoff.
Reload now has slightly amended wording: between turns, it automatically reloads. This makes it a bit more interesting as a drawback because you can use it once per turn normally, but the efficiency of it tapers off the more you use it in a turn - 2 uses/turn per 1 reload, 3 uses/turn per 2 reloads, etc.
Intensify was only tangentially useful as-is (mostly for AOEs) so I changed it to be +2 Harm per Tension spent, but clarified that it only adds to one target per use (as per Superhot and other similar effects) and removed the “can’t go below half” situation because it wasn’t terribly necessary.
MX-BEACON now has a different Integral System that makes it invulnerable to Overheat Harm and Hazards. The old one didn’t really gel with how the rest of it works, this gives MX-BEACON a little more of an identity as the one that can always burn hot.

Discord

This isn’t really a release note as such but Binary Star Games has a discord now! You can join here: https://discord.gg/vF3z2r3n29 Hope to see you there!

v0.1.3 released!

Tue, 26 Jul 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there! I’ve released v0.1.3 of ANOINTED. This one’s mostly about combat tuning as discussed in my last post as well as more character options.

I made the changes described there to staggering/unstaggering.
Added and changed a bunch of keywords.
Added a LOT of new Armaments and changed default loadouts a bit. I also introduced the concept of Variants, which is to say an Armament with a few parameters or one Attack/Maneuver changed but everything else the same.
Spells have been split up as in that post! I also split them up into 3 categories per type (Sigil/Glyph/Inscription for Sorceries, Prayer/Invocation/Blasphemy for Incantations) which adds a little something to how they work.
Tweaked some of the enemies, including both Major Threats in the book. (Alphonse is now pure-fighterish.)

I’m going to be working on area/exploration/etc stuff for v0.1.4 next, I was planning to include it in this one but I figure it’ll take longer (especially because I want to include a “tutorial” area) and I didn’t want to delay it further.

Trophy release!

Wed, 06 Jul 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there!

Trophy is now available for download! It contains:

6 unique Armaments.
6 unique Modular Systems.
3 unique Frames.
Some guidance on how to introduce them.

If you’ve purchased this, you already have it - check your available files. And this concludes the season of The Infected World! I’ll be releasing a compilation of everything here at some point soon.

v0.1.3 thoughts, area design

Fri, 01 Jul 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there! Been awhile because I’ve been working on The Infected World. But I’ve been thinking about and tweaking ANOINTED in the meantime a bit.

Tweaks for v0.1.3

Some general playtesting observations/changes.

Unstaggering needs to be worse for PCs and less bad for NPCs. The original stagger rules (each loses an action) made more sense in an earlier build of the game where each had two actions (more like APOCALYPSE FRAME). To that end:
- PCs have half stamina instead of full at the start of their turn when unstaggering. This puts them on the back foot and forces them to reposition, defend, or if they’re feeling risky, overspend on offense after recovering.
- Most enemies have an ability (usually defensive) that they do when they unstagger. For example, Spearmen will use Guard. This gives a little more of a cadence to a fight on the enemy side too.
- Need to reconsider major threats and staggering/unstaggering too.
Changing a Harm/Defense tie from half Harm/stagger to full Harm/stagger.
- This achieves a similar effect but it’s faster because everyone takes more Harm and acts more.

Some changes:

Caravan Release!

Tue, 31 May 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there!

Caravan is now available for download! It includes:

Some more information/thoughts on The Wayfarers.
A new Frame and some new loadout options.
Mechanics for caravans: areas traveled by traders.
Two new Prime enemies for Wayfarers and Survivalists.
Some more Ace and Crisis Advances.

If you’ve purchased this, you already have it - check your available files!

Until next time!

Updated BURNOUT files

Thu, 12 May 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there!

I made a small update to BURNOUT. If you’re already using it, there are no mechanical changes. Changes are as follows:

Correctly attributed the artist who made the background texture I used.
Text size/spacing has been altered, it should make it a little easier to read.
Fixed an outdated table in the epub version.

That’s all for now, until next time!

Territory Release!

Tue, 03 May 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there!

Territory is now available for download! It includes:

Some more information/thoughts on The Claw.
A new Frame and some new loadout options.
Mechanics for territories: areas patrolled by an elite force.
Cohorts, a new mechanic associated with Tyrants that gives specific bonuses to their personal forces.
Two new Claw Tyrants and four new Wildlife Tyrants (highly mutated or wildly xenobiological major threats).
Some more Ace and Crisis Advances.

If you’ve purchased this, you already have it - check your available files!

v0.4.0 release!

Thu, 28 Apr 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there! This version has a noticeable, large change to Tension, but in gameplay terms, it’s not much of a change. (It’s a good excuse to do v0.4.0 though. Double digit patch versions drive me nuts.)

Tension Changes

Big ones first.

Tension now starts at max instead of max - 3. This rule was a weird kind of band-aid to begin with, and instead of doing this, what I really should have done was…
Max tension across the board is now 2 less. The reason it’s not 3 less is because it felt like low-end Tension cases (aka Speed 1 Heavies that aren’t MONSOON) felt like they wanted a little more on turn 1 than starting at 0.
You can gain Tension above max, but anything above max goes away at the end of your turn. Basically if the strike team wants to load up a heavy with Tension drops go to town one turn, they can. Also there’s no weird order of operation optimization re: spending Tension before using Hot, Renewing, etc.
Rolled back Impulsive and Focused. Now that it’s more likely Aces will have max and greater than half Tension, Implusive and Focused are now what they used to be. (Implusive+ and Focused+ are unchanged.)
Updated all of the pregens, Fari and paper, with these changes.

Other

Gatling, Kinetic Cannon, Recoilless Rifle, and Rocket Launcher have been wrong for like 5 versions in the Armaments list (but not the pregens/Fari pregens) and now they’re fixed.
MX-BEACON’s Build Trait is a little more interesting: now it has roll-over, roll-under, and roll-equal cases re: Tension. Give a little more mechanical tension (haha) to keeping Tension high, low, or spending to 0.

I’ll be rolling these changes forward to Infected World content when I drop Territory as well.

v0.1.2 released!

Wed, 27 Apr 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there!

v0.1.2 is out! Some notes on what changed:

Relayout to 6” x 9”, made the font a bit smaller. If I print this, it’ll be hardcover, so there’s no sense staying too constrained.
Made attribute changes as per this post.
- Made changes to the attribute spreads of the various Backgrounds to account for these changes. Each one now starts good at a unique combination of two Attributes.
Made a major change to how combat turns work - it’s now PC goes, NPC goes, back and forth. Yet another step away from LUMEN.
Added a bunch more weapons.
Made tweaks to enemies and changed how they were formatted. Now, conditions for using each ability are less nebulous and more precise. (This is preparation for GMless stuff.)
Changed formatting and terminology a bit so weapon/enemy ability entries are more concise.
Other little things.

Also, I’ve enabled community copies! Including one for everyone who’d bought it up to this point - thanks so much for your support for a game in progress!

v0.3.9 release!

Sun, 10 Apr 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there! This is a fairly minor release. Here’s the list of changes:

Changed the formatting of Systems to put Support/Offensive next to the name instead of in tags. This has been a long time coming because it’s been consistently confusing for people who aren’t familiar.
Fixed the MX-BEACON entry in ACES HIGH (the Armaments/Modular Systems were all messed up).
Made the Tyrant Barrier a little bit better.

In an effort to have less files on the page, I’ll be zipping up each individual book’s pages/spreads/epub versions.

Wilderness: Mapping the Infected World

Tue, 05 Apr 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there! I’m going to show how the map for Wilderness works. The goal of the map is to provide a tangibility to the world itself and inspire the fiction of a mission.

Placing the two main hubs

The first step is defining where The Collective and whatever the nearest Republic city, town, base, or settlement is. (There could also be more than one, but there should be at least one prominent one - it was a factory, after all.)

Adding fari pregens!

Sun, 03 Apr 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there! I just added pregen sheets for Fari, a free and open-source VTT! It’s already got a generic sheet here but this pre-fills that sheet with values for each stock model Frame, which makes it easier to get started. They’re all customizable as well, so you can keep using the sheet throughout a campaign!

Attributes

Fri, 11 Mar 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there! Wanted to think out loud about how attributes work. It’s been awhile since I thought out loud about design stuff.

Attributes: A history

So Attributes (or Approaches) are a standard LUMEN feature: they usually describe the way you’re going to tackle some obstacle and you roll that number of dice. In a typical LUMEN game that’s usually where they start and end. There are typically three of them.

v0.1.1 released!

Thu, 10 Mar 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there!

v0.1.1 is out! Most importantly in this updates is the fact that it now has an epub release. I also tweaked a few things across the board though - typos, oddities, inconsistencies, and one or two “feels better” style changes.

I’ll be doing more substantial changes over the next few weeks, so stay tuned.

Until next time!

(Read the original on itch here!)

v0.3.8 release! And price increase.

Sat, 12 Feb 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there! As you can guess by the title, I’ve got two sets of news. I’ll start with the fun one, some minor updates.

Core Updates

Arc Mortar got a clause stating that its Harm isn’t reduced by anything that isn’t Armor or Shields. This is because of edge case interactions that came up such as Long Range Optics or the Interfering tag reducing Harm when used with it. (It also has Piercing by default so it typically ignores Shields in most cases, but that’s worded as such so there’s no confusion about interaction with things like Praetorian’s Tyrant Trait.)
Colossus type enemies got some clarification and additional guidance, and the indicators for number of parts are labeled as such now.
- World Serpent got buffed and should be far more in line with the Consul.
Tangible rewards are suggested for each mission type instead of just being implied.

ACES HIGH updates

System Breakthrough got a wording fix (it said third instead of second because of how System tags used to work).
Tyrant Traits are explicitly noted to override wording of Ace traits, tags, or Systems when in conflict. Normally conflicts like this are biased towards Aces but Tyrants are supposed to be a special case that forces Aces to change tactics and this goes along with that.

Price update

APOCALYPSE FRAME is now $15 instead of $10. This is a reflection of how much more polished it is compared to its original release in addition to the free expansion bundled with it, which was not originally considered in the price. I’ve been considering doing this for awhile and finally decided to go for it. I’ll likely raise the price again later once it’s at v1.0 as well.

How to run APOCALYPSE FRAME on roll20

Sat, 08 Jan 2022 00:00:00 +0000

(Updated 5/13/22)

Hi there! Not a development log for once. This is just a thread about how to run AF online on roll20. (There’s no character sheet for roll20 yet, but making one is on my backlog.)

After running this in person for months, my home group has gone remote again, at least for now. This isn’t a problem - we’d played remote for about a year and change until everyone was vaccinated - but last time we played remote, we weren’t playing something that needed a grid. We are now.

v0.3.6-7 release!

Tue, 04 Jan 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there! A few minor changes now that I’m getting some new eyes on the game (and now that I’m actually playing it instead of just running). v0.3.6 was the first 3 of these only so I figured it wasn’t worth a devlog, but the others are enough to justify.

A bunch of typos and copy/paste errors were fixed.
I still had the 0-Tension rule in (gain 1 if you end the turn at 0), which was supposed to be taken out in favor of build traits. It’s removed now.
Charge and Charge+ have been improved to not care about other Armaments with them. This gives a lot more flexibility and allows a lot of Armament combos that weren’t really viable before.
Impulsive now gives +1 Harm only at 0-1 Tension instead of under half. (Impulsive+ is the same.) The way it was made perfect sense when players didn’t start combat at max - 3 Tension but now that they do the “under half” condition was basically always on until they took Frame Damage. 0-1 still makes it valuable (especially for heavies) but it’s not quite as good as it was.
Some Armament tag swaps. After doing an inventory of tags, I found I was overusing a few.
- Gatling: Loses Burst, gains Invigorating. Burst doesn’t really make sense at low dice and I wanted it as a default tag for the more “assault rifle” build weapons. Invigorating gives Gatling a good reason to be used even if you’re not leaning on Spin Up.
- Recoilless Rifle: Loses Piercing, gains Near. Recoilless Rifle and Rocket Launcher are kind of swapping positions. Now, Recoilless is a bit more versatile range-wise while still gaining a benefit at longer range. It didn’t really feel like it had a role before, now it feels like a heavier scout rifle and that’s a good place for it. (For now, anyway.)
- Rocket Launcher: Loses Near, gains Incendiary. Rocket Launcher now feels more like a proper long-range explosive to tie in with Grenade Launcher and doesn’t overlap so much with Marksman Rifle.
- Kinetic Cannon: Loses Piercing, gains Impulsive. Piercing was a bit of an oddball on this one to begin with, and it felt like it needed something extra to be in the conversation with other heavier Close Armaments.

That’s all for now. Until next time!

v0.3.5 release!

Mon, 27 Dec 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there! Just released an update that covers a few things.

Wording

Updated wording in a few places for clarity. Thanks very much to False Idol Workshop for help with this!

Armaments

This is kind of granular, so feel free to skip forward. Short version is a lot of Armaments got buffed.

Design notes: The Fading Step

Tue, 21 Dec 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there! I’m going to highlight something that I think turned out pretty well with BURNOUT: the Fade check mechanic, which is the “primary” mechanical system of BURNOUT. It’s the thing that controls, well, the burning out of the Sunwell. I don’t think I’m anywhere close to the first person who’s done something like this, but I want to highlight something that worked because I think it’s a neat twist on the existing LUMEN dice mechanic as well as something that can produce a lot of interesting and diverse outcomes.

ACES HIGH released!

Wed, 15 Dec 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there! At long last, ACES HIGH is out! In it you’ll find:

6 Experimental Armaments, 6 Experimental Modular Systems, and 3 Experimental Frames (which include new Integral Systems, Integral Traits, and Build Traits).
Some notes on running APOCALYPSE FRAME as a campaign, including Crisis Advances (making your enemies stronger over time, including 3 new standard enemies) and Ace Advances (new benefits and functionality to improve your Aces over time).
Tyrants! These are dangerous prey for a Strike Team - they’re nasty boss enemies you can use for special occasions that are meant to be treated as equals. 10 Tyrants are included, as well as advice on making your own.

Best of all, it’s free to anyone who has APOCALYPSE FRAME. You’ll see it in your downloads: if you have the base game you should have ACES HIGH. This is because these are all things I wanted to be part of the core experience but would clutter up the game significantly if you’re not already at least a little familiar with it. It didn’t feel like a complete experience in the way I’d envisioned it without their inclusion. That said, each of those 3 sections is also largely independent/modular, so you can pick and choose what you’d prefer to use or not use to your satisfaction.

v0.3.3 release!

Sat, 11 Dec 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there! Some minor changes prior to ACES HIGH releasing.

Look and Feel

Everything has been revamped a bit visually. I have a real bold font now!
Fixed a few typos/similar.

Armaments

Grenade Launcher swapped Splash for Close. Splash only operates on a 6 now so it’s not nearly as helpful on a Grenade Launcher. Close/Near with Incendiary, however, is situationally very useful.
Default loadout switch: Gatling on H1-VANGUARD was switched with Electrolaser on L3-GLADIATOR. Gatling didn’t make much sense on the VANGUARD because Focused+Spin Up really wants something with decent Tension. This switch also makes VANGUARD more Far oriented and GLADIATOR more Close/Near oriented, which both make a lot of sense.

Systems

Afterburner no longer has Efficient. It was a little too obvious of a choice.
Pulse Laser can optionally hit Far for 1. It needed something to distinguish itself from Plasma Cannon.

Please let me know if I missed anything. ACES HIGH is coming soon! I’m testing a few things still. In the meantime I’ve been churning on NOVA: BURNOUT, so keep an eye out for that - it’s right around the corner.

Druid and Necromancer

Sat, 27 Nov 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there! This time, I’m talking about Druid and Necromancer! Two weird 13 True Ways classes that I did weird things to. Both are (in my opinion) way more interesting than their initial incarnations.

The Original Druid

The original druid is almost certainly the least functional class in 13th Age. It’s hard to summarize the ways in which it’s a mess, but in short: tons of spells, separated spell lists/progressions, no class features/default spell list but it used two-tier Talents. I liked the general thrust of each set of Talents - it really did its best to try to pull together the million different things Druids are associated with in fantasy games - but the end result was deeply incoherent and you could easily make a useless character.

Expansion Chat 4: The result of me pulling the rug out from under myself

Fri, 26 Nov 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there!

So as you’ve noticed, it’s been awhile since expansion chat. Mostly I just hadn’t been touching it since the v0.3 update - it was content-complete, but it needed testing - also I was releasing 36th Way and launching my site which took up a lot of my time and brainpower. And it turned out that a little distance from it did it some good. So let’s talk about it.

Commander and Monk

Mon, 15 Nov 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there!

Last time, I wrapped up the original 13th Age core classes. Now I’ll be talking about my Commander and Monk refreshes. Both of them had seeds of the Power dynamic I took to other classes, but both were changed drastically!

The Original Commander

The original Commander is interesting. It’s very clearly 13th Age’s answer to Warlord, which is cool because Warlord was cool and it’s an idea worth exploring. It has command points, which operates similarly to the standard Power that I gave everything in the sense that it powers Commands. You can gain Command through Fight from the Front (attack, if it hits gain) or Weigh the Odds (no-roll gain). It shares that Commands list with Tactics, though, which are (mostly quick/interrupt action) Daily/Recharge abilities. So most of the Commanders I ever saw were actually multiclasses with classes that rarely used their quick action, like offense Paladins. Oops.

Sorcerer and Bard

Fri, 05 Nov 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there! Here to talk about two more classes, Sorcerer and Bard. This’ll round out the original 13th Age core classes (I think).

The Original Sorcerer

13th Age Sorcerer has a few interesting things going on. Breath Weapon/Chain are types of spells, and class feature-wise the main thing that isn’t just a type of spell is Gather Power, which lets you waste an action this turn to double damage the next turn (which lets you stretch out dailies). Most of its talents tie back to the heritage idea. Ultimately, though, it’s a fairly standard casting class.

v0.3.1 release!

Fri, 05 Nov 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there! Based on my feedback from 0.3.0 I released a balance, metagame, and accessiblity update.

Integral Traits

A few Integral Traits received minor tweaks:

Hairpin Controls (L1-RECON) now only works on the first 4 rolled in a turn.
- It was a little too consistent with high-dice attacks.
CQC Plating (L3-GLADIATOR) is now Riot Shielding and does the opposite - it grants +1 Armor vs Near/Far attacks.
- This is a more useful bonus overall and makes more sense given L3’s Big Shield characteristic.
Long-Range Optics (M2-ARCHER) now allows them to extend their Far range to 3 hexes with a die/Harm penalty when no enemies are in Close/Near.
- This makes their Trait more distinct from the Scoped add-on and lets them have something no other Frame has.

Integral and Modular Systems

I made a few changes to Systems based on two observations: longer-range Systems are more powerful/useful than shorter-range Systems and Near/Far range area-attack Systems are very powerful.

Separate charsheet/card sheet!

Wed, 03 Nov 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there!

In addition to the PDFs, I added a separate character sheet and card sheet. The former is self-explanatory, the latter provides a template for condition cards and ability cards. (They’re both already in the core book, this is mostly for convenience/having them as a separate smaller file).

Enjoy!

(Read the original on itch here!)

v1.0 is live!

Tue, 02 Nov 2021 00:00:00 +0000

It’s out! Go get it!

At long last, after just under two years of development, 36th Way is live! You can either get it here on itch for PDF/ePub or you can read the entire SRD online at my new site.

Next steps

I’m going to be taking feedback as to minor changes - probably typos/term update errors at this point but who knows - while making APOCALYPSE FRAME updates/the expansion release.

Barbarian, Ranger, and Paladin

Sat, 30 Oct 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there! I'm going to talk about some of the simplest classes in the original 13th Age - Barbarian, Ranger, and Paladin - and how they changed.

The Original Barbarian

Barbarian was one of the most dirt-simple classes possible in the original. You had Rage, which was a Recharge 16+ ability, and aside from that you mostly just did basic attacks. The unique thing it had was tiered talents, which was just that some unlocked at high tiers. It was kind of effective when it popped off, but boring most of the time. So my goal was to make it more interesting on average.

The Rogue and The Wizard

Sat, 23 Oct 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there! Today, I'm talking Rogue and Wizard. I'm going to stop promising any of these will be short, but Rogue was, so I just kept going to round out the initial 4.

The Original Rogue

Rogue has always had a weird vibe. It's one of the few 13th Age classes to have a "spell list" as a non-spellcaster. (And you'll note that they don't do the weird spell slot thing. Almost like it could have been that way all along...) It's got Momentum, which is a fun idea - it's an on/off switch where if you hit an enemy you get it and if you get hit you lose it, but while you have it you can use powers that key off of it. One problem I ran into with this was that if your rogue never hits, you don't gain it. Also there's only so much they can do with low defenses to keep it, even with their various powers. So my initial step was to reorient how Momentum works.

The Cleric

Tue, 19 Oct 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there! I'm going to be talking about the Cleric redesign. It's not as much as the Fighter changes so this should be shorter.

The Original

First, the original Cleric. I love the general setup it has: all Talents represent Domains and it has Spells. Simple, but effective. What's not to love? Well, it was a little too good, mostly. Each Talent gave you a daily ability, and on top of that you got a bunch of very effective spells, and you could easily have similar offensive capability to Fighter/Paladin. It wasn't quite the classic 3.X CoDZilla or anything but it was definitely in that conversation.

The Fighter

Sat, 16 Oct 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there! Today I'm going to talk about classes. Specifically the one that started it all: Fighter. I've always said you can judge One Of These by how good their Fighter is and I think mine's pretty good.

The Original

So 13th Age Fighter is one of my favorite classes in it! I was always happy to meet it halfway and figure out how to best make one when I was originally playing one. But I'm fully willing to admit that it misses the mark. I loved the concept - Talents as encounter powers/passives, Maneuvers as actives feels good. It's why I kept coming back when I played even when it didn't always pan out the way I wanted it to. I wanted to replicate that "feels-good" quality while picking up where it left off.

Character Creation

Tue, 12 Oct 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there! Last time, I covered the basic stuff that goes into each character. Now, we're going to go over what you need to make a character. There's really not much to it (which is the point!) so this one should be short.

In general there are five steps. All but one of them (Class, which we'll dive into last) barely involve mechanics in the Crunchy Game sense - rather they're about defining how you interact with the world.

v0.3 release!

Mon, 11 Oct 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there! As promised, v0.3 is done! This one was a more extensive change than v0.2. See the devlogs tagged as v0.2 -> v0.3 for more details on why I made any given change.

Resources

A third resource, Ammo, has been added to Frames. Tension and Ammo are distinguished from each other as follows:
- You may spend Tension to gain another action on your turn or reroll an attack. Tension is regained from Drops as usual (as well as from certain Build Traits). You can no longer use Tension to reroll Attribute rolls.
- You may spend Ammo to use an Integral or Modular System. Ammo is not typically regained until the end of the mission.
Resources on each Frame have been tweaked to account for this.

Attributes

Attributes no longer govern attack rolls. However, they add to your Frame's maximum resources:
- Drive adds to maximum Vigor
- Speed adds to maximum Tension
- Control adds to maximum Ammo
For 3/6 kinds of Frame Damage, something that didn't take a roll now takes a specific kind of Attribute roll instead of asking for one in general.
You can now set your Attributes to 2/2/2.

Traits

Each Frame now has a Build Trait. In this release, this is either Light Build, Medium Build, or Heavy Build.
- These tie into Vigor and Tension, further differentiating Heavy, Medium, and Light Frames.

Armaments

Armaments now have a number of dice listed next to each. This is the number of dice you roll (barring any changes from traits, tags, conditions, etc) when attacking with that Armament.
- Each Armament and Backup Armament was rebalanced with this (and general variety) in mind.
Six new Armaments have been added, bringing the total to 18 Armaments.
Some tags now do different things.

Systems

Systems now use tags by default.
Six new Modular Systems have been added, bringing the total to 18 Modular Systems.
Some existing Modular Systems were altered.

Frame Damage

Leg, Shoulder, and Core damage now indicate which Attribute gets rolled.
In addition to the standard Vigor/Tension restoration and +max Tension, you regain 1 Ammo when you gain Frame Damage.

Other

Changed the example round of combat based on the updated ruleset.
Advancement has been tweaked slightly (you can now buy into non-random tag advancement earlier).
Some enemies were tweaked a bit.
I'm sure I did changed something I forgot to mention here.

Quality of Life

Both Pages and Spreads are now available.
- I may experiment with other formats for
Rearranged where Frame information lives.
- After descriptions, everything for each stock model Frame is simply listed out in one spread.
- Traits and Integral Systems are listed in the next few pages.
- At the end of the book, each Frame has two sheets: one that's a pregen stock model with Attributes pre-assigned and extra Resources pre-calculated (and what every tag/term does listed), and one that's empty (with dotted-line boxes for filling in your maximums based on your Attributes). Both have extra dotted lines on Tension (in a more faded gray) to account for Frame Damage.

I'm going to be rethinking the ACES HIGH content (at least the Ace-facing equipment stuff) based on these changes, but also I'm focusing on releasing my 36th Way SRD and that's going to happen first, so stay tuned.

Basic Attributes

Fri, 08 Oct 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there! I'm gonna talk about a lot of the other basics now - Attributes, Skills, and Icon relationships.

Death to Ability Scores

So ability scores in 13th Age and its predecessors are awful. I don't like them, and in 13th Age especially they're basically vestigial. They act mostly as a gate for certain classes, as half of the noncombat calculation (alongside Backgrounds), and a way to screw up chargen. There's a few other things they do for combat, but it's not much of interest. They add to defenses, HP, and some classes do something with a non-main Ability Score every once in awhile. There's no reason these values couldn't be set, say, by class for the most part.

Developing the Basic Mechanics

Thu, 07 Oct 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there! I'm going to be writing a bunch of devlogs about everything in 36th Way, in pretty much the order I developed it. This one's about the most basic mechanics of 36th Way: rolls, Advantage, and Disadvantage.

Why 3d6?

13th Age uses a 1d20 in a fairly typical way for most things: roll it, add your level and maybe 1 or 2 other things, see if it's bigger than something else. I've never liked the d20 in any game. So when I started this project it was the first thing to go. 3d6 has the same average as 1d20 (10.5) so it seemed like a logical choice - and especially because at the time I thought I was just going to change the die, a few mechanics, and the starting 4 classes and keep everything else the same. That didn't last, obviously.

Thoughts about v0.2 -> v0.3: Resources, Systems, and Size

Sat, 02 Oct 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there! I want to talk a bit about one of the bigger v0.3 changes: Ammo. That is to say, I'm adding it. If you haven't read my initial 0.3 post and my Armaments and Dice post please do! But to recap, Tension is being split into Tension and Ammo: Tension handles rerolls and grants extra actions, while Ammo is used to activate Systems. Tension can be regained by Drops (and by another method - we'll get there), while Ammo is either only restored upon return or during some kind of mid-mission supply cache discovery. So that means each Frame has 3 Resources, Vigor/Tension/Ammo, which do very different things.

Thoughts about v0.2 -> v0.3: Armaments and Dice

Fri, 01 Oct 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there!

As noted in my last post, one of the things I'm changing in v0.3 is Attack rolls keying off Armaments. I'm going to dive deeper into that here, think out loud about the balance involved, and see where that gets us in general. There's a bunch of math ahead. You've been warned! I promise it's going somewhere though.

Dice and Probability

I covered this a bit in my first devlog about v0.2's Attributes. The most important part, though, is the probability for each number of dice (0 and 4 won't come up much, but mostly for comparison):

Thoughts about v0.2 -> v0.3: Let's get weirder

Wed, 29 Sep 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there!

So as alluded to, I have some ideas about what I want to do next to core. I came to these conclusions both by playtesting the game (and by replaying Armored Core) to get a handle on what kind of feeling I wanted to capture. Right now AF is pretty close to LUMEN CORE in a few particular areas, and these changes would do quite a bit to push that further away. Let's get a bit weird with it.

Slight change of plans!

Tue, 28 Sep 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there!

Sorry for the radio silence. I've been working at ACES HIGH and also preparing a different project (to be announced shortly)! ACES HIGH is basically done pre-editing in its current incarnation. But "current incarnation" is the key.

I've been thinking about the core mechanics and I'm going to make a few major changes to how certain things work - something that'll take things further away from core LUMEN and lean a little more some mecha concepts I wanted to emphasize. I decided that it would probably be more confusing to release it as-is given that fact. So my goal is to release an update to the core book, and once those changes are settled, propagate those changes to ACES HIGH. I'll make a follow-up post detailing the concepts there.

Expansion Chat 3: Tyrants

Tue, 14 Sep 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there!

Tyrants were the biggest reason I decided to fast-track this expansion over creating premade missions. If you'd been paying attention to v0.1.0, you might have noticed that Prime enemies got a downgrade between versions. This is because originally Prime enemies were supposed to fill the role that Tyrants currently fill. But as I playtested, I decided they needed to be their own thing.

Expansion chat 2: Campaigns

Thu, 09 Sep 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there! In this post I'm going to be talking about the Campaigns section of the upcoming Aces High. Specifically, the mechanical bits: Crisis Advances and Moonshot Advances.

Crisis Advances

The idea behind Crisis Missions is that they're intended to add points of challenge and tension to an otherwise power fantasy-oriented game. But when the consequences are simply narrative, this can create a disconnect when the Aces' actions are otherwise unaffected by these encounters that are supposed to signify increasing danger to the place they call home.

Expansion chat 1: Experimental Loadouts

Sat, 04 Sep 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there! I'm going to both announce a supplement to APOCALYPSE FRAME core, tentatively titled Aces High, and also talk a little bit about one part of it. The supplement is going to be bundled in free with the core book because it contains stuff I feel is necessary to an experience that feels complete. (Also, it gives you an idea of what I'll include in future non-bundled supplements.) You can see my current overview spread for it below:

v0.2 release!

Tue, 31 Aug 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there! As promised, I'm releasing an update to APOCALYPSE FRAME after some re-reading, testing, and thinking about the system. In addition to general cleanup, the changes are as follows:

Attributes

Attributes for every character are now 3 in one Attribute, 2 in another, and 1 in a third. Between missions, you can swap your 3 for your 2 and your 2 for your 1. See the devlog here for my thoughts on the matter. Suggested Attributes for the 3 Arrow Frames have been altered to account for this.

Integral Systems and Traits

L2-BRAWLER's Kinetic Discharge and H3-ANGLER's Net Launcher have been made slightly weaker. Kinetic Discharge in particular has had its downside made more apparent. I talked about this change a little here.
M3-SENTINEL's Support Drones now takes effect at the end of the turn and affects the Ace as well. This is to enable the player to rely less on other people getting into position to get the effect (and hopefully reduces the need for intensive planning/quarterbacking ).

Armaments

Shotgun and Machinegun gained Piercing. This brings them both to the same Harm/Tag parity that everything else is balanced around, gives more access to Piercing (previously only the Gauss Cannon had it) and makes attacking groups of Shielded enemies less tedious.
Scoped and Sighted tags now only add +1 Harm if enemies aren't in the other two ranges.
Aimed, Forceful, and Quick tags no longer exist. See here for more information. They've been replaced with 3 different tags (Critical, Distracting, Impulsive).
Three Backup Armaments have been added: Shiv, Handgun, Revolver. These mostly come into play when the new Frame Damage option on a 4 forces you to replace an Armament with one (because it's been damaged). In addition to accessing them via Frame Damage, you can also choose to switch to one of these mid-Mission before or after making an Attack action. You can't switch back until after the Mission, though, so be careful!

Modular Systems

Directional Reactor Vents now does extra 1 Harm (not 2) at half or less Vigor (not Tension) and ignores Armor. This separates it more fully from Metal-Piercing Blade and leaves mechanical space for both to compete. Previously, it was almost certainly better than Metal-Piercing Blade, and especially with L2-BRAWLER.

Frame Damage

Frame Damage for 1-3 has been changed as described here.
In addition, Frame Damage on a 4 now disables the Armament and forces a change to a Backup Weapon that matches one of its range tags.

The GM Turn

During the Enemy Activation phase on the GM Turn, the first Activation per enemy per turn allows two Moves. This is a middle ground between one and two Activations per Ace (as discussed here) and allows enemies to do things like move into range and shoot in the same GM Turn without providing the potential for 8-10 attacks on a tactically inept party (bear in mind that any given enemy may only attack once per GM Turn).

Enemies

Made some enemy Moves explicit to give a GM a ballpark as to what's appropriate.
Added a few new enemies: one kind of Wildlife and four kinds of "generic" enemies that could be used in several circumstances.
Loadouts for several enemies have changed.
Prime enemies were rebalanced to have lower Vigor/damage. In general they've been changed to be less of a special thing for named characters and more of a general "leader" or "boss" style enemy (and guidance for how to use them has changed to match).

As for mechanics for serious, named threats, well...stay tuned.

Enjoy!

Thoughts about v0.1 -> v0.2: Frame changes and enemy changes

Thu, 26 Aug 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there! I’m going to talk about some changes to enemies, as well as two minor changes to Frame abilities.

Enemies

The biggest change to enemies is going to be the number of activations on the GM Turn. Prior to this, the GM would take a number of Moves on the GM Turn equal to the number of Aces. With the amount of tools Aces have at their disposal, however, this doesn’t end up being enough to make much of a dent relative to the number of Drops with a modicum of smart play. The solution is to double the number of Moves taken on the GM Turn. Given the restriction on any given enemy attacking more than once per GM Turn, this doesn’t have much of an impact on suboptimal play, but it makes sure something can happen. This needs more testing at high numbers of PCs, naturally, and Colossus enemies should be given another look given this change.

Thoughts about v0.1 -> v0.2: Frame Damage and Tags

Sun, 22 Aug 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there! As promised, I’m going to talk about some other things that will be rebalanced for v0.2: Frame Damage and (a handful of) Tags. Some of these were revelations I had while testing, but others were a function of considering how things came together more closely.

Frame Damage

Frame Damage is the consequence of losing all of your Vigor. It’s intended to show wear and tear on a Frame that’s taken significant punishment and raise stakes in combat. However, it’s designed to avoid “death spirals”: this is why Vigor and Tension are restored to full and max Tension goes up. It also provides a nice arc in combat, in which a Frame that’s been taken out can come back restored and ready.

Thoughts about v0.1 -> v0.2: Attributes

Sun, 15 Aug 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Hi there! I’m going to be releasing dev logs for my process periodically. Especially as the game progresses and gets more content, it’ll probably make some decisions (in the past and future) make more sense. Hopefully it’s of some use to someone!

Attributes in v0.1

In v0.1, the LUMEN Force/Flow/Focus attributes, Drive/Speed/Control, must simply total to 6 - minimum 1, maximum 4. This means you’d get the various permutations of three arrays: 4/1/1, 3/2/1, and 2/2/2. Now, for reference, given that the values we’re looking at are 1-2, 3-4, and 5-6:

1 die is 33% across the board for each outcome.
2 dice is 11% fail with consequence, 33% succeed with consequence, 55% succeed without consequence.
3 dice is 4% fail with consequence, 26% succeed with consequence, 70% succeed without consequence.
4 dice is 1% fail with consequence, 19% succeed with consequence, 80% succeed without consequence.

So part of my goal from the beginning has been to make sure every available statline makes sense. I had started with 7 attributes, but in my initial round of local testing, my conclusion was that players who chose a 4 were simply more advantaged than those who didn’t and didn’t have to give much up for it. So in an effort to curb this I added two changes: I reduced the number of attributes to 6 and added Attribute designations to each Armament (with two potential attributes each). This would mean that 4-havers would be forced into 1’s in their other two attributes, greatly hampering them out of combat and in combat (because they’d only be able to use 8/12 Armament types effectively). It also has the side effect of making the different attributes feel different mechanically.

First post! And later expectations.

Fri, 13 Aug 2021 00:00:00 +0000

This is the first development log post for APOCALYPSE FRAME! Thanks for taking the time to read it, and thanks so much if you've purchased/downloaded the game. Please let me know what you think!

v0.1 of the game was released!

A fully playable version of the game is released! It's got enough content to last a group a good while, advice that will help a GM run both long-form and short-form games, and ideas to help spur creativity.

Version 1 (Late 2022)

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Introduction and Overview #

Goals #

These are what I hope Total//Effect will achieve.

Speed #

Reduce amount of time calculating totals, making secondary rolls, etc. as much as practicable without losing anything interesting. Enable movement through each quantitative step of a process as quickly as possible.