Pacifica
Hello, and welcome to episode 257 of Effect Pacifica. My name's Matthew.
Dave:And I'm Dave. And as usual, we have a packed program for you today. We've got little bit of World of Gaming news to talk about. There is some very good news for our US backers for Tales of the Old West, which we will
Matthew:Finally.
Dave:Finally. Which we will explain in Old West News. And Pacifica. Yeah. So the Pacific, the the big part of the show is we had a fabulous interview with GI Garcia, Gabe Garcia of Firelock Games, who who we know pretty well.
Dave:He's a friend of the show. I've worked with him on on War Stories, and they are currently kick starting with a couple of days left at the time you'll be hearing this, if you're listening to it on the day the show comes out, of their expansion Kickstarter for War Stories, which is The Pacific. And we had a fabulous chat with Gabe, so you can hear all about that a bit later on in the show.
Matthew:And Gabe's always lovely to talk to.
Dave:He is great. Yeah.
Matthew:As a year zero game, I don't think War Stories gets enough credit. In fact, after the show day, there is another suggestion I wanna make, but we don't need our listeners to talk about
Dave:that So
Matthew:let's crack on. We've got no new patrons, but there have been one or two that have upgraded their patronies. Thank you very much. Thank you. You know who you are, and of course, thank you to all our patrons.
Matthew:Because this show wouldn't happen without you.
Dave:No, indeed.
Matthew:World gaming then.
Dave:Yes. So Alien Evolved, the beta PDFs have come out, and people are getting to look at them, and think on the whole liking what they're seeing. There's a very different layout and graphic design style. I know Which
Matthew:I love.
Dave:Johan Noor has been working on that for them, which, you know, as we all know, Johan is a sensationally talented graphic artist and designer, and it does look really good. I I I still find one thing slightly jarring, and it's
Matthew:Tell me.
Dave:It might be just me, but you've got this lovely pale effect and feel for the book now with, you know, obviously the white background of the pages, that sort of, I don't know, limey, greeny, bluey colour for the text.
Matthew:Yeah.
Dave:Which is lovely. But then you've got some of the old pictures which are there, a great big slab of black. And Yeah. That slightly jars for me. And also maybe, and I can understand why they've done it, but a lot of they've reused a lot of the original artwork.
Dave:And there's lots of good reasons to do that, think. Because some of that artwork
Matthew:It's by marching grip, that's the main reason.
Dave:Because it's fabulous artwork, you know, it's brilliant stuff. But I think maybe seeing out of the corner of my eye that that that that the bit of artwork is something that I'm very familiar with, and it's kind of looking out of place because I know it from a different design of book. And then that very stark, those images are all very dark and very, you know, go very well with that design where the whole book is very dark. It just seems to jar a little bit for me to see it
Matthew:Yeah.
Dave:Flunked on that very pale
Matthew:To be honest, I mean, obviously, you aren't a qualified graphic designer, so you can't really talk about this subject. But I can.
Dave:Well, I can. Because because I'm a I'm a I'm a consumer of graphic design, and I've seen a lot of graphic design.
Matthew:Yeah. You're just a mere consumer.
Dave:And I
Matthew:can You only know what you like.
Dave:And I can I can Why you like? I can register my opinion on it, so which is what I'm doing.
Matthew:But I am saying that despite your, frankly, inexperienced and naive attitude to the art, you're entirely right, Dave.
Dave:It's right.
Matthew:And and I think it's to do with the edges. This this was art that in the original version of Alien wasn't meant to have edges, and now it has edges. Yeah. And and that's what jars, I think. It it puts everything in a little box, whereas once upon a time, the art used to encompass your whole view.
Matthew:It used to surround just
Dave:flowed across the page, isn't it? In
Matthew:the Yeah. Now now it's tucked in a little box. And, frankly, the alien is a little bit safer when it's kept in a box, which is generally what colonists always understand and try and achieve. Very rarely succeeding, of course, that being the whole point of Alien. So, yeah, it weirdly looks a bit safer.
Dave:Yeah.
Matthew:And it's a real challenge. But overall, I'm going for the accessibility of the book.
Dave:Yes, I agree.
Matthew:And the efficiency of this new layout as well. Because people have said, Oh, God, it was so wasteful, the old layout. Which was a lovely attempt to try and put individual concepts on their own page or their own spread. So it had relatively few words per page in terms of the layout. And that was a lovely thing to do, but made for actually quite an inefficient read, and a lot of people noticed that.
Matthew:And this is a better layout generally. More accessible, more readable. But it would have been oh, I don't know. Can you commission can you can you dump all that lovely artwork and commission new artwork simply to go in with the page layout? It's a real challenge.
Dave:Yeah. And it's and it's a huge expense when you've already got so much kind of iconic and superb artwork.
Matthew:And just brilliant stuff. Brilliant.
Dave:Yeah. Brilliant. Sitting in
Matthew:a Even but it's now brilliant stuff kept in a little box. So there we go. You can't always win. I I I haven't so I've only backed the starter set.
Dave:Yep. Same here.
Matthew:Because I wanted to have a starter set with my name on it. And I'm very pleased to see the first thing I opened was the credits page just to make sure that yours and my name's were still on it. And I was very pleased to see that. And I was interested to see that our only collaborator on as a as a writer of this is Thomas
Dave:Yeah.
Matthew:Which I can live with. I can live with Thomas mucking about with our work. He is the boss after all.
Dave:Yeah. That's true.
Matthew:Yeah. So
Dave:No. That's cool. Yeah. I mean, it's it's it's it's weird because I obviously, a big a big kind of, like, drive for this evolved game is the ability to make it easier for players to use minis their in their games. And personal preference, I just don't like it as much.
Dave:I think the maps that are produced with minis in mind, I'm not gonna say look a bit shit, but they look like a battle map. They don't look like an evocative map of a location that allows you to fill in the gaps and imagine what the ship is actually like. It almost gives too much detail, too much information, and makes it feel, you know, much more like just some kind of old generic traveler floor plans for a place you leave you
Dave:rather than
Matthew:Or not even traveler floor plans because they were actually relatively simplistic. Or yeah. I mean,
Dave:Corollionis style floor plans, I guess, a bit more.
Matthew:Yeah. Or or and also, it feels very much looking at these even on paper. They look like I'm meant to be seeing them through the screen with a fog of war on in some, you know, desktop version. Which, yeah.
Dave:Which they probably Which
Matthew:may be Yeah. Probably what we want to do with them. And it's a way a lot of people play now. So maybe we can't complain at that. But, yeah, I agree with you.
Matthew:Now what I don't entirely agree because some of the layouts some of the more layout style maps, like of Hadley's Hope, I think are even better. But they're not they're not the battle maps as it were. They're the, you know, this is where everything goes together. I love the new version of that. It's feels a lot closer to the model than our old one did model, and by which I mean the, you know, the photographic model they used in the movie.
Dave:Well well, one thing jarred for me there as well, it looks so the the the the proportions of the the actual colony itself compared to the landing area and the that kind of outside the wall stuff looked like they'd drawn a picture of a person and made the head far too big. So that that just that just looked out of proportion to me. And again, this is again I mean, I'm I'm as as with the the previous comment about the about the battle maps, I recognize that there will be a lot of the people who are gonna love them because that's exactly the kind of thing that they want. Like you say, either for a VTT or for putting them out on the table and using their, what are going to be, I guess, fabulous minis, that they're gonna get from Free League or elsewhere, to really bring their game to life. I totally get that.
Dave:That's just not my preference. But on this one again, it just felt I don't know. It just felt out of proportion and almost a bit cartoony, if that's the right way of of describing it. So it felt to me, and again, this is just my own preference, it might well be that having had the history that we've had with it and the all that time and effort to put together the map in the first place, that I'm just feeling a bit, oh, well they've changed the dimensions of the map. That's not right.
Dave:But anyway, it just felt a little bit odd in in that sense. But Yeah. Anyway. Yeah. I should probably just, you know, relax.
Matthew:Get over yourself. Get back
Dave:in my box. Yeah. Exactly.
Matthew:I I am gonna look forward to opening that box of of of fun, which which I had a big hand in it when it when it finally comes.
Dave:Yeah. Absolutely. Yeah.
Matthew:Treasure hat.
Dave:And it does look like that the scenario is is very much the same as it was before. I didn't read it in details, but I had a quick look through.
Matthew:I I've had a scan through. Interestingly, it starts in a different place. Yeah. And it ends in a different place. But I've got to say, I think the ending is a I was always I always felt our ending was a bit of a fudge because we we created a I'm gonna I'm gonna go spoiler free here.
Matthew:We created a place and a and even a shuttle that didn't exist in the movies. And this this puts puts all of that in a more logical place and, you know, slightly turns the journey through the
Dave:the Yeah.
Matthew:Through the colony around a bit, which I think is fine in the long run. That was all that always niggled me a bit in in our version, and that's fine. It obviously niggled Thomas too.
Dave:Yeah. Which which, again, it it didn't niggle me because I know it didn't
Matthew:niggle you because I tried to persuade you to change it, you
Dave:wouldn't because I guess if they if they're relying on rivers of pain for their source material, I guess then there isn't a shuttle there. If you put rivers rivers of pain to one side, which is probably not a bad thing to do considering how
Matthew:Generally, generally, yes. Don't
Dave:ignore rivers of pain. Then there's absolutely no reason why there shouldn't be a shuttle there. But anyway
Matthew:Yeah, I think you and I have a disagreement on that, but
Dave:never mind. It's fine, it's fine. But I mean, initially, there was I had this fabulous scene, and I can totally get why why they they it was taken out. But in the original story, Hope's Last Dance, when we did it for UK Games Expo back
Matthew:in 2013,
Dave:there there was a a secret tunnel that they that players could find inside Yeah. Hadley's Hope. And you'd follow that tunnel to a secret chamber where there's a shuttle to escape.
Matthew:Yes.
Dave:Now that was a bit of a stretch. It's a bit fantastical, you know, so I totally get why that was taken out. But I had this fabulous, fabulous scene in that. So as the players are traveling down that tunnel, it's a very long, long tunnel, very dark, but the lights react to movement. So they turn on when you're when there's movement, they turn off when there isn't.
Dave:So you get the players running basically in this pocket of light down the thing, and then
Matthew:And then another pocket of light.
Dave:And then there's another pocket of light they see right at the fire and following them, which is the aliens chasing after them. And I thought that's just such a beautiful cinematic moment, which at the
Matthew:It is. It is.
Dave:At the table would would create a real sense of tension and excitement. But, no, I can understand why that bit was changed, but I was disappointed to lose that lose that cinematic playing moment from the game. But yeah. I mean, it's, yeah, it's turned out really well. But, anyway, you know, it looks really good.
Dave:Some of the new artwork is is superb. They've they've done a lot of new artwork for particularly the stuff that is derived from Alien Romulus. And it yeah. It looks it looks really good. I was slightly I I do now want to get my hands on the PDF of the core book.
Dave:I didn't back that. But
Matthew:Ah, you're like me. I thought you might have got back the core book as well. But
Dave:Yeah. I thought I had, but I obviously hadn't. So I might I might add that, potentially. But, I mean, largely, from a very, very narcissistic point of view of I'd I'd just quite like to see the bits that I've done actually in
Matthew:In the new format.
Dave:In the new format. Yeah. So, I mean, interestingly, some of our patrons have already done some had a session where they went through the life path Yeah. Which I wrote.
Matthew:We can put a link to that in the show
Dave:notes. Yes. Absolutely. Which is on Douglas' channel, I think. So I I watched some of it, but didn't get the chance to watch all of it.
Dave:But it sounds like they had a real blast in going through the life path, so I'm really pleased that that seems to be entertaining people as well as creating interesting characters.
Matthew:I think I think I will get the new core book, but only when it's out in print. I didn't feel the need to pack it.
Dave:Yeah. I might just get it when it hits Yeah.
Matthew:You know, it's not like I'm playing a massive amount of Alien and I have got the wherewithal to play Alien if I feel the need. Yeah. But when it comes out in print. Yeah. And I can get it on my Free League staff discount as well.
Dave:Well, there there there is that too.
Matthew:Yeah. Yeah. Well, I'd say really soft discount. Effect podcast may get a review copy.
Dave:That's true.
Matthew:Let's not rush to buy it.
Dave:No. Cool.
Matthew:Anyway. Yeah. So let's move on. So that's all very happy news generally. It seems a week can't go by without some kerfuffle happening in the gaming industry.
Matthew:And this one happened with Goodman Games and their Kickstarter for a re release of I remember I don't do do you remember this adventure stroke campaign, city based adventure campaign? I remember seeing it when I first started playing D and D.
Dave:I I remember City State as a Judges Guild thing back in the day, but I never played that.
Matthew:Yeah. There it was it was always so I don't know. When we both lived well, when I lived in Hartford and you lived in Hatfield, there was a little sort of hobby shop in Hartford, which is where you went to get your gaming stuff. It did all sorts of crafts and stuff, but it had, yeah, molds for making the Pony on it figures and had corners by the window of role playing games. And in there was what was then an astronomically expensive out of reach for me, you know, 10 or £12, I'm sure.
Dave:Yeah. Yeah.
Matthew:Box for City State of the Invincible Overlord. And I vaguely remember one of our school friends having it, and it having the most amazing map. The most amazing Yeah. Detailed cityscape. And I'm just being kind of jealous and kind of wanting it, but at the same time, actually spending money on that.
Matthew:And I feel that nostalgia is what must be driving this. Now when I was working in the game shop, Goodman Games would often produce kind of deluxe expanded versions of classic of classics like City State of the Invincible Overlord. Great big massive volumes where they'd put you know, you've got a reprint version and or a facsimile version, and you've also got a modernized version as well. Of course, they do it for fifth edition rules as opposed to first edition. Although, I think you get the original, you know, the original because you get the facsimile, you've got first edition stuff there as well.
Matthew:And, of course, they do it for Dungeon Call Classics as well, which is their own game.
Dave:Yeah.
Matthew:And these were you know, these used to they're expensive. They sold $70.80 quid, I think, these big, thick hardback volumes. And I think the sale of those is driven by the sort of nostalgia for that, you know, yearning for that game that I was when I was 12 or 13. Yeah. And finally now, I could afford it.
Matthew:But I'm so far beyond that. Anyway, anyway, Judges Guild is the problem here because Judges Guild, I think, is owned by the son of the original founder, and he's a bit of a fascist and has said some terrible stuff about people. And and, in particular, Jewish people and
Dave:Holocaust denial and things like that.
Matthew:Yeah. And stuff like that. So people were worried that, you know, and as far as I'm aware, it still owns the rights to this game. So Goodman Games are licensing the rights. So are people backing this going into, you know, is is money being paid to this horrible man?
Matthew:And Goodman Games have, you know, hot news have kind of released another so first of all, they'd said something along the lines of, yeah, we've all had difficulties with this ban in the past, but this is a great scenario, so we want to reprint it. And they've got a lot of kickback for that.
Dave:Well, I think wasn't wasn't there a wasn't there a kickstarter in 2020 when this
Matthew:There was. Yes.
Dave:When this all kicked off in the first place. And that Kickstarter I don't know a great deal about it, but just from what I've read, it it it seems that that Kickstarter certainly didn't fulfill, and all the people who backed it just lost lost their money.
Matthew:I think $80,000 it earned.
Dave:And I think this is this is the kind of a key point in in Gooden Games' current position, which is that by by by reviving the the game, they can repair or or or compensate those people through making judges guild donate their proceeds from it to paying those people back. Yeah. Which, I mean, on the one hand, that's that that that seems that seems fine as a as a as a aspiration. On the other hand, people go into Kickstarters knowing full well that sometimes things are gonna go wrong and you're not gonna get your money or you're not gonna get your product, you'll lose your money. So it feels almost a bit like, is this just the window dressing that is allowing them to justify to themselves going back to a relationship with Judges Guild that still got Bob Bledsaw the second Mhmm.
Dave:In charge I think
Matthew:you might be. Or Yeah.
Dave:Yeah. And then kind of justifying, well, it's okay to to renew this relationship because they're not gonna make any money out of it because it's gonna go to paying off paying back those people who lost their money on the first Kickstarter. Now, they'd have to make a lot of money to pay everyone else off. Pay
Matthew:Everything they lost. Yeah.
Dave:And how do you how do you then, you know, do you do it alphabetically? Or do you just is it just random? I mean, because some people do
Matthew:it like in the pound, I guess.
Dave:Yeah. But anyway, so so there is cents
Matthew:of the dollar, I should say.
Dave:So there is that in the background, which, as I said, as aspiration in itself to try and make good the the screw ups of the past, that's that that's fine. But in this situation, does that is that enough to justify, you know, working with a person who, as far as I know, hasn't shown any, oh shit, I shouldn't have said that. Sorry. I don't really believe that. I was in a bad mood at the time and all the rest of it.
Dave:Yeah. Tried to roll back from his comments, which again, I haven't seen them myself. I'm just replaying what reports have have said about it. But no reason to doubt those reports, you know, the veracity of those reports. Because you get with some others where people have said something stupid, and then at least have had the grace to apologise and roll back from it, even if deep down they still believe those things.
Dave:But if they if they at least do kind of the right thing and say, hands up, makeup, but that was wrong. I apologise unconditionally. At least then you could think, okay, well, let's give people a second chance. But if in this case, this guy still believes all of these things he said and hasn't rolled back from any of it, then, you know, if he's gonna stick to his guns in that sense, then he has to suffer the consequences for doing so.
Dave:Yeah.
Matthew:Yeah. Anyway, so that's that's boring. Let's again talk about something more happy.
Dave:Let's talk
Matthew:about UK Games Expo.
Dave:What's what's the what's the final position there then? Are the is it that Gooden Games are still planning to go ahead with it now?
Matthew:I think they're going to go ahead with it.
Dave:I think they are.
Matthew:Yeah. They're looking to so, you know, to pay everybody back that 80,000 $85,000 or whatever, they're gonna have to make something like, you know, $850,000 themselves Right. For the licensing revenue to be worth 85,000, I guess. I guess
Dave:10% then.
Matthew:The the matter here is that, you know, the the Judges Guild, as it were, are getting 10% of whatever they make. And I don't know whether they're gonna do that.
Dave:Yeah. So there's there's there's something here that I've just seen. It says that the funds that would go to Judges Guild will be placed in an escrow account managed by Goodman Games, and those funds will then be used to reimburse the backers of the previous unfulfilled Judges' Guild Kickstarter. Yeah, I mean, maybe maybe that's maybe, you know, guess it's up to each individual to decide whether that's a good enough reason for renewing their relationship with this fellow or not.
Matthew:Yes. It's it's it's not a thing I would have bought anyway. You know me. I'm not a massive five e player or indeed. No.
Matthew:That sort of fantasy.
Dave:No. It's not something that I would have I was I would I would back anyway.
Matthew:And neither would I want to plunk the city state of the Invincible Overlord in the middle of our Forbidden Lands campaign. So that's nothing there. And we will have our own city state of our own Invincible Overlord, I'm sure, in in a future Forbidden Lands supplement.
Dave:Mhmm.
Matthew:And convince there's gonna have to be a city version of that in in some future expansion. Let's talk about UK Games Expo, though.
Dave:Oh, yeah.
Matthew:So, we said last time we're going to UK Games Expo. You were a little bit vague on the time and place of your seminar.
Dave:Yeah. And it's lucky I was
Matthew:that it was worth it. So that people can fill it in their diaries and and plan their whole weekend around when you're talking. When is your seminar, Dave?
Dave:So it was quite good. Was vague last time because Millie asked me to move You
Matthew:were wrong.
Dave:Well, no. Millie asked me to move it. Only slightly. So it's on Saturday. It's at 02:30 for an hour in not sure which one, but one of the conference rooms that they have just outside the the halls where we always hold all these seminars.
Dave:But yeah, so I'll be there talking about role playing game design, how to make your players happy. I'm not sure as a subtitle that that really works, but we'll see how it goes. But again, it's very much the opportunity just for everyone to get together and have a chat. And I mean, I always love doing it. It's great fun.
Dave:We always get a great crowd. And yeah, I hope to see hope to see lots of people there again for that. Yeah. So Saturday, '2 '30 in one of those seminar rooms. Don't know which one.
Matthew:Have you updated your bio, Dave? You know, to to to because, you know, when you first started this, you were a writer just starting out. Now you've got a whole bunch of exciting things under your belt.
Dave:I I should do that, shouldn't I? No. I probably haven't.
Matthew:You should. Yeah. You should, you see. Yeah.
Dave:Oh, good. Yep. Good good prompt. Thank you.
Matthew:I ought to be your bloody marketing manager and making money off your, you know, 10% of everything you earn.
Dave:You are making money off my efforts because, you know, all my great writing and game design, you know.
Matthew:Alright. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Remind me when the money starts coming in.
Matthew:No. We've it has come in, but it's it's also going out to the ferocious rate at the moment. Yeah. We've
Dave:Now now now my status on the on the bank account is up to you. I I see all your transactions. So, you know, Hilton Hotels and, you know, expensive restaurants. I'm not quite sure how that should be.
Matthew:Somebody's gotta go to Barbados. No. But our latest big transaction is we've got a we've got a new banner for our own stand at UK Games Expo. It's got one of our favorite pictures.
Dave:It's gonna look very good.
Matthew:It's gonna look gorgeous. So I've just ordered that. And we're order some more dice trays. I just realized that we talked about this a couple of weeks ago, I haven't actually put the order in. And that'll take a couple of weeks to turn around.
Matthew:So that needs to happen. PDQ. What else? So, do we need some more t shirts? I I think we probably do or something.
Matthew:Now, have a think about that. Not right now. And we won't think about it while we're talking to our listeners either.
Dave:That's Yeah. Yeah. Podcasts and stock discussions. That's that's that's gold, that is. Know?
Dave:Know you know why you listen to us listeners because we talk about stock. Oh, yeah.
Matthew:Oh, tell you what though. Let me just throw this out.
Dave:Go on.
Matthew:If you, dear listener, would like to buy a Tales of the Old West t shirt, tell us. Because we could actually I could actually, you know, not just get a couple for you and me, but get a bunch that we could sell on the It's
Dave:not a bad idea.
Matthew:If people were interested. I have no idea what the design's gonna be yet, so you take it on red. Just would you be interested, dear listener, if you're coming to UK Games Expo in picking up a Tales of the Old West t shirt of your very own.
Dave:Good stuff.
Matthew:And if there's enough demand, maybe we'll get some extra ones.
Dave:Cool. Yeah. That sounds like a good idea.
Matthew:Nice. Right. Old West news. It's a nice segue from Tales the Old West t shirts into Yeah.
Dave:Oh, yeah. Well, the the big news this week is The US palette has finally got out the door. Went out it went out the door yesterday, a little bit later than we had anticipated for various reasons, which we, you know, we shan't bore you with. But, yeah, finally, the the packet is gone out. It's gonna take five to ten days to get to the the The US distribution center.
Dave:And then once it hits The US distribution center and we've paid the tariffs Mhmm. We we said before we
Matthew:recall The tariffs might might go down
Dave:while it's cutting
Matthew:the Atlantic, though.
Dave:But but I I think at the moment, if they unless yeah. Exactly. Unless things go stupid, I think we are pretty comfortable that we can absorb the tariffs and it's not going to be too big an issue for us. So that is great. Once it hits The US distribution center, it's going to take up to two weeks to be shipped internally in The US, depending on where you are in The US.
Dave:So some people might get it much more quickly than that. But on that basis all our US backers should get their products by the end of the month, which is our target delivery date anyway, which is great. And if not, it might squeak into the June, but certainly not by much. So that's that's really good news. Fingers crossed that everything goes fine.
Dave:And, yeah, give it another few weeks and everybody will have their stuff.
Matthew:Yeah. And I think I think we can say if it does squeak into the middle into the June for you as a as an order, it's your fault for living in some out of the way place. If lived in a big metropolis, I'm sure it would be there much
Dave:Let's not let's not start blaming our backers before they've even had their rewards. But, yeah, I mean, the The US shipment was always going to take a bit longer because of the way we managed it. We've talked about it before.
Matthew:And it has kept prices down?
Dave:Yeah. Has kept prices down. So interestingly, we had a a comment yesterday after the update from a US backer who had noticed who'd gone back to check their pledge, had noticed that their pledge on pledge manager was now showing that they owed 30p. Now I looked into it, and actually, I think what has happened is the because we've we've changed
Matthew:Updated the prices.
Dave:We've changed the pricing because obviously the pricing on the pallet was cheaper than the direct delivery, and anyone coming now for US Fulfillment will have to be direct delivery. So I think the prices inside the Pledge Management System have basically updated all the numbers across the board.
Matthew:Yeah.
Dave:So if you're a US backer who paid your delivery your your delivery charges on time and by the deadline, don't worry if you go in and see that there's apparently money owed because it isn't. It's just the system, I think, that is that is
Matthew:And it may be much more than 30 p you see that you owe because I think that was a relatively small package. So it was roughly Yeah. That package is
Dave:one book. So that is that is that is the cheapest. So if you just get in the one book, you know, doing it via the pallet is cheaper, but not a lot. This as soon as you get a second book or any more weight on it, that price goes up through the roof. So the direct delivery prices are, you know, as a lot of our poor backers in the rest of the world have
Matthew:seen Have discovered, yes.
Dave:Can be a
Matthew:bit In Australia and Canada.
Dave:Eye watering. So we are really sorry for that. In for future for future campaigns, we will look more deeply into the possibility of trying to do a similar principle that we've done with The US with other places. But it does depend upon the volume of orders that we get. So we needed to have like a what's the right word I'm looking for?
Matthew:Yeah, economy of scale.
Dave:There is an economy of scale. Also, need to have a kind of a minimum
Matthew:A pallet load.
Dave:A minimum center of gravity.
Matthew:Yeah.
Dave:A minimum amount.
Matthew:Minimum center of gravity. Yeah.
Dave:That's right. I'm
Matthew:sure that's not the word you're looking for.
Dave:It's not. It's But, yeah. Anyway.
Matthew:There's got to be enough enough order there to be able to order it in a bulk, you know, and In a and pass on to a local distributor. All of that. Economies of scale works better for me on that one. So get all your Canadian and Australian friends to do it as well. We've already had an approach from one of our backers who said that they could, cause they run a shop, they could maybe, you know, be the distribution center in Australia.
Matthew:So next time we're looking
Dave:for that. Yeah. Yeah. That's cool. Yeah.
Dave:So that's so that's that's the that's the reason why it's it's a bit slower for The US backers, but you will be paying less money as a result. Had Cool. There was something else something just came to mind.
Matthew:Oh, and we're closing the Kickstarter. Not Kickstarter, the pledge manager.
Dave:Yes. So we'll we've given it one more week, but we'll close it on Friday May. So if you are one of those stragglers, there's only a handful left, but get in before that and that'll make life a lot easier for everyone.
Matthew:Yeah. 10% of our original backers haven't completed, but a lot of those were, you know, just digital guys. You've got your digital content already. No need for you to complete the backers.
Dave:Yeah. Exactly.
Matthew:Unless you wanted to add physical stuff to it. We've got about, I think, 26, 20 five individuals who actually have ordered physical stuff and haven't completed their pledge packages yet. You've got a week to do it. If you don't do it that week, obviously, you know, we will still try and on audio on her, but you'll be coming directly to us, paying us somehow with a credit card or something, the postage, and then we'll post it to you direct. And it will be a lot more difficult, and I'm sure more expensive because Yeah.
Matthew:Yeah. Prices just seem to be going up, don't they?
Dave:Yes. That is that is true.
Matthew:Okay. Oh, yeah. The other
Dave:thing I was going to say was No.
Matthew:That wasn't the other thing you were gonna say. Sorry. I thought I was reminding you there.
Dave:No. Was we we'd managed to put a little bit of stock into a couple of retail stores once once our UK and European backers were getting their their products. And the the first place was the game shop in Aldershot where you used to work. Mhmm. And it was lovely to see that it's been selling.
Dave:So I don't I don't know how many how many how many copies they took.
Matthew:Alright. That's a bit disingenuous of my Facebook post. Is it? I said, down to their last copy. They only took well, they took three, but one of them was for the manager of the
Dave:show. Okay.
Matthew:So they sold the
Dave:other one.
Dave:They sold one. Alright.
Dave:Well, it's better than none. So thank you to whoever bought the copy of Tales of the Old West from the the the game shop in Old Shot. But, yeah, it did make me think, oh, wow. We must have given them six or eight. That's great.
Dave:Sold very good. Okay.
Matthew:Now, we've given we have given eight to Athena Games in Norwich. Yep. And I think they've sold more than one copy there. Excellent.
Dave:That's cool.
Matthew:I might drop them a line and see see how they're doing. And actually, while we're talking about retail as well, it's worth mentioning that on that palette going to America, there's 10 of everything going to Paladins Game Palace in Bakersfield, California. Yep. So there's a retail, a local retail there. If you want to mail order from there, it will probably be a lot cheaper than mail ordering from us.
Matthew:We are going to set up a web store on our on website so people can order directly from us. But you will also be able to order from our distributors. We're just about to sign a deal with them where they will become our distribution partners into retail as well. Yeah. So they they distribute for a bunch of British and European retail stores.
Matthew:And your local store may well be able to order it from them. And, so if you want to buy it locally
Dave:we have had a couple of retailers come and chat to us when we were at Dragonmeat, the mini Dragonmeat a couple of weeks ago. So that was great. So there's definitely a little bit of interest out there to take a few copies from from a few retailers. So come and get it, guys. Come and get it.
Matthew:We may, I mean, have to do a reprint at some point.
Dave:That would be very cool, wouldn't it? It'd be it'd be very interesting to see how what how many we sell at UK Games Expo, and we need to have a chomp conversation about how much to take.
Matthew:What stock to take. Yeah.
Dave:Yeah. Which we do offline. But Yeah. But Well,
Matthew:particularly now that we're we're adding t shirts.
Dave:Well, exactly. But it'll be really interesting to see how how well we do at UK Games Expo.
Matthew:Cool. Shall we shall we talk to Gabe now?
Dave:Let's do that. So War Stories, their new Kickstarter is still running for The Pacific, and, yeah, we chatted to Gabe yesterday.
Matthew:Well, in the heman with us tonight, we we've got an old friend and collaborator, at least a collaborator with with Dave. Oh, yeah. And that's Gabe Garcia. Gabe, welcome back to the show.
Gabe Garcia:Thanks for having me. Thanks for having me, guys. Good to be back. It's good to see you guys are doing well, and and I'm looking forward to chatting about all RPG stuff.
Matthew:Excellent. Well, all of RPGs is quite a large topic. We've only got about half an hour.
Gabe Garcia:We'll narrow it down a little bit. Well, you know, Dave and I are thinking about
Matthew:We can try. Should we be talking about War Stories, The Pacific?
Gabe Garcia:That's right.
Matthew:So you've got a Kickstarter running. We're a bit late to this show. So when you're listening to this, the Kickstarter will have, dear listener, about two days to go. So follow the link in the show notes as soon as you can, or it or maybe it's gone. In which case, do whatever the late pledge thing is as soon as you Yeah.
Gabe Garcia:That makes sense.
Matthew:But, Gaye, this is, I feel Well, we've always known that this was going to be the first big expansion of War Stories, and that is moving the theater over to the Pacific. Was there an early stage in the planning before you published the first War Stories where you were going, which is it going to be? Is it going to be Europe or is it going to be The Pacific and Europe won out? Or was there ever a time when actually, you know, we're going to start this in The Pacific?
Gabe Garcia:No, we had the initial desire to start off in Europe only because the first inspiration for putting together, war stories as a World War two RPG set in a realistic setting. The inspiration had been banned of brothers initially, So the fact that it was not just band of brothers and it was a European setting, but it was additionally set specifically during the Normandy beach landings, and it was set at a very, very precise time. That was kind of the inspiration. However, with the understanding that if the product was well received, then we would definitely expand it to not only different locations in the war, but even perhaps perhaps release publications that had information about the early years or perhaps the mid years or something along those lines. So Yeah, I was always Europe and then the natural progression would be Pacific.
Gabe Garcia:And then there's even, you know, more ideas beyond the Pacific, into other theaters and other and other topics.
Matthew:Cool. You talk a bit about times. Obviously, we know, where the core Wall Stories and Dave's excellent One Day of It with Destiny campaign is set time wise. Actually, I'm going to be really honest here. I know less about the Pacific Theatre.
Matthew:So which time period have you chosen and what's happening then? And why did you choose that period?
Gabe Garcia:Sure, sure, sure. We kind of chose mid war, sort of 1943. The landings at Guadalcanal feature are featured strongly in the campaign that's present in the expansion book. And that that campaign kind of zeros in on Guadalcanal in the same way that the one hundred and first featured were featured in the Normandy campaign that Dave was able to put together for war stories in the beginning, so it's an expansion and it's it gives you a broad understanding and resources to play in The Pacific in general. Sort of the same way that the core book has a general understanding of how to prepare scenarios set in Western Europe.
Gabe Garcia:Well, this does the same for The Pacific, but book will have a built in campaign for Guadalcanal, and that's going to be featuring the Marine Raiders, much in the same way that, the one hundred and first were featured for the army, in the core book and in the in the first campaign book.
Dave:Cool. That's really exciting. I mean, I do have to say when back in the early days when we were just finishing War Story's first time round game, and and there was talk of Pacific, I bought this enormous, really thick history book on the Pacific and, and read it, and then I never got asked to help. But that's fine.
Gabe Garcia:That's you had the second part. You had Market Garden to worry about.
Dave:I did. I'm not And then there's that
Gabe Garcia:thing called the Old West. I don't know. You got sidetracked.
Dave:I'm not complaining. But it was going to be getting Yeah. I mean, it forced me to to read stuff about history that I knew a bit about but didn't know very much, which is great, and I and I and I love all that. But, yeah, so you talk about Guadalcanal. And so the the campaign you've got in the book is going to be what similar in structure to Rendezvous with Destiny, but based in Guadalcanal.
Dave:So you've got, what, six or seven scenarios that fit into a wider story.
Gabe Garcia:Correct. Correct.
Dave:Is the plan then to move a bit like we've done? You know, we'll come to Market Garden in a minute, but a bit like we've done with Market Garden. Is the plan then to go to, I don't know, Pelelo or Okinawa or Iwo Jima and have campaigns set further down the line of the Pacific war timeline?
Gabe Garcia:It can definitely lend itself to that, particularly since the Marine Raiders were present in a variety of islands that were that were the subjects of many, amphibious invasions. And so it lends itself to that possibility. Absolutely And we could go all the way to you know some of the big big final battles that really preclude the dropping of the bomb. But I'm not sure if it'll move in that direction. It may be that we're you know, it's depending on how it's received and whether the, audience prefers perhaps a little more focused by firelock games on yet a third theater, which might be North Africa or it might be Eastern Europe.
Gabe Garcia:Those are two that that have been kind of hollered about on on the Reddits and on the forums and on the different groups that would be great to have a tank campaign in North Africa. Or you know, sniper campaign in in Eastern Europe somewhere, you know any of those would would feature well and so we have to decide whether we're going to maintain our focus or we're going to spread out a little bit. And I think that the audience is sort of the reception that that that is that is, the feedback that is provided for us may determine that in the end, but it's certainly possible.
Dave:Mhmm. No. That that sounds really cool. And I say when the the history of of The Pacific is I mean, there's so much of it. Actually, I mean, you know, they okay.
Dave:There's a lot on the Western Front as well, but there's there's there's such, you know, the Pacific. I mean, the word itself covers Yeah. An area of of landscape that is Sure. Thousands upon thousands of miles by
Gabe Garcia:thousands. China, Burma, all of that. Yeah.
Dave:So in terms of, what the Pacific book gives us, other than the campaign and the sort of the setting stuff, so where where have you gone in in the idea of new rules or or additional equipment and that kind of stuff? Are
Gabe Garcia:we Sure. Sure. Yeah. Can I can share some of those things? Well, first of all, we we definitely have, the Japanese weaponry.
Gabe Garcia:All of the firearms, you know, all of the most commonly used, pistols, machine guns, heavy machine guns, light machine guns. We have a few vehicles as well. We had to include obviously some amphibious vehicles. So some of the gear is relatively obvious in terms of what you have to add and what you have to provide the GM and the players with the tools to play. We further more added to the scope of, specializations as well.
Gabe Garcia:The skills remain the same. There's the same 12 course course skills, but we added a good amount of specializations to each skill. I believe. I think it was something either one or two. I think it was two specializations per skill, so they tend to be, fleshing out, you know, different ways of making your character and maybe put them in in along the lines of what we, did with the core book, but with a with a skew toward the Pacific and some of the skills that perhaps marines may be given versus regular army.
Gabe Garcia:We went ahead and actually gave sort of bonus specializations for Marines and Rangers and, and kind of started to flesh out what we did with the. With the one hundred and first airborne, where we kind of singled them out a little differently. We did the same thing for the Marines. So there's a bit of that. We had some new archetypes for those who play the game and just use archetypes and don't really deal with fleshing out the character in detail.
Gabe Garcia:And then and then there's obviously a background on the history with a timeline, some, extra adventures or ideas for, missions that are present there, some tables that show, you know, the different terrain that you may encounter, weather charts, that sort of thing, kind of really give the GM as many tools as we can, so they can devise their own adventures that aren't in Guadalcanal and that maybe take place in The Philippines or in Burma or or in China or anywhere else.
Dave:Yeah. There are two things there that kind of struck me. One, I mean, the terrain. I mean, because obviously the terrain in some of the Japanese islands was so different to the terrain that the troops on the Western Front would have would have would have met. Yeah.
Dave:And so so calling that out and doing stuff to, to to to make that feel unique in the Pacific campaign is is a really good idea. The other thing that struck me, obviously, you know, a lot of the Pacific stuff is is amphibious, as you say. Have you added rules to help the GM run an amphibious battle?
Gabe Garcia:That's a great question, and and we have not made any specific nod toward the amphibious side of the battle. So, for example, if you have in Guadalcanal, you have the famous, naval battle that takes place and preeminently so in the beginning to the middle of the of the campaign. That's in the background. I think that the focus is more on the squads and more of the individual combatants. The fact that there is obviously a major naval component to World War two is something to me that begs its own air and sea add on, an air and sea book that allows you to either play on board a submarine or on board you know, a destroyer or maybe even piloting, you know aircraft that comes off of aircraft carriers and you have your own cadre of fighter pilots.
Gabe Garcia:Maybe that's a cool way to handle. You know those rules, and then that's where I would incorporate any kind of naval or aerial, mass battle like we did with the core books land battles.
Dave:Yeah. So I guess I was I was thinking is there is there advice and guidance to help the GM run that scenario when the player characters are hitting the beaches?
Gabe Garcia:When they're hitting the beaches, this is definitely going to be along the same lines as the land battle. Yeah And if you incorporate if you wanted to, obviously there is the ability to incorporate any of the naval bombardments that might have taken place onto the onto the beaches itself. In the same way that the land battles were handled. There because of the fact that the way Guadalcanal historically occurred, and we're trying to stay as close to history as possible. For the most part, the Americans landed on the beaches of both Tulagi and, Guadalcanal itself relatively unopposed.
Gabe Garcia:Yeah Yeah, so there wasn't really a need to have a staged mass battle at that point of the campaign. Although, of course, there are plenty of mass battle opportunities throughout the rest of the campaign after the landing.
Dave:Mhmm. Because I was just wondering whether those rules could then be taken by somebody who wanted to recreate, D Day from the point of view of the troops who hit the beaches.
Gabe Garcia:Oh, true. True. Yeah. Yeah.
Dave:No. That's cool. That's
Gabe Garcia:cool. Definitely.
Matthew:Now one of the other additions to this game, and I noticed it was mentioned with Dave. We will get on to Market Garden eventually, but let's stay in the Pacific for a
Dave:Save the best for last, ain't it? I mean, Gabe is brilliant. I mean, the the one thing I would just like to say, I with War Stories, I I genuinely had one of the best collaboration experiences working with you, Gabe. You know? Well, thanks.
Dave:Much better than working with Matthew on Tales
Matthew:of Labor. Hang on. I'm still in the room. That
Gabe Garcia:is greatly appreciated, Dave. And I I reciprocate that compliment, of course. That being said, I don't I haven't worked with too many other people anyway, but still, David, still terrific.
Dave:It's a lowball. Thanks, Pat.
Matthew:Yeah. Working with you is definitely better than not working with anybody, Dave. I can I can entirely agree with with the table now? But no. So one of the differences, just get back on topic.
Matthew:I remember this being a demand when you were doing the pre this is the first time you've done a Kickstarter for War Stories, isn't it? Yes. Time was last time, wasn't it? And I remember the appeal order went very well, but there was a lot of chat at the time in the comments and in the in the Facebook groups and things like that. It's like, oh, go on.
Matthew:You gotta give us figures for this minis. Right. And and I remember thinking, who the hell needs second World War minis? Where can you not find second World War minis? Sure.
Matthew:But you've relented this time. Is there a reason why you went for the minis in this kickstart?
Gabe Garcia:I think that there's three reasons I can think of off the top of my head. I think number one is there was comments made like you said, where people kind of said, Well, are you going to do minis and whatnot? I think part of that has to do with the connection that people make with firelock games in general producing the miniatures they do for their pirate themed miniatures games. And they do such a good job with that. I think it was natural for fans of the company to say, Well, are you going to do minis for this now and be interested in knowing what those minis might look like?
Gabe Garcia:I think the second reason is, the artwork our of our artist Ian is so, great, and I think that it's so, evocative of the sort of, action that you that you will have with your characters in an RPG. That that the art itself inspired the idea of putting that sort of, look to a miniature and be able to paint it up. And I think that, my as my understanding all of the miniatures presently are inspired and based on that artwork that the archetypes, that Ian had painted up for the core book and then this new expansion book as well. So I think that that it just lent itself to that. And then and then I'd have to say the third reason is, I think Firelog just, they've invested in their own, you know, production of miniatures so that they're made all in house.
Gabe Garcia:And so right since they're all made in house, then you know what the logic is, you make use of your investments and produce something that appears to have an audience anyway. So I think all those are the reasons. You know, people like miniatures and people that may not be into the RPG might all of a sudden say, Well, they have miniatures and I'm into miniatures and maybe I'll try this RPG. So I think that it pans out a little bit, logically, and I think that's the route Firelocke took.
Matthew:That's very interesting. It's immediately prompted two questions. One for you, Dave. Actually, I'm just going to pass this one over to you. So you went to Salute a couple of months ago.
Dave:Salute is
Matthew:a big miniatures wargaming convention that we have here in The UK. And we took Free Leagues miniatures game. That's what you were selling. But of course, we were also selling things like Twilight 2,000. Did you see potential for more wargamers getting into role playing games if only there'd been firelock games on the table as well?
Dave:I think if we'd had a if there'd been more minis for sale on more or any, actually, really, minis for sale on the stand, it would have drawn people in for sure.
Gabe Garcia:Mhmm.
Dave:I think if we go back to Salute next year as Free League and we take Alien Evolved with the minis that that comes with, then I think Free League will have a much better time at Salut than we did this time because, again, it's a it's a, you know, it's a it's a convention that comes from a very heavily war war gaming background. And even though it is expanding into a wider range of stuff and role playing games are a thing there, there's still a very, very minor part of it. So I think yeah. I mean I mean, a game like War Stories, if it was on the table with a load of minis in front of it that are as as cool as they look on the Kickstarter, just where I've seen the pictures, That would definitely attract people in, I'm for sure.
Matthew:Right. Now you shut up, Dave. I want to ask Gabe a question now. I'm just realizing I should've we should've had that chat after the interview like we do in our Yeah. In that normal format for them.
Dave:It's it's yeah. It's no good you interviewing me while people Dave sat on the line going, right. Well, it's I I I'm I'm bit overworked. I wanna go and do something more interesting. Well, the best
Gabe Garcia:part of that last the best part about that last question is Dave took so long to answer. I thought for a second it was my turn to answer. I was like
Dave:I was
Matthew:just, like,
Dave:forming forming my thoughts, Gabe. You know what it's like. It takes me while to get up to speed.
Matthew:So, Gabe, hopefully you can answer this one more speedily then. You talked about in house mini production? Yeah.
Dave:No thinking time, Gabe.
Matthew:No thinking time. Firelock because you've been doing the Pirates. And I first heard of you years ago when a friend of mine was raving about the miniatures game. Can't think of what it's called now.
Gabe Garcia:Bloody.
Matthew:Yeah. So you make those minis in house, not diverging too deeply into politics, but obviously tariffs have been a big pain in the ass for lots of Absolutely. Do you make those minis in the Mainland Continental United States Of America as well?
Gabe Garcia:If you count Miami as that, I mean, some people don't, but
Dave:yes, think officially it counts.
Gabe Garcia:Officially it's in The States. South Florida, we are in The United States. So yes, the minis are done in house. In fact, quite a lot of the production in general is done in house. And so, we we've obviously been very aware of the tariff conditions and situations and the economics of what.
Gabe Garcia:Of what that's brought to the gaming industry, but in general, the productions of the stuff that we are able to do as I've understood it. I mean, I'm not directly a firelock employee. I write for them. But it's all in house. There have been some minor tweaks where we had to make adjustments.
Gabe Garcia:Otherwise, for example, we initially thought we were going to be able to do a starter box set. And the starter box set was something that production wise would not be the smart thing to do at the moment in terms of the tariffs.
Matthew:Yeah. Just the economics of that point to China and then the tariffs point point very firmly away from China again.
Gabe Garcia:Right. Right. Right. Exactly.
Matthew:But that is it, know, you should maybe make more of this, I'm thinking. How well is the Kickstarter doing at the moment?
Gabe Garcia:I think the Kickstarter is doing well, all things considered. And those things, of course, being the tariff and the economics, It's my understanding and after looking around a bit, obviously it's in our interest to see how everybody else is doing in general, but I think the gaming industry has taken a bit of a hit with the economics and the tariffs. I think people are shying away a little bit from, kind of investing and putting their money in a situation that might be a bit, you know, fluid and not set. And so maybe some people are waiting and seeing. But regardless, we've broken our obviously our goal and in fact, we've more than doubled our goal and we still have a week left as of this recording.
Gabe Garcia:And we hope to continue adding to to to what we've been able to produce, especially if we're able to say that a lot of the things that we're making are in house and that they'll they'll they'll they'll be affected by the tariff to whatever extent shipping costs might be affected. I'm not really familiar with it. I know that there's a large contingent of European, fans and potential, clients or buyers and whatnot that that are concerned with shipping costs to Europe. And I'm not quite sure where that is, but but I think we're doing okay, all things considered, particularly with the market the way it is.
Matthew:Well, in in our experience of of just this last week, it does look like I was expecting shipping costs to go down because there was less demand because of the tariffs. Actually, it appears that shipping costs have gone up. Not unaffordably for us as a games company, but
Dave:I
Matthew:think different the way I expected. But anyway But
Dave:I don't I don't I don't think it doesn't seem to me that that the kind of the uncertainty, you know, in in what's going on with the US government and tariffs and stuff at the moment has directly affected those shipping costs. No. The shipping costs are just pretty expensive anyway. Sure.
Gabe Garcia:Sure.
Dave:So so I think, hopefully, all that uncertainty won't affect the actual cost of shipping come the day. Correct.
Matthew:Yeah. No. I was just hoping that it might go down because there'll be shipping companies there.
Dave:Well, I hope that as well. Yeah. That
Matthew:isn't what happened. But anyway No. But, yeah, I think it's it's a good thing, actually, that listeners might want to be aware of, particularly if they're in the Continental US, that it is American made as well. So you're not in danger of getting tariffed on your minis if you go to your minis. And it's an interesting range of reward levels you've done, where you've got book only reward levels, but you've also obviously got combo reward levels with various sets of minis.
Matthew:I noticed that if I were going to back, that there isn't the thing that I'd want. But there is a lovely a la carte one where you put a pound in and then you add whatever add ons you need. Sure.
Gabe Garcia:Mean, I tried to guide them in that and I think that one of the things I told them to definitely add is the sort of the veterans level where if you're already a prior customer, that's got the core book and got, you know some of the cards and the dice and whatever, and you just want the new stuff that that isn't a pledge level that I believe last I checked was the most popular pledge level. Everybody's got all the stuff already. So get all the new stuff. And now you've got yourself. You know everything that there is.
Gabe Garcia:And then you know, obviously, there's the all in. So for everybody that you know, wants to be the completest and wants to have all of all of the products. That's that's also good. I'm looking at the fact that the one pound or one dollar you know, entry level pledge. There's quite a few people in there, and I think that those are folks that are kind of riding, you know, the wave of of of of the circumstances and see what it is that they're gonna end up adding at the end.
Gabe Garcia:So I think that that's definitely something you can perceive as a positive for sure, because there's a lot of folks that are in that level.
Matthew:Yes. And then they may add stuff on in the campaign or in the pledge manager after.
Gabe Garcia:Sure. We welcome that for sure.
Matthew:What's happening there. So that's that's good. Now I do notice there is this weird little book that you've also got that has nothing at all to do with the Pacific. Let me just find it out again. Operation it's a gardening supplement?
Gabe Garcia:It's a gardening supplement. It's all about, you know, the farmers that were affected, over in Belgium and, other places. So, yeah, now I've It's about the Nation Market Garden. Dave's baby right there. Come on, Dave.
Gabe Garcia:That's fantastic work.
Dave:You know, I'm happy to sit here and just be abused by Matthew. That's kind of standard. We've done it over the
Matthew:last seven years. Why stop now?
Dave:Forty seven. So, yeah, I mean Or maybe. I
Gabe Garcia:mean, delighted
Dave:to have the opportunity to do the next installment of the the story of the hundred and first, which obviously operation Market Garden, the audacious plan from Field Marshal Montgomery to try and get over the Rhine through The Netherlands by taking many bridges along a very narrow axis of advance, which was always gonna be challenging. The hundred and first, the eighty second airborne, a lot of the British and Polish airborne troops were all used to, as part of the operation, to try and then capture bridges and capture the road, Highway 69, and then usher the British thirty thirty corps armored division along there so they could get over the bridge at Arnhem and, you know, across the Rhine and into Germany. We focus very much on the hundred and first as we did with, rendezvous with Destiny. So it's very much the, Eindhoven area of, operations and what the one hundred and first experienced. But, again, we've tried to be very, faithful to the history as far as we're able to.
Dave:Had to take a few little, sort of liberties with some of it to try and make sure the gaming experience was as good as, we could make it. But in essence, again, it's it's it's running through that period of, you know, about a month, about thirty days worth of combat, or operations before it became clear in the real world. Anyone who knows the history knows that Market Garden didn't succeed. Not for lack of trying. There was an awful lot of there were there were there were I describe it as a a lot of victories that ended in defeat because there were a lot of victories, but the ultimate objective, wasn't achieved.
Dave:And I won't go into the various reasons
Matthew:why Spoilers. Spoilers tape.
Dave:Well, and and it becomes a bit of a history lesson as well. So as interesting as I find it, and I guess Gabe as a history teacher finds it, I'm not sure anyone listening might find it.
Matthew:So, Gabe, have you have you been involved in this at all? I know Dave has done most of the writing, but have you been collaborating in any way or reading drafts?
Gabe Garcia:Well, definitely. I read a couple of the drafts that he had, and I think I might have given him just maybe one tiny bit of advice very early on, and I can't even remember what it was. I feel like I did. But definitely this is 100% Dave's child and, and it looks fantastic. I mean, I was able to look at some of the final copy and some of the final maps, which, of course, is, straight out of Dave's, penmanship and artistry.
Gabe Garcia:The final maps will kind of be digitized and worked with to match the same sort of artwork from the original book, but it all looks great. He had a part in even choosing some of the illustrations that we were able to put together for his book. And, it's a great follow-up. I mean, I think that that's one of the. Greatest parts of the book and war stories in general, the ability to kind of have historically accurate campaign that spans a good amount of time and scenarios and admissions and the fact that you you can actually open up a history book or pop in a documentary or download or stream a documentary and see all of the action and be able to connect it with what's happening in your tabletop.
Gabe Garcia:In a in a role playing game. I think that's the that's the best part of the story. And I think that that's what drove a lot of people to get into war stories and certainly for us to put it together, So I think that this being the second book of that sort of trilogy is I mean to me, it feels like a movie and just kind of the anticipation of a movie. Because you're you're you're the ones that's providing the characters and your DM or GM is the one that's kind of directing the whole thing. So the fact that there's a trilogy involved.
Gabe Garcia:I mean, there's a lot of RPGs that have done trilogies as well. But this is neat because it's from a historical perspective. So I mean, if think if you're not jazzed about that, I mean, they obviously may not be a history buff, but, and an RPG, you know, you got to combine those two and it and it and it really paints a nice picture.
Dave:No. I think that's really well said. I think the other thing that I I love about it is that we're not prescribing how that history plays out in these campaigns either. So, you know, the campaign, you know, depending on your player actions, might come to a different result.
Gabe Garcia:Correct.
Matthew:We could win Market Garden.
Gabe Garcia:Could happen. Capitalization. Far. You never know, Dave. Come on.
Gabe Garcia:Because Get the inspiration.
Dave:Well, the thing is that I'm yeah. I'm I was about to get into my history lesson again. But Market Garden, they're like like three big sectors, and you've got the hundred and first sector around Eindhoven. You've got the eighty second airborne sector around oh, I forgot the name now. The next one up.
Dave:And then you've got the British and the Polish around Arnhem. And obviously, all three sectors had to succeed.
Gabe Garcia:Succeed.
Dave:Yeah. Now the hundred and first, you know, succeeded in in in many of their objectives. But if all three didn't succeed, then
Gabe Garcia:Yeah. Wasn't wasn't gonna work
Dave:out. Yeah.
Gabe Garcia:Right.
Dave:I mean, it's brilliant. I mean, there's a lovely bit of history, with it, which I'll just will bore you with because I I love it, that I came across.
Matthew:Sorry, Gabe.
Dave:In in the sorry. I know this is your interview, Gabe. But
Matthew:You're meant you're meant to be the one boring us with history, Gabe, not Dave.
Gabe Garcia:I love it.
Dave:I love it. Let me let
Matthew:me let
Dave:me be quick. Let me finish. So, Montgomery was so set on this plan. He was so single-minded about it. It it was basically intimidating and badgering all the other commanders, to get this operation authorized.
Dave:And at one point, he had this this meeting where he really went off on one, with Eisenhower. And at the end of the meeting, Eisenhower said, you can't talk to me like that, Monty. I'm your boss. And then Monty went, oh, shit. Okay.
Dave:Fair enough. He started backing up. But I love it. That was that was really what really happened at the time.
Gabe Garcia:Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Definitely.
Gabe Garcia:Yeah. All that's great. I mean, you know, from, you know, from that perspective to, you know, Teddy Roosevelt's son storming the beaches of Normandy to, there's there's a there's a small, tiny, tiny character and I'm not going to spoil it, but there's a small tiny character in Guadalcanal who happens to be the grand or he was obviously he's not with us anymore, but he was the grandfather of a very big pop star celebrity. I won't say who. Won't say who.
Matthew:You got me intrigued. Yeah. Is it easy to spot when when you see his name, will you guess,
Dave:oh, yes. Yes.
Matthew:Yes.
Dave:Swift, is it? Oh, come on, dude. It was a guess. It was a guess.
Gabe Garcia:No. You did not just guess that. Did you really?
Dave:Yeah. Yeah. Well, that's the obvious one to guess, isn't it? Or should I say miss Kelsey?
Matthew:Pop star personality. You bit the clue in the name there.
Gabe Garcia:I guess you're right. I guess you're right. True Yeah, that's always neat to see those elements of history kind of come together. And you're right, David. It's true that you know these stories go go different ways.
Gabe Garcia:And obviously, the player characters have an enormous role in directing the sort of story that ends up happening, and they can absolutely change history, even if it's from a small perspective in a very minute part of a battlefield. It could have a you know the butterfly effect, and it could absolutely change the outcome of some of the grander parts of the story. So,
Matthew:we're running out of time. Obviously, this is going to be a success. It's certainly gone past its goal. It's doubled its goal. There's a bit more work to do on it.
Matthew:Is there a game for you? Well,
Gabe Garcia:for me, actually, most of the work is done. I think what I've got left is to, hand over some of the data on the new Japanese weapon for the cards, the deck of cards that we're putting together. The book is done. It's out of my hands at this point. Dave's book is obviously done.
Gabe Garcia:It's out of his hands and, the GM screen is going to be the same as the other GM screen, except with new art on one side. There's been talk about the possibility of making the GM screen of a thicker material. I don't know the logistics of that, and I'm not sure if that may or may not be a stretch goal further down, you know the last few days of the of the campaign. And then any anything beyond that? I'm trying to think it's all in the hands of Lily, our layout artist extraordinaire.
Gabe Garcia:And it's basically just about done. She's doing the layout and that's about it. Yeah, that's a great
Matthew:So, Gabe, what are you working on? Because you're not I mean, obviously, you have a day job. You teach. But don't tell me about that. That's boring.
Gabe Garcia:Yeah. Actually, am working on I am working on something for war stories. As a matter of fact, it is a sort of, French resistance espionage sabotage kind of adventure. At the moment it was going well when I started about a month ago or so, it was going to be a relatively small thing that would probably be provided on our website via PDF download. But as I've continued working in the last four weeks, it's gone bigger and bigger and bigger and bigger.
Gabe Garcia:It's over 35 pages at this point, so, I am not 100% sure what format it may end up being, and there is a an off chance and a possibility that it will be incorporated into perhaps. An espionage expansion, and that's always been in the back of my head to provide an espionage expansion expansion for The OSS. Yes So we all the different, you know, part
Matthew:of the
Gabe Garcia:groups that are across Europe and we could even go into the Pacific with that as well. They're definitely partisan groups there, from the local the local people as wealth, but I don't know. It may or may not end up in that book or it may still be a standalone product. Is going to be in France and is on the West Coast Of France. There's going to be a submarine pen involved and, and it's looking pretty interesting.
Gabe Garcia:I've done an enormous amount of research on submarine pens. I probably know more than I need to ever know about submarine, pets in Western Europe. But you have to know those things before you sabotage.
Dave:It is amazing. They're really like, focused in specific things that you learn a hell of a load about when you're researching this kind of game. Yes you'll never ever need again.
Gabe Garcia:No, never ever Ever. It's pretty cool, though.
Matthew:So that excites me. I'm kind of torn now. Part of me wants the PDF because we can have the PDF as soon as you're done. But also, with an Espionage expansion, I am reminded, Dave, that when this game first came out and people were going, oh, when are gonna do Eastern Front, North Africa, whatever? I was going, oh, dad.
Matthew:The the thing I wanna do is partisans in Resistance. Broadly in Europe, but French resistance or wherever. There's loads of partisans. Sure. Because for me, that gets closer to the role playing experience around the table as opposed to, you know, little bit more distant from the skirmish game,
Gabe Garcia:right?
Matthew:That might be a war game.
Gabe Garcia:Sure, sure, sure. As a matter of fact, you'll be interested to know and this is this is a tiny bit of detail on my actual job as a teacher. My AP students. I have a P U. S history that I teach and they took their test today.
Gabe Garcia:And then they still have three weeks left to school, but it's pretty clear that the understanding is that once you take your AP test, you're done in that class. No one wants to do any more work for the next three weeks. They want zero work and I am blessed with a very tiny class load of five students.
Matthew:Oh lovely.
Gabe Garcia:We're going to play test my partisan, sabotage campaign starting on Monday. I've got their characters all lined up and we're going to sit in class and play.
Dave:God, I have had the wrong teachers at school. Yeah. Was just gonna say that.
Gabe Garcia:It's gonna be great. And and two of them have played RPGs. Three of them have no idea what they're about to dive into.
Dave:How do I get into that class, Gabe? I guess I'm a bit old, possibly, but you know.
Matthew:Yeah. I think, Dave, you have to start teaching that class. That's what I like to do. I'll tell you what, actually, a friend of mine, Chris Kidlow, who's also in the industry, he works KSU and stuff like that. He has very recently retrained as a teacher and is having great fun.
Gabe Garcia:Oh, that's great. I love it. It. I have a great time teaching. It's fun to have it and the kids all enjoy.
Gabe Garcia:You know, you make the history come alive as best as you can. And, and give them as many of the gory details as possible. You gotta you gotta sit into my description of Abraham Lincoln's assassination. It gets pretty violent.
Dave:Okay. Well well, we'll when we've got a quiet show, Gabe, we'll get you on to give us a your ten minute or fifteen minute description of
Matthew:Gabe Link
Dave:Gabe Linkin.
Gabe Garcia:Abe Lincoln. Right. Right.
Dave:Yeah. This is yeah. You're talking about Gabe Lincoln, some other guy from
Gabe Garcia:somewhere else. Other guy. You don't know who that is.
Matthew:Oh, it's brilliant. It's been a real pleasure having you on the show again, Gabe.
Gabe Garcia:Likewise, fellas. Love it. It's a great time.
Matthew:Gabe is a lovely, lovely, lovely person,
Gabe Garcia:isn't he?
Dave:Yes. I am. Thank you.
Matthew:Gabe, I said, not Dave.
Dave:It sounded like you said Dave. But Gabe is a lovely, lovely guy. I had a real, real blast working with him when we did the original War Stories. Slightly on I I said in the interview, you know, I I jokingly said, no. You didn't ask me to collaborate on this one.
Dave:And I think Yeah. My slight disappointment is simply because I enjoyed working with Gabe so much. So, you know, obviously, I don't mind in the slightest that they didn't invite me to work on the Pacific 1. But, yeah, I think my disappointment is that Gabe is such a lovely guy, and he's a real pleasure to work with, and really collaborative approach for both of us. It was it was super.
Matthew:Excellent.
Dave:Yeah. But, yeah, I mean, Pacific sounds great. I like the idea that they're going to do a a rendezvous with Destiny style campaign for Guadalcanal. I guess that's gonna be really cool. With hope for for more in future if if it does well enough.
Dave:So, yeah, get along and back it, folks. As at the time of recording, I haven't got it up on my screen, which is a nice
Matthew:I have got it up. And see what the numbers are. We're looking at the moment at just a 95 backers. They made 20 almost 22,000 pounds, which in dollars is $29,000 from their original goal of 12,000. So it's not not a success, but it's not a massive number of backers, Yeah.
Dave:I was when when I asked him, you know, in in in the interview about about yeah. I got I got a sense that they're a little disappointed.
Matthew:Yeah.
Dave:But they've done well in that they've more than doubled their pledge, and so the the book will get produced. But But I
Matthew:think there is a thing that, you know, these are luxury items, actually. Games. They're not
Gabe Garcia:Yeah.
Matthew:You can't eat games. And, you know, I think maybe there's a general feeling of being a bit uncertain about what the economy is doing, particularly in America.
Gabe Garcia:I think
Dave:that's
Matthew:very true. All around the world, I think people might just be pulling back a bit of some of the games.
Dave:Waiting to see what what transpires and Yeah. Keeping their powder dry. Yeah.
Matthew:But they need to get better distribution overseas because it's a great game and it's not in enough shops, in my opinion.
Dave:Yeah. I agree. Yeah. But, yes. Great.
Dave:Yeah. Brilliant. Okay. What what are we what are we what are we planning for next time?
Matthew:So next time, I mentioned in our last episode that I'd been quite inspired to look at the rules. And maybe I really loved Thomas's great ship that he designed for us under the Great Ship Adventure. But, you know, Thomas did say that's all out of his head that the and and and the law of the great dark. And I thought, well, maybe, you know, we we should put some stuff out there that that helps people enjoy enjoy some of that lore of great art. A bit like we did in the old days when
Dave:we were
Matthew:with the Coriolis effect.
Dave:Absolutely.
Matthew:And I thought I might start off by trying to design a great ship in the same way that, obviously not exactly the same way that Thomas did, because that would just be copying his homework, but have a go using their great ship design tables and things and see what I come up with. Talk a bit about what great ships might mean in this new horizon that we're all having to deal with.
Dave:Yeah. That sounds like a great idea. Yeah. I'll be I'll be well up for for that.
Matthew:Does that sound bitter that we're all having to deal with? Do I sound like somebody who really wants to be in the third horizon?
Dave:No. No. More business
Matthew:than Honestly, I will.
Dave:Eventually. One day.
Matthew:Eventually. Yeah.
Dave:No. That sounds great. Right. Cool.
Matthew:I mean, we are a bit busy over the next couple of weeks planning for UK Games Expo, but hopefully, I'll find some time to do that. So that's that's what we'll try and present to you in two weeks' time.
Dave:Cool. Excellent stuff. Right. With that then, I guess that's us done for today. So it's goodbye for me.
Matthew:And it's goodbye from him.
Dave:And may the icons bless your adventures.
Matthew:Nice Florida accent. Good attempt, aye.
Gabe Garcia:Was it a
Dave:attempt? Florida accent? Are we going well?
Matthew:I have no idea.
Dave:No. Me neither. And I'm not sure it sounded much like Gabe either, but yeah. You have been listening to the effect podcast presented by Fiction Suit and the RPG gods. Music stars on a black sea used with permission of Free League Publishing.