Many Moving Parts

Dave:

Hello and welcome to episode 279 of Effect, Many Moving Parts. I'm Dave.

Matthew:

And I'm Matthew. And we genuinely have a chocker block world of gaming section to talk to you about

Dave:

You're just finding another way of saying we have a packed programme without saying we have a packed program.

Matthew:

No. No. No. What I'm pointing out is not the program. It's the world of gaming session that's pretty packed.

Dave:

Oh, okay.

Matthew:

I think I think you will find that the feature is slightly light on the actual content, Dave.

Dave:

Oh, yes.

Matthew:

But before

Dave:

You're you're preparing it. So as as per normal, it's light on content. Yeah. Okay. Fair enough.

Matthew:

Before we get there, though, we we do have a new patron to thank. And we've got, as I said before, quite a packed world of gaming. I was beginning to wonder whether Kickstarter and crowdfunding was kind of past its peak, but it probably isn't, as you will discover later on. And then and then we've got might well, here's the thing. I woke up this morning, nice and early, as I am want to nowadays, being old.

Matthew:

And I went to have a bath as I often do when I wake up early. And in the bath, I thought, right. Okay. I have been writing a lot about on this working a lot, I should say, on this alien epic adventure for UK Games Expo. Finally sent off to UK Games Expo, if you like, a kind of first draft.

Matthew:

The first draft they've seen. Today then, I won't do any more writing on that, although there's a couple of paragraphs I need to add to it, I think. I'm gonna write instead an article for the podcast about writing epic adventures. And then we can record it. I mean, it's not really giving Dave much notice to, you know, read read the article when I've written it, but we can record it tomorrow morning when we record.

Matthew:

And then I went

Dave:

No. No. No. That's today.

Matthew:

That's today. Do Did I leap out of the bathroom and write an article? No. I didn't leap out of the bathroom and write an article. I instead thought, let's have a bit of a discussion.

Matthew:

Let's have a free form thing. So that is that is our light on content bit. No prerecorded content there. Instead, Dave, you and I are gonna talk about writing for Alien, Cause you also have an Alien project that you're writing at the moment as well.

Dave:

Very

Matthew:

different. Much many, many, many more words, I think. Yeah. Yeah. We can talk about that.

Matthew:

And it's our first look as well, actually, at Alien Evolved for both of us. So

Dave:

Yeah. I haven't I haven't played it yet. So I'm gonna be playtesting it in the near future. But you have. You've done a playtest already, haven't you, sir?

Matthew:

I have done a playtest. Yes. Yeah. So and then and then we'll talk about what we're gonna do next time. Sounds like you got a very good idea, Dave.

Matthew:

And we'll say goodbye. So that is our heavy at the start, light at the end program that we have for you today.

Dave:

But, of course, we'll we'll whip through it with our usual efficiency and, you know, and and lack of laquacity. So it won't be a long show. You know, we won't blather on for an hour and twenty minutes or anything at all

Matthew:

at all. Nice tight 45.

Dave:

Yeah. Exactly. For sure. Yeah. That's your that's your middle name, isn't it?

Dave:

Tight forty five minutes.

Matthew:

If only.

Dave:

Anyway, okay. New patrons. Who do we have as new new patrons? You said we have a new one.

Matthew:

We got a lovely new patron who who, as usual, I first noticed when he appeared in the Discord.

Dave:

Indeed.

Matthew:

And his name is Leon Leon Castro Lagunas. Thank you very much, Leon. You are living, I think, currently in Denmark. And he first appeared on the Patreon. I thought, oh, that oh, sorry.

Matthew:

I should say first appeared on the Discord. Discord. So I went to Patreon to to welcome him officially over there. And I already had a message from him saying, how do I get on the Discord? So obviously, Leon, you worked that out.

Matthew:

I'm not gonna explain it here. But it is worth pointing out that the key benefit, the basic benefit that every one of our patrons get is they get enrolled onto our Discord, which is, Dave?

Dave:

The nicest place on the Internet, TM.

Matthew:

And Leon is looking to play Tales

Dave:

of the

Matthew:

Old Tales of the Old West

Dave:

Yeah.

Matthew:

In something in a European time zone. So I think we will invite him into our into our West Marches style

Dave:

Indeed. Yeah.

Matthew:

Campaign we're running.

Dave:

Which is now rolling. It's had its third episode, I think, so far. So we'll look

Matthew:

what We'll put a link up there to to YouTube. It's not appearing on our podcast channel yet. I thought, with what with now not having a full time job, I was gonna leap back into editing all the backlog of Yeah. Of podcasts that we did on the actual plane.

Dave:

So so did I, actually. What what you what you've doing, mate?

Matthew:

I'll tell you

Dave:

when we reach

Matthew:

the feature part of this episode. But frankly, it takes too bloody long. That's what it takes.

Dave:

Yeah. That's that's our that's our key our key conclusion is writing games takes too long. Or writing good good games takes too long.

Matthew:

I've had the best part of a month off, and it does not feel like it. Let me

Dave:

tell you that. Yep. Yes. So well so welcome, Leanne. Lovely to have you with us.

Dave:

Thank you for your patronage. Thank you, as always, to everybody who supports us. We can't do what we do without your support. And, obviously, your friendship and your companionship on the Discord is fabulous.

Matthew:

Brilliant. Thank you for that. Thank you for actually saying thank you,

Dave:

which is the point of well, point of this moment. Exactly.

Matthew:

So now, shall we move on to Yeah. The world of The first thing I wanted to talk about is very close to my heart, but not on Kickstarter yet. There's been a bit of a delay. I think it was meant to go on Kickstarter this week, and it's Ballad Hunters from Peregrine Press. Mhmm.

Dave:

So I haven't heard anything about this until I saw it in the show notes. So tell me all about it.

Matthew:

Ballad Hunters is I'm gonna say a little bit shall we say, Versidy, I think. It uses the gum shoe system, but it is a modification of the gum gum shoe system. So much so that it is being called a lab product. So it pushes pushes things one way. The basic conceit is this.

Matthew:

A little bit like in Versen, you are investigating weird goings on. But but specifically unlike Versen, although connected a little bit with the way I write adventures, the weird goings on are when folk ballads come to life. So the idea is that you will notice people behaving strangely or be informed about people behaving strangely. Strangely. And what they're doing is they're acting out the story of a folk ballad.

Matthew:

And, obviously, you know, terrible things can happen at the end of these folk ballads. And it's up to you to to try and I don't know whether you could stop them even or whether you can lessen the impact. So that that's essentially the mechanics of the game. Well, that that's that's the the theme of game. The mechanics include a thing where everybody's got their own kind of verse or or or or

Dave:

They call a compass verse.

Matthew:

Yes.

Dave:

Yeah.

Matthew:

Yeah. So you can you can effectively change the direction of the ballad by putting your compass verse in and and maybe maybe saving it. Now this sounds like a fun concert. It immediately rang with me because as you may well know, a whole bunch of the adventures, what I have written have come from ballads, folk ballads, like Tamlin ages ago. Do you remember a game scenario we took to Games Day back at the Royal Horticultural Hall when you were doing your Judge Dredd scenario?

Matthew:

I also we had a we had a table representing our club at The Shine Yeah. And alternated your judge dread scenario with my Tamlin scenario.

Dave:

I do remember. I don't remember the scenario at all, but I do remember that. Yeah. Absolutely.

Matthew:

Cool. Well, in the scenario, you are looking for a missing woman, and it it turns out that she is being kidnapped by fairies. And she's fallen in love with a knight who has been kidnapped by fairies. Mhmm. And he is gonna be have his eyes replaced with wood and his heart replaced with stone and become a fairy forever, unless we can stop it.

Matthew:

Which is the story of the ballad. And similarly, did a Feng Shui scenario based on

Dave:

Thanks, Rick.

Matthew:

A modern folk song called Lady Diamond by Steele Spann. If you remember one where there was a gangster's daughter who was in love with the cook at their Chinese restaurant that they Yeah. And most recently, actually, somewhere in December is not entirely based on a ballad, but is quite a lot based on a song from the Decemberists. So

Dave:

So this is right up your right in your wheelhouse, isn't it?

Matthew:

Strikes me that this is in my wheelhouse. And also, I want to run a game where everybody around the table has to sing.

Dave:

Well, don't include me on

Matthew:

that one. It says singing is optional, but great fun. So so, yeah, I think I might back this one when it when it comes live on Kickstarter.

Dave:

Couple of as a complete aside, I I my wife and I had a little weekend away last weekend up in Suffolk, and I drove past Kentwell.

Matthew:

Oh, yeah.

Dave:

And I'd never I'd never known where it was before, and I drove past it and went, ah, Kentwell. Matt used to go there. And then did you meet Sue? Did you meet Sue there, was it, or something?

Matthew:

No. I didn't meet Sue there. No. Okay. Every other girlfriend in my life I've ever had,

Dave:

I met Sue. Yeah. So anyways, I just thought that that was interesting. Started finally seeing where that was. But yeah, on this I mean, is I had a very

Matthew:

By strange coincidence, actually, I transposed that Tam Ling Linn adventure to the geography of Long Belford where

Dave:

Right. Campwell is. Yeah.

Matthew:

Cool.

Dave:

Cool.

Matthew:

Anyway. Sorry. You I interrupted you.

Dave:

Yeah. So this is this is I had a very quick look at this before the show because I haven't seen it on the on the on our list.

Matthew:

That's the idea of the running monitor to help me do that. Yeah.

Dave:

I don't I don't usually do that though, frankly. And it has so a couple of things. I think, one, it has a a feel to me of a game a bit like 10 Candles, where each it's it's it's less of an RPG that you would yeah. It's not a campaign thing, it feels to me, but it's it's it's a really good for a sort of one off, you know, in a done in a nice oldie worldy pub, you know, with candlelight and stuff. It would be really cool.

Dave:

And did I have another thought, but I completely forgotten what it was in my mention in Kentwell. But, yeah, no singing for me. That's for sure. Because I thought But, no, it looks it looks I I like the idea of it. Yeah.

Dave:

It looks interesting. But, yeah, from a from a 10 candles kind of stance point, I think, for me anyway, rather than something that runs longer form.

Matthew:

So I think it's not gonna be live. I think it should have been live as this episode went out, but I think it's been delayed. And I think it's now coming back to or coming going live on Kickstarter on Tuesday, March 31. So look out for that. We will put a link in the show notes.

Dave:

Cool.

Matthew:

And I've just seen an update there, actually, which wasn't there last time I looked, with a YouTube link to a bunch of folk songs. So I might have a look at that.

Dave:

You gonna back that I

Matthew:

think I might. Yes.

Dave:

Yeah. Cool. Do we

Matthew:

have I've got any money. I'm now I'm now in a similar position to you and not having any money coming in. So Yeah. But maybe I I probably will. Yeah.

Matthew:

Will. I will. I will. I'm definitely gonna do it. Right.

Matthew:

Next, we have a Year Zero game. Pact.

Dave:

Mhmm. Interesting idea, this one. I again, so I saw this the other day. I like the idea of so so their tagline is you sold your soul to a demon, now you must face the consequences. A game of urban occult horror based on the u zero engine.

Dave:

The idea of you being someone who sold your soul is a nice idea. And obviously, I suspect many players have played in games where that kind of theme has come up in a particular scenario or campaign. But having a game that's focused on you being in that position sounds to me like it opens up quite a lot of opportunities for, you know, what the deal is. What deal did you make with the devil? What are you offering or what are you getting in return?

Dave:

Are there different levels of the deal? You know, is it just you have sold your soul, so at the end of the day, your soul is gonna go off to hell? Or are there variations to that? So I I like the idea of that. It immediately gave me a huge nostalgic kick back to one of my old favorite films from the late eighties, which is Angel Heart.

Matthew:

I was about to say, because I remember that was a very good film.

Dave:

It's super

Matthew:

fun I was gonna say, I remember that being your favorite film, like it was a bit shit and nobody else liked it. But I do remember you really enjoying it. But I really enjoyed it too.

Dave:

Again, it's all

Matthew:

about Sifra.

Dave:

All about a man who sold his soul to the devil. Yeah. It's it's brilliantly well done.

Matthew:

He's a detective, and he doesn't realize he's sold his soul. He doesn't realize that the mystery is

Dave:

he sold his soul to level.

Matthew:

Yeah. Spoilers. Yeah. But

Dave:

It's quite an old feel.

Matthew:

Yeah. Bloody 25 years old.

Dave:

Well, at least at least longer. 35, probably. But yeah. So it immediately gave me that kind of vibe just looking at the at the campaign page. Again, I've not got so much money at the moment.

Dave:

I probably won't back it. But I'll be interested to see it, and and I would, you know, maybe pick it up at a convention in due course.

Matthew:

I thought maybe we should invite them just what's what's the timescale we've got there? Only twelve days to Twelve

Dave:

days to go. So yeah. Well, there might be late pledges. I mean, they've done well. So they've got £40,000 on a £10,000 goal.

Dave:

So they've they've succeeded very, very impressively.

Matthew:

More successful than we did, although slightly less backers than we had, but they've still got twelve days to go.

Dave:

Bastards. But we yeah. We it'd be interesting, actually. We could get on the show for next time. Although, I've got a very good idea for next time.

Dave:

Or we could get them on the show for the time after and

Matthew:

Maybe get them on the show for at some point when they're

Dave:

Late pledges.

Matthew:

Printing or something like that. We'll we'll we'll have to we'll we'll drop them a line anyway.

Dave:

Yeah. That's a good idea.

Matthew:

And get him on to talk. So, yeah. It looks well, I say it looks great. I am not quite as keen on this sort of game generally. You know, I've never really been a fan of, for example, Vampire.

Matthew:

Their sort of urban horror stuff doesn't particularly work for me. My my my go to game in that genre is Unknown Armies. Because at least you may be you may be incompetent, but at least you're trying to make the world a better place.

Dave:

Whereas, I guess, this one, the theme is you're not trying to make it a better place. It's very, very selfish and very

Matthew:

you're at least quite selfish.

Dave:

Narcissistic. Yeah.

Matthew:

Yeah. So so, yeah, I'm I'm kind of wary of this one, but I'd like to take a look at it. I'd like to see what they've done with the year zero engine here. We will be talking about year zero as a whole in a little while anyway. But, yeah, I might splash out for the PDF of this actually.

Dave:

Yeah. I mean, they they they specifically make a point of saying, you know, if you love Cult, World of Darkness or Free League games, come and buy this. Yes.

Matthew:

Well yeah. I don't think any games that we ever have put on Kickstarter have we ever said, oh, don't buy this.

Dave:

No. Of course. No. No. But they're they're

Matthew:

Well, they say games that we've it sounds like we've done more than one. No. We've done one game. But we did say buy this.

Dave:

Well, of course we did. But my point is they're very explicitly saying that this game is is

Matthew:

Is for us.

Dave:

Is emulating those things. So if you like those games, you should like Pact.

Matthew:

Cool. Yeah. Right. I'm I'm well up for at least looking at it, even if I'm not so interested to necessarily

Dave:

There is a quick there is a quick there is a quick

Matthew:

start. Oh, was there a quick start? I didn't notice that. Oh, I will definitely download the quick start, and we will put a link to that in the show notes too so everybody can check Right. That My screen has suddenly gone black, and I don't know what's next on our running order.

Dave:

Long as

Matthew:

you're as long as you're still recording,

Dave:

that's fine.

Matthew:

I I don't know why we've put this next item on the running order, really. It's not really our scene, is it? Doesn't doesn't fit with our general vibe. Shall we skip over and talk about Tunnels and Trolls?

Dave:

You're so boring, mate. You really are. I mean, again, this is just a little call out. We're not gonna say much about it, but Mythic Battles RPG Pantheon and Ragnarok is on GameFound as we speak. Eleven days left at the point of recording, which is the March 22, Sunday morning.

Dave:

They've succeeded. They've got their money. They've got €65,000 over 45,000 target. I I wrote a fair chunk of Ragnarok, and that's the reason it's here. And it was great it was great fun writing it.

Dave:

I wrote so I didn't have any any involvement in any of the rules or the system, but I did write the campaign at the back of for Ragnarok, and, you know, a lot of the setting material. And all the all the stuff for for oh, god. Basic remember the name? Midgard and Jopenhaim. All of that kind of setting was all done by me, which was great fun, actually.

Matthew:

Well, you say we're not gonna talk about it, but actually, I am kind of intrigued by it. The so remind me. We've talked about it before, I think, when you first, you know, got the good karate yet. But these are from the publishers Mammoth,

Dave:

are they? Mon Monolith.

Matthew:

Mon Monolith.

Dave:

That's it. French company, Monolith, who produced the Mythic Battles board game and have done so for a number of years.

Matthew:

And kind of very based on those board games. And those board games Yeah. I guess, are beautiful figures that you can paint or choose to leave unpainted Absolutely. Battling each other on a in some form of board game arena. Am I right?

Dave:

Battle map. You get battle maps, basically.

Matthew:

Right.

Dave:

One of the things they very much wanted to do was allow, a crossover so you can use your figures and battle maps from the board games for the role playing game, if you wish.

Matthew:

Mhmm.

Dave:

So some of the locations in some of those campaigns are based on the battle maps that are available in the board game.

Matthew:

I see.

Dave:

So you've got it. Right. The the stuff in the board game is cross compatible with with the role playing

Matthew:

game. So is the idea in that case that you might role play some sort of adventure, and then that adventure will lead you to a place where there is an epic encounter, and you roll out the battle map, and you kind of switch to the board game to resolve that encounter?

Dave:

I don't know. I don't think you switch to the board game. So the role playing game is all based on, you know, role playing as we would understand it. You don't turn it into a a board game mini game. They have they were deliberately making sure that the mechanics for the role playing game were were reflective of the mechanics in the board game, but it's not I don't think it's a port across.

Dave:

Haven't played the board game. But yeah. So you've definitely got role playing mechanics for things like combat. But I think the idea being that you've got all these, you know, lovely peripheral items, you know, maps and things, and it's good to make use of them. So that was that was kind of part of the thinking behind trying to roll those into the into the into the board into the role playing game.

Dave:

But, yeah, it's it's basically Ragnarok is is set at the at the time of, you know, the end of the world, Ragnarok. But you have the opportunity to change the outcome. So the the the myths and the the the understanding of how the world will end is well known for everybody. But as player characters, you are champions, of your chosen god, so you can you know, and you get different benefits for whichever god you are the champion of. Mhmm.

Dave:

But there is there is there is a glimmer of hope of changing the ending of that myth, and so it's not as bleak and dark and final and apocalyptic as as as the prophecy says it must be. So it's good. It's it's a nice Yeah. I think it's got plenty of playability in it, and it looks lovely. I mean, the artwork, because they've they've got they've got so much artwork, and it the artwork is just smashing.

Matthew:

Cool. And that was our work that was made for the game, the board games originally? Or is it new artwork?

Dave:

There is there is some new artwork in there, I think. But, yeah, originally, there was yeah. There was so much so much artwork from the board game that they've they've used they've used a lot of that again, I think. But it's great. The artwork is lovely.

Matthew:

They're a French company. So I'm assuming everything is going to be in English and French?

Dave:

Yes. So as I understand it, I'm not an expert, go and have a look at the the GameFound page.

Matthew:

The the GameFound, which we will put a link to in the show notes.

Dave:

You get you get the option to have it in French or English.

Matthew:

Right. Yeah. Right. Yes. So do you say so is this the first time that your RPG writing work has been translated into another language?

Matthew:

I I Surely not, actually. Surely alien Yeah. Has been

Dave:

That's what I was gonna say. I haven't I've never seen it in another language. But, yeah, I'm sure alien must be in a variety of languages now.

Matthew:

Right. Anyway. Okay. So that is Mythic Battles role playing game, and it's on GameFound now, and we will put a link in the show notes.

Dave:

Cool.

Matthew:

Next one, only we've mentioned this before, and each time we mention, I think we only say this only because kind of nostalgic because when we were at school, you know, somebody whose name we can't remember was running this game at another table. But I think our old school friend Andy, who is a patron of the show, is a fan of it as well. I don't think he ever ran it for us. And that's Tunnels and Trolls.

Dave:

Yeah. No. I've never I've never played it. I think I've said that before.

Matthew:

It's finally on Kickstarter, Having having we've about

Dave:

Yeah.

Matthew:

You know, quick starts and stuff like that. But it's finally on Kickstarter. So you can back it now. I think it's for me, I think the important thing that it brought to the role playing table way back then is the d six.

Dave:

Yeah. I don't even know what what the what the mechanics are for Tunnels and Trolls, frankly.

Matthew:

I think it's a d six mechanic.

Dave:

It's like I said

Matthew:

I don't think it's a dice, Paul.

Dave:

I always I always kind of looked down my nose bit at Tunnels and Trolls back in the day, because it was like because

Matthew:

they only had six hundred days.

Dave:

It's not I am not Not even for that reason. Think it's just like like like what a rip off of D and D. You know, it's TNT. They're not even trying to, you know, hide the fact that they're ripping off D and D back in the day. But that was just how I felt about it when I was 14 years old, and I never never played it.

Dave:

So just looking here.

Matthew:

So

Dave:

So the city

Matthew:

£7,000 has been raised for it at the time of recording. So, you know, it's well broken its its goal. What were you about to say?

Dave:

They're saying here they've there's a a source book called Hazar City of a Thousand Guilds, with contributions from RPG luminaries such as Jonathan Hicks, Gareth Anrahan, Brian Yaksha, Nick Spensan, many, many more. So it looks like maybe they've they've done what we did with Toto and asked some excellent writers to

Matthew:

To to join in.

Dave:

In a contribution. Didn't ask me, bastards, but yeah.

Matthew:

No. You're excellent. You you you sell yourself excellent writers.

Dave:

I'm only a multiple award winning writer, aren't I? You know, after all. So

Matthew:

Yeah. But you're just a hack.

Dave:

I'm not I'm not bitter or anything, you know. Fuckers. Yeah. Anyway, yes. So there it is.

Dave:

It's doing really well. It's got twenty three days to go. It's it's blown past its goal already, as I guess probably we should have expected. It's an interesting one, because again, just looking at the artwork, the artwork is very nice. I like it.

Dave:

I love the cover artwork of the giant frost giant thing, which looks really cool. It's quite a childish art style.

Matthew:

Cartoony is the right Cartoony. For there.

Dave:

Yeah. But also, yeah, a bit a bit childish in that sense. So I wonder if they are targeting a younger gaming audience, which is great, if that's what they're doing, rather than an older an older customer base, perhaps. But

Matthew:

Yeah. Interestingly, I just you know, when you search it on Kick Starter, you come up with a, I think, one of the last times it was revived on Kick Starter, which is on 2021, when it was being called Deluxe Tunnels and Trolls and it was being kick started by a chap called Richard Loomis. And that is a more, shall I say OSR style illustration. So what I like about this cartoony childish, maybe, but more professional look that Rebellion had brought to the table. But given they are the publishers of various computer games and 2,000 AD, it's good to expect They've got some lovely handle lovely artists on hand to

Dave:

do it. And you'd you'd expect a production value, wouldn't you? So

Matthew:

Yeah. They does look lovely. There's a lovely if you're into deluxe editions, there's a lovely a really what I think is a really good deluxe edition that I mean, I'm not kick starting this, but I might be tempted for the deluxe cover on this one, which is very unusual for me.

Dave:

Okay. I was just just looking down to try and find a little bit about the mechanics. So it is a dice pull system, d six dice pull. You run a number of dice equal to your relevant attribute and score hits against a target number. Every four plus, it says, is a hit, and matching results explode to make your dice pool even bigger.

Dave:

Okay. Don't Yeah. Doesn't really understand how that works, but but, yeah, d six dice pool, basically. Yeah. Which is which is fine.

Dave:

I like d six dice pools.

Matthew:

Cool. We all do like we we do like d c d six dice pools. Anyway, we will put a link in the show notes and there is still the best part of a month to Yeah.

Dave:

Three

Matthew:

weeks. Breakfast. You're interested. Yeah. Cool.

Matthew:

And it's in the Rebellion Unplugged brand because obviously Rebellion is the brand for games that you have to plug in because they're computer games. It's all simple really when you think about it.

Dave:

I have to say, mean it does look quite I mean, looking through it now, I am becoming slightly tempted slightly tempted to back it. We'll see.

Matthew:

We'll It does look lovely. I mean, there it is.

Dave:

That front cover. That's that that front cover, the just like the the icy blue and white is is nice is a nice, stunning, impactful cover, and I do like that very much. Yeah. I probably won't.

Matthew:

The graphic design here is lovely.

Dave:

Yeah. I agree.

Matthew:

Yeah. Just need to encourage Andrew, who I think has backed this, not to cancel his pledge as he often does for Kickstarters. Yeah. Mentioning no names. Right.

Matthew:

Okay. He can back it, and then we can have a look at his copy and maybe buy it to the shop if it's lovely. But, you know, it's another fantasy game, and we don't need another fantasy game.

Dave:

No. No. We don't.

Matthew:

I've got more fantasy well, I've got one fantasy game that I really want to play, and I've got more games to run than running Forbidden Lands.

Dave:

But

Matthew:

Yeah. Forbidden Lands will take me to my grave, I think. Although, even the dice look good, though.

Dave:

I know. I know. Is quite tempting. Again, it's it's it's something that would look nice on the shelf. It would be interesting to have a look through it from a kind of professional curiosity and collector point of view.

Dave:

Yeah. But I need more shelf space. I have so little shelf space.

Matthew:

And money, Dave. And money.

Dave:

Well, and money. Yeah. Yeah. That's a good point. Yeah.

Matthew:

But I've got because I love I so as I say, I'm not usually into the deluxe covers, but I'm loving the look of these deluxe covers. And there's a picture here way down the sheet of, like, three deluxe books that the core book, and I'm guessing a couple of adventure or campaigns. Hazar, the city of a thousand guilds

Dave:

Yeah. And

Matthew:

something else, the town of Gullet and the petrified throne. And those three ornate metal foil design, They look gorgeous. I don't need them. I don't need them. I don't want them.

Matthew:

But

Dave:

my god. Yeah. Look quite nice, don't they?

Matthew:

I've got a bit of FOMO over this. Moving on. Should I just move on quickly?

Dave:

Yeah. Let's move on quickly. Yeah. Yeah. What's next?

Dave:

What's next?

Matthew:

The next in the list is Public Access, which is on Kickstarter two.

Dave:

Okay.

Matthew:

Now, this is a I'm gonna I'm gonna say a thing. I've mentioned how old you are, Dave. And obviously, I am a little

Dave:

bit older. Even older.

Matthew:

And feel that we slightly missed out on the found footage horror boom of you know, that we would have, I'm sure, been all over in our teens and early twenties had we been in our teens and early twenties at that time. Stuff like The Blair Witch Project and Cloverfield.

Dave:

Cloverfield. Yeah.

Matthew:

And public access is is trying to recreate that sort of feeling in a role playing game. It uses the as they I think they call it carved in brindlewood. So the detective system from the game Brindlewood Bay. I can't think of what which is kind of like a miss Marple or murder she wrote little old ladies solving murders game. It's one of the ones where effectively, as players, you create the boulder.

Matthew:

You know, you decide what happened. The GM doesn't know what happened. As as players, you all come together and say, ah, this is this is how the murder took place, and this is the guilty customer. I think. I've never actually played Viddlabay or any of those.

Matthew:

But that is the feeling I get from this write up. It again, talking of nice design, it looks lovely from that found footage style way of doing things. Yeah. And it's on Kickstarter. Do we need to send any more?

Dave:

Probably not. It's not grabbing me from having a quick look at the Kickstarter. But, yeah, I've I'm starting to sound like you when you can't think of something to say, and I'm going the whole time. No. Let's leave it there.

Dave:

Have you

Matthew:

got pleasure No. No. No. I can always think of something to say. When I when I make that noise, it's because I can't remember the word I was looking for.

Dave:

Happens a lot.

Matthew:

Might do. Might do.

Dave:

It's doing it's doing very well. I mean, they've got they've they've got got well, indeed, three weeks left to go. They've they've already got £226,000 pledged. 3,600 backers. So well done to the Gauntlet Gaming community, which is the the people behind this.

Matthew:

Yeah. Cool. Blimming jumped up podcast.

Dave:

Yeah. I know. Be the thought, Right. What what we got next then?

Matthew:

Hold on. My screen has gone blank again. It keeps thinking we're not working. The end? Alright.

Matthew:

This is a Trending. Yeah. So this is from somebody who we've had on the show, the lovely Christopher Gray. We had him on the show a while back talking about his year zero Indiana Jones with the

Dave:

Yes. What was it called?

Matthew:

Temples and

Dave:

That's it. Temples and something.

Matthew:

Yeah. Temples and tombs, I think. Yeah. Tombs and temples. And this is a project that he's involved in.

Matthew:

I don't know what it is though. Look at look at the kit. We will put a link in the show notes. Look at the Kickstarter. It it appears to be a film and and an RPG.

Matthew:

It's not a yet zero RPG.

Dave:

They describe it as a companion role playing game to go along with the what I guess is a short movie, a short film. There's quite a lot

Matthew:

of those around. I'm guessing it's given given the budget for it of £1,500

Dave:

I know.

Matthew:

It's gotta be a bloody short movie. Yeah. So, yeah, I'm kind of intrigued. I have backed a friend of mine kick started his student film. The son, I should say, of a friend of mine kick started his student film a while ago.

Matthew:

And I backed that more out of loyalty to my friend. Yeah. Although, did back it at a level that got me some special rewards.

Dave:

Okay. Cool.

Matthew:

And in fact, I was promised a reward that I never got. Uh-huh. Matthew, if you're listening to this episode, which you're not. But if you're listening to this episode, I am still waiting for my fabulous illustration of a flying brewery. Don't ask.

Dave:

No. I wasn't I was tempted to, but then I went, nah. I won't. It's fine.

Matthew:

So one of the things he did, as part of his campaign, he said, here's a competition. Send me an idea, and the winning one, I will draw. I sent him a scene actually from the D and D campaign that I was in at the time, which was, in fact, the climactic moment of the D and D campaign where we attacked the bad guys in our flying brewery, don't ask, And my naked barbarian my naked elf barbarian killed the dragon with his fancy sword. It was all it was all great. And I described this in such detail, really, as a joke, because there's no possible way you could draw all the detail I put into this.

Matthew:

He said, oh, I've gotta do that. I will draw that.

Dave:

Right. But he

Matthew:

never drew it for some reason, because maybe I described something that's pretty much impossible to draw, but never mind. Anyway, that's by the by. So, I'm sure his movie, which is a short fifteen minute thing, cost, you know, he was kick starting more than £1,500. Yeah.

Dave:

Now, the interesting thing the about this right equipment, you can do these things pretty cheaply nowadays, can't you? I mean, just with a decent phone, people seem to be making some of these videos.

Matthew:

Oh, yeah. Yeah. The tech is there. But, you know, it's a

Dave:

horrible film. What

Matthew:

Yeah. What's the budget for the blood and stuff like that?

Dave:

Yeah. Yeah.

Matthew:

True. True. And it's Cthulhu esque. So, you know, if it hasn't got great Cthulhu rising from the ocean, then

Dave:

Then, well, yeah, then what's the point kind of thing? Yeah.

Matthew:

So, anyway, 1,500. It's not even at its 1,500 goal yet, and it's halfway through its campaign. So I'm not convinced it's necessarily going to succeed, but I'm gonna tell people to take a look at it and if you can work what it's about, tell us.

Dave:

Like I say, it might simply be that someone is is making a movie and thought, it'll be fun to have a little role playing game out of this.

Matthew:

You mean the the money for the movie is somewhere else and

Dave:

Potentially, I guess. I don't I don't know, really. Yeah. But they say that that if you're looking in the text, it says the game's already finished, and the movie's already in production. So they've obviously got some funds already.

Dave:

I mean, I guess, you know, sometimes you'll do a a Kickstarter, you know, less to to garner the money to do it, but more to garner some attention and publicity.

Matthew:

Yeah. It does say up to this point, The End is Trending has been entirely self funded, powered by sheer willpower, practical effects ingenuity, and the passion of our incredible Los Angeles cast and crew. Cool. Why are we kick start why are we crowdfunding? Because making a movie is a marathon, and we're entering the final most critical sprint post production marketing and distribution.

Matthew:

So that's effectively

Dave:

Yeah.

Matthew:

What you're paying for.

Dave:

Getting enough money

Matthew:

to Cool. Finish it a look at it. Take a look at it. And contributions to this project at the higher tiers are a 100% tax deductible. So that depends, obviously, which tax jurisdiction you pay your tax in.

Matthew:

Yeah. Will say. I will

Dave:

warn people.

Matthew:

Anyway, I I thought it was an interesting thing from a friend of the show, so let's include it in the world of gaming. This is a marathon world of gaming.

Dave:

This is a marathon, isn't it? Go on. So

Matthew:

Fairy Quest. Quest? This is also on Kickstarter. Now, we know nothing about this game. I'm only including it because this morning, as I was writing this here running order, we got a message on our Discord from one of our compatriots and patrons, Clint, who said, oh, does anybody know anything about this game?

Matthew:

The answer, Clint, is no.

Dave:

No. Well, that was good. Okay. Next?

Matthew:

No. Let's just take a little bit. So if you're looking for a game to play with your kids, Fairy Quest is in that genre. Yeah. Alongside No Thank You Evil, which is, I think, the one that I'd point to now.

Matthew:

It was it didn't exist when I was role playing with my kids when they were very small. But I think it is the one I'd point to now as a go to game to play with kids for various reasons, partly because it is a box set with counters and stuff like that. So to a game to a kid who's got a very limited idea of what a game is and might be expecting something more board gamey, it kind of fits in there. Yeah. But that's not what we're talking about.

Matthew:

Here we're talking about Fairy Quest. This is out of Italy. There's a thriving game community in Italy. A little bit insular, I sometimes think, but they're obviously going to be doing this in English because they want to break out of that. We've seen lots of great games come out of Italy.

Matthew:

But this may well have been developed and be really popular in Italy before this Kickstarter. So so there it is.

Dave:

It looks lovely. It's got a very, very nice look and feel. The art style is is really charming, and I I like it very much. Yeah. Apparently, illustrated by a renowned children's illustrator called Marty Mentor.

Dave:

I've never heard of them. But, yeah, that art style is just is, you know, is very, very nice.

Matthew:

It does look like a storybook,

Dave:

doesn't it? It does. Yeah. Yeah. But I think I think it's yeah.

Dave:

I mean, they say, Faerie Quest isn't just a simplified RPG. It's a book created for children. One of the things that makes the project truly unique is its visual identity. So there I mean, yeah, it probably is a simplified RPG, frankly, but with a lovely look and feel to make it look like a storybook. It looks good.

Dave:

It looks nice. I won't be backing it. It's not my kind of thing.

Matthew:

We don't have kids, you and I. Well, we do have kids, but

Dave:

We they're do grown kids, not not little ones. They buy

Matthew:

their own RPGs now.

Dave:

But it looks lovely. Halfway towards this goal with thirty days to go. So hopefully hopefully, they'll do well. But

Matthew:

Yes. It's already got twice as many back as as the end is trending, I notice.

Dave:

Mhmm.

Matthew:

And still a whole month to go. So, yeah. Check it out. Link to the show now. If you've got little kids, check it out especially for that.

Dave:

I think it's interesting, actually, because just to finish off on there, Douglas, one of our friends and patrons, does a lot of role playing with with

Matthew:

With school kids. Yeah.

Dave:

With young people. And I think he tends to be teenage

Matthew:

children. Yeah. He's got two different age groups he

Dave:

works with. So might be a bit beyond them. But it might work perfectly for for someone who who's got slightly younger children, either as a teacher or a teaching assistant or whatever. Youth youth club, you know, worker. Oh, yeah.

Dave:

For for those kind of for those kind of things. So I know Morgan, my my eldest son, he's a teacher. He runs a role playing club with he's at secondary school again, so this wouldn't be probably appropriate for him. But it would be perfect for those that that younger sort of late late primary kind of age, if you want to.

Matthew:

Yeah. No. You're you're right there. Actually, I think it could be a great tool for teachers. Yeah.

Matthew:

I Absolutely. Know, we had to be the weirdos at our school.

Dave:

Yeah. Exactly.

Matthew:

Who who who did it, you know, outside school hours. But actually, I think there's a lot to learn from a carefully run, if you like, formal teaching session involving role playing games. And this might be perfect at that. Yeah. As you say, primary school, which is 11 age group, might be really, really good for that.

Matthew:

Yeah.

Dave:

Cool.

Matthew:

Okay. Next on the list. Oh, god. Trudevang. There's too much in this bloody world of gaming.

Matthew:

But at least

Dave:

We can be quick.

Matthew:

So

Dave:

Trudevang has made a million.

Matthew:

Yeah. We were pleasantly surprised by the success that Trudevang has shown. It is, I think, I'd love to see the breakdown of where those, where that backing came from. Because I imagine a huge amount came from Scandinavia because, you know, there was a whole generation of people who effectively weren't necessarily served by Dragonbane when that was socialist, even though that's their game, because the Dragonbane they knew sorry. The Draka Oktymona that they knew was set in the world of Thudvang.

Matthew:

But

Dave:

And we said before, it looks lovely. We had a bit of a conversation about this last couple of episodes, and, you know, speculating that, like you said, that there's a whole community out there, which there obviously is, seeing how well it's been

Matthew:

backed,

Dave:

who were just crying out for Trudhvang, which is perhaps a slightly more mature approach to to the Drucker Oktemorner story, as it were.

Matthew:

Yes. You mentioned earlier in relation to Tunnels and Trolls how the illustration style seemed to be targeting a particular, shall we say, family audience for that. And I wondered Yeah. Whether Dragonbane was doing the same thing Yep. In a way.

Dave:

But, yeah, it looks great. And, no, congratulations to that. It's really good. Again, I'm not gonna pick it up. I'm I'm not likely to ever run Dragonbane, but I should look forward to having a good look at it when we get it on the stand.

Matthew:

Yeah. Yeah.

Dave:

Yeah. Congratulations, Freely. Well done.

Matthew:

So we won't put a link to that in the show notes. It's already done. You know, you can do your late pledges or whatever. You find it yourself. There there's plenty of other stuff to pledge here.

Matthew:

Yeah. While we're on the subject of feeling though, there was a lovely article about the year zero engine in Trendy. One might even say woke gaming, online gaming magazine, rascal. And it was from an author who said Right. I don't play trad games anymore.

Matthew:

But when I do play trad games, the one I play, my favorite, is the Zero engine. Which we will put a link to in the show notes. It is behind Rascal's pay perimeter. So I think you can buy individual articles, but you may also want to consider subscribing to Rascal. I know I did.

Dave:

Yeah. So I haven't read it because I don't subscribe to Rascal. So did you say that we get a mention in there somewhere?

Matthew:

We get a mention in there. Yes.

Dave:

And what are they saying about us?

Matthew:

Well, you you can find that in our World of Gaming article where I clipped out the bit they think. So one of the one of the advantages he says of Year Zero, although it took a bit of time, and indeed, somebody not too far away from the desk that I was sitting at, in fact, sitting right at this desk, suggested that they should do a open gaming license for it. That's fine. You said, although it took some time for the open gaming license to appear, it appeared, and there've been some interesting stuff come out. It says, and I quote here, it took Free League a while, but they eventually released a system reference document that has led to some interesting third party products.

Matthew:

And first, first in the list, mark you, Tales of the Old West, broadly about, and I quote, the Old West does a pretty good job of decentering the cowboys and native storyline. Still colonialist as hell, but then again, that's the Old West for you. No It is higher praise could be given.

Dave:

Yeah. Cool.

Matthew:

And then he goes on to talk about an interesting Cthulhu game, actually, I haven't heard before, where you you play the elder gods and something else. Oh, Tunnels and Trolls not Tunnels and Trolls. Temples and Tombs, I think, is in there as well.

Dave:

Oh, okay. Cool.

Matthew:

So yeah. Cool. Nice little write up. I slightly disagreed with him on a thing he said about he didn't like Coriolis. It could the Third Horizon because of darkness points, which, you know, is the clunkiest part.

Matthew:

But he kinda said there's no incentive to either spend them or earn them. Well, I mean,

Dave:

yes there is.

Matthew:

Well, the the earning them or the giving them to the GM, there's plenty of incentive for that, which is, you know, the tendency of the game to tend towards failure in probability, unless you re roll. The issue then is the GM has loads, and it's hard to spend them unless he throws them away on trivial shit like I do. So

Dave:

Well, that that is that is true. But then it's Yeah. Yeah. It's incumbent upon the GM to try and spend them imaginatively. But also, I think there is definitely something about taking so I I use black glass beads for my darkness points, and I have a a beautiful old old, not old, but old for me Brass bowl.

Dave:

Brass bowl I got from I was given from the Greeks when I was working out there as a as a gift. And it makes the most brilliant clang, resounding clang when you drop a darkness point on it. And that is a really good moment in the game, particularly if if the darkness point is being is being raised by something that they haven't when they haven't pushed a roll. So they just suddenly hear this ding. It's like, okay.

Dave:

And almost like, you know, the atmosphere is crackling, and they're sensing there's something happening. And it work it's lovely. I love it. It's a real so there's so much that you can make with it. I do accept the the criticisms of it, and I think it can be difficult for for some GMs to get a a grip on.

Dave:

But actually, it really offers some really good stuff if you if you, as a GM, take the time to try and work out how you're gonna use it.

Matthew:

Yeah. I mean, in summary, actually, just to vaguely contradict the thing you said, I don't raise darkness points by something that the players don't know about.

Dave:

I think Because I've booked

Matthew:

so many darkness points, I give them back to the players, put them back in the pool, occasionally without telling them what I'm paying for. That effect, the thing that they see I'm spending darkness points, makes them think that I've got something shitty going down. Yeah. Even if I haven't.

Dave:

Even when you haven't. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. So that is a good use of darkness points. You know, you're raising the tension without telling them how you're raising the tension.

Dave:

You just raise the tension by saying taking a couple of darkness points and they go, okay, what's going on there? No.

Matthew:

And generally, you have so many that, you know, I'll do it for, you know, a little bit of a mid chore strike or something. There's a darkness point. Anything at all that could be bad luck, even if it isn't, I give them a darkness point, and they realize maybe that could have been worse than it was. Yeah. Anyway, they were not talking about that till maybe next week, for reasons we'll come on to.

Matthew:

Where are we? The think that's about it.

Dave:

To the end of the world again. That a bumper.

Matthew:

That didn't I say didn't I say? Best part.

Dave:

Yes. We have that much to talk about this week, but here we go.

Matthew:

Right. So we've got six minutes then to talk about our topic, which

Dave:

is Well, minus minus

Matthew:

seven if we

Dave:

yeah. Minus seven if we're gonna hit our forty five minute target. Yeah.

Matthew:

Okay. So I've just I've just got a little flag there to say we're moving on. Alien. Writing for Alien Evolved, Dave.

Dave:

Come on then.

Matthew:

We're both doing that at the moment.

Dave:

We are, but The difference

Matthew:

is you're doing it and getting paid for it. I'm doing it out of the kindness of my heart, which I feel has gone wrong somewhere, but there we go.

Dave:

I I I So what

Matthew:

are you writing, Dave? Can can you now admit what you're writing?

Dave:

I don't know. I I haven't seen anything official on it. Mean, everyone knows what it is.

Matthew:

Let me just say, you you're working on a secret project. Coincidentally, we're aware of a space trucker supplement being announced as forthcoming from Was it? I haven't seen the announcement. Briefly? Okay.

Matthew:

Oh, I I think Where did I don't know. Maybe not. Anyway Yeah.

Dave:

They've always talked

Matthew:

about It's rumored. Rumored at the very least, if not now.

Dave:

I think in the core book, it does say fourth you know, in a future space trucker book. Yeah. So I think, you know, the fact that there's a space trucker book in in the pipeline is probably not a secret.

Matthew:

He's That is a pertinent fact. And entirely unrelatedly, you're being paid to do something. Is that is that what you're saying at

Dave:

the moment? I'm not sure that my me working on a particular product is a secret in itself either. But, yeah. So I'm so I'm currently working on something related to space and trucking. Yeah.

Dave:

It's yeah. It's it's quite different to what you've been doing because this is a much more traditional commission. I am writing the campaign for the for the space trucking book, The and and the background to the campaign, and then there's stuff that will be in the book, which I'm contributing to because that'll be part of the campaign as well. But it's a very traditional campaign setup, doing the background, getting the NPCs in place, and then writing the seven trucking jobs that your players will will will play through in the same way that you had seven expeditions in Building Better World and seven missions in the The Colonial Book.

Matthew:

The Colonial Book.

Dave:

Yeah. Yeah. So it's it's the same setup. It's the same approach. There's a bigger story behind the specifics of what you might be seeing in any given job.

Dave:

There's plenty of stuff about how to make the campaign bigger. So, you know me, I like a sandbox campaign. I try and give as many tools as I can to encourage GMs to, you know, run side plots, do extra missions, do other stuff that fits their campaign in between the published jobs that they'll have. So hopefully, there's plenty in there to make it a really big, expansive campaign for for for space trucking in Alien. But that is, I think, quite different to the challenge that you'd been given.

Dave:

And I suspect you're finding it's taking a lot longer to write than you'd you'd anticipated.

Matthew:

Oh, yes. Oh, yes. Is

Dave:

often Would the

Matthew:

you care about that mucked off that I just had?

Dave:

Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. Yeah.

Matthew:

So yeah. A little bit of feedback here. So UK Games Expo contacted Anna at Free League saying, oh, you know, we like the Dragonbane tournament. Could we do something else this year? At that time, for some reason, Anna was thinking, oh, maybe we wouldn't do a Dragonbane tournament this year.

Matthew:

Maybe we could do something for, you know, a relatively newer game like the new edition of Alien. And I was roped into the conversation and said, oh, yeah. You know, we could we could do, like, a multi table competition version of the game that you and I, Dave, have already written. Yeah. Hadley's Hope.

Matthew:

Last Hope. What is it called? No. It's called

Dave:

Hope's Last Day.

Matthew:

Hope's Last Day.

Dave:

Thank you very much. And with poor memory issues.

Matthew:

And UK Games Expo weren't that keen on, you know, making an event out of an adventure that's been out for five blooming years or longer. And in fact, was first run at UK Games Expo in a slightly different form.

Dave:

Seven seven years ago. That was twenty nineteen we did that.

Matthew:

Bloody hell. Seven years ago. It's crazy, isn't it? Yeah. I know.

Matthew:

People say this new edition has come out too soon.

Dave:

Yeah. Well

Matthew:

And and so somehow, I found myself volunteering to write a new adventure for this and to make it an epic adventure, which is to say a multi table adventure where everybody's effectively in the same setting. Doing different teams but on on the same vessel. And then it was at Dragon Meet last year. You and I were relaxing in the bar, and we talked about my initial ideas and came up with a pretty solid plan, which we called All Hands On Deck. Yeah.

Matthew:

Featuring the last days of the HMS Yamato, which is the the the spaceship we created for this podcast at

Dave:

some point

Matthew:

in the

Dave:

past. Ages of them. Yeah.

Matthew:

Never actually did anything with, so I thought, well, you know, let's let's let's blow it up here.

Dave:

Yep. Sounds a good idea.

Matthew:

Now, I'm not gonna I'm not gonna and I think you you you've read an early draft of this. Yep. And I've since play tested it. And I have now completed it and sent a copy to to UK Games Expo for them to look at.

Dave:

Have you am

Matthew:

not gonna say

Dave:

Act two as well now? Have you finished Act two?

Matthew:

Act two is in there. Yes. As well. Cool. Excellent.

Matthew:

Which Good I want to talk about because that proved to be a big problem before the playtest. I thought I'd solved it with the playtest, and then I realised there were big problems after the playtest as well. And that has taken some time to sort. So I'm not gonna and I plead with you not to reveal too much about

Dave:

Yeah. Yeah. I won't. I won't. No.

Matthew:

About the adventure. But let us at least say that, yes, there are xenomorphs involved, and there is a threat. So what we've said on the blurb is that things have gone wrong on HMS Yamato. You have to investigate why they've gone wrong. That's pretty much it.

Matthew:

Probably prepare them because I think I've said even there that, you know, life support's gone. You're all, you know, the air you're breathing is what's left the system and if you don't fix it all soon, then you won't be breathing it much longer. So we are looking at a format where there are gonna be 12 GMs, 12 tables, and I will say these are all sold out already. So if you're excited by this and thinking, I'm gonna do UK games, suppose, let me book on to that. You can't unless there's anybody drops out, I guess.

Dave:

Your yeah. You could get yourself on get yourself on the waiting list.

Matthew:

Yeah. 12 GMs, d players, all on the same ship trying to repair it while

Dave:

At the same time.

Matthew:

Yep. Well, alien threats, shall we say, are aboard the ship as well, making things difficult. So I sent a really early, straight off the out of my fevered mind typos and everything over to you to look at. Yep. And you came back with some useful advice.

Matthew:

Obviously, a whole bunch of typos that you fixed, but also the useful advice yeah. But you haven't told the GMs what that actually meant to do. Which is right. Because of course, with this stuff, you know, I mean, I don't know whether it's writing for presentation to another GM and writing for yourself is a very different thing. That when you write for yourself I mean, very rarely, you know me, I make up adventures.

Matthew:

I wing it nine times. I I have the briefest scratched lines of, oh, I think this might happen to this adventure. Isn't this a good idea? Maybe some stats. And that's about it.

Matthew:

And then we sit around a table and I play off what you, the players, do. And it's all great. And and then sometimes I write it up afterwards having having, you know, having learned some stuff from what players tend to do. But this time, you know, I couldn't do that. Needed something a bit more formal than that.

Matthew:

So I wrote it all out. The key thing is actually creating a map that everybody can be on and yet not come across each other because Mhmm. Yeah. Well, it this is the first decision to make is how much interaction between tables do you want? If you've got 12 tables and they're in the same, shall we say, shared space, how much interaction can there be?

Matthew:

And that's that's a thing that you've got to work out. Now in this one, my solution Sorry. Is every

Dave:

Go ahead, Dave. I'll just go. That's a really big challenge for a game like this. Not only, actually, how does it work in game terms. So when you're writing it and you think, okay, well, this table can get a message to this table.

Dave:

Oh, yeah. That's great. Here's the message, whatever. You've then got to work out how logistically that actually happens during the day because that, you know, that's gonna be a real issue of who sent what message to what table, and how do you, as the overseeing GM, you know, the fat controller, how do you keep track of that and where each story is going? So it's it's that's a huge challenge, actually.

Matthew:

So I think I may have solved that by putting everybody on a different deck. So Yep. They're all on a different deck. They've each got an objective on their deck. But then there's a thing about how do you given that this is a kind of a competition, how do you make every challenge different enough that everybody feels they're doing a different thing and they're not just all doing the same thing at the same time and effectively it's a race.

Matthew:

If you if you're all at the table and you're all on this thing, then how do you do that? And then how do you make the challenge they do to get to that objective and complete that objective roughly equal so that one objective isn't that much easier than everything else, and that team sort of automatically win because they had an easier time of it. That Yeah. That has proved to be a challenge. I'm gonna I'm I'm gonna do a spoiler for that one.

Matthew:

Every deck is broadly the same. Every map is broadly the same, except the thing that you need to fix is always in the last room or the last room but one of all the maps. So Yeah. You've gotta go through the same map to get to the thing you need to fix.

Dave:

Yeah.

Matthew:

So that that that was the first of the easiest problem to solve. But then then actually, I redrew that map. It feels to me over this last month well, no, over this last three months because I started drawing the maps beforehand. Again and again and again. I don't know how many times I've redrawn them.

Matthew:

I think I now have the final version, which you haven't seen. I've shared some with you with the draft, and then I realized well and what I shared with you was the first act effectively. Yes. Yeah. And I at that point, when I shared it with you, I hadn't even I ain't got some vague ideas about the second act.

Matthew:

We all had some vague ideas about the second And here's here's the other challenge. The other big challenge for an alien game. In the alien game, everybody's meant to die. Mhmm. That suggests that a group of players if if we're we're only doing two acts here, one longer than the other.

Matthew:

So if you like, it's two first acts rolled or the first act is effectively two acts rolled into one and then it's a climactic second act. So the bulk of the playing happens in the first act. But you might well then expect most of the players in any particular table to be dead by the end of the first act, or at least a good proportion of them. Are they just gonna sit out while the other players go on to the second act? This was my first idea when we were talking after the Dragon meet.

Matthew:

I was saying, maybe it doesn't matter. Maybe, you know, you you score points for dying so your team benefit through your death and then you sit back and watch the survivors regroup and do the final act together in, or the final act around a smaller number of tables. But that bugged me. That has been bugging me all the time because, you know, as you pointed out at the time, think, yeah, but everybody's paid the same amount of money and they're all looking for, you know, broadly speaking, three to four hours gaming. And if you're depriving them of you know, we can make the second app really short, like it's only twenty minutes.

Matthew:

But actually, we know that's not gonna happen. Write something that's gonna last twenty minutes and they'll take an hour to do it. That's just players for you. So if we're we're gonna say, well, second app may go on as long as an hour, that's an awful lot of sitting around watching a bunch of people have fun.

Dave:

Anyway was a challenge. I mean, you could you could have managed that. I think the way I was thinking, you managed that by, like we talked about, front loading the first act very heavily. So everyone gets the first act even if they die at the end of it. And then you make it clear to them that some of you you know, the game is the first three hours.

Dave:

Some of you will survive and get onto the fourth. But I do take your point that that that that might disappoint some people who die at the last moment or who Yeah.

Matthew:

Even then, I feel

Dave:

Yeah.

Matthew:

That wasn't a good thing to do.

Dave:

So For like you say, for a paid event, that that doesn't feel great. Yeah.

Matthew:

Yeah. Yeah. And and luckily, we've got a we've got a perfect thing here, and that's called hypersleep. We've got a crew of of of sailors in hypersleep. And so we can pull spare characters out on every single deck.

Matthew:

So I'm gonna go with that with an issue. There's another threat that you know Dave and nobody else knows and it's a secret until the adventure. But what we've got instead is an incentive to form two teams in terms of the third act. So or for the second act, which is effectively a third act to this. So after the first act, you are gonna find yourself on one side or the other, and then you regroup.

Matthew:

So it's still the same number of players. Maybe some of them have got new characters. That's fine. If but some proportion of them will be on one team, and some proportion of them will be on another team. That no matter which team you started in, you'll divide yourself between two by the time person Yeah.

Matthew:

And so then there's a bit of table swapping there where if the majority of your table are on one team and you're the only singleton not on that team, you'll move to another table where there are people like minded. And then there are two objectives which I think I can share in that one team are trying to destroy the ship and the other team are trying to save it. And I have some objectives to make that happen, which I'm not going to go into detail now because that is the plot of the second act. And therefore whichever team you started on is still collecting the points that you earned during that thing. So if we imagine there's 12 teams on for every deck, you know.

Matthew:

If you started on deck three and your team is the deck three team, then even after the split up where you might be doing you know, you've joined another team, your objectives are now on a different deck entirely, The points you earn during that go towards the total score for the deck three team. So they will be the winners. And the points you earn can be if you're on the if you're on the team that destroys the ship and the ship blows up, hooray. Three points to you or whatever. Three points to your original team.

Matthew:

And if you're on the team that's not destroyed the ship, that's trying to save it, and you save it, whooey, you get three points. So that's that's the the thing I've worked at. But this way, everybody still gets to play for the full length of time.

Dave:

Yeah. Even

Matthew:

if they find themselves having to change sides.

Dave:

Yeah. Cool. Yeah.

Matthew:

So then there's agendas as well, which I was so pleased you did that article on agendas last time because I feel I've made them properly thematic. You did you see those agendas in your version in the version

Dave:

of the didn't slide? Think I did. No.

Matthew:

Have I not done those yet? Alright. Okay. I'll share them with you. Well, in fact, you Cool.

Matthew:

You'll still get access to the documents.

Dave:

It's on the same change now. Yeah. I'll have a look. Yeah.

Matthew:

There's that. Yeah. So but then, then I did all that. I played well, I sat down to playtest it. And I thought, oh, crikey.

Matthew:

The rules have all changed. So Yeah. They haven't all changed, but they've definitely been tweaked. And I thought you will have been dealing with this as well. So what do what what do you think are the most impactful changes in the in the evolved edition of The Wolves?

Dave:

Well, it's a good question, because I haven't played it yet. I haven't run it yet. I'm hoping that I might do later this week. Obviously, the the the kind of the key change or one of the biggest changes is the the change from panic alone, you now have a stress response and a panic response. And the stress response is a yeah.

Dave:

It fills the gap that people called out in the original Alien, where you might gain stress for something quite mundane, or you might be trying to do something relatively mundane, but you push the roll and you gain stress. And then you get a panic roll, and suddenly you're frozen or you're catatonic from, I don't know, having dropped a bottle or something. It doesn't know, it didn't really make a lot of sense. So that that gap has been filled by the stress response. So you can still have a negative outcome, but it's not going off the end of the scale in a in a way that doesn't make a lot of sense.

Dave:

And then you've got the panic response still for those occasions where you are being chased down by a xenomorph or something similar is going on, and you can get those more extreme panic outcomes. So again, I I haven't quite worked out yet how that plays at the table. I need to do that before I I run the game. But that's that's kind of the the number one biggest change that I've I've noticed.

Matthew:

Yeah. The the way you

Dave:

manage Can I that just comment on

Matthew:

that one?

Dave:

The only the only other thing I was gonna say is you now have a a resolve stat. Yeah. And that is that helps you resist the effects of stress and panic.

Matthew:

Yes. That that this is the comment I wanted to make. Broadly speaking, the I feel Resolvestat kind of nerfs the panic.

Dave:

Okay.

Matthew:

So I wrote this expecting panic to happen quite a bit as it often does. It wasn't happening in the playtest. For me, it wasn't happening enough. People

Dave:

Right.

Matthew:

You know, people needed to get a lot more stress for panic to have an impact.

Dave:

Yeah. Okay.

Matthew:

A dramatic impact. So

Dave:

There is there is an easier way around that. Mhmm. And that was that was the thing that I made the mistake when I very first play tested Alien back in the day, and that is giving narrative stress. So as a GM, you can put your players in a situation and say, that's plus one stress because of what you've just seen. You couldn't avoid it.

Dave:

So you can control that. If you need your level of stress in in the on the Yamato to be greater early on in that first act, throw in a couple of things that gives them a point of stress or two. Or say that when all this starts out, they start with two stress or something.

Matthew:

Yeah. I think that's effectively so I've added more narrative stress in already. Yeah. I I I didn't do that before the playtest. So

Dave:

Well, the thing is, on on the original version, adding narrative stress had to be done really, really carefully. Yeah. Because otherwise, you very quickly had your runaway stress effect, and the players were then, you know, Because unable to do

Matthew:

of the way it played before, I generally, as a rule, didn't really add narrative stress. So I think I did. I think on the version you saw, I think there's one point of narrative stress you get Yeah. When there's a particular encounter, which some teams would have. There's gotta be more, basically, is my conclusion.

Matthew:

The I and I still I've added more in. I still think maybe I want to add more in. As you say, that sort of thing will you know, you've been woken from hypersleep before your time. You're already stressed. Here's a point or two.

Matthew:

Might well happen. Also, found the resolve thing was then effectively centering, you know, maybe because I didn't have enough, but there was hardly any extreme stress. Luckily, there is a factor where NPCs will have panic reactions, which, again, I'm I'm I'm not not revealing too much about because I don't want to spoil it Yep. That you encounter. So you have to deal with panicked NPCs.

Matthew:

And that actually that kind of worked better for our team. It it for team play, it made them feel competent and also up to the tension. And particularly when, you know, one NPC had the screen response, which, again, is a lovely one because that gives everybody else in hearing an extra point of stress. But in in my playtest, thought everybody was a bit too successful at managing stress. Now I think there were some things that I, you know, I was expecting to build in, and I think they may still be in there, but maybe actually, needs just to be taken out.

Matthew:

There's no real opportunity in the playtest for you to take a breather and manage stress that way your safe So, I think I may make that clear and explicit and say, this is all too quick. You can't do that.

Dave:

There's Yeah. That's that's probably that's probably a good idea because if you need stress to build to a certain level to make sure that bad things happen to some of those characters in the last within three hours of gameplay, you you don't want experienced players of Alien who would know we have to manage stress, saying, right. I'm gonna have a quick five minutes here, ref. You know, we're in this room. I'm gonna blockade the door, I'm gonna take a breather.

Dave:

And then, like you say, having stress not be a significant part of the rest of that act when you need it to be or when you know, because it's a a short, sharp one shot.

Matthew:

Yeah. The other thing, the stress response, I didn't play that correctly in the playtest, and I think that may also be a cure because, you know, there's some great stress responses that are you know, if you're jumpy, which is the the most basic stress response, then you take two level two stress points every time you push your dice and stuff like that. So I need to I need to remember that more and use that more is is gonna be the other conclusion. What was the other thing? Oh, yeah.

Matthew:

And the thing I didn't test, and I need to get my head around it some more, I didn't test it because the players just didn't do it in a stealthy way. Were very much saying, right. We haven't got time. We're not worrying about doing the the stealth mode bit. Yeah.

Matthew:

So

Dave:

Yeah. I was gonna mention stealth mode.

Matthew:

And that's been totally rewritten, and I haven't had a chance to see how that works in place. So I need to grok that. And I urge you, maybe if you're running it later this week, for you to make sure they have to do stealth mode so you can report back to me and tell me how it worked.

Dave:

Well, it's it's it's really funny, isn't it? Because stealth mode was something that I I

Matthew:

quite we all got rid of because it wasn't working.

Dave:

I quite quickly, as a GM, yeah, stopped using it because it was kind of unnecessary, and it was very short. Because as soon as you fail the roll, boom, the action happens. And, yeah, you fail a roll on the first or second roll, and it's so stealth mode wasn't really a thing. I haven't really looked into it in detail about how they've modified it. I know it's modified in order to take advantage of battle maps and the like to a greater effect, because obviously people like that.

Dave:

Mhmm. Your game presumably is gonna have battle maps and figures.

Matthew:

Well, I don't know. So yeah. That was the original intention, but I don't know whether we're gonna we've got time to get them actually made. So I'm not

Dave:

sure what we're gonna yeah.

Matthew:

Yeah. Yeah. And it

Dave:

wasn't because we're gonna be talking about Yeah. So talking about the campaign game with with Thomas, I was saying, well, presumably, you need me to create maps that are battle maps for the campaign. Mhmm. All that can

Matthew:

made into battle maps.

Dave:

Yeah. Well, it's interesting that his response was, now you're kind of doing the campaign thing, so do the maps as you've always done them. Whereas I think the battle map

Matthew:

The box set Approach.

Dave:

Will come

Matthew:

with the

Dave:

It's very much for is very much for cinematic box sets. Yeah. Absolutely.

Matthew:

I see.

Dave:

Which is which is interesting. So, again, I'm not in the position of having to do that for the campaign that I'm writing. Specifically, obviously, I'm creating stuff where stealth mode might be or should be relevant. But, like, yeah, I need to understand it because otherwise, it'd be quite easy for me just to discard it and fall back on my experience of running Alien as was. I need to run Alien as is, and that's my to make sure that I'm I'm catering for the all the changes to the rules, which there aren't that many.

Dave:

But things like stealth mode is a good example where they've definitely wanted to make it more of a thing in the game than than it has been.

Matthew:

So well, as I say, haven't managed to test it, and I haven't really got the rules for that reason. Whereas I do feel I've got a good handle on stress, and we need to adjust allocation of stress and make more narrative stress happen, I believe. Yeah. And maybe that is where we should conclude this episode, We

Dave:

could bang on for another half an hour, couldn't we? But yeah. We could. We have we have banged on already for a significant amount of time. But, yeah, so I'm looking you were hang on.

Dave:

You were gonna mention I'm not gonna let you go. You said the supply dial. What did you wanna say about the supply dial?

Matthew:

Right. Yeah. So the supply dial. That's a new feature. That is a new feature.

Matthew:

That's the other new rule, which I ended up totally ignoring. Then thinking, oh, well, actually, this may solve a problem I had in the second act. And then going, no, it doesn't. What is

Dave:

what so is there a new specific rule with it? With the Yes.

Matthew:

With the users? Okay. We've got a thing a bit like supply in in the great dark. It's not quite as abstracted out as as it is in the great dark, but there is a supply dial for you to knock down your air. And I thought it was gonna be a really useful thing in this game because you know life support isn't working so I I could imagine there being loads of situations and potentially there's things like radiation and stuff like that.

Matthew:

And I thought, oh, there's loads of ways I can use the supply dial. But I ended up not running it in the playtest partly because I've opened a box set and I was just scrambling around getting the contents of that box set together that I couldn't find the supply dial, which I've taken out somewhere, put together, and then put somewhere entirely. So I didn't use it in the playtest. And then when we were discussing how act two went in the playtest and how we could make it better, The I the idea of a countdown, first of all, came up for the players. And then I thought, oh, maybe this is where we could use the supply tile.

Matthew:

But then there's the problem, I feel, that you've got a bunch of tables who are all effectively counting down should be counting down at the same time. And you can't have a supply dial on every table at a different level, I thought, for this competition thing. In So, fact, I think the countdown happens, without giving too much away to our listeners, based on the actions that people take, and that will be a big countdown. And it's not actually about supply at all. It's about the number of objectives that you have to complete before you get your each of the two sides in this have got two objectives to complete that are kind of different.

Matthew:

And if they complete if you know? And to complete them, they need to do that a number of times, which is I've yet to work out or even leave flexible until the day, and we work out how many tables are each side or whatever. Anyway Yeah. That's by the by. But let's say, on the top of my head, you have to do one thing four times and well, you have to do two things, each of them four times on each of the teams.

Matthew:

So if you like, there are eight objectives. Eight eight things to count down and whoever

Dave:

You've got a mini mini objectives to do. Yeah.

Matthew:

Yeah. And whoever gets to that total of eight first, then either the shit blows up in marvellous glory.

Dave:

Right. Right. Right. Yep.

Matthew:

It doesn't blow up and goes on to explore in marvelous glory for And the winning those those those those two those eight stroke 16 things become the countdown. Yeah, I didn't find a use

Dave:

of the

Matthew:

countdown dial.

Dave:

But No. No. That's that's but so so I've been I've always been a bit a bit confused by the one supply dial that you get in the box set. It There are various

Matthew:

things you can count on it.

Dave:

It well, yeah, it made me think initially, oh, have they have they taken supply and done something to turn tracking your air, ammo, and power into one supply number?

Matthew:

Like they did in the Great Dark, for example.

Dave:

And it it it doesn't seem they have.

Matthew:

No.

Dave:

So actually, you need three supply dials per character. So for a standard group of five, you need 15 supply dials. So it kinda just seemed a bit to get one supply dial in without being offered the option of buying 15, and then they should each be because I think that's not a bad idea. At the table, if I had three supply dials, one one black for air, one blue for ammo, one red for power, whatever, that's a cool little thing. And I quite like that as a player.

Dave:

Think that would be fun. But they don't do that. You get one white one that do I use it for air or do I use it for power? And then how do you, Matthew, use it when your character yeah. It just doesn't get used, basically, then, in that sense.

Dave:

So I love the idea, but you need more of them.

Matthew:

Yes. That's precisely so I don't know, because because I was, you know, this was a kind of a last minute thing where suddenly thought, oh my god, no new rules. And I'm seeing them later on this morning to run the game. So I, you know, I speed read them, but that is the same conclusion I got to. And I thought, oh, that's not how I was expecting supply to work at all in this new version.

Matthew:

I may be wrong. I still hold the fact that you and I are wrong, and it is more like the Great Tark, but I

Dave:

I don't think think you've just been looking in the book. No. You've got you've got basically, they're now they've they've added ammo as a supply, which is cool. I like that. That's fine.

Dave:

I didn't mind the old way of doing it, that if you panicked when you were shooting, you basically emptied the clip. That was quite cool as well. But now it's a supply roll. I have to see how that works at the table, because then after you've fired a shot, do you have to make a supply roll every time? So that actually adds adds extra dice rolling every time you fire a gun.

Dave:

Yeah. But I'll I'll read the rules before I play test it and see what see what they're saying.

Matthew:

And also, it does that thing that when when your supply is high, you've got more chance of dropping it down low. But when you've got one dice, it's just only a one in six chance. Anyway, I yeah. I didn't use it purposely because I realized, oh, hold on. Well, two reasons.

Matthew:

A, it was complex, and b, I couldn't find the actual bloody supply dial. But I was, you know, I was willing to count them on a tally or whatever. But Yeah. In the end, I gave up on there. Then I thought it would be a useful way of counting down the final act.

Matthew:

But then I've I've even discounted it then.

Dave:

It it doesn't go high enough, does it? No. I love that idea for the final act though that that, you know, you could are you gonna have the score up on the screen or something?

Matthew:

Yeah. So the So if you can see how

Dave:

close the ship is to being destroyed. Because that'll be quite impactful, that would.

Matthew:

This is a touch on the on the messaging thing. I've done this conceit where shipboard comms isn't working very well, but you can effectively use Morse code to write a message of up to five words.

Dave:

That was it.

Matthew:

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And so those messages will hopefully appear on the screen as well. Right.

Matthew:

Everybody can look at them or ignore them as as they see fit.

Dave:

Yeah. That sounds good. I like the idea of that.

Matthew:

Yeah. Cool. Hold on.

Dave:

Think Right. I'm should call it a day, shouldn't we?

Matthew:

Because other things we've both

Dave:

got to do, and everyone's bored to tears of listening to us rattle on.

Matthew:

Yeah. So Next. Next time.

Dave:

Next time. So I I had an idea. I've been reading a fabulous book on the history of ancient Greece, and it's big and chunky and dense, but it's really readable. It's really well written, and I'm learning lots of stuff. But in there, I was reading about some of the religious practices around the Greek mythology and the way the Greeks, you know, their relationship with their gods and how they would, you know, try and get favors from the gods or pay back the gods for, you know, for good favors.

Dave:

And I thought there's lots of lovely things in here which would reply really nicely to the icons in Coriolis. So I'm proposing that for next time, I will do a little article on on the icons again about other ways we could possibly draw out more for the icons in a game of Coriolis, because I'm planning on doing something to run on my own campaign. And, yeah, it might be an interesting conversation starter.

Matthew:

Brilliant. That sounds really good.

Dave:

Cool.

Matthew:

Yes. And next weekend, you and I are gaming, I believe.

Dave:

We are.

Matthew:

Yep. And then the so this will be the week after that. Yep. Okay. Yeah.

Matthew:

Cool. Until then, it's goodbye from me.

Dave:

And it's goodbye from him. And may the icons bless your adventures. You have been listening to the Effekt podcast, presented by Fiction Suit and the RPG Gods. Music stars on a black sea used with permission of Free League Publishing.

Matthew:

Allison, I'd get to say that this time, and you could say it next time having written about the icons, but never mind.

Dave:

Go on. Go on then. Say it, and then you can No. No. No.

Matthew:

No. Go on.

Dave:

I want you to now. Go on. Go on.

Matthew:

Fucking say it. I'm not going. I'm not bloody going to. I don't want to. I never wanted your help anyway.

Matthew:

We can we can keep the Straits Of 4 Months open with just US forces.

Dave:

With just the strength of our hot air coming out.

Matthew:

Only asking because I wanted to see what your reaction was.

Creators and Guests

person
Host
Dave Semark
Dave is co-host and writer on the podcast, and part of the writing team at Free League - he created the Xenos for Alien RPG and as been editor and writer on a number of further Alien and Vaesen books, as well as writing the majority the upcoming Better Worlds book. He has also been the Year Zero Engine consultant on War Stories and wrote the War Stories campaign, Rendezvous with Destiny.
person
Host
Matthew Tyler-Jones
Matthew is co host of the podcast, as well as writer, producer, senior editor, designer and all round top dog. He was also been involved a couple of project for Free League - writing credits include Alien RPG, Vaesen: Mythic Britain and Ireland, and Vaesen: Seasons of Mystery as well as a number of Free League Workshop products.
Previously known as The Coriolis Effect Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License