Matthew: 00:40

Hello, and welcome to episode 280 of Effekt Iconic. I'm Matthew.

Dave: 00:48

180. I'm No.

Matthew: 00:52

280, Dave.

Dave: 00:53

Sorry. Hey. Yeah. And I'm Dave. And on the show today, we've got a couple of new patrons to to welcome, or one of them may be a returning patron.

Dave: 01:04

Thank you very much.

Matthew: 01:05

Or is is, I think.

Dave: 01:07

Yeah. Excellent. Excellent. World of gaming, we've got a few things to talk about. License, which we've talked about many times before, but that might have

Matthew: 01:18

That's exciting.

Dave: 01:19

Very exciting.

Matthew: 01:19

Don't spoil it. Nobody knows yet.

Dave: 01:22

And a few other

Matthew: 01:22

bits If you put your news.

Dave: 01:23

In world of gaming. We are gonna be going to salute Excel next

Matthew: 01:29

week. Yeah. That is one of our news items. So let's Yeah. Let's wait till

Dave: 01:33

the audio I'm just giving them a teaser, mate. You know?

Matthew: 01:36

Give them a teaser.

Dave: 01:37

It's called foreshadowing. A it's a it's a very well, you know, well known, you know

Matthew: 01:42

Foreshadowing is something like, I'll give you a salute or something, but never mind.

Dave: 01:48

But it's still foreshadowing. It's a Harvey. Anyway, if you if you're annoyed at my my my my loquacious way of doing this, We've also got some old West news, and we've got an essay. Then we'll end the show. Is that better?

Matthew: 02:03

That's much better, Dave.

Dave: 02:07

Right. Let's do

Matthew: 02:08

try and say it with a bit less enthusiasm, and we'll we'll be there.

Dave: 02:11

You're you're winding me up this morning, pal. Right. Let's let's do something that's gonna cheer us up straight away, and new patrons. We

Matthew: 02:21

have Yeah. This is very exciting. Yeah. Two new patrons. Woo.

Matthew: 02:24

Two. Woo hoo. Well, as you mentioned, spoiled. As I foreshadowed. Spoiled.

Matthew: 02:33

One of them let's start with let's start with Keith as Keith is a returning patron. So welcome back to the crew Keith. You. It's always a pleasure to have a new patron obviously but it's also a pleasure to have somebody coming back you know whatever whatever their reason for not being able to carry on pensioners time ago the fact that they still think it's worth coming back to us is great.

Dave: 02:56

It's absolutely.

Matthew: 02:59

Welcome Keith, great to have you aboard. I don't think though Keith you are on our Discord so if you want to be in the nicest place on the internet come and join us. Put your discord name into your patreon account and then the bot will magically give you access to our discord. And then we have also got Easy Peasy Pumpkin or Nick as they are known.

Dave: 03:29

They are.

Matthew: 03:30

Who has already taken advantage of their patronage by appearing on the last episode of the most recent, I mean, not the very last, the most recent episode of our actual play Gold Country.

Dave: 03:45

Yeah. No. That's brilliant. Nick is one of our one of my Wednesday night crowd. So absolutely lovely that they've chosen to to to come along and join us.

Dave: 03:55

That's brilliant. Thanks, Nick. Excellent to have you here. Really appreciate it.

Matthew: 04:00

Cool. Cool. Cool. So welcome to you both, and welcome to the nicest place I've today. And thank you, of course, to all our patrons, Indeed.

Matthew: 04:07

Past and On to the world of gaming then, Dave.

Dave: 04:13

Yep. We have a license.

Matthew: 04:16

Woo hoo. Finally, we have a license, and it's more than anybody was expecting.

Dave: 04:23

I've just closed the thing that said everything that had was being licensed.

Matthew: 04:27

That's brilliant, Dave. That is absolutely brilliant.

Dave: 04:30

But

Matthew: 04:30

That is a sign of professionalism to have closed it all because you've memorized the entire contents of the press release.

Dave: 04:37

Well, the key ones, for me anyway, Coriolis, third Horizon third party tabletop module, license version one point zero is out. Also, Forbidden Lands is is is under under under its license as well. The Great Dark.

Matthew: 04:52

What else? I'm very excited. I have to say, I wasn't expecting Forbidden Lands. I don't know why I wasn't expecting Forbidden Lands, but I wasn't.

Dave: 05:02

And that's

Matthew: 05:03

kind of interested me because you know me I'm not a big fan of fantasy role playing in general

Dave: 05:11

Per se yeah yeah

Matthew: 05:12

but Forbidden Lands is my favourite fantasy system.

Dave: 05:18

Yeah. Now I've often I've often said in the past, I would I would love to do a Forbidden Lands kind of setting stroke campaign. Kind of grumbling that Free League had never asked me to do it. Obviously, they've got others But who are doing that for now, I've got no excuse now because this one, with the license Now I could do it if I want to. I've obviously got to find the time.

Matthew: 05:47

Yeah. I'll just isn't

Dave: 05:48

gonna happen anytime soon. But it's great. I mean, again, like you, I love the fantasy setting. I've I've said before that in my in my career as a freelancer, fantasy is actually really easy compared to some of the other stuff that I've written.

Matthew: 06:02

Mhmm.

Dave: 06:03

It just flows more readily. I don't quite know why. I think we might have discussed that before. Yeah. But it does

Matthew: 06:08

I think everybody might agree with you though, which is why there are so many fantasy settings in there.

Dave: 06:12

Quite possibly. Yeah. Yeah. But that's definitely something I will tuck into my back pocket and think about for the future. The other things, obviously obviously you've got Dragonbane, which already had the license, but they've also included Simba Room.

Dave: 06:26

So Simba Room gets its own license as well, which is great. Again, mean I love Simba Room. I really enjoyed running the granite hole campaign that we ran. It wasn't very long, but I really enjoyed that. But I think if I was gonna plump for a for a fantasy game

Matthew: 06:46

If I'm doing a fantasy setting.

Dave: 06:47

I would probably go for Forbidden Lands over Simba room.

Matthew: 06:50

I much prefer the system for Forbidden Lands. I think it is brilliantly gritty and I would love, absolutely love to do a gritty setting, not connected to Forbidden Lands at all. I don't know whether the license allows you to have an entirely new world that I'd like to do something so much would I like to do this thing in fact I inquired with the author's agent about whether there was a RPG license available for Joabba Crombie's books and sadly there isn't or if there is it's assigned to somebody else but I'd love to do something that was that had the feel of those Joabba Crombie books and I think Forbidden Lands would be the perfect system to do it.

Dave: 07:37

I don't know those books. What's the what's the feel?

Matthew: 07:40

Oh dear god mate. You're you're missing a treat here.

Dave: 07:43

I'm not I'm not I'm not a big reader of fantasy anymore. I tried it with one of Adrian's books, Adrian Tchaikovsky, and I couldn't get beyond the first chapter. Not because it was badly written, but because just the fantasy vibe just didn't doesn't doesn't sing with me anymore for reading.

Matthew: 07:59

No. I I kind of agree. I have had a similar experience one of Adrian Tchaikovsky's books. You know I mean the world that Adrian created is an interesting you know slightly different world. Those opening chapters open up all sorts of intriguing possibilities but frankly with many fantasy worlds, and it's no fault of Adrians, and it's well written as you say, I just can't be arsed.

Dave: 08:28

Yeah. Exactly. Yeah. There's got to be something that really, really drags you in. So the the book that I wrote, I can't remember the name of it, but it was the the blurb, and it was a bit of a impulse buy.

Dave: 08:38

The blurb talked about a faction called the wasps or something like that. And I thought, okay. Wow. Interesting. You know, a an an intelligent race of giant wasps that might, you know, have an issue.

Dave: 08:53

And I started reading it, it turned out that that wasn't the case. And then I immediately went, oh, bored. Yeah. And stopped reading it.

Matthew: 09:03

Mine was mine was a different book, but but, yeah, it it wasn't it wasn't even bored at some promised concept. All all all the concepts that were surfaced in the first few chapters were kind of interesting and intriguing, but I thought, oh, I just can't be asked to immerse myself in this world. Yeah. Yeah. And and there's a thing as well about books that come in multiples.

Matthew: 09:28

But the the, what can I say about the books?

Dave: 09:32

I was gonna say, you still haven't told me what's the the key the key grab the line to grab grab me for for this.

Matthew: 09:39

So the I I the readers of the first law books which is kind of what they're called are going to probably have issues with my summarization but it is a war torn Europe with a vaguely Victorian society full of people who you know knobs who you do fancy fencing and stuff like that and then a clan of northmen who do a lot of swearing and live a rougher life. So there's nothing necessarily novel about that but just the way it's written, it's gritty, the fights feel like you know when you get stat damage in Forbidden Lands, you kind of feel that as you're reading the first law books, think oh my god he's overstretched himself, he's taken a point of damage. And they're incredibly well written. One of the things about the books is they're not one of the things I hate about many fancy settings is they go, We've lived in this society for a thousand years and nothing need ever change. Not even the world changing events of this book are going to change this world.

Matthew: 11:00

And the world of the first law develops over time. Gunpowder starts coming in, industrialization starts coming in. I don't want to tell you who the baddie is, but the baddie is the best baddie ever. And when you work out who the baddie is or what the baddie is, let us say, you'll go, oh, of course it's obvious actually I know Matthew exactly. I know why he likes this baddie.

Dave: 11:27

Yeah, right, okay.

Matthew: 11:29

There's an initial trilogy but there's a bunch of books that are kind of standalone and there's other books in there. One of my favorite books is called The Heroes and it's about one single battle but in intricate detail. Gorgeous. The characters are lovely. They're really well painted.

Matthew: 11:46

I love everything about it.

Dave: 11:48

I can tell you're enthusiastic with it, mate.

Matthew: 11:50

I'll tell you what. I will gift you an audible version so you don't even have to bother reading. You can listen to it on your commute.

Dave: 11:56

Yeah. Okay.

Matthew: 11:57

Because actually that's it was Andy Gibbs that gifted me the first book in that in the trilogy. I'm not sure whether that's the one I'm going to gift you. You can think about it. But he gifted that to me at some point from his audible account to mine and absolutely entranced me.

Dave: 12:12

And the

Matthew: 12:12

bloke who reads the book, I don't know whether you're into audiobooks at all?

Dave: 12:16

I I have been in the past. For sure. Not recently. But, yeah, definitely.

Matthew: 12:20

So I do find a lot of audiobook narration is a bit subpar. Yeah. But these books are narrated by Stephen Pacey, who you will remember as Tarrant out of Blake's Seven. Oh yeah yeah cool. And he is fucking brilliant.

Dave: 12:36

Yeah. I He's really good. One of my favorite books when I was a kid was The Lost World by Arthur Conan Doyle And I had a tape of of the book being, you know, audiobook, but on tape, read by James Mason, and it was superb. And can I find it anywhere? I mean, I I found on eBay some tapes for sale, but I don't have any way of playing them anymore.

Dave: 13:00

But I was hoping I'd find it online somewhere on YouTube or something, but I haven't been able to find it. But he is again, the the the quality of the the reader is is is everything. Because I did get last thing I got on Audible was I got The First Man in Rome. Again, one of my favorite books of all time. But the the guy reading that, I don't remember who it was, was just rubbish.

Dave: 13:22

And there's quite a lot of long names in it, but so you have to come at it with a certain savoir faire. But it was kind of like reading them like it was a I don't know like a shopping list or something it just spoiled it so I didn't I didn't get any more of them

Matthew: 13:36

no no well I'm I'm gonna maybe yeah I'm gonna give you one or two of the books I'll work out what I'm gonna do but Cool. You can listen to them on your on your commuting to I'm definitely up for something Astounded.

Dave: 13:47

On my commute to work because I'm fed up with listening to the radio, that's for sure.

Matthew: 13:51

Okay. Right. What was that conversation? Oh, yeah. This was about the Forbidden Lands

Dave: 13:55

license. Oh, yeah. So I've pulled up the forbidden lands license, and again, similar to we were talking about the Corionis one earlier. Similar to that, as long as you don't recreate the rules in your supplement or change the rules, you're good to go, pretty much. You are allowed to add new kin, new professions, talents, magic skills, spells, monsters, weapons, etcetera.

Dave: 14:17

But you're not allowed to change the core rules, and you're not allowed to publish the core rules in your supplement. So again, pretty much, fill your boots really.

Matthew: 14:27

That's good. And I'd like to see, so obviously I'm most excited for the third horizon because to you and I the third horizon isn't dead and in fact we may be talking about the third horizon again in the next episode.

Dave: 14:47

Okay.

Matthew: 14:49

But we'll come to that at the end of this episode.

Dave: 14:52

I'm guessing what you mean by that, but if if

Matthew: 14:55

that's You've forgotten what we've arranged, haven't you? Absolutely. Yeah. Never mind. I'll I'll remind you what we've arranged.

Matthew: 15:01

Well, I knew we were

Dave: 15:03

trying to arrange something. I hadn't I hadn't seen anything that said we had. Anyway

Matthew: 15:06

We haven't actually arranged it yet.

Dave: 15:08

I've got two weeks

Matthew: 15:08

to arrange it. There you go. You go. Fine. Fine.

Matthew: 15:12

In fact, there's probably this is probably a this has been a bit of a sequence of Coriolis content actually we've done over the last couple of episodes and into the future, because we've got at least two more interviews lined up.

Dave: 15:27

Is good, because it's nice to come back to the original genesis of the podcast. And sometimes I I had felt we got too far away from it. I hadn't come back often enough. But I think this is this is

Matthew: 15:40

stuff. You're gonna be bored of bloody Coriolis and Third Horizon by the Cyber Finish. Yeah. Exactly. But the exciting thing is when we're bored of Coriolis and Third Horizon, we can move on to Forbidden Lands because as I say I am less interested in the Symbi Room system as one that inspires me to do stuff but I have long been inspired by you know, Tales of the Old West let us remind ourselves was inspired by initially.

Dave: 16:04

Forbidden lands in the first place. Yeah exactly.

Matthew: 16:06

So this is the system that I think if we're going to do any effect publishing fantasy content, we may well find it's forbidden lands content doing. And that hopes, I think Forbidden Lands is a bit of a niche game even within the world of fantasy. I'd like to see other people making Forbidden Lands game with really good quality and the neck of it. Actually this may be a good bit of a segue to an item that isn't in our running order. One of the first things that was announced after the license was announced is our friends from Rollsbijl in Sweden.

Matthew: 16:47

Nordic

Dave: 16:49

Skulls.

Matthew: 16:50

Yeah, Nordic Skulls. They are producing a new adventure campaign supplement whatever for the third horizon so obviously we'll get them on the show to have a chat about that in some future episode but I'd like to see them do some forbidden land stuff as well I mean we know we bought we bought Windheim stuff for Dragonbane but Forbidden Lands is my heart and I'd love to see them make some Forbidden Land stuff. Yeah. If they're not planning that when we talk to them we'll make them do it.

Dave: 17:24

I do wonder whether Dragonbane is kind of hoovering up some of that Forbidden Lands love. Yeah. Absolutely. I'm sure it is. Yeah.

Dave: 17:35

Giving it to Dragonbane. But particularly with Trudvang now as well, if that's the that's a grittier version of of of the original Dragon Veil, Draka Oktamona. Maybe then, you know, if somebody wanted to be grittier they might have gone to Forbidden Lands but maybe now they'd go to Troodvang instead.

Matthew: 17:51

Yeah, yeah. Let's not let's not talk doom about this. Let's say it's great. But

Dave: 17:57

Let's great that they've done it because it means there is the opportunity for those who want to create more stuff. Whereas without the license, there wouldn't be that opportunity. So that that is super.

Matthew: 18:07

Yeah.

Dave: 18:09

Cool.

Matthew: 18:10

Right. What's the next thing on our news? Oh, you and I both received a copy sorry.

Dave: 18:16

Yeah. Was just gonna say you have some views on the Flowers of Algorab, don't you? The, the campaign that that we've just received for So we both published the Great Dark.

Matthew: 18:26

A review copy of the Flowers of Algarab.

Dave: 18:29

Smells like it.

Matthew: 18:30

And remember how when we got a review copy or at least I did. I don't know whether you a review copy of Pirate Porg in the end.

Dave: 18:38

Yes. I did. Yeah.

Matthew: 18:39

Yeah. Yeah.

Dave: 18:39

I got it about a week after you did. Yeah.

Matthew: 18:42

Cool. You know, you remember how enthusiastic I was on the show? Literally, genuine enthusiasm as I effectively unboxed

Dave: 18:49

You were splurging, mate. You That's were splurging with enthusiasm.

Matthew: 18:53

I was and then I did after this show I thought oh you know I'll show people what they've been listening to so I did a little photos essay on Blue Sky recreating the unboxing I love it it love it and so when I got the boxed set of the flowers of Algrab in I thought oh maybe this is going to make me love the great dark. Mhmm. Spoilers. It did not make me love the great dark.

Dave: 19:25

Yeah. I mean, there's there's a lot of conversation we can have here that we were talking about before we started recording, but it would be super, super spoilery. Yeah. Think we've decided to hold off for now which is a pity because there's some really interesting stuff to talk about.

Matthew: 19:39

I think maybe we should do a special spoiler riddled episode or something where we can talk about that.

Dave: 19:46

Like a quick a short one. Yeah yeah

Matthew: 19:48

and maybe involve well and or maybe make a supplement Maybe so Thomas has been running the great dark and or the Flowers of Algarab and more on that later in this episode so there's stuff within the within the campaign that I think you and I are itching to talk about but this is going to be spoiler free. For me the thing that didn't impress me were actually the contents of the box. Okay. I mean you know the dice are very nice although I'm now feeling as I open packs of dice that most of them fail to compare to our trouble dice. I just love our trouble dice so much.

Matthew: 20:37

The the but the last dice that infused me were definitely the pirate dice out of pirate ball which are lovely. I really love those. Yeah these dice are fine. Nothing else really got me excited and the thing I really was disappointed by is the campaign itself, The Flowers of Algrab comes in one great big thick perfect bound soft back

Dave: 21:06

book

Matthew: 21:09

And to me there are too many pages in that book for it to be perfect bound. The spine is going to crack, the glue is going go

Dave: 21:19

off, the pages are going to fall off. Define perfect bound. What exactly do you mean by that?

Matthew: 21:24

So when I talk about perfect bound I'm talking about a soft back book where the pages are glued into the spine and it's a flat spine with a little Right. Yeah. Crease where the gutter would be on the hard bound book. So you can turn the pages over. But you know, that can be made in two different ways.

Matthew: 21:46

In in many books and much to my disappointment, first edition Feng Shui was simply the pages were just glued in against that spine as individual pages. And as the glue breaks

Dave: 21:59

So they all fell out. Yeah.

Matthew: 22:01

They fall out. Well, the worst thing is, of course, it doesn't happen to all of them, but some of them start falling out over time. Yeah. Now, this is actually a kind of combination between a proper book and perfect bound, and that each signature, and a signature is a number of pages that are together. Yeah.

Matthew: 22:20

I learned

Dave: 22:20

that during tales of the old West. Yeah.

Matthew: 22:24

So this has got, let me just see if I can count them quickly. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten, 11. I think 12 signatures so in this we're talking about effectively if you want scale a3 sheets of paper that are folded in half to make a2 sheets of paper or I imagine this is probably Us letter so A four, I should say. A three folded in half makes A four pages or actually in this I think.

Dave: 22:56

Near enough that makes no odds.

Matthew: 22:58

US letter pages. And then those signatures are then bound into the book and are glued. Which is kind of how hardback books are generally made now. But ideally, hardback books should be sewn together as well. Anyway, I prefer it in a hardback book because the hardback the thing that they're glued to or sewn to in a hardback book itself kind of bends when you open the book and you don't have that sort of second layer in a in a perfect bound book.

Matthew: 23:36

The spine is doing all the work. So you flatten the pages down to keep pages open then that will put stress on the glue and the glue will break. And I love that. When two sorry. Twilight 2,000 came out, I thought that was in keeping with the history of the game that they came in perfect bound books.

Matthew: 23:59

But also, each book there was a bit thinner than this book so effectively there's going to be less strain on one book this is one book that's going to be doing an awful lot of work as somebody runs this campaign yeah I mean I worry that it's a bit fragile for that.

Dave: 24:15

Yeah. My I mean, my personal preference is I mean, the it looks lovely. It's lovely and shiny. Obviously, the artwork is great. I like like, you know, lucky books this size, it feels to me they ought to be hardback for my own personal preference.

Dave: 24:31

Similarly, you know, with the Twilight 2,000 ones. Again, I totally get where you're coming from, and I agree with your with your comment about that's feeling right for the kind of history of the game. But still, personally, I I don't particularly like the soft back books that are that big. But, yeah, that's just a personal preference.

Matthew: 24:51

Yeah. And, again, I like them in Dragonbane. You know, I will, when I'm at the stand, vehemently recommend the box set of Dragonbane over the hardback version of Dragonbane but at least with that you've got that hardback version available if you really you know.

Dave: 25:06

But what

Matthew: 25:09

I love about Dragonbane is again each book is smaller therefore more robust not putting so much pressure on that what I think to be an imperfect bound spine.

Dave: 25:21

Yeah.

Matthew: 25:24

So that I'm sure that will last longer but you know what you get in the box infuses and excites you and I've got to say the other stuff I got in the box did not infuse and excite me in the same way so yeah I mean I'm kind of disappointed

Dave: 25:39

yeah okay yeah I mean I yeah, I don't think I'm as disappointed as you in that respect. I quite like some of the handouts for the ships and things. I think they're quite good. The maps take a little bit of getting your head around. They got they're quite lively, but I'm not sure how else how else you'd have done it.

Dave: 25:56

I'm not a big fan of the map of the lost horizon entirely. It kind of confuses me when it shouldn't really so I'm not a huge fan of that. But yeah I mean guess for me, there's there are things that are spoilery that I'd want to talk about, which I have a view on, which kind of concern me as the wrong thing, because I'm sure, actually, a lot of people are gonna love what's in this campaign and where the campaign is taking you. Yeah. Obviously, can't really say much more without

Matthew: 26:32

without spoilers. Well, I'll you what. I think we ought to both of us read the campaign more and make sure because I I've skipped through it to find bits that you and I have talked about. I I I'd want to do it again.

Dave: 26:47

Maybe what you do let's let's say next time the last ten minutes of the show is gonna be us talking spoilery about

Matthew: 26:54

our It's flower going be more than the last ten minutes we spent ten minutes talking about it now.

Dave: 26:59

And we haven't talked about it. Okay the last fifteen minutes. Point being is we get to that point and say if you don't want anything else, turn off. Exactly yeah because the rest is going to be really spoilery rather than having a spoilery bit in the middle of the show that people have then got to try and get past

Matthew: 27:12

and then the end of the we'll work something out but yeah come back to that one and maybe as I say involve Thomas because he's actually run it so we can express our fears from reading and he can confirm or deny them

Dave: 27:26

from running. He can tell us to get back in our box if

Matthew: 27:29

he wants. Cool. So yeah we'll sort something out there but yeah okay Another new game coming out on Kickstarter from from our friends at Free League.

Dave: 27:43

Yeah. I don't know so much about this one. Famoria. You tell me all

Matthew: 27:47

about So this is a Stockholm Cartel a free lead co production like so many things are. It's a Walkborg book.

Dave: 27:56

Oh yeah. I got it. Yeah. Have heard about this. That's why I wanted

Matthew: 27:58

to And it was tagged as folk horror?

Dave: 28:04

Didn't we mention this last week? I think

Matthew: 28:07

we I don't think we did. No. No. No. No.

Matthew: 28:09

Let me let me check. I've got a thing here. Ballad hunters. That is folk horror.

Dave: 28:14

Yeah. We definitely mentioned it that it was coming. I think

Matthew: 28:19

I think It's we not. No we didn't. I've got the list here. Mythic battles we talked about for some reason. Public access.

Dave: 28:26

Remember looking at this. It live yet? No it's not live yet.

Matthew: 28:35

We'll put a link in the show notes. I'm not excited by it. It doesn't feel like folk horror to me. It feels like a a mock ball setting, which is fine, I guess, but it's not exciting me anyway. It's another fantasy setting, basically.

Matthew: 28:55

Maybe a more horrific fantasy setting, but it's another fantasy setting. And as I've already said, on this programme Mhmm. This very episode, I can't be asked.

Dave: 29:05

Well, 4,887 people might be able to be because that that's the number of followers they've got so far before launch. So it's it's popular. I mean, you know, it's Johan Norris is is behind it. We all know

Matthew: 29:19

Yeah.

Dave: 29:19

How good he is. And

Matthew: 29:22

It's gonna look lovely. I'm sure.

Dave: 29:23

Gonna be a great product. I'm sure. Absolutely. But like you say, if if it's not if it's not ringing your bell, it's not ringing your bell, is

Matthew: 29:32

it? It's not ringing my bell. No. Yeah. I mean, compared to a pirate pork salsa set, which even now, I'm remembering how much it rang my bell last time.

Dave: 29:41

Your bell is still ding a linging a little bit, isn't it? I can tell.

Matthew: 29:44

It is. Yeah. Yeah. It's tingly.

Dave: 29:50

Okay. Maybe you should not use that as a as a way of describing how excited we are about stuff.

Matthew: 29:54

Yeah. No. I'm laughing. Yeah. I could use it.

Matthew: 29:56

No. A try now.

Dave: 29:57

Terrible terrible euphemistic options there, sadly.

Matthew: 30:00

Yes. Okay.

Dave: 30:04

But So So don't Have we

Matthew: 30:06

got any other bell tingling news that we need to be hearing?

Dave: 30:09

I'm not sure. I think oh, well, nothing that's tingling my bell, should we say? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Matthew: 30:19

You see? It it steps off the tongue so easily.

Dave: 30:21

I shouldn't have said that, should I? It

Matthew: 30:38

Is it tingling your bell?

Dave: 30:43

Oh, dear. I I am so sorry, dear listener, for you having to listen to this. Yeah. Right. Anyway, so next week, we are going to be at Salute's wargaming convention at the Excel on Saturday, April.

Dave: 31:01

We will be selling, well, plenty of stuff, but one of the things that we believe might do particularly well will be Alien and Alien minis that we will have available. So if you're interested, come along and say hello. If you're absolute, come and find us. I did know what booth we're at but I can't remember off the top of my head.

Matthew: 31:21

No it would have been a good idea for us to check that before starting this recording wouldn't it but neither of us did so we are at a booth in and we'll put some stuff on the social media as well and I'm sure that since we're there on behalf of Free League, they will also be promoting it and we'll be able to remind us of what our booth number is.

Dave: 31:40

I do have it. I just don't have it to hand, obviously.

Matthew: 31:42

Yeah. No. I I I I'd I'd hope so because it would be awful to turn up there with, you know, with a, free league banner in hand and not know where we are.

Dave: 31:53

Or like like it like it was at Dragonmeat, you mean?

Matthew: 31:56

Oh, yeah. But that that was the fault of the markings on the floor at Dragonmeat. That wasn't

Dave: 32:01

Well, the marking on the floor and the fact that they hadn't put all the tables out. So it's it was kind of just make it up as you go along.

Matthew: 32:08

Yes. It

Dave: 32:09

it was sorted, but and I know John was was seething about it because there was lots of people waiting to get in. And then, you know, when I did get in, it took me an hour to work out where we were. But, yeah, I'm sure that'll be ironed out for next time. But, yes, salute. I think we had the did we have the same problem?

Dave: 32:26

No. That was

Matthew: 32:27

I wasn't there last year.

Dave: 32:29

No. It was not Salute. It was or Comic Con where we had the same had the same problem of finding out where we were, and referencing a number of different maps didn't really help. We got there in the end, but again, it's yeah. It's a bit of organization that I know it's different because there's a lot of stuff to do.

Dave: 32:51

But, yeah, I had a couple of less than perfect experiences of actually just finding out where the hell we are in the hall.

Matthew: 32:58

In Excel as well. I hope that

Dave: 32:59

doesn't do Excel. Yeah.

Matthew: 33:02

I can now inform you it is Stand T E 04.

Dave: 33:07

Woo. There you go. See me blathering on, gave you the chance to behind the scenes go and work out where we were.

Matthew: 33:13

Excellent One important point for fans who visited you at that stand last year is we were running demo games then of Zone Wars I think?

Dave: 33:23

Yes yeah it

Matthew: 33:24

was. We're not running any demo games this time we're just selling shit so if you were coming to us looking for a game obviously we'll have some games Exactly. Out to look

Dave: 33:37

Yeah. You'll be able to, yeah, look and feel. But it was, yeah, it was it was it was good last time because Lily and George were were kind of like a little bit they were like, I don't know, like a what a scouting party a little bit out and away and people came and saw them and had a little look and then they directed them over to the stand.

Matthew: 33:58

Cool.

Dave: 33:59

But yeah not not this

Matthew: 34:01

So you'll see how sales compare and whether that is a strategy we should be using in future games.

Dave: 34:05

Yeah. Absolutely.

Matthew: 34:08

But that yes. That is, I think, the end of the world of gaming.

Dave: 34:14

It is. Moving on to Old West news. We've got a few

Matthew: 34:34

and I have now stock is only available for the standard core book but if you're buying a standard core book I've now changed the shipping rates for The US. It is much cheaper for you to order your standard call book with US shipping. Yep

Dave: 34:51

because we're shipping from The US we're not shipping it from here it doesn't have to go through the Strait Of Hornbooze I'm pleased to say.

Matthew: 34:58

It doesn't have to go through the Strait Of Hornbooze or even more disruptive customs in America. Yeah. I've got to say we've had two or three customers who wanted to get the GM screen, more than the GM screen later, and they've all been treated in an entirely unpredictable way so one of them they just got their parcel never see not charged any extra import duty or anything books are generally free of import duty in America and have been even with Trump's changes to tariffs yeah but the GM screen in theory you know should be charged extra

Dave: 35:36

yeah doesn't count as a book does it that's the problem

Matthew: 35:39

it doesn't count as a book now we'll fix that next time we do one yeah but this is why you generally get little supplements in GM screens because then it counts as a book and eases its way through customers in various places. But one person just got their parcel. One person just got their parcel and then months later got a bill for $7 But most infuriating recently last month one person didn't get their parcel, asked us where it was, we chased FedEx. FedEx then invoiced that person for $20 I can't remember exactly what it was. Okay.

Matthew: 36:19

Which slightly annoyed him because on top of the expensive shipping from The UK there, know, it's like double the shipping. Of course most of that is like $5 of actual tax. This the tax that applied the tax on the book and the GM screen, so that shouldn't have happened. Anyway, he decided to pay it, and I I I effectively not I I I gave him the GM screen for free. That So was all sorted he paid it and then still didn't get it because they'd lost the parcel

Dave: 36:48

yeah it's

Matthew: 36:49

bonkers So isn't we're not gonna we're not gonna send you GM screens in America anymore and we are we now have got stock in America so hopefully all of that shenanigans should be solved. Yeah. Well done. Good job. So that that's happening and it also means and this is the most important news of it we have stock in America so if you are listening in America and you have a friendly local gaming store that you go and buy your games, now is the time to tell them to get in touch with us and we can send them stock that they can sell in their shop, not just to you, but to other people as well.

Matthew: 37:29

And there can be more people playing tales of the Old West in America. So this is the call out. Go to your friendly local gaming store, lobby them to get stock in, and tell them they can get it from us. I have created even a special email address for them Distribution to send

Dave: 37:48

email, yeah.

Matthew: 37:49

Distributioneffectpublishing dot com. It's out in our socials as well check out on facebook or youtube there's even a little picture you can download and just hand over I guess to the fairly local gaming store. Tell them to get in touch with us we'll talk prices and shipping and stuff like that. Yes get your friendly local gaming store stocking it. That's the most exciting bit of news.

Dave: 38:17

Yep that'll be cool.

Matthew: 38:19

Now GM screens obviously you know I've just talked about three US customers that really wanted a GM screen and had terrible experiences or otherwise getting it. We're not going to send you GM screens we didn't send any over with our stock it took long enough and there's some bad news on that as well I have to report on as well. It took long enough to get through customs anyway with just the books. I dread to think what would happen if we put a box of GM screens in there as well. So we know you might be disappointed.

Matthew: 38:52

We have previously been asked why isn't the GM screen available on drive thru. I've never thought it was necessary because it's not like there's any new content in there apart from one picture. All the tables are in the core book if you want to make a GM screen of your own you can know you can simply print them out the relevant pages cut them up and stick them on your GM screen but I have now put the production PDFs front and back of the gem screen available on drive thru now as well so that is another bit of news.

Dave: 39:23

Yep cool now that's good because then at least if you know if you want to get that you could always try and print it off yourself at least you get a reference.

Matthew: 39:29

Exactly yeah and then you can had I was very I don't use it much now but I did used to have a kind of three panel horizontal GM screen that had little plastic pockets front and back so you could change it for whatever game you were playing and you could definitely print this out cut it into three letter sized pieces on each side and stick the picture on one side and stick the tables on the other side. If you've got one of those GM screens then you know it would be perfect to use it with that or stick it to a bit of card.

Dave: 40:06

I mean my right back at the beginning of Alien when a GM screen for Alien wasn't a thing I just created my own which I'm just trying to trying to find. I can't find it now. But, yeah, very easily done. So good. At least it gives people the option of being able to do that if they can't get their hands on a, you know, a proper official DM screen from us.

Dave: 40:28

Cool.

Matthew: 40:28

And so the other thing is not yet available on drive thru, but shortly will be our third campfire tale.

Dave: 40:36

Excellent. Yeah. It's the gift horse and

Matthew: 40:38

The gift horse? Yeah. Which should be the very first one that would be coming out because that was the first one on a commissioned artwork for but it's the last one for the artwork to get delivered and we've gone through a couple of artists in that regard.

Dave: 40:49

Yeah but it looks great the artwork's lovely we're just finishing off some other the sort of the graphic design on that aren't we so hopefully that'll be done this week

Matthew: 40:57

yeah I'm just waiting for a new version of one of the maps and then we will put that online and we're now officially recognized I can't remember what the status is but now we don't have to wait for them to check our product.

Dave: 41:13

Okay that's

Matthew: 41:13

I can make it go live as soon as I want now.

Dave: 41:17

Lovely yeah So hopefully, yeah, that will be, you know, maybe a week, maybe two at the most, but that will be up and up and ready for you all to grab get hold of. Cool. Which would be good.

Matthew: 41:27

And of course, if you backed us on the Kickstarter, I will be sending you a link for free copy.

Dave: 41:33

Yeah. Yeah. Indeed. Cool.

Matthew: 41:37

Right. Well Right. Now we've got your essay Dave.

Dave: 41:41

Back to Coriolis. And as regular listeners will know I've long had a thing about the icons. I've always wanted to make more of them in the game and have tried on a couple of occasions to do just that. And while some of my previous ideas have had quite a lot of merit to them and some of my weekly gaming crowd like them, we've never been able to make them stick at the table. I've recently been reading a very broad and sweeping history of ancient Greece called creators, conquerors, citizens by Robin Waterfield.

Dave: 42:15

It's a great read for what can be a pretty dense and complicated subject. And by necessity, Waterfield skips over some of the deeper detail to keep the narrative moving. But in reading about Greek religious beliefs and practices, I've been repeatedly struck by the similarities with the icons. Both religions are polytheistic beliefs. The Greek gods and the icons are all, with some minor exceptions, made very much in man's image.

Dave: 42:45

They both have qualities we would consider human anger, jealousy, vengefulness, mischief and so on. There are many different versions in Greek religious practices, also called invocations, of each god or icon, and even more cults that have their own versions of them too. People who live near swamps might invoke Zeus the dispeller of flies or there might be Zeus the kindly, Zeus of the hilltops, and Zeus the protector of stores, depending on what need the worshipper was most focused upon at the time. Alternatively those who live in colder climbs might invoke Hephaestus the warmer of hearths. The options are pretty much endless.

Dave: 43:29

And the religious worship is a reciprocal arrangement. You pray or make some other votive offering in expectation of or thanks for something beneficial or of which you approve. But I've also been struck by those things that the Greek pantheon has but we don't seem to see in the icons. Things that might add a lot of color and potential story ideas to Coriolis. In the Greek pantheon, you have the Olympian dozen, the main gods of the religion.

Dave: 43:59

But there are many gods that just didn't quite make the cut. Those that are part of the pantheon, but not quite godly enough to make it onto that exalted list. This includes gods like Dionysus, Asclepius, Persephone, Pan, Hercules, as well as countless nymphs and deities of nature. That got me thinking. Which almost icons or proto icons exist in the third horizon, but are being kept down by the icons we have?

Dave: 44:30

Are they jostling for supremacy and looking for the first chance they get to topple an icon and take their place? What effect do they have on the horizon and those who call it home? There must be numerous cults out there for these powerful supernatural beings. What are they doing in the mortal realm to build up their icon of choice, and what is the implication of an icon being cast down and replaced by another? While Zeus is the undisputed lord of the Greek gods, there isn't such a thing in Coriolis.

Dave: 45:02

Yes, the judge is often considered a cut above the rest, but there's nothing substantial about it, and you don't hear tales of the judge making rulings about the other icons or putting them in their place. Surely if there's jostling for position amongst the lesser deities there must be jostling amongst the big nine as well. Greek mythology has the Titans, the foundational gods of the Pantheon and the forebears of the Olympian gods. There doesn't seem to be a powerline in the third horizon, but the call book does say it is not clear where the icons come from. This knowledge was lost during the exile from Al Ada.

Dave: 45:41

Now that sentence implies the knowledge was once known and that there is an answer to that question. But does anyone ever ask that question anymore? Maybe the icons do have a titanic background. And if so, what were they? What happened to them?

Dave: 45:58

And where are they now? Greek mythology also has the concept of Daimones, if that's the right pronunciation, something that loosely translated into demons in later times. These are good and bad spirits that intervene in human affairs. In Coriolis, you have the spirits and the sarcophagi, the jinn and the dark morphs, but most of those would be considered to be evil or at the very best mischievous and cruel. Interaction between a Greek worshipper and their god of choice was very transactional and as I said earlier a specifically reciprocal matter.

Dave: 46:38

There are three broad ways this took place: prayer, sacrifice and divination. Prayer is straightforward in the context in which we care about it for this discussion. But sacrifice is more nuanced. In ancient Greece, it might mean an offering. It doesn't need to be a sacrificial animal, although it often was a chicken, a goat, or a sheep in Greece, but could be a sacrifice of cooked food or part of the harvest.

Dave: 47:06

It could be what would have been called in medieval England a tithe. Although in ancient Greece, this wouldn't necessarily be handed to the bloke in the big stone building on top of the hill, but would often be offered in charity. Or it could be a libation, a sprinkling of holy water or a ritual of purification. And then there's divination where a seer would conduct a complicated ritual to ask for divine intervention or to get some inside knowledge on their gods intentions by reading signs and interpreting omens. Okay, that's all well and good, but what might it mean for the game?

Dave: 47:47

The core book talks a lot about specific sacrifices offerings that each icon might approve of, but I find they don't really get rolled into the game, so sadly that lovely bit of cultural context is on the whole lost. How might we make more of it? With the rules as written, there are only two mechanical ways for the player character to interact with the gods. The quick muttered prayer uttered before pushing their role, and preparatory prayer in a chapel before heading off to do something uncertain or dangerous. One of the great things about Coriolis is the way these simple mechanics bring an appreciation and application of exotic religion to the forefront and really infuse the game with that context and that look and feel.

Dave: 48:33

But can we do even more? The answer might be no. We don't need to. But my recent enthusiasm about ancient Greece makes me want to try. What if you wanted to make a sacrifice to an icon for a particular benefit or perhaps just for them to watch over you?

Dave: 48:50

How might you do that? Well, we could add a specific approach to sacrifice rituals. I'd say the ritual should take several hours to complete. In other year zero games, I'd say a shift, but that term isn't a thing in choreo less. The likelihood of success will be increased by the value of the sacrifice, with the most powerful being offerings specifically called for by the relevant icon.

Dave: 49:17

The value of the sacrifice would bring a modifier to the skill role of up to plus three. But not just anyone can do this, only those with a connection to the icons. In a mechanical sense, this would mean the required skill role to conduct the ritual would be mystic powers, thus making seers and wise folk the focus of communing with the icons. A successful role would award the seer or the sponsor who arranged for the ritual the temporary ability to invoke the icon. This could be done at any time during the scenario or session.

Dave: 49:53

When invoked, the icon would intervene in the scene to the benefit of the invoker. This should be a random table influenced by the character traits of the icon in question as I discussed in a previous show on the Pantheon of the Icons. This leaves the actual outcome in the lap of the icons and to be random. Although a simpler method would be allowing the player to specify the impact with the GM's agreement. A failed role would invoke the wrath of the icon.

Dave: 50:22

The GM would gain the ability to bring down the icon's wrath, again at a time they wished for during the scenario. This should be a random table determining the action of the angry icon rebuking the PC for their temerity. And then how about libations, a spontaneous sprinkling of holy water? This could act a little bit like a signature item in Alien, a once a scenario opportunity that takes a fast action but allows a push without generating a darkness point or some similar small advantage. The player might need to explain and justify the context to be allowed to do this though.

Dave: 50:59

Perhaps there could be a variety of options including blessing another and giving them a boost when providing help. That said there is the, in my opinion much underused talent of Talisman Maker which does something very similar. Perhaps as the DM I should just encourage a greater use of that. Finally we have Divination talking with the icons. My initial feeling was that this again should be a time consuming ritual that requires some preparation and could be a key scene in a story.

Dave: 51:31

But then again there is the mystic talent of premonition. Again in my experience criminally underused that does something similar. So for these aspects maybe the key is making better use of all the options that the core book already offers with perhaps a little embellishment to make them a more important part of the fabric of the world rather than just talents and rules that get lost amongst all the other goodness that can be found in Coriolis The Third Horizon.

Matthew: 51:59

Well, was great. There are things I particularly want to talk about in there that I very much love, but the overriding impression I have is at the end of it you go, actually, of course, lot of these mechanics kind of exist anyway. We should just use them more. And for me, this is the beauty of the Third Horizon over the Great Dark. Is there a bunch of there's a bunch of detail, not just in the story, but in the mechanics that we maybe don't use enough of and we it's there already we should just use it more.

Matthew: 52:39

And that's what I love. That's what I love the first time you referred me to the third horizon and it's what I love now. It's nice to be reminded that there is a bunch of stuff we can use and you're not necessarily adding very much due to that. So let's just praise Bea for that and we'll talk about that again when we come into what's happening next episode. But the thing I do particularly want to talk about is the idea and I'm just going to quote from you if I can get it there.

Matthew: 53:11

The idea of rituals.

Dave: 53:15

Yep.

Matthew: 53:17

Now I do think there is a seance ritual in the mystic powers. Again already exists, takes time. Of the things you point out is

Dave: 53:32

premonition, that is, I think. The one I referenced as being the thing prediction, it's called, not premonition.

Matthew: 53:40

And that is great. And I think I ran one of those and I did make it take time. One of the gaps that you point out in the year zero rules is it doesn't have a definition for that period of time.

Dave: 53:55

That duration. No. Exactly.

Matthew: 53:57

Yeah.

Dave: 53:57

I mean, I suspect that shift or a a a more Coriolis like word to the

Matthew: 54:05

to the works. I think shift works.

Dave: 54:06

Easily just be slipped in. I'm sure I'm you know, in the campaign I'm running, I'm sure I've been using Shift, and everyone understands what what we mean by that. Yeah.

Matthew: 54:18

But what I like about that is okay. You mentioned that that is a thing that happens in prediction but there could be other more intense forms of prayer I love the both types of prayer that exist in the rules in that there's you know the muttered prayer as you're doing the thing which is effectively you know pushing your role I love the proprietary prayer that one might do where one goes into a chapel and prays to a particular icon I love the ease of that and the benefit of it and the fact it makes you want to do that but there could be an even more powerful form of prayer let us say or a ritual which gives something special to there so I think when it comes to you may invent new rules in the system or it doesn't say it says something like we kind of disguised new rules but but

Dave: 55:12

we're not going to stop you

Matthew: 55:13

we're not going to stop you doing it that that is a thing that we we could have some fun with in some future Year Zero supplement. And you talked a bit about what does that give you? And I rather like the idea of there being a random table of sorts. Yeah. Maybe influenced a bit by the number of successes that you got in your initial prayer ritual making thing, that then defines how the icon is going to intercede with the situation.

Dave: 55:51

And with that, I was thinking I mean, there's there's there's a downside to that as well because that's quite a lot of tables you've got to create if you're gonna do it kind of icon specific. But I quite like the idea of making it icon specific based on the kind of the traits that I gave them when I talked about the pantheon of the icons before. So, you know, the messenger would be, you know, temperamental. The dancer would be jealous and vain. And then that would come through in how they you know, the the the trick in making it work really well would be making those traits come through in the random result in what they do when you get your your your your your boon or your your wrath.

Matthew: 56:31

And the beauty of it that you've already talked about is these icons already present in the rule set different aspects. Yes. So the lady of tears is represented differently in different cultures and behaves differently in different cultures or even behaves differently in particular situations so yeah they've got to create only nine maybe 10 tables I can't remember how many icons there are now but generally nine icons so that's nine tables and there's so much fun you can have in there where you say you know so of course I wrote the Coriolis calendar stories and in those stories we've got the messenger appears as I think a bunch of little thrashes that that tell your secrets to the world you know wouldn't that be a thing that suddenly there's a swarm of little thrashes interfering with with what you're doing there are you know I I would have a whale of a time creating those tables and if we did a publication that was just those tables I reckon a bunch of people would have a whale of a time making rituals and then applying them to different situations and you know it could be even more you know because again when you do random tables like that they might not fit the story that's being told but there could be you know invoking whichever particular god in a social event versus a combat event versus shall we say a procedural event of flying a spaceship or whatever there's different ways of doing stuff there there could be a whole book of those tables

Dave: 58:15

let's go back to

Matthew: 58:16

roll master days

Dave: 58:19

that is very true that could be yeah absolutely there's a lot of tables there a lot So look forward to you laying those out, mate.

Matthew: 58:28

Oh, no. No. You know who loves laying out tables? Stefan, the guy who laid out okay. Yeah.

Matthew: 58:35

Let's give him that job. He he no. It'd be over the moon. He's been in contact with us recently yeah

Dave: 58:42

yeah it was great to hear from him yeah

Matthew: 58:44

I love the way you said to him last night yeah we'll send you a book Stefan and I'd sent it I've given him the tracking number

Dave: 58:52

okay yeah you can tell I'm a little bit behind on my effect publishing emails

Matthew: 59:00

anyway yeah Stefan probably would not thank us if we said make it back to stable

Dave: 59:06

no probably not but

Matthew: 59:08

yeah it could be fun so a couple of weeks ago we talked to oh I've forgotten his name

Dave: 59:17

Kevin Kevin Hassall

Matthew: 59:19

Kevin yeah Kevin Hassall that slipped off the thumb. Kevin, he, you know, he's got a layout artist that does some lovely choreoist style work and he, of course, will be over the moon that this license has come out because

Dave: 59:35

Absolutely, yeah.

Matthew: 59:36

He's got one at the moment, traveler adventure out there on Kickstarter, and he's got another more specific Coriolis one ready to go as soon as his license came out. I've seen him on the socials, actually, already mention that he is going to be producing a color supplement for the traveler adventure that says, and this is how it fits in the third horizon. So Yeah. Cool. Cool.

Matthew: 59:59

Good. That's all good.

Dave: 01:00:01

Yeah. The timing was all very good for him, wasn't it? But, yeah, I think the other thing that I was thinking about, particularly on those rituals and, you know, sacrifices and all that, that it should be something that only mystics can do. Because because I think, actually, being a being a mystic in the game, and this isn't necessarily a bad thing for the game, but it might be less fun for the person playing the mystic, they're a little bit underwhelming, really. A lot of the actual mystical powers aren't that exciting, And maybe having them as, you know, this is your shaman, this is the person who could talk to the gods for you, maybe raises them up a little bit better than perhaps they are at the moment.

Dave: 01:00:47

And I get that perhaps from, you know, Free League's point of view, the whole Mercy the Icons campaign is all about where the mystics came from and mystics being hunted and being pariahs and all the rest of it. I, you know, I don't include that in my campaign. That's not my choreo list. Well And I think the mystics are like you said, think, you know, that there are hints that they should they've been there before the, you know, the events of of the campaign that led to the to the issue.

Matthew: 01:01:20

Yeah. It's the thing that I I dislike most about the campaign, actually, is the is the fact that mystics are effectively empowered by Santulans from the second horizon. However, I think you're right in that the book makes mention of the fact that mystics existed before the events. They've suddenly been growing in number. And I like to think that, at them, you know, that that could all be that the hate of them could well be coming from the Zenithians, you know, bloody space Nazis, who are persuading people to hate them.

Matthew: 01:02:06

And actually, people don't hate them. People have always, you know, known that there have been some special people who work like oracles or whatever. We can

Dave: 01:02:16

Yeah. And it's quite possible that they would have been maybe frightened of them whilst at the same time being in in awe of the the, you know, their connection to the icons. So they're

Matthew: 01:02:27

Yeah.

Dave: 01:02:28

Yeah. Kind of frightened of them at the same time as being wanting to use them or

Matthew: 01:02:32

get Which, again, is a kind of Hellenistic thing as well, isn't it? In that Yeah. You know, you may well say, Oh, you've got weird powers. You should go and work in this temple or whatever and get out of my family. So there may be that sort of relationship.

Matthew: 01:02:51

Anyway, we can explore this, and now we can explore it in licensed content as well. Indeed. Which is terrific.

Dave: 01:02:56

Yeah. And, again, one of the other one of the other things that I I quite like, again, not from the not from ancient Greece, but they're they're probably examples in ancient Greece, but from Rome, was that, you know, there are examples of, sort of, like, well known seers who are just kind of sitting on the senate steps who then suddenly burst into a vision and start pronouncing stuff, and everyone takes it really seriously.

Matthew: 01:03:21

Yeah. I think I think we can we can do our bit to rehabilitate

Dave: 01:03:26

Yeah. The mystics.

Matthew: 01:03:26

Mystics and empower them a bit more with their own third horizon power. Nothing from the fucking dark horizon or from the second horizon. True icon power from the third horizon. Yeah. Cool.

Matthew: 01:03:41

Now here's an interesting little side question. Maybe we we can talk about this at another episode. I'm just wondering, in the licensing, how many people are going to be doing this campaign pre wake of the icons or post wake of the icons? Their material. I think it would be worth labeling there's stuff that I want you know we we talked a bit about a new horizon post wake of the icons and that interests me a different political structure the xenophians are being properly hated for being bad guys etc yeah but also I can see there's a lot of people who just want to keep the third horizon as it was beforehand so I think there could be you know there could definitely be two paths this adventure is set before the fall of Coriolis Definitely.

Matthew: 01:04:31

One is set afterwards.

Dave: 01:04:32

Yeah. And

Matthew: 01:04:32

I'll tell you what I'd do afterwards. I'd have a rebuilding Coriolis campaign.

Dave: 01:04:37

Yeah. So I've I've had a couple of ideas. I mean, I think I think I I guess in theory, as a GM, if you wanted mostly of the icons to still be a thing, but you you could then delay playing that for as long as you wanted. So you've got Coriolis and that setup for as long as you like, and then you go through the events of of most of the icons. Or you say those events have happened and now Coriolis is gone, and you move on to something that's post post Coriolis.

Dave: 01:05:06

Yeah. The other thought I had was and again, this I'm gonna be careful how I say this. In the origin in Coriolis of Third Horizon, there was always the the mystery of the two ships, and what happened to the second ship.

Matthew: 01:05:24

Yeah. Spoilers. It could be an alternative destiny is what you're saying.

Dave: 01:05:30

Basically, what I'm saying is that is there a parallel a parallel reality? And, you know, there's a you find a Yeah

Matthew: 01:05:41

yeah I think we've we've inched enough let's maybe talk about that in when we talk about our spoilery episode.

Dave: 01:05:49

We could okay if you think that's too spoilery you could take that out.

Matthew: 01:05:52

I think that yeah. It might might be.

Dave: 01:05:54

But because

Matthew: 01:05:54

but no

Dave: 01:05:55

because again okay. If we're gonna take this out, my my point being is you could have a a Coriolis Third Horizon campaign where you go through a a twisted portal and you come out into reality where actually it's Nadir is in the place of Coriolis rather than Coriolis. And it's a very it's it's similar but different.

Matthew: 01:06:12

Yeah. Yeah. No. Actually No. Think that's right.

Matthew: 01:06:16

We'll leave that bit in.

Dave: 01:06:16

That was the thought I was coming to. Yeah.

Matthew: 01:06:18

Yeah.

Dave: 01:06:21

Rather than rather than anything more more, you know, explicitly spoilery.

Matthew: 01:06:26

But before we are tempted to talk spoilers, because I so so much am, I wonder whether we should draw this episode to a close.

Dave: 01:06:35

Yes. I think we should.

Matthew: 01:06:37

And what we should say, and I've just been thinking about this actually, although I said I know exactly what's happening next week even if you don't. I think, or next episode, there are two alternatives here and actually it's worth us looking at timing and stuff. We have said that we should talk with the nordic skulls guys about the new Coriolis content about to kick start so we should. We have also said that we want to talk to Thomas because Thomas who's a patron of ours, he's been on the show before he is in the process of translating the flowers of algorab into the third horizon so we think that's a fabulous thing to talk about we'll be talking about that in a future episode and we'll also be talking to nordic scars but those will be two separate episodes and which comes first I think we need to do a little bit of work behind the scenes to work out which one of those it is but in the next episode one of those two things is very likely to happen.

Dave: 01:07:41

Yeah, no that sounds good and it'll depend on who we can get hold of as well so yeah yeah cool that sounds like a great plan lots more Coriolis content coming your way folks so stay tuned

Matthew: 01:07:55

stay tuned and then we've got to ask Kevin back as well actually we promised him

Dave: 01:07:59

we did he could

Matthew: 01:08:00

come back but again we'll time that in when when he's doing the kickstarter for that circuit adventure

Dave: 01:08:05

yeah that might be a little way off I guess yeah cool well on that note everyone have a fabulous Easter I don't know why I'm saying that because you'll probably listen to this after Easter. So in which case, it's goodbye from me.

Matthew: 01:08:20

And it's goodbye from him. And may whichever aspect of the icons you prefer bless your adventures.

Dave: 01:08:29

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.