It does answer it in a way : I understand there’s a variety of resources that will make characters and their “magic” feel different through mechanics grafted into the Cortex system.
This means by contrast, that different types of magic are not handled mostly with fiction (ie : detailed descriptions of their inner workings and requirements for elemental, hopscoth, tarot, etc.).
What are you working on right now?
The way that I intended sorcery to work for Immortalis is defined by description with the group choosing a shared thematic category and then each Sorcerer has their type or Sphere of Power. There is a simple d8 assigned to it by default being a distinction. How you use sorcery is freeform based on fictional description with affiliations, approaches, and arenas guiding things for conflict resolution when appropriate. In Cortex Prime there are powers and abilities with limitations and other parts for a more traditional kind of game. I am going with something a little more open-ended or abstracted here given that all the players are Sorcerers.
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I just finished a version of Leadtown complete enough to open it up for public review and playtesting.
The nice thing about this game is that the most basic mechanics are known to work because they are based on a popular archaic game of Faro. This means that if you ever enjoyed a game like Roulette (but with card counting), you will enjoy the base mechanics. That said, for those that find games of chance dull, you have an extra layer of mechanics which give the game a Push Your Luck feel and open-ended story telling.
I am excited about this idea because the feel is perfect for a game focused around taking risks in the Old West AND I managed to complete a fully playable version. I am the sort that tends to start things and not finish them so it is a win from the point of view.
FYI. Corrected the files in the link:
Leadtown: Old West rpg playtest version
Currently the rules are just under 9,000 words so it is about 28 pages with pictures and tables.
If you are interested in reading or playtesting this game, I would love feedback! That said, I am not a graphic artist or formatting expert in any way so it would be great if comments are just on the writing and / or game mechanics and / or the experience of writing or playing this game.
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There are only two pages available to me.
I find the first page a bit abstract. I suggest addressing the reader as “You” and going straight to the point. Especially, I don’t understand the 3rd paragraph intent. (err. : than win they)
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One thing I wished had been done with this is to have the person making the game put a statement in as to what experiences they’d had with Cortex before the started.
I just sent feedback for one and I don’t think they quite grokked Value statements and how they drive play.
I’m very curious as to how people with little to no experience with Cortex are able to use the CP Guidebook. I’ve run all the different flavors so I’ve got a strong background in them.
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So I’m bouncing around a couple of projects currently:
Untitled Wretched & Alone game
I’m aiming to take part in the Wretched & Alone game jam, and have been thinking about doing a game where the protagonist is stuck in a time travel situation gone wrong. Try to hold on to your sense of self while you navigate your memories and try to find your way back to your loved one before you become unmoored in time and space.
Olympischer Platz 3
A hack of The King is Dead where players take on the roles of intelligence officers, agents and their contacts in Berlin during the Cold War. I wanted to do this for a game jam but it spiralled out of control and I ended up making & submitting a much simpler game instead.
I’m excited about the prospect of interpersonal drama, secret objectives and trying to suss out what the other players’ agendas are. I’m also excited about doing the layout; ideally I’d love to get this game printed out with passport-format playbooks and stuff and ship it in cool manilla envelopes…
Delta-v and Burn Retrograde
These would be more boardgame-ish projects. I’d love to try and make a couple of space ship simulator games… The first one would pit players against each others in Battlestar Galactica-esque space fighters, with the players rolling dice and allocating them to different actions on a hands-on-throttle-and-stick type console. The other one would be a cooperative game where players take different crew positions on a corvette or frigate.
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A few months back, someone on Reddit was asking if there was a Pokémon RPG that was less crunchy than some of the fan-made stuff. I replied that you could hack Anima Prime to do that pretty easily (Rookvale is one existing example, but hard to find now). Naturally, I haven’t been able to stop thinking about such a thing, especially with my son having dragged my wife and me into Pokémon Go.
At this point, I’m getting near being done enough to release it (this will be a DivNull Seed, so will not exactly be “finished”). Some things that interest me about it:
- I’ve hacked Anima Prime more than most, but this game allowed me to manage its powers in a way that let you just make a few key choices and start playing. So, character creation is fast. Creating opposition is even faster.
- It has let me mess with “4-up” assembly of character sheets, and some tech behind that. This is a key component of another design idea in the back of my head, so hopefully will aid in working out some kinks.
- The game will come with three different settings, each one built around an approach to a design issue specific to the genre: the mons are way more interesting than the characters and, in most of the source material, the human characters are essentially immune to harm. (No one ever seems to think of winning a Pokémon battle by just punching Ash Ketchum in the face, for example. In real life, that would be really tempting.) Anima Prime strongly divides “conflict” and “character” scenes, and the main setting takes the approach that the characters only agency in conflicts is through their summoned mons. Not sure this will actually work, so that’s kind of exciting to me. The other settings use different approaches, so it’s been interesting designing a system that can handle all three.
- It’s free and Creative Commons, but I’m going to try using itch instead of hosting it myself this time around. Never used it before, so stuff to learn there still, I expect.
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This has been an interesting and inspiring thread to read through! Last Fleet has actually been a reference point for what I’m working on, so it was exciting to see that @rabalias started this. There are other games here that I’ve seen online in the last year too. Wish I’d taken notes while scrolling through the 180ish posts. Might have to read them again!
The main game I’m working on is called Cosmic Resistance.
The Pitch
The universe is in danger. Organize rebellion against an interstellar tyrant. Seal a vortex before the dark god escapes, swallowing your homeworld. Stave off ravenous bugs, unhinged robots, and shapeshifters. Make friends along the way.
Cosmic Resistance is a game about defying existential threats, and finding out how hope survives. It is inspired by the settings and themes of media like Mass Effect, Star Wars, Marvel: Infinite War, and Saga.
I’m Excited About…
Lots of things. I’ve started posting more on reddit’s r/rpgdesign section, and I’ve enjoyed sharing ideas with people. Like others, I started by designing a game I wanted to play. Starfinder with simpler rules, Impulse Drive with more magic, Farflung but more anchored. One of my favorite mechanics has to do with the way I’m adapting Stress and Drives.
Hopes & Dreams
I’m about to start playtests with my friends, so the current hope is just that it goes well, and people want to keep playing. There are layers and layers of goals. It’d be great if people online also took an interest and one day I got to run a kickstarter, but I should focus on crawling before I walk, or run, or fly.
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If you still want to limit the use of flashbacks in Coslmic creation, I have found in Technoir (or maybe that came from Primetime Adventures) a “gauge limiter” I am fond of : you put a limited set of tokens on the table. The number of tokens either very rarely as campaign milestones or never varies.These tokens back and forth between players (GM included).
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Now that Ben’s let the cat escape its bag I can also mention a couple of other projects that are nearing completion.
A) I did maps for Ben L’s “Through Ultan’s Door” No. 3 and No. 4, a double issue of his Ultan’s Door Zine coming out this year. The first zine was well reviewed by Fear of a Black Dragon (https://foabd.libsyn.com/through-ultans-door)
B) Wrote up a fairly length companion adventure for Ultan’s Door set on the Sewer River and in Zyan itself titled “Beneath the Moss Courts” which Ben’s publishing along with the double issue, making for something akin to a triple issue of Ultan’s Door.
Here’s some art I doodled for Moss Courts, and a link to Ben’s blog about the release:
https://maziriansgarden.blogspot.com/2020/05/whats-happening-with-through-ultans.html
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Thanks @DeReel. I actually have my first playtest tomorrow, so I’ll be keeping an eye on the flashbacks. A group pool of tokens feels like more artifice than I’d like, but it’s an interesting option to explore. I could use them as “spotlight tokens” or something, and shift the game towards a more cinematic feel.
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I have a draft of a fraternity-themed Lasers and Feelings hack, which I’m tentatively calling Frats and Bros. L&F feels like a nice simple for a novice designer like me to dip my feet into. There are a lot of small elements to reskin into my setting, a bumbling yet affectionate take to fraternity college life.
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Love the name, although I also like Dudes & Bros
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If you’re keeping an & in the title, I would assume those are the stats? It’s not immediately clear to me what a Bro action and a Dude action are though. I would go with something like “Bros & Feelings”, “Bros & Assholes”, or “Bros & Ladiesmen” depending on what I wanted to explore.
Sorry if I’m over-stepping. I feel like I’m halfway into workshopping a game I know nothing about. 
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@Radmad @pizzazzeria Thanks for the interest!
I am mulling over the best way to name and describe the two stats. At the moment, “Frat” maps to “Lasers” and “Bro” maps to “Feelings.” I want to encourage players to roleplay their characters to embody both the responsible, reverent side of fraternity (upholding traditions, handling responsibilities, negotiating with administration) and…the less serious side (both frat house hijinks and camaraderie).
Ideally, “Frat” would be like the superego/left-brain/logic to the id/right-brain/emotions of “Bro.”
Also, the current inciting event is the chapter president going out of town and not answering his phone, leaving the rest of the chapter to run operations without their “responsible“ leader to rely on.
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Cool premise! It sounds like you have more experience with actual frats than I do. Popular media of crazy frat boys has overshadowed the connotations of “responsibility” when I hear the word “frat”, which is unfortunate.
I’m not sure what kinds of words would emphasize those ideas, and eschew the overlap. I feel like the word “brotherhood” fits in here somewhere, but for an audience more familiar with what the word “frat” is supposed to mean, you might have already nailed it.
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I got a couple projects in the hopper right now!
First to come out is my game for the Wretched and Alone game jam, Far Beneath the Barrows a game about being trapped in a terrifying, constantly shifting underworld, drawing inspiration from the story of Orpheus and Eurydice and the novel House of Leaves.
Second, I’m working on The Tournament Arc, a game designed to accompany my upcoming article about how to design action sequences for gamefeel. It’s designed around quick back and forth, and character arcs built into their mechanics. It’s meant to be easy to learn and play, while still packing a decent punch of spectacle.
Finally, I’m in the very early developmental stages of a game called Chef Wars which draws inspiration from cooking competition shows like Master Chef, while combined with elements of the anime Shokugeki no Soma. This one is rough, but I already have a lot of interesting ways about how to incorporate preparation and research into the more dynamic cooking battles, and plans for Forged in the Dark style territory control and faction management systems.
And I’m making significant progress with my ZineQuest game after taking a fair bit of time off for mental health stuff. So, all in all, quite a bit of stuff on my plate but I’m hoping they will turn out nicely!
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I was out from the community for a while. In that time I released some game stuff, and currently working on others:
HEAVY WIZARDRY is a game about VR hackers fighting against greedy corporations to better their communities. It is my take on anti-colonist dungeoncrawler with a strong online privacy angle. Instead of delving into “undiscovered” lands for gold and glory, PCs break into corporate nodes to get stuff that will help people around them. It is a game about direct action against the avatars of late stage capitalism. It is dungeon crawling with synth/vaporwave and video game aesthetic. It is based on WoDu and modern OSR games like Maze Rats, Knave, Into the Odd and Black Hack. I plan to release it as an “art” zine, so the layout and graphics are taking me forever (you can see some sample spreads here).
Of Maps and Men lays on crossroads between narrative world building and OSR. It is played by (snail)mail and you end up with a fully fleshed out map of a region. It is playable now in its jam-game status, but I got a tonne of good feedback that I want to incorporate and re-release it in a expanded version.
Waking World (?) The idea behind it was to create a PbtA like game that can be played easily by blind and sight impaired players (there is a lot of info checking in PbtA that makes it far from perfect for such players). Over time, with bunch of feedback and after multiple tests it mutated into something much closer to Trophy/BitD, but it is now in a working state (you can read about it here). Soon I will get to writing it all down, either as a system-only game focused on accessibility, or connected to the Waking World campaign I have been running (which is an anti-setting focused on weird fantasy and discovery).
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This sounds super interesting! Since this is not a thread for discussions, would you consider creating a separate thread for HW?
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