Hello and welcome to the Weekly Scroll Podcast.
My name is Ryan. And I really only take passage
on ships with luxury quarters. And, and today we're going to be
looking at Off Worlders from Chris P Wolf, A science fiction
role-playing game about adventurers, outlaws and guns
for hire making their fortune on the rough end of the Galaxy.
That's what we're doing, the rough end, not the smooth end.
Yeah. So.
So this is a game that I wanted to do for a while, mostly
because it's the system that I pretty much love the most.
Ryan Ryan 2D6 game, you know. Yeah, yeah, it's very much.
We'll have a brief discussion on Powered by the Apocalypse, but
yeah, brief as as we do all things but but yeah, I don't
think we got anything going on for those that are are not
catching other stuff. We have started our first
campaign here on the show in the in the light of a setting sun's
coming in every Monday. We got 2 episodes out, a zero
session and a first session. So make sure you go check those.
If you like westerns, that's been fun.
We'll run that for a couple more weeks, but other than that,
we're just going to try to what's up.
Well, it's only really a campaign if it comes from the
campaign region of France. Otherwise it's just sparkling
adventure. There you go.
Yeah.
So we have a sparkling adventure of Ghost of the Sierra Verde
from John Davis. So check that out.
Check John out. And it's it's been fun.
I because I have to use my TDVS glass.
I'm going to pour it. Downstairs.
There we go. Boom, look at us.
So yeah, let's start with the game just a little bit.
So I held up already. This is off rollers.
It's a it's a big little book. Yeah, it's a big little book.
Yeah, it's very tall and skinny. So it's 8 1/2 by 11, and as far
as the book goes, it runs to about 24252620.
It's like 2728. It's like 28 pages all the way
through. So at 8 1/2 by 11 for 28 pages,
we're going to write this as a book, not as Zine today.
Because if this was, you know, A5, it would probably be like,
you know, 4050 plus pages, if not longer, which we would
usually do as bigger than Zine. And it's kind of stuff and
enough art and enough everything that I think it it, it warrants
being, being, getting the full treatment as opposed to a Zine.
And also because we want to. You know, because we fuck it
because we fucking want to. I mean, I do want to talk about
the value score. That's important.
I think so. Yeah, I think for this one that
is important, so. We can make sure is. $400.00 for
for half a print of this so. Yeah, which is incredible.
You can only find it on eBay. So.
So yeah, talk about the game a little bit here.
Off Worlders again by Chris P Wolf.
Offer Holders was published on Drive Through RPG on November
2nd, 2018 and released on Itch on June 4th, 2020.
I think the print runs started in like 20-19 maybe on drive
through based on some of the comments and stuff and there has
been some updates. It sounds like it originally
came out in a four column layout.
It's a three column layout. You'll see, you'll see that in a
second. The people that are are that are
watching and some small live dates from there, but it looks
like I said it was on drive through before it hit itch.
So it's it's built on the foundation laid by world of
dungeons by John Harper, which is one of my favorite games of
all time. It's one of the, I think the
three games that kind of like like changed the way that I
think about games and. Dungeons really early on, I feel
like, you know. Yeah, I love it and I don't
think it's a PBTA and we'll get into that.
It says like World of Dungeons, Off Worlders is designed to be
heavily interpreted in play, hacked to bits and customized to
taste. And on Itch page, it does say
100% of the money we make from Off Worlders for the foreseeable
future will be donated to bail fund organizations and other
organizations aligned with the current protest movement in
support of Black lives and police accountability.
Thanks for your support. So it's still on this page.
I assume that's still happening. So that's that's awesome.
Yeah, that's sick. And sure, we'll get some fun.
More leftist Fox comments. We haven't had one of those in a
while. We've talked shit about cops
multiple times I think, so maybe that person.
Off of them away, you know, those weird right wing OSR guys,
come on. And like, this is cool and like,
yeah, hey, fuck the government and the police.
They're like, not for me. Yeah, Yeah.
Well, I mean, we're definitely in the fuck the government phase
again right now. And you know what?
Go ahead and fuck the police too.
And ICE. Especially ice, Yeah.
So let's just fucking hop into the game.
Let's do it. Let's.
Do it all right, Offworlder. So the cover is very yellow.
Let me get let me get a zoom to page level so we can see the
whole cover at one time. I so the cover is yellow.
There's a skyline in the back slightly above halfway that has
like a black like halftone. And it is a picture of an
astronaut in a space suit, you know, with the whole glass top
and everything, gun holding a crate of something looking away
from you in like A at like 7:00, seven to 8:00, you know, Wait,
wait, wait. 9:00 to 10:00 away from you.
It's an interesting angle of a person.
Yeah. Not not even just the cover of a
book, but like just in general of like a person angle.
Yeah, I love the shadow and like the very obvious light source.
I really enjoyed the art throughout this.
The August is Olivia Gulin Golin.
What should we decide? GULIN, let's say, let's say
golin, a little bit of both, like a mix whose.
Name I don't recognize but I did enjoy this.
Yeah, the arts. Fantastic all the way through.
All the way through. All the way through the spot
arts really good. I love a lot of the there's like
a page of like what you need to play the game and I really liked
the journal and pencil specifically on that.
Like there was like a lot of time spent coloring the front of
this journal, and I don't know why, I just appreciated it.
But yeah, art's great, so. Yeah, it's so good.
I love the. Texture of the background on
like the cover and a couple other pieces as well.
Yeah, yeah, there's a halftone. There's like a really, I'm not
calling it halftone, but like, I don't know, because I don't know
what else to call it. Like when you have like very
closely done circles that creates like a texture across
the entire thing. I believe that is like halftone
all the way through. And it's very consistent and
it's really nice. And it's a game that uses like
one artist all the way through which it's.
Stippling used. Stippling.
Is a technique of creating an image, texture or pattern using
small dots. Yeah, but that's, I mean, I know
it's stippling is Yeah, that's right, not.
Quite that. So I would definitely call this
going on. There's dots.
We all like it. So I definitely call it like 1/2
tone a little bit so. So getting.
Into it. Welcome to Off Worlders.
I'm going to read this because it's it's the core narrative.
It's in the entire game. So we'll talk about that.
Yeah. Offworlders is a science fiction
role-playing game about adventurers, outlaws and guns
for hire making their fortune on the rough end of the Galaxy.
It is designed to be straightforward enough to pick
up and be ready to play in just a few minutes as a one off game,
but with enough meat to play short campaign as well.
The player characters and off world lawyers are the owners of
a small Starship in a time when humans have spread to many
worlds. Together they explore the
universe, completing A profitable jobs and overcoming
dangers. You'll fly between planets,
taking on the dangerous work that no one else wants.
You'll fight ruthless pirates, explore drifting derelict and go
toe toe with weird alien monsters.
And just to make enough credits to keep your ship flying, you'll
overcome these challenges by the skin of your teeth and come out
stronger on the other side. Along voyages, your characters
will learn about each other and grow together.
The first part of this book describes the general rules that
everyone at the table will use to play.
The second part is dressed directly to the Game Master and
contains rules and guidelines for running off worlders either
as a single session or as a campaign.
So let's go to the credits page and then talk about some parts
that are that are interesting. I think.
So credit due off Worlders of the game by Chris Wolfe,
illustrations and a book design by Olivia Gulen.
Off Worlders is inspired by World of Dungeons by John
Harper, which we talked about. It also has some inspiration
from Dungeon World, from Sage Latorre and Adam Coble, which
obviously fell out of, you know, but we're not going to bring
that. But off as well as Traveler by
Mark Miller, obviously, Yeah. And stars with that numbers from
Kevin Crawford. But obviously Traveler stuff.
Anyone that knows Chris knows Chris is the big Traveler fan
so. Doesn't want to be traveler
stuff, yeah. If you play off Worlders, please
let me know what you think. I believe that should be up.
I don't know if Chris still is on Twitter, but I know we
interact with him on Blue Sky, so you can check them out there.
And then Offworlders is licensed under Creative Commons and
there's a link to the license, which is great.
So go into the index real quick and yeah, we'll talk about this
and then we'll talk about what I was going to say.
So nice. I mean, layout wise it is two or
three columns. The index is 2 columns versus
white, but it's black, it's black and white.
When you do go to the drive through print, we'll bring this
up again later. It is like premium color, but it
just I guess makes the paper and quality better.
Even though it's a black and white inside, a color on the
outside, but it is all black text on white background.
There is a index here playing the game and then all of the
sections for playing the game. There's a Game Master section
and a sheet section, and then it is hyperlinked, which is
fantastic. It's completely hyperlinked.
There are in fact bookmarks, which is really great to see.
It's really interesting. So obviously, like I said, this
system speaks to my heart. But it's funny because, you
know, we've only like, I've chatted with Chris recently and
this game came out long before we ever even started the
podcast. And this version of the game
come out long before we ever started the podcast.
But it has so many of the things that we love, which is funny
because like as I was going through it, I was like, oh, this
is this. If I was writing a game, this is
very close to the system that I would write and it has, and it's
fully hyperlinked and it has complete differentiation between
a player section and DM section. I was like.
I thought exactly that going good.
I was like, look at this is a proper fucking tabletop game
right here. I was like, introduces the
rules, then does character creation, then expands it on the
rules that, yeah, game Master section partitioned off.
Yeah, I was like, good, this is good.
It's so funny. Yeah.
It's so funny because it feels like, again, this came out long
before we ever started the show, but this feels like someone,
like, listened to our critiques and was like, all right, I need
to make sure I hit all these points.
But they just did it on their own.
So obviously love the way that they did this, I think.
It's a statement on the fact that the industry is moving
backwards. Actually, things are getting
worse. Oh I I could not.
Like I know you're joking, but I'm not.
And I completely agree that the entire industry for in various
ways has gotten worse since 2018.
So. That's OK, don't worry, when the
MCDM game comes out it'll fix everything.
Oh, you mean the game that made two and a half million dollars
that never still doesn't even have like a name and has had no
updates or anything in years? Yeah, we'll see if that ever
comes. Out.
No, don't worry, it's coming. Yeah, zoom to page level again.
There's a couple pieces of like full page art here.
That again is just fantastic. Oh, this is.
Let me see if it if it will go together here.
Good spreads, yeah. Yeah, yeah.
Let's see if I can if it if it's the right number of pages.
No, it's not. Nah, it's too bad.
Yeah, I mean, I could just throw in a page, but I'm not going to.
But this would be a two page spread.
I'll just hold up in the book to start playing the game section.
Solid, nice big spread of zoomed in on hands, kind of looking at
a table. Yeah.
And that's got like a grid across it and some maps, some
coins, a controller for a submarine, you know.
But we get the playing the game section, which again, I yeah,
you got it. It took a second.
You got. That guy, when you said it, they
just as it marinated, it continued to get funnier, yeah.
So, so playing the game and again, I, I, I fucking love that
there is a hard differentiation between the playing the game
section and the GM section. Yeah, like so many games should
have that. Like Speaking of John Harper,
like fucking Blades in the Dark. Did you see Blades in the Dark?
Deep Cuts is coming to back her kit.
It's like an 50 page expansion of the setting in the.
World no fucking way. You were kids longer.
If any game does it, that's so funny 'cause that's my exact
reaction. If any game doesn't need anymore
and could actually use much less, a Blades of the Dark does
not need another 150 pages. It needs to cut out 150 pages
long. But you know what?
Some people are very excited for it.
Deluxe edition of that game is they actually cut out like 120.
Yeah, make a Zen. Yeah.
Did you just have blades in the dark of the Zen?
Not even that, just like all the parts that repeat themselves.
Just clip that shit right the fuck out.
It's funny because I'm so like I am so critical about like, you
know, more isn't act necessarily more, but like we just went over
liminal horrors new project and that ones actually more in like
a meaningful way. And that one I'm like, okay,
well, that expansion of size, I want those tools, you know?
Yeah, I mean, I, I do and I obviously we we love Josh and
and Golden, our cousin Zach on the show, everything.
But like when they were like 350 pages, I was like, well, I'm
sure we'll have an opinion on that, but we'll see how it goes.
Mostly a toolbox. It's fine.
Yeah, mostly a toolbox. And like I said, I do love that
you can't. You're getting the
investigator's edition with it, which is just all you need to
play to. So you don't need all of those
things. So getting a book knowing it's
just a toolkit is way different than getting a book and going,
oh, I need all 400 fucking pages of this.
And we also know that they are separating it into appropriate
sections and everything you know and like plug in.
A different episode. Yeah, I mean, that's a good
game, but but again, speaking real quick before we get into
this too deep World dungeons for those don't know is a 2D6 game
from John Harper. And for those that also don't
know, we, we kind of beat up on blades in the dark here on the
show a lot because honestly, in my opinion, it deserves it.
But it's it's never going to not blow my mind that I that the
same guy who did blades in the dark dead world of dungeons,
which is my favorite games and lasers and feelings, which is
another one my favorite games and lasers and feelings is like
a one page. Game they'll have not read
lasers. I know it's very short.
Literally like a one page game. Just fucking read it like it's
fantastic. You basically you have like 2
stats, it's lasers or feelings like and like that's kind of and
and then World of Dungeons is literally like a four four to
six page game If you don't like the character sheets in it,
which is crazy, but it is at its core A2D6 like mix success game.
It's one of the original kind of like Pbta hacks, quote UN quote.
But I've said this forever, once I really knew what Pbta was, I
don't personally think that World of Dungeons is a PBTA
because it basically just uses the 2D6 mix success dice
mechanic and slaps that onto basically like a a super
streamline dungeon BX ish kind of game.
Right? So there's no narrative
scaffolding, there's no moves, there's no any of that stuff.
It's just the dice mechanic, which I don't think makes a
PBTA. I've said this over and over
again, what I think makes a Pbta is the narrative scaffolding,
which is why you can have a thing like Dreams Askew and
Dream Apart or Masters. Well, yeah, because those games
literally like no dice, No Masters doesn't even have a dice
mechanic. But it is still Pbta because it
has narrative scaffolding. It has movements that is
pickless. It has all of those things.
Which again, I think personally for me is what really defines
the game, is the way the game is scaffolded narratively and the
way that the players in gyms interact with that kind of
conversation, which World of Dungeons doesn't have
realistically. And this game is really built on
that. And it's funny because I asked
Chris, is this a PBTA? And he was like, you know, like
my answer would be no, because but again, I also don't think
fist is a PBTAI don't think World of Dungeon is the PBA.
I don't think this is the PBTA. If you want to call it anything,
I would say it's a Dungeon World hack because you just take a
mechanic of it. But again, PBTA quote UN quote.
Like quote UN quote. Per the website, Powered by the
Apocalypse was just supposed to be a brand that they published
under, per Vincent Baker. It never was meant to like be
the name of a whole system or anything, even though that is
what is obviously evolved into what people see it.
As but anyway, lineages of games, I mean everything so many
things we that are hacks of other things I could just look
at and be like that's a BX hack, you know, I mean like yeah,
yeah. Yeah, so I personally just
hitting the same 2D6 mix success on its own does not necessarily
make thing APBTII don't think that this is 1, but this is the
page you were talking about with the What you need page.
Look at the little journal bro, isn't that sick cover on that?
Journal's cute. It's got a little.
Is that? Is that an orange slice?
It is a little. Orange slice.
Got some dice. I think that's an.
Is that an eraser to you off to the side?
Like what? It's a little little thing, yes.
So, yeah, so two things on this page.
And again, you'll notice now we hit this three column layout.
This has two columns. It's got a left column and a
middle column and then like a blank column to the right.
But it's got the art across the top, which is really, really
fantastic. I love the layout through this.
I think it's really, really great three column grid layout
with a very simple, straightforward text.
What you need stuff rules, pencils, people, things like
that. There is a section here.
I didn't want to say that it's the, the book is mostly
hyperlinked all the way through, which is fantastic.
But there is a section here that says off rollers character sheet
for each player 1 ship sheet and you can get these at
crispywolf.com/offworlders. But that is not hyperlinked.
So obviously you can just copy paste that.
But like, if you're going to hyperlink anything, copperlink
your own website where people can find stuff.
Absolutely I. Agree.
Yeah, what's that? Pretty good.
The conversation is one of my favorite parts in this entire
book, and I'm just going to read through it too.
Guys can hear this, a lot of games kind of touch on this, but
not in the way that Chris explains it here in these couple
paragraphs, and I think it's such a fantastic way to do it.
It says a game of Off worlders is a conversation.
The Game Master will describe the scene around the player
characters, populating the details on people.
The players will respond to that world, describing how their
characters interact with it, asking the GM about details and
saying what their characters say to each other and the NPC's.
Basic like, yes, of course, right?
But then it says you'll take turns, but you'll take turns
like you do in a conversation. Sometimes you'll speak for
longer to get something done, and often you'll step back to
let someone else have the spotlight.
Unlike many other games, you'll never split up into a specific
order to take formal terms. Just let things flow naturally
and let whoever the action is centered on describe what the
character does. If you've been in spotlight for
a while, invite someone else to speak up.
I love that. I love that like when
something's happening, if, if there's still like a rise to the
action, you just kind of let the action rise kind of like you
would in a conversation. And when it's time for someone
else to take that, you can. So everyone just kind of knows
that sometimes someone will have the, you know, the, the
spotlight for a little bit and then you'll pass it to someone
else. It's just a great way to write
that out. And, and I really, really love,
I really love that basic terms. I will say we're getting into
basic terms. This is a page like there's only
I think 2 pages throughout the entire book that I'm like, just
like, not quite like. The biggest fan of this is one
of them. Basic terms is 3 columns, about
half the page, the bottom half the page with nothing across the
top. The fact that the top half is
just empty in this page, it's. Just empty, which is fine
because like the way that the the the grid layout is done
throughout the entire book. Like there are spaces that work
for this style of layout, but I I wouldn't have minded like just
a little something here on the top of this page here you just.
Entered the terms like, I mean, maybe a little, yeah.
It's like up into a little bit yeah, but but it's it's fine.
Like it's not I would wouldn't take a big Ding against it.
It's just they took everything they needed and and put it and
it's interesting, but with the amount of spot art in the book,
like one more tiny little piece would have been totally fine.
I. Kind of agree with that, yeah.
But basic terms, these are terms in the game.
We're not going to go over them. But if things like what is a
player, what is a game master was an attribute, it doesn't say
what is. It just says like player
characters or and then gives you a little thing for all of them.
So non player characters help XP, just an explainer.
So for people that haven't played a bunch of games, that's
fine. This is like the kind of best
way you can do what is a role-playing game, Just give the
terms that people might need and that's it.
And then we get to rolling the dice.
So this is the core mechanic of the game basically.
And I love the way that it's kind of laid out through the
entire book where you'll get a header at the top.
It says rolling the dice, and then you'll get kind of like a
bolded little section for for what the section is.
And this says when a player character to something dangerous
on certain or contested, use the dice to find out how well it
goes. You'll roll the dice and add one
of your attributes to get a final result, then use that
result to figure out what happens next.
And then what they do a lot is number sections and then explain
stuff as you go. So there's four parts to this.
It's describe what you want to do and how you do it.
Pick the attribute, pick the most appropriate of the four
attributes, talk about the potential outcomes, and then
roll the dice. And when you roll the dice, it's
2D6 plus, you know, an attribute or whatever.
So on a 10 or higher success, you get what you want.
On a 7 to 9 complication, you get what you want.
But if some cost reduce effect, difficult choice or harm, the GM
tells you what and on a six or less it's a miss.
You probably don't give what you want and the gym will make your
life more complicated. They'll tell you exactly what
happens. The good news is you earn one XP
and we'll get to that in advancement later.
If both dice come up with sixes, it's a critical success.
You give what you want and something extra.
If you have a skill relevant to the current situation, you may
choose to re roll one of the dice, but you take you must take
the second roll, use a new total for your result, and then the
game master never rolls the dice.
The the players are always ones that roll.
The game is about them and the risks that they take.
If an MPC attacks a player, the players one that rolls either to
avoid counter attack or something else.
If a player takes damage, it's usually because they roll the
dice and got a complication. I love that.
I feel like my the way I look at games and, and, and this
specific system and the way Chris does is extremely similar.
So, so many things are as we go through this, I'm like, yes,
yes, yes, That is how you say that.
That's how you do it. And the rationale behind like
players roll the dice because the consequences are on them is
just great. Love it.
You know, I've never seen you and Crispy Wolf in the same
room, so yeah, who's to say we? Definitely don't look similar.
You can tell he's taller to see more camera.
So only role when it's interesting.
We don't need to get into that like consequences, like if if a
thing can just be done or it would take time to do a thing,
just it just fucking it's a thing.
Only role when it fucking matters.
And then nothing never happens. We've talked about that enough.
But it's a great core concept of the game.
And that's the core. That's the core of the game.
And honestly, everything on this page is my favorite core of a
game period. Love it.
It is again, it is the core of the world of dungeons,
basically. It is the core of fist,
basically. Like, it's great.
I love it. This is a me game.
We've done a lot of you games for a while, like the ice cream
and everything. Yeah, but this, I love it.
So, attributes. Every PC has four of them
representing different ways they may change their four
attributes, right? They can go from -1 to +3.
The four attributes are Strength, Agility, Intelligence,
and Willpower. They are exactly what you think
you are. Willpower does.
It's not just determination, it's also like Charisma.
Yeah. Yeah, and your force of
personality, so you can like bark out orders, manipulate
people with it. I love that.
I think that's really neat. But otherwise, strength is and
agility, intelligence, exactly what you think they are.
I do like the way that they explain it though, like they
say, like what it is and how it can be used.
So for example of one, intelligence, perception, logic
and knowledge useful for analysis, messing with
technology and knowing stuff. So I like the way that they
break that down a lot of the through the entire book.
It's written in a way where it's very concise, but still
thorough. Like when you read it, like you
get it. There's not anything through
this entire book where I was like, I don't quite get what
they're saying. I just think it's.
A wealth it's. A wealth I again I I rather
really like this game skills. We talked about it at the
beginning and again I love this is a thing that we talked about
a bunch right before you. You should have a page like
this, like the rolling the dice page that gives you the core of
the game and and touches on all the parts of what you're going
to run into. And this page does where it
gives you the dice mechanics. It talks about skills.
It talks about all the stuff in a very small way.
And then you get full explanations later.
So you on that very first page, you have a good understanding
entire game. It talked about skills before
and now you get skills here. And what skills does is you have
it or you don't. And if you do have it, when you
make a roll, you can re roll one of the dice and you have to take
that second roll, which I think is a really fucking cool way to
do it. Basically gives you advantage
like at choice for a skill you have.
There are 8 skills, athletics, culture, manipulation, pilot,
science, sneak, survival, and tech.
All of which you can guess what they do.
Yep. And also very simple.
They have like a, the skills all have like a very short
description and it just is like a category of things that you
have a specialty in, which means that if you want to make up your
own, it would be pretty, pretty effortless, you know?
Super fucking easy. Yeah, abilities, player
characters and off world will start with two.
You may get more later. And they are special tricks
done, something that you get that bends the rules a little
bit. And those are described later in
classes. When you get to the making an
off world section on the next page, I have a note in my notes
that says, I wanted to talk about this again as we go
through this. I'm like, this is just really
well done because how many times we read through a book that's
like, you'll find this below, but like it's a book.
So it's actually in the page next to you or the above you or
it's not below you. So yeah, this is the way to talk
about navigation in a book. Don't say it's below or it's
above or something. Writing in docs and shit where
it's just it's continue to Scroll down, you know, yeah,
you. Forget when they did physically.
In their hands, that's not. Exactly.
So this is just a small thing where it's like the next page
because it's just the next page, which is great.
Then we get to the making an off worlder page.
So I love this, you know, we love a good numbered list.
There's 6 steps to making a character.
And then on this page you also get customizing classes and
aliens. So why don't you?
Do you want to make one as we just run through this real
quick? I'd love to.
Pretty, pretty easy, straightforward.
So number one is pick a class. So there's four classes.
We'll we'll pick whichever 1 you pick is the one we'll go over
when we get to it. So there's warrior, outlaw,
geek, and psychic. Pick one.
Psychic. Psychic, I'm shocked.
Your class gives you a few unique abilities to choose from.
You pick any 2. As we said, you get 2.
So when we get to, we'll run through this a little bit and
then we'll hop in and you'll pick two of your abilities.
Actually, no, fuck it, let's just pick your abilities.
Now. Let's just run down and we'll go
to psychic. So I love the way that the
character sheets are that little things are.
There's two per sheet and there's a piece of art next to
each one. So the geek has kind of like a
scientist looking person next to it, the Outlaw does.
And even the layout on the sheet I love.
Again, it's a three column layout.
So the middle and right column have stuff in it and the whole
left side column has art in it and just looks good.
It's really good. Yeah, layout layout.
But that's not definitely the word you're looking for.
But. It looks a good grid layout.
It's really well done. So we got Geek, we got Outlaw,
we got Psychic. So all the classes are really
good. They really enjoy each of them.
They have fun abilities. Yeah.
So psychic psychics possess supernatural mental abilities.
Yeah, you're psychic. That's that's the thing I do.
Like in this game, it says at one point or another, there
aren't inherently like aliens. That's a decision that you you
make your table and if you want to have aliens, maybe you like
it doesn't give you any bonuses. Maybe like all psychics are like
of an alien race or all warriors are of like a cast of alien
warriors. And I really thought it was a
fun way to do it. But yeah, for psychic like to
pick two abilities, right. So obviously I'm going to pick
premonition because I think it's a fun one.
Once per day, you can just ask the GM about an outcome of an
action. And the instance they give is
what will happen when I open the store.
And I just like that I can just, you know, and then James, just
to tell you most likely what will happen, honestly.
So I'll probably take that one because I think it's fun to know
what's going to happen in the section before it happens.
And then I don't know, man. I'm thinking maybe maybe jump or
scanners. Jump is like you can teleport
once a scene to a nearby location and scanners, you can
easily read surface emotions, and you have the ability to roll
intelligence to read deeper thoughts like specifically
searching for information. What do you think?
What's one of those? It's funny because those are
probably the two that I wouldn't take really, but I'm a combat
boy. I'm a combat boy.
I would take telekinesis or blast I think but forced all
this pretty. Dope I almost shooting with my
brain. Listen, you gotta you gotta
question something. Scanner.
Then we're reading. Scanners are good.
Well, premonition and scanner really work well together.
Yeah. I think it's kind of like, I
don't know if they meant to do it this way, but I feel like the
three on the left and the three on the right are kind of like a
separation. So you got blast, which, you
know, brain blast. You got force wall and jump.
Those feel like very much like, yeah, doing physical things kind
of. And then the premonition scanner
and telekinesis feels like very mental things and it's all with
your brain, but it still feels different.
So premonition scanner think works really well together.
Those are good. You big Jimmy Neutron fan.
I mean, you know, I'm a big fan of Jimmy Neutron's mom.
I don't know, but hey, hey, buddy.
So anyway, so you picked us number one, you pick a class,
you picked psychic and you pick you pick two abilities, Scanner
and Premonition, right? Yes.
So then you choose two skills. So we have the list again up
here Athletics, culture, manipulation, pilot, science,
sneak, survival and tech. Which two skills you.
Know so I was going to go ahead and take tech and manipulation.
I thought manipulation would be great for that character, so
that's awesome. I'm.
Definitely going with kind of like a sport non combat
character. It sounds like it.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Especially with tech, the you
can kind of, not only are you in people's brains or in machine
brains, Yeah. So a manipulation is great.
You can convince people what to do.
Like, I think they all kind of like work together, synergize,
you know, it's usually corporate speak.
My solid synergy. So yeah #3 you assign your
attribute so you have a an array here and it's plus 2 + 1 zero -1
standard for array. Love that shit.
Think about your class, what kind of things your character is
likely to do, etcetera etcetera. So with your 4 attributes, you
got strength. What was the second one?
Agility. Intelligence.
Willpower. Agility.
Yeah, Strength. Agility.
Intelligence. Willpower.
So where are you putting 4? I think we're doing 2IN
intelligence, of course, one in willpower.
What are the numbers? I have already blanked and I
have a 0 and -1 right? Yeah.
So we'll go 0 and agility and -1.
Strength, yeah, that's kind of what I figured it'd go.
Yeah. And that I mean that fits the
character so well. All that and there there is
options for advancement and we'll get to those.
I will say real quick before we go back down to Oh no, no, no,
it's on the next page. So we don't need to.
So so that's number three of six.
Number four is record your health.
Each PC has a maximum health equal to 12 plus their strength
and agility together. So you have 12 I.
Have. 11, you have 11, yeah. If you look at the example I
have, it's your example from the example.
Yeah, it's literally the example because it says if PC with +2
strength in it and plus one agility is 15, but APC with 0
strength and -1 agility, which inflict what you did is 11
health. So you start with 11.
Yeah #5 is get your gear. You start with three supply.
Supply is like my favorite thing in the entire world.
Yeah, I. Saw this in here.
I'm like, yeah, this is such a Ryan game.
It is it's in it's in Derf from Boven.
It's in I think it's just what gear in the vanilla game from
Gear Sinclair. It's in a couple of things, but
it's quantum. It's it's quantum inventory.
Basically supply is an abstract amount representing any items
you might be carrying. Gears explained in Money,
Weapons and gear on page 11. Oh, is that hyperlinked?
Oh, that's not hyperlinked, so no inline hyperlinks, but it is
bolded and it gives you the page number and it's only like 20
pages. So not, we're not going to, I
mean, we want to deduct anything for that, but just something to
point out a little bit. Could use a couple more
hyperlinks in here. So there we go.
Done. Use zeros across the board.
So you get you start with three credits, you start with one
light weapon, describe it. So just whatever the fuck you
want, right? Then choose either an additional
7 credits or light armor worth 1 armor and we'll get armor in a
second and a second weapon of any type.
So are you getting more money or are you getting armor and a
second weapon? Oh man, I think I'd probably do
more money. That's what I kind of thought it
sounds armor and a second weapon for your for your like non
combat support character doesn't quite fit.
So and credits report. We'll get to that in money.
So you you start with 10 credits, which is crazy.
That's a lot. Of ton.
That's actually a ton in this game.
In this game. It goes a very long way so.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. And because it's, again, it's
abstracted, which which I love, yeah.
But we'll get to that in a little bit.
And then name your name and describe your character.
Come up with a name for your character and share with the
other players. Come up with at least one
distinctive visual detail, can be clothing, body, possessions,
anything, just to get a, a mental picture.
That's number six. What you got?
I got xylon blow bracks because he's named.
Blow. Blow.
Yep. You got it.
Yep. There's no way you would go with
blow Brax because people would just call you blowbacks like.
All the time. Exactly the point.
Yeah. Zylon blows backs, bro.
Yeah. Yeah.
You fell with my trap there, buddy.
You activated my trap card. Yeah.
He's got one eye on his forehead, but it's, it's, you
know, it's fucking. What are the words can I say?
So you're so you're Yamcha. Yamcha.
Oh, am I thinking of the wrong one?
From Dragon Ball Z. Oh no, that's the thing.
From Fucking Yu Yu Haka show you.
No, no, no, no, no, no. It's not Yamcha, it's the other
one. Is it Tian?
Oh, Tian, Yeah, it's Tian. Tian is not.
That's absolutely true actually. I fucking love TN too, so yeah.
TN's great, but he's just sideways.
Yours is up and down. Though, Yeah, so you're.
Like a navigator from from from Warhammer 40,000.
Oh, OK for a second, like you say, navigator from Dune, I'm
like, no, they're worm. No, they're not worm.
Dune. They're like good fishy guys in
the tank. Yeah, do you know TN is like
descended from aliens and shit? That's why he's not.
Is that is that Canon? Yeah, he's his lady.
Like he's descended from aliens, bro.
Look it up. TN Shinhan.
Yeah, so anyway, while you look it up and and realize that I'm
right that he is in from Aliens, I'll talk about customizing
classes and aliens. So customizing classes,
experienced players may want more flexibility becomes making
a kick. Thank you.
If everyone agrees, players can ignore the listed classes
entirely and make a character simply by choosing any 2 skills
and any 2 special abilities. Players should communicate and
make those without too much overlap, which is great.
I love that. Basically like you can just go
classless and just make it a pick, Pick and choose which is
great. And then aliens, yes.
Thanks what you're saying and I have a minor complaint.
OK, aliens off worlders don't have specific rules for alien
species. As a group you should decide
amongst yourselves if aliens exist blah blah blah blah blah.
Maybe all psychics are from one species, or all warriors are
from 1. You know, you got you got the
not Namekians, that's why I said the Nietzscheans.
Nietzscheans. So what's your 1 complaint?
So the classes. Yes.
In this sci-fi space game, yes, Are geek totally outlaw,
sidekick makes sense and Warrior.
Well, let's read the top of Warrior and see if it says it.
Warriors are soldiers and bounty hunters.
All of their abilities provide an edge in combat.
Play a warrior if you want to be straightforward and violent.
So it sounds to me like your complaint is the word warrior
feels a little bit medieval. It does if it is a very medieval
fantasy class title, you know, I just think that there's like a
Merc or a bounty hunter or soldier or.
Opposite but it's literally saying that soldiers it.
Like I feel like warrior is a pretty is a catch all for
everything you just said as opposed to just being one of
those things. But I don't necessarily
disagree. I think.
I think even Fighter would sound a little bit more sci-fi.
Yeah, maybe. Yeah.
I still think there's more sci-fi than that.
That's my only. It's such a minor complaint.
I do really like this game in the classes a lot.
Very fun and interesting. Yeah, but like.
To counter your claim a little bit.
So it's it's geek specifically so that it's not saying doctor,
scientist or technician. It's outlaw.
So you don't have to say smuggler, scoundrel, a Jack of
all trades. Like it's, I mean psychic,
psychic, but then warrior. So you don't have to specify
soldier, bounty hunter. I, I feel like it's, it's, it's
as it is as broad as you could get while still covering which I
which I do like. Because you can then pick.
Bounty hunter or a mercenary? You called it mercenary.
A mercenary could also be a soldier or a bounty hunter.
So I mean. Theoretically, yeah, but it
does. I feel like that's just one
layer in. I agree.
If you were to go out right now and you went out to like a group
of like, of like members of our, our armed forces and you called
them a bunch of warriors, they would be like, you know, except
the one corny guy who's like, yeah, I'm a warrior bro, You
know what I mean? I.
Feel like they would be. I feel like they would.
They would. I hear what you're saying.
I think it's valid. I think it's valid.
I personally don't think I would like zoom in any more than like
fighter. Yeah, but.
I still think keeping it up in the air to be like you're a
thing that's encompasses several things, yeah.
Yeah, but I mean, I don't necessarily the warrior thing
doesn't bother me. But you're right, in the context
of tip top role-playing games, warrior does feel a little bit
fantasy, but but that's valid. I think that's very valid.
So after the making an off roller thing, there is a
character sheet here. Well, it's like a it's like a
Gray box that says player characters, the crew of the
Quiche Lorraine, which is a ship and we'll say that again later.
And it gives 4 basically like character sheets for four, like
fake characters, you know, like example characters.
So there's K the Warrior, Ria the outlaw, Imani the psychic,
and Trixie the geek. And it lists all of those
things, including the gear they chose, their appearance, things
like that. So their psychic was Imani,
their appearance was their body covered in biomechanical
implants. They also picked scanner and
premonition, and they also picked manipulation, but they
only, but they pick culture. And they did strength -1 they,
oh, they did willpower too, instead of intelligence too,
because willpower is manipulating.
So that makes sense. And the health 11 so.
And they're the so very similar to the character you made.
So yeah, interesting that, you know, you you kept kind of true
to at least what the game intent was for for their example of
like. Credits instead of taking a
second weapon. So you, I think that that's neat
because it makes sense to be like the way that the designer
thought about Psychic is what you got from Psychic 2, which I
think is good. I think there's only space for
making a bad like a battle psychic though.
Like there's definitely room for that in this.
This absolutely I wanted to do. You know, yeah, but no, I think
if you took like the armor, the weapons, you took blast and
force wall, you know, put it all into strength and manipulation,
Yeah, that would. Jump, move around the
battlefield and just, like, fire it.
Yeah, could be crazy. Could be sick, you know, blast
and jump together to be sick. Just like teleport and like
fucking blast and shit. That's cool but you only get it
once. But.
Lightning. Fighting in damage.
So again, I love the way the book is structured because we
got the rolling the dice page, which gave us like an
explanation of the core mechanics of of the game.
Then we got the rules. You need to understand how your
character works. Then you get to character
creation, which we went over, which includes classes and
skills and everything, and then you get the rest of the rules of
the game. That's literally like the best
way to put a game together, at least in in, in the opinions
that we've come to our. Completely correct and
unquestionable opinions, you know.
Exactly. Exactly.
So fighting a damage resolve fights just like any other risky
situation. When a player attacks an enemy
who is prepared to defend themselves, you should roll
dice. When an enemy opens fire on a
player, the player will be rolling the dice to avoid the
attack or counter it somehow. There is no formal structure of
turns around, you simply follow the action as it unfolds.
I love this. I fucking love this.
I'm still so much of this game. So when a player takes damage,
it will usually because of a miss or a complication outside
of a fight. You can take damage from other
things, but again, usually from like the consequences of the
actions that you choose. Which is like anyway.
When players damage NPCS, they inflict damage as indicated by
the type of weapon they are using.
For instance, a heavy weapon does 1 E 6 + 2 damage, and we'll
get to weapons in just a minute. Someone don't deep into that.
Enemies and hazards inflict damage against PCs in the same
way. Roll for damage and subtract the
result from the PCs Health, Health and dying Health is a
measure of how much damage a character can take before
they're in big trouble. When ANPC reaches 0 health,
they're out of action. When APC reaches 0 health,
they're in serious trouble. They must roll the dice with the
results below. And they add so it's a it's a
roll plus will a willpower. So on A10 plus you're down both
rest and care. You'll make a full recovery.
On a 7 and 9 you will live. But the player must choose some
part of the character that gets lost forever.
For example, the steadiness in their hands, their sense of
security, or their left eye. This has no direct mechanical
effect, but might make life difficult or complicate
situations in the future. Love that, love that.
Just extract. Away losing self Yeah, my love
from from my fellow man Yep. Yeah, same bro, same.
But I love that. I love that that's exactly what
you could do. It can infect you.
If you're like a big RP are losing something in RP would be
a big deal. But if you're someone who leans
a little bit more mechanically, be like, well, I use my right
arm and now I can only use one handed weapons or something, you
know what I mean? Like I love the abstraction of
that six or less. The PC is doomed.
They might not die right away and they might get a chance to
do one last thing before they go, but they will not live to
the end of the game session. Love that shit, Love that shit.
I also love the idea that they don't die right away, but they
could just be like limping and slowly bleeding out the entire
time. I movies like that, books like
that, shows like that where someone like like they're still
trying to save you get all the way to the end and right before
you get saved like you died. Love that shit.
It's great. Yeah, I agree.
Very high drama, you know? Yeah, armor medicates incoming
damage. It's in the gear section.
Basically, it's armor one, or armor 2, or I guess Armor 3-4,
etcetera, etcetera, or whatever. If a character's wearing armor,
they subtract their total armor amount from any incoming damage.
If the damage is equal to or low, it's soak.
It's armor soak and recovering health.
There are two ways to recover health.
You have first aid. If you have a few quiet minutes,
you can spend one supply to heal another character for one D6 of
health, not yourself, and then resting.
If the character gets equivalent of a good night's sleep, they
recover health equal to half their maximum health, rounded
up. That's it.
Straightforward, great money, gear and weapons.
So tracking every little piece of equipment and every penny is
not necessary. Most equipment is covered by
supply, otherwise you get credits.
The currency, the base of currency is credits, and one
credit represents A relatively substantial amount of money.
So that's really all you have to track.
So things worth one credit, A light weapon is worth one
credit. A substantial bribe is worth a
credit. An opulent night out.
I'm a few weeks in a mid range apartment.
So a credit is a lot of money. It's like 1000 bucks in my in my
brain. I went 1000 bucks.
Like so you start with like you start with like 10,000 bucks.
It's crazy. There's a list here of more
expensive items. So a new spacesuit is 3 credits.
Passage to a nearby star system is 12 credits.
A small space station is 5000 credits.
So you can already get passage. You can already almost get
passed into a nearby star system and you're halfway to an average
ground car. One important thing that we'll
talk about in a little bit is a spaceship upgrade is 50 credits.
So that tells you how a big deal it is.
Yeah. But they're fairly substantial.
You know, yeah, they're big supply.
So we talked about those before. Supply is an abstract thing.
It it it off rollers assumes you're carrying all the
necessary shit you have. So instead of choosing
everything you need you can just abstract with supply.
You begin with three. You can spend one supply at any
time to produce a mundane item or item of similar complexity.
You you refill your supply whenever you have some downtime.
Your maximum supply is always 3 and you can spend 1 to half
anything like 50 feet of cable, a blowtorch, a small explosive,
a multi tool. Basically like any of the shit
that you would know if you're a geek and you need your fucking
like sprocket fucking wrench or some shit, you have it.
You just say I have it on me. My supply is 1.
I love that. I will always love supply.
Better than like having to try to like pick and choose every
fucking thing you have on me. If you have the thing, if you're
whatever you would need for your character, you just have it.
It's fine. Thoughts on supply?
Yeah, it's always a great role. I mean, it's it's definitely, I
really appreciate it. I mean, in some systems I like
having inventories and then some systems I'm like, supply is a
way better option. I think this is like clearly the
latter of those. It is a way better option for
this. Like, why would you keep track
of everything? This is so about the fiction,
you know? Yeah.
Yeah, when when basically everything else is abstracted in
the game, like wounds, like health is just an abstraction,
Credits are an abstraction, like everything is abstraction.
There's no reason to. Have a real issue with like
inventory management is in games where like, yeah, like obviously
a lot of rules are inherently an abstraction to like a, a
simulating and thing happening. But like, when so much is like
behind the fiction and it's based on that, and then they're
like, and then you're going to count all your fucking bullets
and I'm like, fuck you. Why would I do that in this one?
Exactly. I'm running OSE right now.
And that one feels a lot more appropriate to have.
Like, no, dude, you got 20 errors.
Like this is the rule of scarcity in this, you know.
Yes, Yeah, yeah, because this isn't a dungeon crawler where,
like, you're stuck and don't have access to just like you go
into fucking sleep or going to the store.
You know what I mean? Like, makes sense in those
things. And like, it can be fun in those
things. Like, you can have a whole game
literally just built around like, make sure you have exactly
what you need in the dungeon because you're fucked if you
lose all your torches. Like, that makes sense.
But you're right. Like in a game like this when
everything's abstracted is pointless.
So heavy items. Some things are heavy, they're
large, they're clumsy. PC must take -1 anytime they
roll the dice to do something like run, jump or climb while
carrying a heavy item, and it's also difficult to hide.
Heavy can cause complications. Boom, love that.
Yeah, there's page. This is the other page.
I was, I was talking about that like I'm like the only other
page I'm not the hugest fan of. So it's the gear page and it's
it's, but it crosses the middle and right column in the three
column layout, even though it isn't separating the three
columns. And then there's a picture of
the quiche Lorraine underneath, but the entire left column is
empty. And to me, like even like, you
know how on like the what does this need page?
It did the two columns, but then like the art on the top kind of
spread into all three. If they would have just kind of
instead of this touching the mid of the page on the right, if
they moved it so it's going across all three, I think it
would just be it would just look a little bit better.
It just feels like a little bear on this page.
And it's also, I think one of the only pieces of art that
breaks the margin and touches the the middle.
What would be the middle of the page?
Or like the edge of the page that's not a full page piece?
OK, I got you. So I think if it is just pulled
into the margin and spread to the the other margin, I think it
would just look a little bit better.
But that's such AI mean that that's like such a small gripe
in the context of like how well the whole rest of the book is
laid out. I know like all of our gripes
about this are going to be fairly small, like this is a
pretty solid, this is a pretty solid product and game, you
know? Yeah, for sure.
So gear. There's three things listed.
Weapons, armor, and ship items. I like the way that the weapons
work. There's unarmored, light, medium
and heavy, A list of credits, the damage, and some notes.
So unarmed. Unarmed damage is lower of 2D6.
Light is 1D6, medium is 1 D 6 + 1.
Heavy is 1 D 6 + 2. Classic.
You've seen it in other systems. Love it.
It's great. And then it lists what those
things are like. Unarmed just kicks and punches
all the way up to heavy with just plasma cannons and shit.
Armor. Light Heavy and Assault 123 Yes.
Random thought, what was the game that we went over that had
like vastly different damages for each weapon?
Swibers right? Wasn't it?
Was it Swibers? I need to go back to it.
I kind of liked it, you know? Yeah, well, cuz Swibers does
weird shit to do weird shit, which I loved Yeah, but I'm
pretty sure that's one where it's like you'll randomly have
like it's like 1 is like 2D12 one is like.
Yeah. Yeah, I think that's what you're
talking about. There might be something else.
Something's tickling my brain a tiny bit, but.
But, but yeah. And then ship items, there's
Starship, Dr. fuels, Starship upgrades and hull repairs, which
are important because we will talk about those in the ship
stuff just now, right here. So.
And a picture of the keys, Lorraine.
So then we get to the ship. Is it is that what you were
thinking of Swibers? Yeah.
I don't know if that's what you're looking.
At no, that's not. That's not what I'm thinking of.
It is. Was it wolf walled?
No, it wasn't wolf old. Are you sure it wasn't wolf old?
I'm I'm 100% positive it wasn't wolf old.
It was this year was. What's up?
Was it this year? Yes, it was a weird one.
Keep reading this I'm the I'll. I'll have the answer in about
two minutes. I know exactly what what it is.
You can't think of the name. OK, so the ship so the players
begin with a small spaceship. It's big enough for all of them
to live on with a few additional passengers when necessary, and
the PCs control the ship with using their attributes and
skills. It's capable of flying between
planets in a few hours and a flying faster than light to
traverse the space between stars in a matter of weeks when it
comes with the spacesuit for each PC.
So you got a creating the ship section, a ship up, and a ship
upgrade section controlling the ship travel and maintenance
here. So quick run through of how that
works. I will say real quick, I do love
the fact that you start with the Starship.
Yeah. And like, especially because
like, I've gone through Traveler a few times and like, the
gameplay loop is so locked into the fact that you get a
spaceship that you're fucking trying to pay off desperately
while trying to keep it like in shape, that it feels like, I
like that, but it feels like you're really locked into that.
So it's nice for this when you're like, yeah, you just
start with a spaceship. You just got to make sure you
can pay for fuel. Yeah.
And any upgrades, any damage, anything like that.
Yeah. I mean, yeah, Travellers, I
mean, the the core loop, it really is just about like you're
you're so deeply in debt you can't ever stop.
You know, this one's not quite that.
You could just. Sad simulator.
Yeah, you could just you could be running with it to to do
other adventures if you're a whole ship of Marks and stuff
like that. So it doesn't quite loop you in
the way Traveller does, but it that is an option to play if you
want to play it that way, which is cool.
So creating the ship real quick. By default it's a blank slate.
It has a small cargo hold 1D, does 1D6 damage and has 15 hull
and has 0 armor and four Max dry fuel and begins fueled.
To make the ship, the player simply select 2 upgrades which
we'll get to in just a second. All upgrades will open new
opportunities for the players, and the type of jobs they get
will reflect their choices. The rules represent smaller
starships like light freighters, frigates, and corvettes, about
50 meters in length. That's about 150 feet for us
fucking Americans. The ship is large enough for
everyone to live in together comfortably, but no larger.
And of course, the players should choose a name something
like The Desert Rose, The Good Grief or the Null Gravitas.
That last one's good, by the way.
It was Azag. Oh, so this was not this year.
It was not this year, it was last year, but that's definitely
the one I was talking about. It does have super weird
damages, doesn't it? Yeah, Like, lift them off.
You're looking at lift them off. Yeah, so dagger is 1 D 10 + 1.
A sword IS3D4. Spear is 2 D 4 + 2.
Staff is 1 D 6 + 2. Great Sword 3D6 Mall one D12 + 2
Yeah. It's weird.
It is. Yeah.
I I remember liking it because I think we looked at the math and
we're like it kind of mass out, right?
It can't make sense, right? With a dagger, yeah, the the
floor for how little damage you could do is there and but you
could fucking kill somebody with a dagger and then a mall is
going to do more damage most of the time or whatever.
Yeah, there was a logic to it that's off topic.
How did we even get to that subject?
We were talking about damage from the weapons being like 1 E
6 + 1 and stuff like that. Yeah, yeah.
So ship upgrades. When you make your ship, you get
2 upgrades marked with an asterisk.
May be taken twice, providing A cumulative bonus.
Otherwise you only get one. So additional armor, advanced
drive, advanced electronics, afterburners, fuel tanks, high
maneuverability, luxury passenger quarters, massive
cargo hold, just fucking massive Med Bay, more powerful weapons,
shuttle hanger and then additional ship upgrades cost 50
credits. So the ones that are that you
can take multiple times are additional armor and additional
damage. Everything else you can only
take once that you can. It's a nice spread to be able to
do really interesting things because if you decided if you're
a ship full of mercs and you want to do additional armor a
bunch of times, additional damage a bunch of times, some
extra fuel tank and some high maneuverability for like your
adventure games, you can totally do that.
But if you do want to kind of loop in a traveler thing, you
could get the extra cargo hold, you could get the luxury
passenger quarters and you could be more of like shuttling things
and people around and things, which is really.
Firefly thing and you can shuttle people around on your
ship and maybe harbor fugitives and also be fugitives.
Yeah, and then also like randomly end up on like western
themed planets and like, say, and a bunch of ladies and
chicks. It works OK.
I love listen. Viralize, one of our favorite
shows of all time. Like it is a travesty to all of
mankind that it get cut and that it got cancelled.
Yeah, it's actually total bullshit, so.
Yeah, yeah. I mean, at least we got the
movie Serenity I and I love that I saw Serenity before I ever
even knew what the fuck Firefly was.
So it actually made me watch Firefly.
Also, I do really like Serenity so it's great.
Does anyone not? I think it's pretty well
regarded. Yeah, I mean, and then you.
Disagree. Leave a comment.
Yeah, no, I mean, and Serenity was supposed to be because
Firefly's one season, right? Yes.
Yeah, so Serenity is basically the entirety of season 2 turned
into a movie. Something like that, yeah.
Yeah, so anyway, so controlling the ship, other than your
damage, hull and armor, the ship does not have any attributes and
the players control the ships with their own attributes and
skill. Love that ship combat works the
same as regular combat. You just subtract damage from
the hull and when the ship hole reaches 0, it is disabled and at
the mercy of your enemies. If a person is unlike enough to
be hit with the ship's weapon, multiply the total damage by 5.
There you go. Travel.
You can travel. Real quick, multiply damage by 5
means they're gonna fucking die. Yeah.
Oh, yeah. Yeah.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Travel, you can. Maintenance, you can add a
suitable spaceport. Hole damage can be repaired at
the cost of one credit for two points of hole and then drive.
Fuel cost 3 credits per unit and is available in any reasonably
equipped port. A great piece of art here on the
side I know we the entire left hand column is basically this
like small slice of like a mech factory or you just like.
Ant or yeah, whatever. That's a gun probably.
Or like a turret. Yeah, that's definitely like the
arm and that's definitely the leg.
And then you see these two little people at the bottom,
like behind a railing. So it goes even lower before
just kind of chatting it up. So love, love that.
And again everything is like half toned and and the art is
again fantastic without this entire book.
Yeah, I I really enjoyed this book visually so.
Yeah, it's great character advancement.
So if you play multiple sessions you can have advancement.
And there's there are three ways you can earn XP so you can
advance. One is rolling misses.
Every time you roll A6 or less you gain 1 XP.
It's very much I think. Does Troika do like the like you
get stuff on fails? I believe it.
I believe Troika does. Probably, yeah, I can't.
There's end of session questions, so like, you know,
death in space and stuff and, and a lot of free league games
do that. Or like at the end of a session,
you can answer the following three questions and if you say
yes, you get one XP. Did we earn a profit?
Did we discover something new and interesting about the
universe? And did we overcome a difficult
challenge or dangerous adversary?
So you can get up to three points at the end of a session
for those. And then during long trips is a
really interesting 1. So basically this is your
opportunity for RP downtime like a bunch of other stuff.
So basically the the way it works is you ask another player
a question about themselves, something to learn about your
crew members, your fellow crew members.
And if they answer the question, you earn XP, you earn one XP.
So it really encourages people to have conversations and to RP
and to learn about each other, which causes you to also expand
your character and stuff. I love that.
I think it's really, really interesting.
And then spending your XP advancements when APC has at
least 10 XP and some downtime, they can spend their
advancements. You can pick in any order, but
you can only take each one once, and that is get a new class
ability you can take up to three times and then increase an
attribute by 1, and those are all worth to a maximum of two.
Those are over 10. And then for 20 XP you can
increase an attribute by 1 to a Max of +3.
So yeah, when PCs get close to maxing out their advancements,
the player in GM should have a discussion about how to bring
the ongoing campaign to a satisfying conclusion.
There you go, another dope piece of art which would be a full
page spread for the game. Master of It just cracked me out
that they're in space and the person behind the the ships
pilot wheel, it's a wheel. It's an actual wheel, has their
feet up, has their feet up on the dash and they're playing a
game on their phone of the spaceship like blasting stuff.
I love that this is such a great piece of art.
The art stylist fantastic. The shading stylist.
Fantastic. Looks great, I really enjoy it.
It's so good. So this is the whole Game Master
section. So we'll talk about a bit about
parts of this, We'll cruise parts of it, but we're more than
how we do the game here, the book here, so.
Way more than halfway. We're done essentially after
this. Yeah, we're like 2/3 way
through, so the following sections are addressed to the
Game Master. If you're planning on being the
Game Master for your group, you should read it.
If you're not planning on being the Game Master, you don't have
to read it, but you might find it interesting.
I love that. Again, I love the hard fucking
line between the player stuff and the game master stuff for
since I'm not putting the whole spread, I should look before and
added an extra page in. But that's the full page spread
and I love that it is like a 8 1/2 by 11, basically a four
fucking giant full page spread of art for the player section
and the GM section too. That's you don't see that a ton
like full book page spread across both.
So as a gmef 3. So first is your goals As a gmef
3. Primary goals portray dangerous
and exciting sci-fi universe feather characters lives with
conflict and adventure and play. To find out what happens there
are things you should do, which is ask the questions and use the
answers and prompt the players and let things snowball and
respond to the dice and adjudicate abilities fairly.
Again, some cool art throughout here.
I love the pages that have like 2 columns and then the third
column is just like a long strip of art.
I think that really looks fantastic.
And this is a cool strip of the ship inside there's a die of
fate. It's definitely like a whirl of
dungeons thing. Basically if you have a
situation where you you are unsure and it could have like a
binary answer like a yes or a no, roll AD 6 low.
Is about it. Roll AD 6 about it.
High roll is a positive result, and lower the roll the worse the
result. Boom, dunzo.
Love it. Easy peasy.
Because in 2D6 makes. Except there's not really like
nothing never happens, and for the most part you're not really
going to get a binary thing. But if it really is like you do
or you don't, just roll AD 6 about it.
Yeah. So I'm not sure.
I just roll one anyway and I'm just like, the better the
result, the better the outcome. And if you're rolling the one,
something fucked up is going to happen, so.
Exactly. And if you're the six and some
good, good, you got good stuff. So jobs a framework for your
session. So this is this is kind of like
the core gameplay loop from like the GM standpoint of how to like
build out your adventure. So basically you it's it's jobs.
A lot of times it says that players are troubleshooters,
mercenaries and free booters. So they get jobs.
And a job is a simple list of events and facts centered around
a particular goal or problem. The there's a, an example job
here, it says a special delivery.
So there's a list of like 4 job events.
There's a list of two NPCS that have health, armor, damage, and
a little thing about them. And there's like 4 questions
here about the job, like how will they circumvent customs?
What's in the crate to hire the PCs, things like that.
And that's really all you need. And and the bottom part here
basically says like, it should be vague.
It should only be detailed enough to keep you going.
If you like more improvisation, it should be just enough to get
you going, but you should never plan what is what is.
It's a year. What you shouldn't do is plan an
exact story or try to predict exactly what the PCs will solve
the problem. That's what 5 ES for.
If you want to be a passive player, they just has your
handheld the entire time, go play that.
If you want to be a storyteller, write a fucking book.
But the next best thing, I guess 5E don't do that shit.
I want you to throw a second one in there.
Start your first session with the first job event and then
just go from there. I I love this.
I think this is such a great way to do that is to just give you
just enough details to like keep things going and enough events
that like want, however they decide a thing like these other
big things like could or would happen and and that's it.
Cash rewards. Basically, it says the average
job you get 30 to 50 credits for, but for highly, for like,
longer, more dangerous, more important jobs, you have up to
100. And don't forget that a ship
upgrade is worth 50. So when you're thinking about
how much you're playing the characters, it's not just the
ship upgrade, but that's a big thing.
So if you give too many of those, you know, but characters
also need like, to resupply and things like that.
Yeah. Here's a break.
Yeah, definitely. Eating away your supplies is
like paying for fuel. And yeah.
Hold repairing hole damage, repair like your hole.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Not playing characters one more
time. And snacks too you.
Know, I mean you have snacks. I mean it's not cryosleep,
you're making the trip, so you got to have them snacks, non
player characters. Here's a quick breakdown of how
to do it. Basically you list the
character, the health, armor, the damage.
So one thing is like civilians and animals, generally untrained
people have three health to 0 armor and the lower of 2D6
they're just normal ass people with three health and, and, and
they're on arms, you know, things like that.
And it goes all the way up to security guard soldiers, elite
units, huge monsters are 16 health, 3 armor and 2D6 for
damage. So the damage never really gets
beyond 2D6. Average is like 1D6 plus one or
one D 6 + 2. But, and I mean, people's health
doesn't really go above like, but like 15 so.
SO2D6 that could be that could be bad.
A good chunk, yeah. I mean it could be, it could be
half your life, it could be your entire life in one go.
Like 2D Max 2D6 would kill you in one shot.
It would. Kill me in one hit you.
Didn't even take armor starships yeah lists three types of ship
attack, frigate, science vessels and capital ships and it just
gives whole armor and damage. Feel free to mix and tweak all
that kind of stuff. The long game, so the star map,
factions and timelines. And there's a cool like, kind of
like a university map. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
The map, yeah. Oh yeah, the star map.
The star map is fucking cool. I love the shit out of that.
If you play multiple sessions of offworlders, you'll expand your
games universe beyond a single job and location to keep track.
This is how you do it, right? There's the star map.
So quick rundown of of the 6:00-ish things on how to make a
star map. To start drawing the star map
for your campaign, follow these steps.
One after your first session, get a blank piece of paper
somewhere in the middle draw a star.
There is a star map in the back. I'm going to jump to that real
quick for this to see. There is this really cool like
just lined drawing in the back. It it's, it's like, it feels
like you got one of those those things with a little teeth and
you're, you know how you do like the the pin where you make
designs by sticking the pin in the slots and spinning it?
Yeah, but this is cool. You can just start right in the
middle. And I like how there's so many
different things orbiting that you can really follow.
It's a great, it's a great little piece.
It's a great piece. I.
Almost, said Compass. And I'm like, that's not what
he's talking about, so. No, but you know what I'm
talking about though, right? I do know what you're talking
about, yes, but. Couldn't tell you what it's
called. So somewhere in the middle, draw
star. Draw it small enough so you have
plenty of space #2 next to the star draw dot.
This is the location where the PC's first job took place.
What is it? Planet, moon, whatever #3 Get
the star a name something like Amaterasu or Hertzprung and
write it down. Did you make a Naruto joke just
now of? Course Amaterasu is Naruto.
Yeah, well, I was thinking of the what's the game where you
plays the Wolves? You're playing as the spirit of
Amaterasu and the Wolf, you know?
Is it a video game? Yes.
Oh well then I I don't fucking buy them.
Don't ask me. I don't you're.
So useless bro I was. Thinking amateur obviously.
I was thinking amateurasu like the black flame that fucking the
best character in all of Naruto uses.
Oh call me O Comedy is the name of the game.
O Comedy is amazing. You should play it.
It's one of the best games I've ever played.
I'll check it out. So get the star name, think
about who rules the star system. Is it interstellar, mega
corporation, whatever. This basically you're building
the universe out right #4 Consider the other location star
system. Add one or two now #5 Does the
faction ruling star also rule any other stars #6 Let your mind
wonder. Think about other factions.
I might come into conflict if they control star systems.
You can draw political borders if it helps keep track.
So leave space to add to your map.
It's never truly complete. And remember, the closest star
systems can take one week and one unit of dry fuel to get to
factions. They exist.
You know what factions are. Faction play is cool.
It's a good idea to have it in here.
Space, space factions of anything that's going to have
faction space is going to have like in factions.
Yeah. Absolutely so.
So you have those. The timelines is interesting.
Basically says time time much like a job as a framework for a
single session. Timelines are frameworks for
your campaign. You should make one timeline
after you first make your star map and you can add more as
universe gets fleshed out. So basically to make a timeline,
think about the factions on your map and the goals of each.
What is happening. Jot down a list of three to five
events that will happen in your area unless the players like
basically make a sharp detour to get to that and and affect it.
So basically Long story short with the way timelines work
though, universe spins even when the players aren't fucking with
it and things will advance even with the players don't encounter
them. So the players are not the
center of the fucking universe. The universe is.
It's not player centric. So that's why timeline's the
stuff that you have there. There's a example here.
Timeline is disunion. In the UDW, there's five things
listed #1 Water riots in the mining colony hurt sprung 9
begin to escalate #2 After a terrorist bombing, the Union of
Democratic Worlds declares martial law on health sprung 9
#3 The UDW diverts fleet resources to hurt spring system
as violence spreads #4 Sensing weakness, the neighboring 10
Tanagran Empire seizes a dry fuel production facility from
the UDW, and then #5 war is declared between the Tangran
Empire and the UDW. You know what?
Hey, if you're listening to this that timeline shit, you should
just take that and use it in every game that you play that
you run because it's a good, good idea.
It's great I. Read that, I was reading a
Vaults of Our Adventure after I read this and they also have
suggestions of when you leave this city and come back.
Like what's changed? It's not a timeline.
Like having something in the back pocket that shows the time
moves forward without your players is good, but the
timeline thing's really very good.
Yeah, it's good. And The thing is, like, you
could have that listed, but like, if the players show up at
#2 and just fuck it up or fix it, like you just drop off the
rest of them. Yeah.
But if they show up at like, at
#5 you can now explain why they're at war, you know?
So it's, it's cool. And you're not, again, you're
not writing a story. It's writing a series of events
that could happen unless the players intervene, which I love.
So both your others. Say, for me, that means that if
they intervened and then left again, I get to write a new
timeline. You know, like they can see the
outcome. Yeah, the outcome of their own
actions. Yeah, love that the
consequences. You know, that's that's the
reason I like 2D6 games is the consequences.
And one of the things I don't like about Blades, give me 10
seconds is that you can you roll and then you so you then get a
consequence, but then you can release the consequence.
But then you can also like decide it's a flashback to go
back to time to also resist the consequence.
It's like just accept the consequences of your fucking
actions. So both your star map and your
timelines are mutable and ever growing etcetera, etcetera.
You develop goals and interests and things happen and go from
there. I 10 seconds, right?
That's pretty good. You were actually under I think.
So then we get the inspirational tables which are also fucking
dope. So using the following tables to
generate names, places, and ideas, you can just pick what
sounds interesting to you and roll 2D6 so it is 6 down and
then it is 6 tables of 6 for world types.
So archipelago, artificial, burning, dark, dead, forested.
Like you could literally rule 66 real quick about on any one of
these tables I'll pick 1. So there's world types, themes,
objects in space, cargo, and names.
And you can roll as many as you want for a new.
Let's do objects in space. You said 66, first one is going
to be 6. It's a battle in progress.
OK. And then two is oh sorry, wait
did I do that wrong? You just roll 6 dice and then
say what they are in order. OK, yeah, then 6/1 or mine?
Cool. Oh, I was just.
I was just, I know it says 2D6, but I was just going to have you
roll 1D6 across all six tables. Yeah, I mean.
That's fine. Yeah, well, the first one I got
is Babble in Progress. Then I got a cryo sleep pod.
You come across a cryo sleep pod.
Dear, come back in progress, yeah.
And then I got #1 debris filled. Debris filled, yeah.
Yeah, filled full of debris, so. You're looking for You're
looking for a cryo sleep pod in a debris field.
You get there, there's a battle in progress.
Yep, keep going. Next 1A military fleet.
Perfect, perfect. So next one is #6A luxury liner.
Maybe we're going there to save a rich person that was on the
luxury liner. They've been a good deal this
battle. Exactly.
So you get to pull the cryopot out because they're sleeping,
Yeah. Last one I got is transmission
buoy, so it's. Just it's just out there.
It's there, yeah. Yeah.
Boom, objects in space. Love that.
It's great. Then we get to the character
sheets. They're simple, straightforward.
I like them. They just, you know, name class.
There's spots for all the things you need to write in and circles
for the things you can just like select in enough spot for notes.
Love it and some advancement at the bottom.
The ship is the same thing. Anything that you need to write
that could change is a little box.
Anything you can just fill in a little circle for scantron style
is listed there and there's enough notes at the bottom.
We got the star map and then a great page in the back.
Love this. It says break this game and it's
the same font as was used on the playing the game, the game
master, but it's like it's fucked up now.
It's all like all broken up and and and everything staticed out,
which makes sense because it's break this game.
It's very thematic. I love that it's cool off
Worlders is designed to be extremely open to
interpretation, remixing and hacking, negotiating specific
uses of abilities and making small rulings about dice rolls
at the table. As part of the fun.
I encourage you to come up with new classes, abilities, aliens,
a weird, weird gear for your game and talk to Chris P about
it. And that's the game.
That's the fucking game. Woo.
So now we're going to these scores.
Let me expand some stuff here. So we said we're going to call
this a book because again, it is only what is it like 28 pages,
but it's 8 1/2 by 11 with three columns.
And if you you broke one of those columns off the animated
Zine size, I feel like this would be closer to probably 45
to 50 pages at least. So it's book size.
It's got enough stuff to be called a book, so we do here on
the show quantifier terrible opinions with numbers.
We do so by using 5 metrics worth up to 10 points each.
Those five metrics are as follows.
Art and layout, which is the quality, quantity and style of
the art and the layout visually all the way through usability,
which is things like hyperlinks. Table of contents, bookmarks,
book ribbons, if you got them, if things are in good order, if
the book it reads well, how usable it is?
Is it at the table? Rule set is?
If it's adapted rule set, how well is it?
Is it adapted? If it is a new rule set, do we
like it? Do we think it's good on a first
read? Originality is is originality
like are the are the mechanics original?
Is a system original is a setting original, anything like
that. And then value is bang for your
buck, not just the cost of it, but how much you get for it.
So are there adventures? Are there digital tools?
Are there character sheets? Like what all do you get for the
money that you spend? Each are worth up to 10 points
for a total of 50. No one's ever gotten A50.
No one's ever gotten less than a 25.
So we'll see how we do so art and layout.
What are your thoughts? You know, I like a lot of things
about it. I think there's a couple of
hiccups in the layout. Nothing major, very serviceable.
3 columns. I really like the art.
I really like the just style of it for this.
It feels really good in this kind of like 2D6 sci-fi game.
And yeah, I'm I'm into it. Yeah, I'm into it, I think.
I think the art's fantastic. Yeah, I think the use of it is
really interesting too, because with the with the with the three
column grid style layout, it really gives you opportunity to
have things in any of the three columns and then art at the top,
bottom or sides. I'd love the side art.
It looks really great. I think the three column grid
style layout also fits the sci-fi theme really well.
Font choices are good. Again, there's only like like 2
pages that like, I was like, this could be a little bit
better, but it's not bad by any search of the imagination.
And that's, that's me being as picky and fucking pedantic as
possible to be like, I wish the art didn't touch the page and it
was into the margin. But I think, I think this is I,
I, I, I like it, I think it's good.
What do you think? Yeah, I think it's good.
I think it's good. I'm really good.
I think it's really good. I think it's really good.
I think this is really good. Yeah.
I think it's also interesting to pick 8 and half by 11.
You don't see thin 8 and half by 11 a lot, which I think how.
Big it is. Yeah, I do.
And it's well also realistically too.
Like it it, it makes it good for the table too.
Like it really lays. It lays open well and stuff.
And you get like, yeah, well, one thing that I really love
about it too is 8 1/2 by 11, you get 3 columns, but it breathes,
you know what I mean? Like nothing feels like, look
how beautiful. Also like when you just look at
that kind of abstractly, like it just looks good.
First of all, great. I mean, you know, great.
But like the margins are nice, size, there's plenty of spaces
between all the chapters. None of it feels busy at all.
Like it looks and feels really, really good.
I like it. I like it a lot.
Yeah, I think it's really good. So we think like A7.
Yeah, I think so. Open folder Yeah, 7 on this.
What the fuck did we give a three to?
Usability. So it has basically everything
that we want. It has.
It is hyperlinked. I think the table of constants
is really well done. I think the headers and sections
stuff are really well done. I love the differentiation, the
hard line between the player section and the GM section.
So keep your GM shit out of my player stuff.
Keep your player stuff out of my GM shit.
Again, bookmarks, hyperlinks. There's one or two things that
like you could put a couple more hyperlinks in.
I think those are like really like one or two page references,
but they are listed as pages. So that doesn't really bother
me. And then I think it's always
important to hyperlink your own website when you throw that in
there, but I'm not going to take any points from that.
I think the minus. Five points for that so.
Yeah, for, for not hyperlink in your own website.
I think that it is laid out really well as in like the order
of the sections, like it's exactly how I want to read it.
There was never a question of what was going on because if if
something did pop up, it was like the next page and it told
you where it was going to be. I strongly agree with that.
Honestly, I really like I it's funny because like, frankly,
this is a pretty light game in terms of what's in it, you know?
And so if Chris had been way sloppier with where where things
were, it would have, I mean, not that it wouldn't have mattered,
but it would have mattered The I see games way more stuff that
need the division or need this, this layout.
And I'm just like, fuck, you guys need to be doing this.
So yeah. Yeah, I just love how like it's
a, it is a pretty light game. I just love how thorough
everything is done throughout, you know what I mean?
Like I mean. A lot of that has to do with
Chris's writing ability, though, his ability to communicate, like
through written word. He's really good at it.
Yeah, like again, like it's concise.
The writing is concise, but like you never not to the point of
feeling like you're missing something or that something
isn't fleshed out enough or that it's not explained well enough,
which is really great. But I also think that like
obviously Chris has a really good understanding of like the
reader side. You know what I mean?
Because there's books that we've gone over where you can tell
that the creator wrote it and they spent their like, they
looked at it too long and it's written so that they understand
it. And I feel like this book is
incredibly well written for the reader to understand and laid
out for the reader to understand.
And like even like with the numbers and everything like
that, the numbered lists all the way through.
Like I just think it's a good product to again, to like
understand what is being communicated.
And I think that really benefits to usability as well.
So what do you think? No, you picked this one.
I I mean, I think it's good for for how short it is.
And then here's the thing. If you added 50 pages, I think
it would just continue to be the same, you know what I mean?
Like it would still be all the way through.
I agree. I'm probably, I'm probably gonna
aid on this. I think it's like, yeah.
I think the usability is definitely a strong point of
this. Yeah, rule set.
So it is kind of a light rule set, but yeah, I love it.
I think in the GM section, I think, which is obviously still
part of the rule set too. Like the way that the job
framework works, the way that the timelines are explained, and
also the what is there is more than enough.
And there is also like not only permission and encouragement,
but a blank canvas for people to run with it and and make things
on their own. And we already talked about how
easy would be to to take this as a core and go for that.
And that is like literally in the description of the game on
the itch and drive through page and in the page in the back of
the book, it literally says, like, this is more than enough
to play. But I encourage you to use this
as a foundation to build the game that you want.
And I love that. And I know there's there's like,
there was like one comment on the drive through page where I
was like, Oh, you're a person who has no imagination
whatsoever. And basically like, it's the
same people that are like Merkborg.
It's barely a game. It's like it's way more than
enough of a game. I'm sorry that you need every
single fucking possible thing laid out for you, because you
you can't take it in any, any fucking way in your own
imagination. That's crazy to me.
It's like I was watching YouTube videos on Classic Traveler a
while, not that long ago, talking about, since we're
talking about a person very inspired by class Traveler who
writes about it kind of popped in my head.
And one of the person's critiques is that unlike D&D,
like it doesn't hold your hands, all the things that leaves a lot
of things up to the game Master to decide.
And they were talking about how that's a weakness.
I'm like. Yes, yes.
For playing the game, damn it. People, people I understand to a
point that people like some people want their hand held and
some people like I don't like Pbta because I don't like
feeling that like my choices are kind of like a little bit like
narrowed down. But I know a lot of people
really do like that because they they want, yeah, but I, but so I
understand that there are differences.
But I also think that like, I do also think that tabletop
role-playing games and like the style of games from like a
medicines is a little bit of a journey kind of like music,
right? Like, yeah, you don't, you don't
immediately go into like the hardest, weirdest part of a
genre. You, you have like an intro into
it. But like, some people stay, some
people are Top 40 people, some people are radio pop people.
That's fine. I don't understand.
You can enjoy that. I like digging deep to find the
weird shit fine. They're just less than me, you
know? Yeah.
Right. So I think tabletop role-playing
games are a bit of a journey and people, people starting with
something like 5 where they're handheld and there's so much
scaffolding and structure to it. Like eventually, I personally
think it's a good idea to start moving away from games and let
that scaffolding fall off of your playstyle.
And eventually you get to games like this.
Like I, we talked about this a bunch, like the lighter a game
is does not mean it's an easier, Sometimes it's harder because
you lose that scaffolding, you lose the structure.
And for some people that never understood that they were on a
journey or on a pathway towards that or need that scaffolding
and aren't really able to play without it, they don't they
don't get it. I just wish, and that's my thing
is like, that's fine. If you don't like that, that's
fine. Recognize that it is a different
style, not a flaw, you know, so rule set.
I obviously fucking love it. Like this is literally like this
is my exact game. Like this is my exact type of
game I want to play. It is almost all like obviously
if I was writing a game, it would be like 80% this like I
mean, obviously. So I'm going to give this high
numbers. What are your thoughts though?
And and also like, I really can't think of any, like I can't
think of any downs on it. Yeah, I mean, I, I like this
game. I I really enjoy things well put
together. I mean, I don't know that I'm
like necessary blown away by anyone aspect of it.
I think it all works really well together.
I like the classes. I like the two D6 rules,
although it's not like a massive riff on 2D6, you know, it's
pretty much like how I would expect it to work, you know?
So yeah, I think it's good. You know, I'm probably about
seven for rule set. Yeah, I mean, you know, I'm
higher on it than that, but this is my genre.
Like the thing I like about. Is there's nothing in here
that's like really dynamically unique A to itself, you know?
I will disagree I think the way that I mean you literally said
that everyone should steal timelines, which is part of the
rules. Yeah, like the.
GM Those kind of things are part of the rules, like the way that
a lot of it works. And the thing that I like about
this is not that there is like a rule thing that makes it unique.
It is that the entire style of the game is meant to be like a
starting point for you to make it your own and gives you more
than enough for you to do that, which I think is a plus for this
style of game. The stylus system.
It is because again, we said over and over again, it would be
so easy to run a travel style game in this would be so easy to
run an alien style game in this. This is a really beautifully
done kind of like canvas that you can do anything you want
because you know, if you're playing we've we've also looked
at games where it's like this game does this one thing and it
does it really well, but it does this one thing like I think this
game's one of the strengths of it is that it can do all of
those things, you know, like 5 E you know you can do anything
with it right, But I think it shines in the way that I want a
system to run, but I think the GM section really shines in some
other things. So I, I mean, if you're at A7,
I'm I'm at like at least an 8 on this.
So 7 1/2. All right, 7 1/2.
So I'll round that up and give it an 8.
Yeah, originality. This is where I can understand
some of the what you just said a little bit more.
You know what I mean? Like I can, I can agree to that,
I think. I think things like the the
timeline bit and the star map I think are really interesting.
I think add your originality, but it's a space game.
It is a world of dungeon hack. So as far as originality goes, I
I think the IT was never meant to be like the most original
fucking thing in the entire world.
Yeah. So I think your again, your
previous critique I think applies to this a little bit
more. So what do you think on the
originality? Put my previous critique right
here. Boom, copy paste.
So what number are you thinking? I don't know.
I think, yeah, this is where it's going to kind of hurt, you
know? Well, so we so so 5 isn't you
have nothing good or bad to say about a thing.
And I think I think it's kind of like is I'm thinking 6 because
the honestly, I think it's five. And then when you throw in jobs,
timelines, the star map, all that stuff, it bumps into a six.
I'm good with the six for that. But again, like this wasn't this
isn't a game that like strove for the originality.
So that's obviously going to be where it does.
And then value wise. OK, so the game is fucking free.
It's a free download on itch. It's a free download on drive
through RPG. It's entirely free.
And if you want a print, if you want the print I have in my hand
right here, a nice beautiful premium color, even though it's
black and white print, it's 699, it's 7 fucking bucks, pretty
good PDF included. You can't really get, you can't
really get better than that. And the way the system is
designed with the inspirations and all that kind of stuff, you
have basically a limitless number of things to run with it.
So I mean, value isn't just the price, but we've said over and
over again, if a game is free, it kind of has to have a 10,
right? Yeah, you kind of Yeah, the game
is free, so. I mean, yeah, so I'm, I'm, I'm,
I'm and, and, and again, like I, I don't think there's like
basically nothing on drive through that's only like 7
bucks. Like there's no way that that's
not just like, cost. Yeah, yes, totally.
I mean it's yeah, 7 bucks is crazy.
But not only that, not only that, not only that, and I think
we have to throw this into value.
All proceeds from this game go to charity.
Like, I mean, if to me that's that's that's value for my
money, like that means. I thought we just said we were
going to give it a 10. Oh, oh, all right, yeah.
I was like, maybe it's just a nine, but then yeah, you can't.
Like the only way you can make it go up is if like again, like
if the money you do give goes to fucking charity, you know what I
mean? Like there's no way to like 7 +
8 plus. I think a free game could could
get less than 7. If it's a bad game though, you
know or less than you know. What I mean, no it's not.
Worth it plus 8 + 6 + 1039? Is that what we got here?
I did not do the math. I trust you.
And then I think, I mean, obviously the only thing, I
mean, I don't trust me, that sounds weird. 7 + 16 + 16, yeah,
3939. And the only thing that really
drops it like at all, it really is the, is the, the originality,
you know, and then because it's, it's, it's a space game, like
it's, it's hard to really get a lot of like crazy originality
with it being a space game. But that's, that's off.
Worlders art and layout 7 usability 8 rule set 8
originality 6 value 10 total score 39 again, I, I fucking
love this game. This is the style of game I want
to play. I, it shocked me when I first
read it where I was like, did Chris read my mind while he
wrote this game? Like it's crazy.
So definitely go check out Chris P Wolf.
We've got some other cool stuff going.
If you like traveler got some good writings about that.
We'll make sure that the links to all their stuff is below.
I again, I don't know if they're still on Twitter, but I'll make
sure that the link to the blue sky everything is there.
We'll make sure that the link to off worlders is there, but that
is off worlders. I don't know.
I don't none of us on what we're doing next week.
Sunday dirt will be on for our next not catch that.
Yeah. On Monday we'll continue in the
light of a setting sun. And then next Friday we'll,
we'll do a game, we'll figure out what it is.
But again, we'll try to be a little bit more consistent about
being on top of our our reviews and, and that's about it.
That's all I got. Yeah, and that's all I got too.
OK. All right.
Well, OK. Thanks for thanks for listening
for those listening, thanks for those in chat that we're here.
Hunter, always nice to see you and we'll see you all next week.
Have a good day. Bye.