Hello and welcome to episode 240 of Effect. Roll in, roll in, roll in.I'm tempted to carry on singing, but I won't.I'm Dave.Thank you.
And I'm Matthew.And I'm very relieved that you haven't carried on that whole song, even though I chose the title.
Yeah, singing is probably overstating what it was that I was doing there, actually.So, yeah, wouldn't want to confuse it with somebody who can actually sing. Anyway, yes.
Then again, Westerns have got a long tradition of people who can't necessarily sing singing.I seem to remember Lee Van Cleef was it?
Growling out, I was born under a wandering star.
No, that wasn't an invitation Dave.
We have got a packed episode, Dave.Yes.And I'm going to tell you what we're going to talk about.We've got a new patron who has not only patronised us and come on the Discord, but you have also met him personally.I have.
So you can tell us all about him in a bit, but we'll say thank you to him.We've got some news from the world of gaming. We've got, of course, as one might expect in the middle of a certain Kickstarter campaign, we may have an Old West News.
And we've also got an interview with Chris Vermeuren, who is our evil competitor in the Kickstarter stakes, running a year zero Kickstarter at the same time, but a lovely bloke.He can't be evil.
He owns a German Shepherd, so that makes him a very good man in my book, regardless of whatever other heinous crimes he may or may not have committed.
However, yes, so he's a lovely bloke and he's convinced us both... Well, he hasn't quite convinced me yet, but I will be backing his game on the strength of that interview because he's thought a lot about Terminal State and it is...
It is better than I thought it was, I think, when we talked about it last time in the World of Gaming.
Looking at it on the Kickstarter page actually doesn't do it justice, I think.
Likewise, I was convinced to back it based on the conversation we had with him, because there's a lot of lovely little ideas in there, actually.And, you know, cyberpunk, you might think it's a bit of an old and worn
Genres particularly lately and we've talked about you know, some cyberpunk games recently But this had some nice really nice takes on it.
And yeah, so I've backed it and I'm hoping Hoping he can get get over the line Yeah And then I hope we can get over the line because by the time we've done that we'll be talking about our next episode and saying goodbye and that is the full content of this episode is
So shall we start it with a thank you and a personal description of our new patron? Nils L. I know nothing about you, Nils.
I don't even know your surname, other than it begins with the letter L. But you've already been an active member of the Discord, which I also like.Everybody who's a patron, if you're not on the Discord, come to the Discord.
Join the nicest place on the internet.But you've also met him in person.Tell me about that.
Yeah, it was lovely.So Nils and Richard from... Long-term patron, Richard.Both from Stockholm had come over to Edinburgh for Tabletop Scotland and came over and said hello and introduced themselves.It was lovely to meet them in person.
You know, that's one of the things I really love about conventions.It's getting the opportunity to put a face to the name and to actually say hello and have a chat with some of our lovely friends and supporters.
And it was great because they both signed up for what happened to be the last demo of Tales of the Old West for the convention.And I was really looking forward to it because
Of the other players, one of the volunteers at Tabletop Scotland, lovely guy called Brian, he came over and talked to me and was trying to find a time where he could join a demo because he really wanted to, but he was obviously working.
But we managed to squeeze him in.And then we had two other lovely people, Howard and Vicky, who I'm sure I've seen at another convention.They both look really familiar, but they're both lovely.And I'd spoken to them beforehand.
So I knew I had these five people coming for this particular demo. And, you know, running a demo like this with strangers, there's always a little bit of trepidation as the GM, you know, will they like it?Will they get involved?Will it be difficult?
What kind of people are they?All that kind of stuff.But on this occasion, I knew all five were gonna be superb players and it was gonna be loads of fun and it was great.
I really, you know, I got to enjoy that demo as a player and, you know, GM player rather than somebody running a demo.It was great.But Nils was lovely and we had quite a long chat after the game.
He's been working on some stories that he's got a bit of mental block on, so we were chatting about that and trying to give him some advice about how I might try and deal with some of the issues he was finding.But lovely, lovely, lovely fellow.
Ricard, fabulous guy.It was a real delight to meet them both.I know they had some potential problems about their flights home. because of the weather.
So hopefully, Neil Thrickard, if you're listening, I really hope you got home safe and sound without too much faff and bother. And yeah, it was great and so delighted to have Nils on board.Lovely, lovely guy.
Cool.So thank you, Nils, for backing us and for flying all the way over from Stockholm with Rickard simply to meet Dave.That's not a thing I'd do personally, but... I'm not sure it was simply to meet me, frankly.
I suspect they had some other things in mind as well, but it was lovely to meet them in person.It really was.
It is brilliant.So that's our only new backer.But of course, thank you to all our patrons.Here's me confusing backers and patrons for reasons that will be explained, I'm sure, later on. So we're on to the world of gaming.We are.
And the first item in the world of gaming is one we've already talked about, I think, when it was first announced.But now they've announced actual pre-orders.And I think when you pre-order, you can get a PDF.And that is for Space 1999.Indeed.Indeed.
With the creative mind of our friend Andy Peregrin behind it,
of um always work for loads of things but he does quite a lot with modifius at the moment uh yeah i mean i mean nostalgia alert i mean you know red alert nostalgia um looking at the cover of that book i just want to get it just for the cover.
Now you see I assumed you'd be kind of first in the queue for this because you know we've already talked ad nauseum about the Eagle being one of your favorite spaceships.
I absolutely love the Eagle yeah it is it is probably my favorite sci-fi spaceship of all time I think yeah.
So why are you not there?Why are you not singing it as praises to me?Why haven't you been badgering Andy Peregrin to write adventures for it?All that sort of stuff.
What's going on?Well, I did have a little chat with Andy at UK Games Expo about it, but I haven't been badgering him. bunch of reasons.One, I've got no money so I'm having to be very careful where I'm spending at the moment.
Hence the badgering Andy Peregrine about writing adventures for him and then getting money for those adventures.
Well number two is that having had a really quiet spring All the projects I was waiting for all came at the same time, as did Tales of the Old West.
So at the moment, I'm doing about, you know, well, my day is basically getting up, thinking about gaming, working all day, going to bed thinking about gaming, waking up, say, I don't have time for anything else.
What I didn't want to do is badger him for something only to either make it, make, make it really anxiety-inducing for me to try and deliver something good or not deliver something to the standard that I would want to deliver it.
But I would very much love to work with Space 99 tonight, absolutely.
I guess my other thing is, I mean, it's been a pretty quick flash to bang from what I understand from having spoken to Andy about it at UK Games Expo, which is great, and they've done a great job in doing that.I do just wonder a little bit,
how well the Space 1999 universe converts into a role-playing game.I haven't looked at the rules, this is just like a first-off knee-jerk reaction kind of thing.So I'd need to get a look at the book.So I just wonder a little bit.
So I don't have the money or the time to pick up too many new games at the moment.So that's the only reason, really, I'm standing off for now.I suspect I will pick it up at some point in the future, but I'm probably not going to pre-order it.
I have a problem with Space 1999, I have to say. Which is, although there were many aspects of it that I loved, loved, loved, loved, there are very many that I just can't get behind and don't enjoy.
I mean, I love the actual actors, you know, Martin Landau, Barbara Bain.
the old bloke whose name i've temporarily gone out of my head yeah i can picture him yeah him him yeah we can all see him in our mind's eye but can we remember his name no we can't and the woman who played maya and then there's it's not terry nation no actually you see the woman who played maya wasn't doing it for me at all the guy hold my
I need to know now.I'm going to look this up whilst you're talking.
There's one character who is an eagle pilot, and he's got a close friend who is a little lady.They're both great, and I can't remember either of them.
Half-remembered Space 1999.This is what I listened to.
This is what they listen for.Yeah, exactly.
I gotta say I would love to have watched a movie of space 1999 like a disaster movie.The episodes that I remember are the ones where they're on the moon and things are going wrong on the moon.
Ponzi Star Trek thing where they're flying through a solar system and meeting strange alien cultures.Do it for me, not at all.
No, the science behind Space 1999 doesn't exist, does it?I mean, you have to completely hand wave that, what is frankly bullshit.Yeah.
And I know that, I know it's very popular here in the UK.I understand it has quite a strong following in America.Obviously it was designed, although it was made here, it was designed very much with that ITC international audience type thing.
Michael Grade's dad, Lou Grade, Lou Grade was always trying to push his shows for transatlantic shows.But I don't know whether it's got much pull for role-playing game in the continental North America.
But no, sorry, it just doesn't do anything for me as an IP.So I don't think I'm going to back it.
So the guy you were trying to think of was Barry Morse, who played Victor. Barry Morse.
That's his name.As soon as you say it, I can remember it.
And the two I was thinking of was Zendaya Merton, who played Sandra Benes, and Nick Tate, who played Alan Carter.
Nick Tate was a good-looking fellow in the classic 70s mould of good-looking fellows.
I think I wanted to be Nick Tate or Carter in Space 1999 because he got to fly all the Eagles.Well, now you can, Dave.All you need to do is buy the book.That is true.It'd be interesting.
As I said, I don't know much about it having had a quick look at some of the stuff around it the the the the spreads that they've shown to me had a very Star Trek adventures kind of vibe in terms of the look and feel of what they've done Yeah, which is fine It might
I do wonder whether it would have been good to have done something to really differentiate this from Star Trek Adventures.And I'm basing this only on seeing a spread of a page or two.A few spreads.So again, it's an initial reaction.
But again, I just kind of wonder whether they could have done something, changed the style significantly to really differentiate it from some of the other products that they've got going on.
But I fully suspect, or expect, I will purchase that book at some point.I'm just not gonna pre-order it now, I don't think.There's a little bit in my back of my head saying, why don't you just back it anyway?You've got some birthday money.
But we'll see, we'll see.
Well, let's wait and see, you know.Yeah, let's wait and see.It's not like you've got time to run the game.
And, of course, the fact is, really, you want somebody else to buy it so that you can be Nick Tate.You don't want to be the GM.So, no, you've got to convince somebody else to buy it.I think that's my conclusion on this one.
I understand your poverty.That won't be you on this occasion, I suspect.
And it won't be me running it.I can guarantee that.You've got to find somebody other than me to buy it.I'm no fool.
Well, I mean, that's debatable.But yeah, anyway.
Another thing I don't think I'll be buying, but only because it's in Swedish, is Partizan, a new game from friend of the show Anders Blixt.Yeah.
So this is really interesting.Tell me about it, Dave.So not having heard of it at all, frankly, it came up that he's just had a launch party this last week for Partizan.And it's a game which...
feels anyway to have a Twilight 2000 kind of vibe about it in that it's it's based on Or the backstory to it is based on a real event that happened in the 80s when a Russian submarine Was beached or was um ran ashore Just off Sweden and it caused a big ferrari at the time.
I can vaguely remember that happening.Actually, I I don't remember the detail but I do there's a bit of me and you know, the teenage me remembering that story happening.
And in Partizan, that story, obviously, because in the real world, I don't remember how it was resolved, but it didn't resolve in any violent conflict.In Partisan it does resolve in violent conflict and the Warsaw Pact states invade Sweden.
And you then play, as the game suggests, a Partisan.A Swedish Partisan.Fighting against the occupying forces of the Eastern Bloc.I love the idea of it.He had the idea originally in the 80s when all this happened.
So this is a, you know, we think it took us a long time to get Tales of the Old West to the table.This has taken him 40 years.So, you know, good on him for sticking with it and getting there in the end and delivering it.
So I have had a copy sent through, thanks to the ministrations of our lovely new patron Nils, which is brilliant.I haven't had a chance to download it yet, but I think, I suspect it's gonna be in Swedish. which I can't read very much.
But looking at some of the images online, again, it looks lovely.It does have a kind of... I mean, it's interesting.It's got a kind of between Twilight 2000 and War Stories sort of a feel to it in terms of the artwork and the way it's laid out.
So I think it looks lovely. But yeah, I just thought I wanted to mention it, because it's a really interesting thing.It's a demonstration of Anders' desire to get this game to the table eventually, seeing it has taken him literal decades to do it.
And yeah, I just thought it was worth a shout out.
And so again, one for our Swedish listeners in two ways.One being it's in Swedish, but also it's a very local story.Yeah. I expect we're probably not going to get to see an English translation, because I guess the market won't be there.
Unless with Magnus' book coming out on the Swedish invasion of Gabing and other stuff, there is a huge demand from the continental US to see it.So our American listeners start demanding it. of the Swedish publisher, who I have no idea who that is.
We'll put a link in the show notes as soon as Dave or Nils gives me a link to put in the show notes.Because I've googled for it and I can't find it, because Google obviously knows I don't speak Swedish.
So the publisher is called Eloso.Oh, Eloso, yeah.
Eloso have done some other stuff, yeah.
So I can probably, well there's a link here on this thing I'm looking at.I'll see if I can copy that and send it to you on the Discord.
I might, now you've said the low so, I might be able to do it.
But yeah, so. Yeah, interesting.And also, I mean, it's an interesting one, because it does kind of reflect a little bit of Twilight 2000, because obviously in that game you've got the US and the Swedish setting.
So it's dovetailing a little bit in with that.I don't know what the rules are like, I don't know what the mechanics are like, but yeah, I thought it was well worth a shout-out, and good luck to Anders, and I hope it does really well.
Ah, yes, I'm seeing the website now.Actually, Expert Partisan, it appears to be called.
Yeah, although everyone seems to be referring to it just as partisan.Although it does, you're right, it does have expert above the title, but yeah.
And it is all very much, as you say, there's some sample spreads here that remind me very much of war stories. No, not War Stories.
Well, as you say, actually, a cross between War Stories and Twilight 2000.Yeah.
There's definitely a feel there.But yeah, it's good stuff.I like it.If it was in English, I would probably give it a punt.Yeah.
That entirely distracted me from the rest of the world of gaming, looking that up.But the other exciting news, which again, like Space 1999, goes back to something we talked about a few episodes ago, and that was Chaosium's
basic role-playing worlds competition where they said, you know, send us your world and potentially win money, I think a $10,000 prize fund, of which people who are shortlisted for the final award get, all the shortlistees get $500.
And they've all been announced.Okay, cool. Now, I think there's now a public vote for the design challenge to choose the top three.I am not sure how you're meant to choose.
I don't know whether these are already available somewhere and you can download them, read them and then choose or whether I can't see links for them, so I'm assuming you get to choose from the blurbs that have been written for them.
But again, I'll put a link in the show notes.And there are some interesting blurbs that I wanted to pull out.One of which is Cleo by Ian Hathaway and Enrico Borro. One of those is a historian and one's an archaeologist.
They've done it in the History and Games Lab, which our patron, Bruce, has attended and talks about in the Discord at the University of Edinburgh.It's a fun RPG usable for public history and in-class education at different levels.
In Clio, you play as a history enthusiast known as a diver who, thanks to advanced AI, can experience the past firsthand.
Each of Clio's scenarios contain quick-to-explore nodes combining traditional basic role-playing gameplay and some board gaming style stuff as well.
Now that interests me in all sorts of ways, partly because I have a PhD in exploring the past through ludic narratives. But also it reminds me a bit of playing, the experience of playing, oh God, what's it called?
Assassin's Creed, where you dive into the past.And also because it's from, you know, Friend of Friends, the Edinburgh Games Lab. But yeah, I don't know quite how to get my hands on that.
That's one that leapt out at me as a thing I'd like to take a deeper look at, but I don't know whether you just have to vote and then hope that they win and then it gets published.
Get the product, yeah.How many shortlisted candidates are there?
So let me count them.There are 10 shortlisted candidates.
Right, cool.They include... There could be only one.
No, I think there can be three winners of top prizes.Three winners selected by the judges will be announced after the people's voting has closed.That's right, you can vote for your favourite right now.
The People's Choice winner will win another £500, whether or not they get any of the major prizes.And each of the three winners will get another $2,000, not pounds, sorry.
cool and yeah yes so check out we'll put a link in the show notes and you can check those out and see if there's any you want to vote for that's all i'm going to say about that i think i've run out of other stuff to say cool cool yeah should watch with interest
Discworld, Dave.Discworld role-playing game is coming to Kickstarter soon.Again, I think this is one we've talked about in the past, but actually able to be funded shortly.
Yes, so Modiphius.Again.Again.Busy people at Modiphius.So I had a little chat with Danny and a couple of others from Modiphius at Tabletop Scotland and talked about this.
And I think this is not going to be a 2D20 game unless I'm getting confused with something else.
But I think that they were telling me that, I don't know what the mechanics are going to be, but Discworld RPG won't be 2D20, which will be a departure, obviously, from Odysseus.
But it's an interesting... Now that you mention that, I feel we did talk about it a bit ages ago, and it looked like quite an interesting, much more narrative mechanic, but I honestly can't remember.
yeah so i don't know any more detail about it but i'm pretty i'm pretty sure this is their first rpg departure away from away from 2d20 which i think is fine actually there's a lot of 2d20 games out there now and um it's funny i've just heard kind of so
There's a lot of year zero engine games out there.Obviously, I love the year zero engine.I quite like 2D20 as a system as well.But there's a bit of me that feels, maybe we've got enough 2D20 games out there.
We don't really need any more or don't need another one quite yet. But I don't feel the same about Year Zero.Well, naturally enough, because we're in the process of producing another one.There needs to be at least one more, Dave.
And I'm not just saying that because we are in the middle of producing a Year Zero game.But yeah, that just kind of, that insight just struck me in that moment and thought,
I think on the basis of the thought that Discworld not being 2D20 would be a good thing, and diversify Modiphius' mechanical approach to role-playing games a little bit, which I think also would be a good thing.
Discworld itself, I love the books, I don't think I read all of them, but some of those that I remember, the original Color of Magic and Guards Guards and Mort in particular were absolutely fabulous.
How, again, similar to Space 1999, how they convert and how they convert well into a role-playing game is another question.For me, anyway, I think, you know, the trouble with taking a, what's the word I'm looking for?
An IP like that, that wasn't the word I was looking for, but it'll do.An IP like that, that's got comedy so deeply woven into it as its current IP, because of the books.How do you recreate that feel at the table?And do you even try?
And if you don't try or you don't succeed, Does that mean that Discworld RPG is just another fantasy RPG just set in the world of Discworld and it doesn't really bring anything new?
Having games that are kind of telling you to be funny and laugh a lot is fine but You can't force people to be funny and laugh a lot, particularly not to get to the level of witticism that Terry Pratchett achieved at his best.So I don't know.
Again, I know nothing else about it, but my initial feel is that while I love Discworld, again, it might be difficult to translate into a role-playing game.
Yeah, we've spoken about it before and we've agreed, I think, before that you and I at least can't really see the attractions of role-playing games, apart from Toon, that are designed to be funny.
And Toon was just stupid in a good way.Silly.Silly stupid.And you go into it with that kind of attitude.There is no other thing to do in Toon other than be a cartoon character that falls off cliffs and gets squashed with anvils.And it's great.
There's no pretense to some other deeper story.Whereas I feel if you were going to do something in Discworld, at least I would have an urge, even if I tried to resist it, I would have an urge to that deeper story.
And there's a thing, I kind of have a number of issues with this.So yes, there's that thing about, and I'm not talking about fun, because loads of games are funny when you bring them to the table.
I remember our first stream of Morkboyer, we had comments saying, no, this is going to be a dark and serious game and you're laughing too much, you're having too much fun.No, I don't think so.
I think it's meant to be funny, or at least fun, if not comedic.
And that's the thing, I feel I've not read the whole oeuvre of Terry Pratchett but I've read a good number of the books and of course part of the reason why they click with people like you and me is they remind us actually of games of
I'm going to say generic fantasy role-playing games that we have been involved in and some of the silly ideas that we've come up with.I have no idea whether Terry Pratchett himself was a gamer, but I find it hard to believe that he wasn't.
And I'm pretty sure that his games of D&D or RuneQuest or whatever it was he was playing, some of the ideas in his books came out of those games.
There's that thing as well of, you know, one of the things he does is he uses the fantasy setting to take something very real and modern like taxes or their postal system and kind of satirize them in that way.
And we all do that, you know, I mean D&D is full of people, you know, wanting to build a department store which is an entirely 19th century creation in this proto-medieval stuff.That, you know, kind of the D&D world is that is the same mishmash.
So, personally, I really don't want to hear myself say this, but personally, if I were deciding I want to profess my love for Discworld in game form, I'd just be writing a 5e supplement actually at the end of it.I don't know.
I'll be interested to see the system and how they handle it and how they make it funny or fun enough to be funny maybe is the way I should describe it.But actually I think You know, years ago there was a GURPS Discworld book.Yes.Probably did the job.
I mean, GURPS surely Feels to me like the least funny system there can be.But, you know, that's kind of what you need.Here is your sisterized list of everything that's gone on in Discworld, where it all fits together, some stat blocks, that'll do.
Now, go and have fun at the table, the same sort of fun you've always had at the table, with a slightly Discworld flavor.
I suspect that, as with a lot of their stuff, Modiphius will do a banging job and it will be a beautiful game.They are getting a reputation for doing excellent starter sets. So the Dreams of a Machine starter set is just packed full of stuff.
It's quite how they make a profit on it, I don't know.So I suspect it's gonna be beautiful to hold, production values will be great.And I'd be interested to see what the mechanic is.
But again, for reasons I've mentioned earlier, I won't be backing it at this point, but might pick it up in the future perhaps.
Now, it'll be interesting to look at the Kickstarter as well, because again, if I were doing this, and if I were a big company, or bigger than you and me, Dave, you know, with money to burn, not money to burn, but, you know, with capital to put behind the Kickstarter rather than purely asking the Kickstarter for the capital we need to publish the book, I would be doing a whole bunch of ephemera around this, because I reckon there's a whole bunch of
shall we say, unrequited Discworld collectors who, frankly, I haven't seen enough. in the way of, say, plastic figures of Discworld characters.
It's not a thing that I buy, but loads of science fiction and fantasy IPs have got some really strong representation in those shops, like Forbidden Planet is nowadays, full of plastic tat.
And if I had the Discworld license, I'd be looking to give you dice towers and all sorts of shit that are
reference the reference the books in some way you know a little plastic figure of death to put on your table when you're making your essays and stuff like that.
I think you can have great fun with that and it might be a big success actually if they were to go down that three-dimensional tat route.
And they have a lot of expertise and ability in producing those kind of materials.Just having a quick look at the Kickstarter page.They've got nearly 7,000 followers.
Yeah, knocked our 550 into a cocked hat, didn't it?
Well, I was pretty pleased with that.Well, 504 at the point that we launched.So was I!Yeah, but we're not Modiphius, are we?And we're not Free League, so we can't really compete.But I was very pleased with our... Yeah, so it doesn't say very much.
With imagination and some shiny math rocks at your fingertips, your story on the disc awaits.So yeah, look forward to seeing what's there when it comes out.Cool.
So, hold on, I'm sure there's some other news apart from Discworld.News to the world of gaming.What have we got in my running order?
At Tabletop Scotland, I picked up my copy of Aegean by our pal and friend of the show, Stu Goff. I seem to be having terrible trouble with pledge managers, as in deleting the email without looking and therefore not completing pledge managers lately.
So Stu came in to find me and said, I've got your Aegean book.So I popped around and picked it up.I wanted to say that I haven't had a chance to read it yet.
I'm really interested to look into his city building rules, because as you know, I'm very much into those kinds of things. But I just wanted to say, actually, although there's not a lot of art in the book, it's a lovely, lovely book.
It's really nicely put together.It's an A5.A5, the smaller one? A5 is smaller.
Well, I mean there's a number of smaller sizes of books.
And you know I try and educate you all the times on the various sizes of books.
I was thinking that earlier and I thought I've got no idea actually what size this is.But it's that like slightly smaller than A4.And it's thick.It's a good inch and a half thick.It's got 300 pages of really good quality paper.
And it's really nicely laid out.For a book that doesn't have a lot of art in it, it's still really engaging and drawing me in.
So I just wanted to do a little shout out and thanks to Stu for sorting me out with my terrible, terrible ability to deal with pledge managers.Yeah, and I'm looking forward to reading that City stuff.
And when I have read it, I will talk about it on the podcast. But yeah, give a little shout out to Stu there and a big thank you for sorting me out.So it's a really good looking book.
Excellent.And talking of conventions, I added another thing at the last minute onto the order.And that is that we are officially going to Dragonmeet. We will be there, of course, representing Free League.
They've officially asked us to go and run their stand, so we will be there.We may be joined by Anna from Free League, and I am encouraging her to come and join us. Because I thought, obviously you need the money because you're a starving artist.
But if she were to join us, then that would free me up to maybe run some Toto games and talk about Toto at the podcast zone or stuff like that.
So I thought I might broach the subject with the podcast zone organizers in anticipation that she might join.
I think our friend John Dodd seems to be involved in that.So I saw something literally a day or two ago about opening up the podcast zone for people to put their names down and go along.So good timing, I think, is that.
So now's the time to have a chat with him.Yeah.
Cool.That'll be good.That'll be good.Yeah.Excellent. Cool, that was quite a lot of World of Gaming.
Yeah, that was.And we've got more news still.We've got news from the Old West.We have news from the Old West.Yee-haw!
That was it.That was the news from the Old West.Yeah. Yeah, so we are now 11 days in, I think, maybe 12 possibly, 12 days into the campaign.We are nudging up to the 20,000 stretch goal.We've just been hanging around there for a little while.
We obviously like being 19,700 and something.So we are nudging the 20,000 stretch goal. You know, we have hit the doldrums a little bit, as we expected.
Mid-campaign doldrums, yeah.
But we were saying that actually, with all our efforts at the start and all the great support we got right at the beginning, the really fast start we had, and things like Free League and others supporting us online, and then Tabletop Scotland, I think we've held off the doldrums for longer than perhaps we should have done, or could have done.
but this was an inevitable thing that was going to happen so that's fine you know we've got 18 days to go.
I've said to a number of people that if before the campaign someone had said, we'll give you 16 grand, I'd have bitten their arms off there and then and have been deliriously happy.
So yeah, the whole thing is more successful than I'd ever kind of dreamed it would be.So yeah, and we've got 80 days to go.
Not that we ever dreamed it would be, because we have got stretch goals that go all the way up here.
Realistically dreamed it would be then.
Realistically dreamed, yeah. As good as the best we were dreaming of, I think, is possibly the way to describe it.And definitely not as bad as... The day before we opened it, my son Tom asked me,
you know, what would make me happy about the first day.And I thought, well, good, what would make me happy about the first day?Obviously, funding would make me happy the first day, but that's not really very likely.
So I, you know, I put out some numbers, I said, you know, I'd be very unhappy if we only had 40 backers by the end of the first day. I'd probably be quite happy if we had a hundred backers by the end of the first day.
I was trying to pull figures out of thin air for, you know, where does the happiness happen?Luckily we didn't have to worry about that because we crashed straight through our target price and got fully funded within five hours on the first day.
So obviously I was pretty ecstatic from that point on.
Yes, absolutely.Same here. And all the way along, I was expecting us to hit a brick wall.You know, as I said, we've hit the Doldrums now, but going from 8,000 to 19,000, I thought, OK, where does this stop?Is it going to stop at 10, 11, 12?
And it just kept going.And yeah, so yeah. I'm pleased.
There is nothing that can stop me being happy about how we performed.
There are other things going on in the background as well.You have been reorganising the text because, of course, now we're actually funded, we've got to think about getting this in order.
So the last read-through we'd had, we'd thought about combining two of the chapters and you've now done that, I think.
We've also obviously put in the chapters that we'd already written, but we'd made them contingent on stretch goals, so they now all fit in.We're looking at the artwork some more.We've got plenty more art to commission.
We're about halfway through though on what we've done so far.But we've got more art now specifically to commission for the judges screen, the GM screen, which was a stretch goal that we have. made.
We had thought about doing it before the campaign but were slightly warned off it and I think that was the right advice at the time but now we're back on there.
So yeah, we're firing on all cylinders and hopefully we will keep to our promised target of delivery next May, whatever happens in the next few weeks.
And the exciting thing, again, is the very last day of the campaign, I will be in Essen at the big Essen spiel.So I'm going to take some leaflets there and see if we can get a last-minute boost of German backers at Essen.
Yeah, because that's... So that's the Thursday the 3rd, is that right?
That starts on Thursday the 3rd, which is, I think, the last day of our campaign.I think we finish at around four o'clock on that day.
Let's just hang on.One, two, three, four.
Counting.That's the thing that our podcast listeners love.
So actually, if my calculations are correct, we would finish, I think, at... Oh no, it is.It's four o'clock on the 3rd.Yeah.So you've basically got until mid-afternoon on the 3rd of October.Yeah. Yeah, cool, cool.Worth a final push.
Get some lovely German backers to join us at the last minute.That would be very good.
I don't know what your plan is for Essen, but whether you could get that afternoon, that morning off from the stand.
Well, I've got to talk it over with Anna, obviously.She's the boss.
But even an hour off in the morning, an early lunch, as it were, would let me scout around all the role-playing area.I mean, it's more of a board game show than a role-playing show.But it's a big show, though.But it's the biggest show in the world.
Is it bigger than Gen Con?You should get one or two customers.I think it's bigger than Gen Con in terms of numbers and in terms of... floor space.Okay, cool.
Well yeah, you've got a lot of walking to do in two hours then, mate.
Yeah.You've never been, have you?
You don't know quite the truth of that.
Well, we'll see.We'll see what we can do.I might come and fetch a banner from you if I can persuade Anna to let me have for that first morning.Right, okay.
She can only say no, yeah.
Yeah, I think that's probably all our old West News that's fit to print.
Yep, but rest assured we are cracking on and we are doing our utmost to deliver on the schedule that we've promised.But also, we will be very good at keeping people informed, so I think we're very, very keen
And I think some people have already commented on how good we've been at responding to questions and comments on Facebook, on Kickstarter.So, and that is a trend that we will continue.So, I mean, communication is something we will be all over.
So if you haven't backed it yet, why not?If you're listening to this, unbacked.And if your grandmother hasn't backed it yet, ask her to explain to you why she hasn't.Right, shall we move on?Yes.
Let's give another Kickstarter campaign a bit of love, shall we, Dave?
So we had a great chat with Chris Vermeeren about Terminal State, and here it is.So we have a special guest in the Hammam today.We've got Chris Vermeeren, who is the creative mind behind, I guess, our rival Kickstarter at the moment, Terminal State.
I welcome you, Chris.Thank you. Don't put my rival, if that's the case, you're, you're, you've almost knocked me out already, but that's all right.
We're here.The Kickstarter tide raises all the boats.So Chris, welcome.Um, and, uh, As we traditionally do, I'd like, as a new guest, I'd like to ask you all about your life in gaming.Where did you start?
Oh, wow.So I'm old when people can't see you.So I started in middle school, like many of us, with D&D.I actually have my red dice Red box dice still the original ones that he had, you know, use the crayon to fill in.
They're pretty much round now, but actually brought some dice over when I started up here in case we wanted to roll anything.And I found those, I have them in a cigar box of all things.
So gaming since, you know, early eighties and started with D and D did a lot of. Riffs with friends in the end, and Street Fighter, went through a world of darkness phase like so many of us do.Cyberpunk 2020, obviously, once I got into cyberpunk.
Some Shadowrun, though, the early Shadowruns were broken, so that was fun.
This sounds exactly, you could be saying my life in gaming.
I was actually about to say that.Timeline works out and Dave is a big, well was, was it has to be said, a big Cyberpunk 2020 fan.I think you played a bit recently and you weren't enjoying it as much Dave, am I right?
At Cyberpunk Red, yeah, it was too combat heavy and the combats took too long for me.
And I think, you know, the younger me, when I used to run loads and loads of 2020, kind of loved the combat, but I don't remember it being as long as it felt in the new version.So I didn't quite enjoy that as much.
Yeah, I wasn't either. as impressed with Red as I was hoping, because I love Cyberpunk 20.I mean, 2020 was a huge part of my childhood.
So we got to Shadowrun.More campaigns than I played.Yep.And then got into various weird, I don't know, TMNT, which is another Palladium adjacent, Marvel role-playing game, the original one, because I was a comic book fan for a long time as well.
And then got into YZE.I got Mutant Year Zero just because it looked cool.And then the Forbidden Lands.
Bloody hell, Dave.He is you.
We are clones, because... Then I got Forbidden Lands when the Kickstarter was.And the main reason I backed that was one of the stretch goals, because I actually checked, you know, this was five years ago, I can't believe it, was to make it OGL.
And I always had the idea that turning a magic system into hacking
would make for an easy way to make cyberpunk games, you know, a cyberpunk game, you know, more fluid rather than having its own sub game like it is in so many things or hand wave in so many other things.
So that was my goal.And it was, I got back and I'll just turn it real quick. That was four years ago, and we're finally here.We're rewriting the game.
If I had released this, it was probably version four by now by how many times I've pretty much rewritten from scratch the game.Partly Free League's fault for bringing out new dice and mechanics all the time.
Then I'm like, oh, that's a much better idea.
Yeah, I think we have to thank the guy whose idea it was to get... Oh, shut up, Matthew.
You can tell where this conversation is going because Matthew did suggest that idea to them back in the day.Although I suspect they were going to do it anyway, but Matthew loves to take the credit when he can.
So you wanted, that's a very interesting concept you said, you thought if we could turn a magic system into hacking we could solve, I'm now going to overlay my own problem with it.
I have a problem with Cyberpunk which is somebody's the hacker and everybody else has to sit around for about half an hour while the hacker does their thing which all takes a couple of seconds in game time but sitting around the table seems to take two hours just like combat.
Or you have to find somewhere to hide the hacker when you go into somewhere, so they just won't get killed by a passing guard.And then they kind of sit out of the combat.So, yeah.
That was one of the main things I wanted to solve.
Yeah.So, tell us, how have you solved this with magic?
Well, hopefully I've solved it.Again, it's iterated from there.It's not really fully based. is not like the magic system for Britain lands.That's where the concept came from.
It's become its own thing now, of course, but in terminal state, and that's one of the reasons I call it the server punk of now, because it's more based on some newer, everyone can hack.Everyone.Okay.Right.Everybody's wired.You don't have a deck.
There was a genetic cyber deck that was released by a actually anarchist group when somebody was developing.So everybody's been genetically nano rewired to be able to hack.So everybody can hack.Everybody can help hack them.
So hackers just, but the goal, you know, there's the four stats in terminal stages, like most YZ games.So anybody can shoot just like any other game.Anybody can punch just like any other game.Anybody can try social stuff, just like any other game.
So anybody can hack and that's based on the, you know, the tech skill.
And then hackers are better at it, just like anybody, you know, like somebody who in my game and active is the shooter guys are better at shooting than the normal guy, but anybody can pick up a gun and try and shoot.
So, and then anybody can help just like any other skill in, you know, a YZ game you can add on.So. not only the hackers hacking, there's actually hackathons, you know, the term I use it in this, where sometimes you require help to do it.
You need so many successes, kind of like a pyramid test in the summer games.You need so many successes, you need other people to help you to get through this thing, be able to take down something major.
So that's actually an interesting thing.You talk about this being the cyberpunk of now, not the cyberpunk of 20, 30 years ago.
And of course, now has changed in that, you know, we see groups like Anonymous and, you know, people don't, they're not lone hackers anymore, are they?Real, real hackers get together what? get together virtually, at the very least, in groups.
They do stuff in groups.So that is an interesting concept to add into Cyberpunk.Sorry, but I interrupted.You were about to say, but also.
Don't remember where exactly, but to build off of that of the Cyberpunk now is hackers also to bring them into the group.So everything is little mesh networks rather than being a, there is a large over net over everything, but hacking that's
virtually impossible.That's where you really have to get in the hackathon.So when you go, you need to be there and you have to be on the local network really.So you have to hack in person rather than having a hacker sitting at home doing nothing.
You have to be there.You have to be there as a group.It brings them more as part of the group.Also, because it's the future of now, since everybody can hack, things have gotten back to where most security things have gotten more analog again.
one of the character classes of couriers, because there's, you know, people deliver things on paper because you can't hack the paper, you have to try and steal it from people.
Locks on, you know, most of the big, you know, rich people's houses are going to be old analog locks because, you know, everybody can hack a lock easier than picking a lock, you know.So things have backtracked some just as, you know.
Okay, that's an interesting idea, I like that.Callback, yeah, as well.So I was just going to say, I like the idea that you've got there of the, everyone can hack, so the hacker becomes a much more important integral part of the group.
Did you want to say a little bit more about how the hacking actually works then?So if you're in a group and you're trying to hack into something, how you do that?
It's also, yeah, so it's made it, so I'm using the Dice Pool, but hacking, I mean, so I'm using Stepdive, but hacking actually goes into, ends up going into the Dice Pool.
So systems have what I call SSP, System Security Protocol points, and that's their pool of dice.And with that, they can put some towards their firewall, some towards having a SysOp, some towards, you know, they're defensive.
So you just build it out of your dice pool instead.And then when you hack in, just like anything else, you only need one success to get in.
So you're in, and you can start doing your first action, but then they've got all their pool left to try and kick you back out, fight you. Once you're in there, it becomes like a form of combat.So that was the goal.
So it's not like, it's not hard to get into a system.It's hard to stay there and get anything done.Cause then you're fighting against it and they can, and if you glitch, you know, so if you roll a critical fail, basically, you know,
in this, then that can up the system's AI, is one of the side effects that can happen.It can call the system Damon, which you don't want, because those can actually hack genetic code as well.They're like really messed up.
And in those kind of like, as you call them in 2020, the run, presumably then you can have a run where everyone is running in it.All the characters can run regardless of how good or how bad they are.Yep, that's the goal.
So it becomes a completely different environment where everyone gets to play. Yeah, that's cool.
Yeah, because you got the social guys, but just like in the most ways, you got the command thing.So there may be more of a support in general, but you got the command ability.You've got a taunt ability, just like any other one.
So they've got abilities that can help everyone as well.Or you can, of course, try and avoid combat altogether and manipulate people into calming down.
Doing what you want.Yeah, exactly.Social hacking, as they call it.
And hackers, there's actually three different types. I did do a throwback to Shadowrun.There's the hijackers, or what I'm calling, or like the riggers.
So they focus on more on drones, because drones, again, being the future of now, are a huge part of the game.And then there's puppeteers who can actually hack people.Again, since everybody's wired, you can hack into people.
And that's where it gets a little more magic-y.Most of the puppeteers Apps, as I call them, are based more on the Fervent Lands spells, especially the mind control-y type ones.So that's the nod back to that.
And then all the hackers apps are named after medieval-y, evil-y things, like Sword is how you attack in, is your app for attacking, and Shield, and Sentinel, and Hydra, and things like that.
So that's another nod back to the idea of being based on a fantasy magic system.
So I remember when Forbidden Lands was introduced, of course, we only knew the D6 dice pool then, and Forbidden Lands effectively introduced magic into the world with D8s and D10s and D12s.
The artifact dice, yeah.You kind of turned that on its head and you said, right, okay, meet space.
we're doing this with step dice like Blade Runner, like Twilight 2000, but cyberspace, or whatever you call it in your world, is back in the dice pool system.So now the D6 are the magic ones.
I love that.Yeah, so you have the pools instead.
So how do you, so I'm just thinking though, if I'm a, you know, a hacker of some sort of puppeteer or something like that, And when I do my social hacking, when I'm trying to convince somebody of a thing, I'm rolling step dice.
How do I calculate my magic pool when I'm getting into cyberspace?
So you still use the step die for your attacks.The die pool is really just the SSP, the defensive ones.Oh, right.Yeah.So your stuff is just still general.
And if you look at the math, you know, hopefully I'm factoring it well, but the tables are, you know, the step, the swing on them a little different, but, you know, you factor in, you know, so the base level of, you know, the base level SSP is, should be relatively decent, you know, and, you know, if it's an easy system, it should be pretty, you know, a low pool.
So it's easy to, easier to get into and they can't do a much as much against you. and things like that.So it's pretty easy to balance the two from a baseline.
I don't want to leave that list as a straight end.So people use step dice, systems use dice ball.
Right.Loving it.Loving it.
Yeah.Is there a way in the game that you can be trying to, in the real world, socially influence someone whilst one of your mates in the cyber world is trying to hack into their wetware?Yeah.
Yeah.Everybody else can do, you know, whatever they want to do as normal.Hacking is just basically another form of combat.It's just the tech version of combat.
It's like you're attacking the systems, or you're hacking into the cameras, or whatever you're doing.There are some base level things you can do really easily.
And then if you're attacking the actual system stuff to really take control, that's where it gets into the step die stuff.I mean, the die pool stuff when you're going into a system.
Cool.Loving it.And so we've talked a little bit about the sort of characters you can have, you've got different archetypes and things like that.But what's the what is the future of now like?When is when is the future of now effectively?
How far away from now are we?
2089 is where the game is set.And that is actually, funnily, I didn't know this when I started, I named the game Terminal State years ago when I had the concept.
When looking around, there was an old Mutant Year Zero for the one that was more cyberpunk-y, I can't remember, what is it?Naya or whatever version of it was.
One of the older New Year's, there was a module that somebody did called terminal state, which I found later, which is fun.And it was set in, it was set in 2089.
So I'm like, yeah, I'm going to throw back to that just for the historical value of that.So, but it's set in 2089.It's a kind of a point of light.There's a term, the term it's called terminal state.
Cause there's terminals that go up to the near orbital ring.So there's three rings that are circle. which where all the corpse and the rich people live and are used for transport to get around the world.
So there's specific terminals in specific areas.Around the terminals are huge sprawls.The main setting is the hub, which is a purely man-made.It's in, since I'm American, it's in like Colorado, uh, Wyoming, you know, middle of nowhere.
They built this giant, you know, terminal, this huge city and it's covers almost, you know, three States.
It's not quite, you know, Gibsonian sprawl from, you know, the entire sea, Eastern seaboard, like in a Neuromancer, but it's, these things are big.So, and there's, I can't remember how many there are total now.I think there's like 20 or 30.
main terminals between the three rings and one's right on the equator, one's kind of in the northern hemisphere and one's in the southern hemisphere.
The rings you mean?Yep, the rings in space and then the terminals go up from, so there's like terminals in Australia and Brazil and Europe and Japan, there's a whole history around there.There is not one in New York because
that New York got nuked in my campaign.So everybody says everything in New York.So I got, I got, yeah, I love it.It's where the first terminal was supposed to be built.And then it got hit by a mass driver attack.
And when I was researching about it, there's a nuclear power plant in New low, uh, lower New York and these terminals, you know, go all the way up.So they're huge.So when I got hit, it fell and hit the nuclear.
So New York is hit by a mass driver asteroid throw.And then it got, you know, a fallout from a nuclear power plant.So it's just New York is a wasteland.Sorry. I wanted it wanted to be different.I didn't want so New Jersey is the new New York.
Yeah.So New Jersey is where it has to be.So why is New York not the main one?You kind of made it the sprawl big enough, but I'm like, no, that's more fun.
I like that as well that, if you like, the main terminal is in what might otherwise be known as flyover country.Yes.So you're really changing the polls.And of course, one of the big things about Cyberpunk is the classes.
And I noticed that you advertise four different types of humanity, but six social statuses.Can you unpack those?
uh social statuses or humanities or both what are we uh the state social status we might come back to humanity i'm quite interested in what fabricant ringer and neo might be so we'll come back to that in a minute we'll come back to those yeah social statuses are exile which is
your Mad Max-y, Judge Dreddy, you know, when you get sent out into the wastelands, because again, it's Point of Light.
So anything around here is called our DMZs, between them, or what I changed it to, since it's in there, Duldrums, spelled with a Z at the end.
And again, since Terminal State, I'm a huge Front 242 fan, as a Front 242 song, Duldrums is in there.I'm like, it all ties together.I like weird, some Rhinicity things like that.
So you got the exiles, so that's when you're kicked out, or if you're born outside of an arcoplex, which is around the main areas around the terminals.So that's the portman of arcology and complex.So they're just a big grouping of arcologies.
You're an exile, or if you get kicked out for, you know, you could piss off the corpse, or you self-exile yourself because you don't want to be involved with them.Then there's, which this one's,
Throwback to 2020, which some people may not like, there's cop as a status.
Yeah.Punk.Punk is a status.Citizen is a status.Corp and elite and the elite are the, you know, the really rich and each one comes with their benefit.
Social status is the only part of the character creation that you have to roll, but because it also determines your base reputation and reputation is what determines your credit. And that's how all the buying stuff in the game works.
There's no money system.It's a purely a credit score, which is the ABCD from, you know, the step die.And that's based on your reputation.
And since that, but I did, since I know a lot of people might be not want to make a corp or cop, you have to roll, but you can downgrade.
So you can, you don't like what you can, you can, you can, you can't upgrade and you can't choose because I don't want people every everybody wanting to be elite because they get more money, more cred, more rep, but so you can sell from a copy, you end up in exile.
Oh, like Mad Max, I guess.
Yeah.Or, and Judge Dredd, you know, when you get sent off into, so. And you could either make it part of your history, which is kind of cool.
So, you know, I rolled a cop, but then I chose to be an exile or was exiled, or you can just decide you were an exile.So it adds a little more.I like stuff like that where you can add this flavor.
So you've got six classes, you roll for whichever status you are.Is that on a D6?
Because otherwise you'd have too many elites.
And elite actually is 11 plus.So you have to be, your humanity type gives you a bonus to your role.So you have to be either a Neo or a human or a, actually Neo or a human to even be an elite.You can't be a fabricant or a ringer and start an elite.
Brilliant.Which brings us neatly today.
Perfect question.Yeah.So fabricants are sentient, sapient AI.We use sapient and purposely instead of sentient because actually technically correct.And my brother is an English major and I need to get the other.
But it's the one that AI gains sapience.It's It has to legally has to register its code and get put into a robot body.So that's a fabricant.Right.And robot is almost ever all tech in this game is nano organic in some way.
So they're not exactly, so they're not replicants, but so they don't look humanoid on purpose.They look more robotic, but you're not exactly just, you know, wires and gears, there's a little more to it.
So yeah, I was gonna say, obviously, obviously, robots, in one sense or another.Yes.
Yeah, they're, yeah, they're made purposefully not to.And now you can, if you're a sentient AI, sapien AI, put yourself in a humanoid body, but that's against the law.So that but that's something you can do as a starting character.
If you do that, then then if you get caught, you're in trouble.So it is an option, though. Then there's the human, of course, which is pretty straightforward.
Neos are kind of like meths from, my brain just turned to all the carbon, kind of, in terms of their humanoid intelligence is put into new body.
But unlike that, these are cadavers that are either genetically altered to look like you, usually made to look younger for rich people to put themselves in.
or so there's three options on those there's you in a new version of you you and just another body like more like altered carbon and then what was the i don't even remember the third now oh just a one that looks oh it's modified but it's not like exactly like it looks
really close to you, but they started with, you know, it's not fully, you know, you, it's like they try and it looks, you'd pass as you, but it's not like it's a exactly you.So it's like, right.
Kind of like the cheaper version you went for the, the, the, the downgraded, it is the cheapest version of them and cost wise, it's like even cheaper than getting a, you know, just a normal body that wasn't you.
But yeah, I just thought it would be odd. for the rich people to be putting themselves into cadavers.
I quite like that.Yeah.Reborn.Yeah.Using the lower classes effectively.Um, yeah.Yeah.I'm all for this.
And then it makes a whole industry for, you know, people, you know, bumping people off to, you know, sell the bodies and kind of mad.So what was that?Uh, I was in, um, max headroom, right?They had a whole subplot of the body snatchers and then
Ringers are genetic clones.They were originally made to build the rings.They were a labor force.
They come in four casts, which gives them, so that's kind of like a sub, they have their own little sub bonuses based on the cast that all balance, hopefully balance out well.They seem to in place.
And they just recently, once the last ring was finished, gained independence because they were, you know, basically a labor force servants.They didn't have any rights.
And they just gained independence, got their patent from the company that owned it.And now have made a mass exodus down to the planet.And, you know, there's, so if you're a ringer, there's, you know, hundreds to thousands of you out there.Yeah.
So they're a little more, they're the most replicanty one.Exactly.
This is, this is brilliant.And as you're talking, I'm flicking through the quick start here, which, um, uh, am I right in saying this is normally, uh, a few dollars, but if you go to it via the kickstart page, then it's, uh, it was, yeah.
Wasn't I put it up for free for a free, uh, RPG day in June.And then I left it for a while and it was getting close enough to kickstart.I'm like, I'm just gonna. So now it's just free.
Right, cool.That's a lovely feature.Seventy odd pages.Yep.Nicely designed.Is it time?Just to have a look at how we're doing.Yeah, it may be time to talk about how you put it together.So you've thought a lot about this world.
We've talked about this being like the fourth or fifth iteration of this rule set.I'm loving the detail in the background of this already feels very believable world.Yeah.Kind of interesting concepts that I'd like to play with.
I just have a little memory problem on my computer, not my own head.It's just and. I'm going to quit that, sorry.I just don't want my computer to crash while we're talking.So yeah, you've thought all this stuff.
How have you gone about turning it into this very nicely designed quick start, and I'm assuming nicely designed hardback when people back it.Who's your team?Tell us about your team.
Me.I'm my team.My brother's my brother's the editor.I'm the team.I've been a graphics design.I was a graphic designer for years.Then I did web design.I'm now one of the cogs on management.
But I've been it's my I've we got our first Mac and 85 and I've just done graphic design on the side. forever.I have a degree in advertising.I don't have a degree in this, but it's what I've always done.
It's been my, my passion for ever is just graphic design.So I've been putting it all together.
But the illustrations where they come from, uh, those ones in the quick starter stock, a lot of the ones in actually the main book are, are stock, but I manipulate them heavily.I think stock, if you used well as perfectly fine, use a,
A lot of people probably know Grand Failure, Tithi Luodong, I think is the name.It's been out there in a lot of cyberpunk stuff, uses it here and there and stuff.And they've got, they've got a lot of art.
And again, if you manipulate it well, and I'm going more for feel than an exact representation.A lot of like all my, all my gears, all my gears, silhouettes, because one of the main concepts, I didn't want this to be a gear
gear porn, gear management game, like so many cyberpunk games are.So my weapon table is modern weapons.I think there's 10, maybe eight.I don't remember right off the top of my head.And it's a customization system.
There's all kinds of add-ons you can add.There's different projectile types to buy.So you can build your weapon that you want rather than having this, especially in YZE where the minutiae between the weapons is so minor half the time.
I mean, T2K, they're trying to replicate them, almost a military strategy game.So there's a lot of weapons, but if you look at them, most of them are very similar. So it's not in the stats.So when it comes to look and feel, then that's customization.
That's making it, you know, and then that's on you to make, decide what it wants to look at.
And some of the... It's a bit like Feng Shui, where all the guns pretty much do the same amount of damage.Yeah.
But if you describe them in gun porn terms, then you get a bit of a bonus.Yep.
Yep.Doesn't quite have that, but yeah, there's the base, different ones have some different levels and then your add-ons do different stuff. It's more about the feel you want for it than anything else.
No, I like that.I like, I like very much the idea of customizing your own, your own gear in that way.
Yeah, that's cool.And then it was stretch gold, but you know, with the way campaigns going, they're probably going to end up in there anyway, because I like them.There's random tables to roll up all these things too.
So you can pick your stuff, but then I have a random table to just randomly roll up and see what you get.And you could end up with something fun.
So at the moment, just kind of point by system you choose or no, we're rolling things up.So we're still running our class and stuff.
Yeah.Gear is a point by for the customization by default.But then there are the random tables if you just want to have fun and see what you get.You don't know what you want your character to have.So.
That's cool. I do have a couple of other questions.You were talking about the exiles.So you're saying that exiles can be born outside the kind of metropolises.Do they then not have the kind of pre-installed wetware?
Everybody's got that because it's genetic.It was a nanovirus, basically, that we released out.And so everybody is.And then you're usually dampered on it until you're old enough.
So one of the big, I said everything in mesh, so there's the outer net over everything.
There's also what I'm calling the safety net, which most, so all kids, you know, you're, you're basically blocked from being able to do a lot of stuff until you're of age, which of course you can hack through that if you have a younger character and want to figure that out.
If you're clever enough.Yeah.
Yeah.You're not going to have a baby stuck on the internet.
Now, I was just wondering whether there was a dynamic there for a character who didn't have that, who would then get to play into the system.
But no, that's... You can turn it off.It's an optional thing, but I also have a... I like the game dial idea from a lot of the... Is it Powered by the Apocalypse that uses the dials?I always get that in Blades of the Dark.
So there's a surveillance and a survival. Yeah, there's a surveillance and survival dials.So if you turn off your ability to connect, they're going to know it because you basically they're tracking everybody.
And if you go off, they're going to know where you were and then you went off.So that raises the surveillance level in the area because somebody has went off and why. Yeah.
And then as you go out from, you know, the, the city areas, the survival level goes up.So making it harder to do certain things because you're in areas where you can't do them as easily.
So there are optional rules that you don't have to worry about if you don't want to, but they're in there so that if you want to get a little grittier trying to keep it, so it's not. too gritty, like T2K.
I don't know if I could even play without a VTT.There's so much to it.
You probably can, but I wanted it so it's playable, you know, without having to worry about that, but that there's ability that if you want to ramp up the grittiness and the crunch, there are some options.
Yeah, cool.Now, the other question I was going to ask, now, most cyberpunk games have a concept of humanity and you kind of lose your humanity the more cyberware you get. Do you have something like that in terminal state or not?
I know what answer I want, but let's hear what you have to say.
There is an augment limit, and it's based on two of your stats.It's a derived stack, kind of like health, where it's combined.And you can go up to that without any... chance of penalty.
And even when you go over, it's not like you automatically, then it's when you, then you have to start rolling.
And the more and more you go over, the more chance of, you know, having something where you're, you're just taxing your system too much is what it is.
Cause it's based on your, your, your flex, which is your nervous system, basically stat, if you want to think of it that way, reflexes and your cool is my other.So then my, my stats are based, nod backs to cyberpunk 2022, their body flex.
tech and cool.Cool, cool, cool.I love those.Yeah.So your cool and your flex make up your augment limit.So your cool is, you know, your, and you're sorry, my brain just turned off.So cool and flex determine your augment limit.
And when you push those to the limit, then you're starting to tax your nervous system or your, your, your, your ability to, you know, cognitively, you know, be human.You're losing your cool.Yeah.
No, that's cool because I can see why a lot of games have it.
I often find it takes, this is to use a favourite phrase of Matthew's, it takes some of the fun out of it when you're kind of so limited in what you can do without suddenly becoming effectively a robot, which I don't enjoy.
Yeah, the game is supposed to be fun.If you want to be shining with lots of cybernetics, then you should be allowed to shine with lots of cybernetics, in my opinion.
Yeah, you can.And not every cybernetic has the same effect.
Because if you can have as much cyber as you want, if you want a cyber arm, if you're not getting a game bonus from it, if you're not using one of the cybernetics that give you a bonus, then it's just you have a cyber arm.I don't care.
Yeah, exactly.So it has no game effect.So it has no effect towards your augment limit.It's the ones where you have to buy that actually give you a bonus, give you an effect.
And the term for when you go over your limit is you've gone augmental, by the way.
Okay, yeah, that's cool.Excellent.I love your play on words.It's cool.
I'm just talking about, so I'm loving, you know, your stat names and things like that.Can I ask a vital question, which is what skill do you use to spot somebody creeping up on you?
Yeah.Observe and it works.Yeah.
Um, and how many skills have you gone for?Cause you know, some games have got like 16, some have got 12.Um, what have you been doing?
I stole from Blainer.It's got 13 cause it's got the drive skill separate based on maneuverability of the vehicle.Just like that.That's brilliant.I'm like, that's, that's so brilliant.I loved that.So that had to happen.So there's, there's 12.
three for each stat.Cool.
Well, I think we're out of time, Dave, unless you've got any more questions.
I think the only other thing I'll say is that that's been a great chat and it's encouraged me to back it, which I have done about five minutes ago.So very good luck to you, Chris.It sounds great.And I do love the look of it.
And so, you know, the old Cyberpunk, Cyberpunk Red, you know, doesn't do it for me anymore. I am still a big fan of the cyberpunk genre and this all sounds great.So yeah, good luck and fingers crossed.
It seems to be a brilliantly realized world, Chris.
Yes, absolutely.It's funny because when I started it, I was going to make it setting agnostic.
And just kind of have, you know, I just wanted to make a cyberpunk system for YZE.And now the setting is actually the largest part of the book, partly because every part of it is a two page spread.
There's six districts and three sectors in each district.Well, not quite.They average out in three, some have two, some have four, but basically there's three sectors in every district and every sector has a two page spread.
So it becomes the largest section of the book, that and the core section.
Because I love the concepts you've thrown in.I'm loving the fact that there's kind of homages to cyberpunk or associated stuff of the past, but it's all its own thing.It feels it's it feels fresh and new.And that's yeah, that's great.
Yeah.Yeah, that was that was the hope.Yeah.Yeah, I agree.I think I listened to your one before.The cyborg is probably the best throwback. 80 style cyberpunk game out there.It really does.What they were all missing is the punk part of it.
And they nailed that.But this, I wanted, this one wanted more of a, like Cyberpunk 2020, where it's kind of a, it's a cyberpunk world.There's more to it than just the punks.So I wanted everything in there, but still a fresher take on it.
Hopefully that was the goal.
Well, it sounds brilliant.I haven't yet backed, but I probably will before the end of your campaign.And I urge our listeners as well.I mean, obviously, don't cancel your Tales of the Odd West.
No, no, no, no.This isn't a one or the other.Back both of them.Yeah.Very different.Very different.
You can't go wrong with YZE games.It's a solid, solid system.Yeah, absolutely.
That's brilliant.Thanks very much for coming to talk to us, Chris.Thank you for having me.
Thank you.So that was great.It was a real pleasure chatting to Chris and really opened my eyes about Terminal State.
As I said earlier, I think talking to him has revealed how much more thought and stuff has gone into this game than is perhaps apparent on the Kickstarter page. I backed it.I backed it during the interview, as I said.
So fingers crossed, looking forward to this funding.So as of recording, which is Sunday the 15th, there's 11 days to go.It runs through Thursday, September the 26th.They are 2,001 pounds short of their target with 127 backers.
So if you're interested, go and have a look, back it, let's see if we can get Chris and Terminal State over the line.
Yes, this is a game that I think deserves to exist.And I haven't backed it yet, but I will be backing it.And I hope that we can persuade another few tens of backers, surely just tens of backers is all we need to get it over the line.
And it looks like a great book.Chris is, as you heard, a graphic designer.So it looks a bit gorgeous already. and it'll be a lovely thing to have on your shelf or in your PDF library if you can't afford to have it sent over from America.
Either way, it looks great.Absolutely.Right.Next week, Dave, or next episode, I should say.
Yes. You had an idea about what we might do next time.So Tales of the Old West, we're trying to create the rules and the mechanics to reflect some of the vagaries and the variances of the time.
And one area where this is particularly salient is weapons and guns.
I'm gonna talk a little bit next time about the weapons of the West and how we've tried to use the rules, the Azero engine rules, to bring out some of that sense, that look and feel of what weapons were really like and how they, how your choice of weapon will actually, you know, give you tactical advantages or disadvantages depending on what you want your weapon to do, what you want to do with it.
Yeah, and we. I feel already the next episode is going to be called... Are you clapping?
No, that was me shooting my little gun that I took to Tabletop Scotland.So it's a very cheap little plastic gun.But, and I only got it as a whim, as a prop, just for a bit of fun.But then actually... You just wanted a toy, Dave.You wanted a toy.
Well, there is that as well.But actually, at the convention, it was really helpful in me describing how the rules You know, apply.
Oh, double action and single action.
Exactly.So I was able to demonstrate it really clearly to people who don't know much about it.So that was actually.
We need to make another video, Dave.We do.Explaining that.I think we do.
Absolutely.We should do that soon as well.
So, yeah. What was I going to say?I was going to say something very important.And you've just taken me... By shooting your gun at me, you totally disturbed me.
Also, on one of our videos, our launch video, I did say we don't even have a gun.But now we do.It's not a real gun, but we have one.
Yes, it was the video, as you say, a little short video we did just in the last minute, in fact, of our day at ILARP.I said, oh, should we do just a quick one for when we actually go live to announce that we've gone live?And that was hilarious.
Another video is coming out as well, I should say, probably shortly after recording this on the Sunday where we talk about campaigns.
But guns in Year Zero are interesting in that guns and the different sorts of guns people had in the Old West were at times a huge modification of guns.We thought it was important to reflect that wide variety of guns.
But Year Zero engine generally isn't great at doing that because there's not much nuance in the stats. Things have got more complicated in Twilight 2000.They've taken an approach to giving you a bit more variance in guns in that way.
We didn't want to go down that route, but we have, I think, created something that is quite variable.But we've already been asked questions that
Pertain to some of the decisions that we actually made in developing this like yeah very early on we talked about cap and ball pistols and ammunition and whether we should reflect that in some sort of way and For reasons that you will explain next week next episode Dave.
We didn't go down that route for this game There's no reason why you can't
And we'll, you know, maybe we'll do an earlier period where there's more cap and ball stuff and we'll actually do some official rules around that in one of our future publications.
But for this period, we said, no, actually, let's just stick with the slightly simpler mechanics because there's other stuff that people have got to get their head around.
And we'll talk about that next week.Next time.
Indeed.Cool.Well, I think that's probably enough for today.So it's goodbye for me. And it's goodbye from him.
May the icons bless your adventures.
You have been listening to the Effect Podcast, presented by Fiction Suit and the RPG Gods.Music stars on a black sea, used with permission of Free League Publishing.
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