It hath begun…

Crow’s Feet, by artist Andrew Gillis.

Here’s how the deal with Andrew works: he’s doing illustrations for every Element Card in the game. Some of which he gets to author himself, the rest of which he gets to take from the Elements I write. The art is supposed to feel hasty, sketch-like… like the players are required to breathe that last bit of life into it. Crow’s Feet is the first element he’s sent me, along with this description he wrote for it:

For back story on this one, I’m calling her “Crow’s Feet” and she used to be a little girl, who would make faces. Her mother told her not to, and that her face would get stuck that way. Obviously she didn’t listen. Crow’s Feet wanders the Woods, looking for something.

Sometimes, your decisions turn out to be perfect. I couldn’t be happier with this arrangement.

Keys & Powers, Now Up!

I’ve just finished pages 3g and 3h. Respectively, they are the pages on Personal Keys and Powers.

For those following along rigorously, you’ll notice that Imposter and Outcast have been removed from the pre-made Personal Keys, replaced by Uptight and Investigator. The reason being that Imposter was too similar to Liar, and Outcast created characters who were isolated from the group – obviously so, but then I realized that in play it undermined the dynamic I was shooting for.

Also, I added a new Power to the list of pre-made Powers: Wordkeeper.
It follows:

Wordkeeper
Anything that is spoken near you, you can replay it later, as if from some invisible radio nearby
(Gain a risk when…) you replay a secret, or when you replay the words of an enemy

Feedback on those two pages would be much appreciated!

Finding the Heart of Ashes

Alright,

I’ve just written out the rules about recovering the Heart of Ashes – the signature relic that everyone is ostensibly searching for. It is probably the heart of Seven Flames, the last connection his spirit has to this world (horcrux style). Once recovered, it could unify or destroy the land, bring about or prevent the second apocalypse. No one knows the extent of its power, really, they just know that it has power.

Below are the rules about retrieving it. They’re also listed on  Page 3f: Improving.

Finding the Heart of Ashes

If you improve so that you have 3 skills that are at “+4″, you are now able to find the Heart of Ashes. You can do it right away, or whenever feels natural. You don’t need to search for it or anything – all you have to do is declare that you find it, and how.  What is the Heart of Ashes? That’s part of what you decide when you declare it.

It’s fine to say that:

• You suddenly realize that YOU are the Heart of Ashes, and have the power to welcome Seven Flames into your heart or take your own life to dispel him from the world forever.
• You stumble across a weird lump of ash, that glows this purple glow. No one else sees it yet, and you’ve got a decision to make!
• The heart of ashes is actually the left eye of the Scarecrow Statue, and it’s been hiding in plain sight all along.
• etc, etc

When you find the Heart of Ashes, you choose what to do with it, and what happens as a result. The game doesn’t end there though, nor does the heart protect you from the consequences of your choices. It does, however, count as a new Power (and you choose what it does, and when it costs).

Recap:

• When you have 3 skills at +4, you can recover the Heart of Ashes.
• You choose where it is, how you recover it, and what that means.
• You choose what you do with it, and what happens as a result.
• The Heart of Ashes counts as a new Power, and you decide what it does and when it costs.
• This doesn’t end the game.
• The Heart won’t protect you from the consequences of these choices.

FEEDBACK!

How do you feel about these rules?
Are they clear?
Would you feel a big burden of responsibility if, after a few sessions of play, you recovered the heart and had to make these decisions?

What would you make the Hearts’ power be?!?!???!?!?!? (I realize that the best answers would be contingent on what had happened in play, and that without context the answers might be less awesome, but I still want to know!)

Pages, Pages!

Hey, along the right-hand side of this website is the “living rulebook” for Heart of Ashes. Well, it’s starting to come alive, right now.

In the past couple days, I’ve written pages 2, 3a, 3b & 3c. That’s the “stuff that’s permanent in the setting” and some of the game’s rules.

Check it out! What makes sense? What doesn’t? What’s exciting? What’s worrisome?
Post your thoughts here, not there, if you wouldn’t mind!

Where do you hang your keys?

Alright,

I’m thinking a lot about the physical aspects of the game right now: the materials used, the way material components interact. Part of this is because the game currently has lots of physical components, making it difficult to step beyond the prototyping stage without some streamlining.
My big concern is with keys. Let me walk you through how it currently works. You have a character sheet. It’s roughly 5″x7″.
You then have cards for all of your keys. There are Key Cards that are the size of playing cards, and you take a new one and write your key on it every time you buy a new key.
So, you have a character sheet and 1-6 (on average) Key Cards.
You also have Powers, which are also on cards. So you have 1-4 Powers (on average) sitting there, too.

So, next to your character sheet, you have somewhere around 2-10 cards, all laid out.
Too cumbersome?
Is there a way to represent Powers and Keys that’s less disposable?

Thought: Have a bigger character sheet, with room to write them in.
Pros: fewer cards and pieces of paper flying around
Cons: you’ll have to write & erase on the same space, over and over again… it doesn’t look as pretty… it’d require a big sheet. 2 page character sheet, probably.

Re-sparking the Flames

Alright, after several successful games of Heart of Ashes at Gamestorm, I suddenly stopped working on the project.

Which is strange, because I was having lots and lots of success. I think the game components didn’t work exactly like I’d imagined they would, and I’d already become married to my perfect little vision of the game. So, perhaps there’s a lesson that I’m in the process of learning, there: stay flexible, don’t commit too heavily, be prepared to give your darlings makeovers as often as necessary.

So, here’s where I’m moving, with some different game components…

Visual: I am going to toy around with a very different visual style, for the character sheet and cards – crisp lines, twisty images, more iconic and solid. I like what I created, but I also want to play around with options, and resist the urge to “lock myself in” to something too early.

Physical: I’m contacting printers about the possibility of printing element cards (the cards that describe setting elements, list their stats and list their world keys). I imagine them being the size of postcards, which means that they’re a much bigger headache than custom playing cards are. Custom playing cards are actually pretty reasonable and affordable to print on POD nowadays. Last night, though, I came up with a neat realization – a 5″x7″ card is the same size as 4 playing cards placed together in a square. So depending how printers lay out and cut cards, doing up some 5″x7″ Element Cards might be feasible/doable. Fingers crossed.

Art: I’m in contact with a friend of mine in Vancouver, who is a wicked guy and a cool artist. I’m hoping that he’ll be able to do art for Element Cards, and for the game in general.

Distribution: I had a fun idea! The main game consists of: a 5″x7″ rulebook, some 5″x7″ character sheets, and the basic set of Element Cards, of which there are 40-75 (also 5″x7″). Then, occasionally develop expansion sets – Undersea Empire, Wizard School, etc. Release them as blister-packs of Element Cards (perhaps 20-35 cards in an expansion). The idea tickles me.

Text: I’m starting to write the living rulebook pages in earnest this evening.

Rules: Shadows need more guidelines and structure, as do conflict generation in general. I’m going to think more about how to structure these things effectively, and post some ideas on Thursday.

Playtesting: Once I’ve got the notes up, I’m going to be calling for playtesters. Expect that call to go out before the end of the month, ideally within two weeks. I’ll provide all playtest groups with phone call check-ins, and I’ll be awarding all of them with some seekrit surprises at some point too.

Stormed!

So, I ran Heart of Ashes about 2.5 times at Gamestorm this weekend. That “.5″ was for a single-player game that lasted about 2 hours. It essentially felt more like a tech demo than a full on game.

I learned a lot about the game, much of which I am really stoked on.

First of all, I realized that in order to build meaningful Shadows, you need to introduce players to conflict quickly. That means dumping them into a place with lots of potential conflict and opposed factions – like The City, or a Town. The games where I introduced characters in the woods… failed to deliver the same sort of “oomph!” early on.

Second of all, I learned that the difference between a proactive player and a reserved player is that one will take XP, reinvest it into new Keys, and be hella mechanically powerful in a matter of moments. This is also true in Shadow of Yesterday, but it is very pronounced in Heart of Ashes (partially due to the fact that I’ve simplified advancement, and in doing so made skill-creep happen much quicker).

Third of all, I learned that in one session, you won’t be able to hit upon the “meta-plot” of the game (the meta-plot being: Seven Flames is returning to this world, and his second coming depends upon the heart of ashes, and you’ll retrieve it when you have three skills at +4). Which, like, is fine. In a single session, having a single conflict arc is sufficient. In a multi-session game, you’ll want to have that “ultimate goal” endgame mechanic more. So, I think this point is fine.

Fourth of all, I realized that there is still too much writing going on in the game, and that I need to figure out how to reduce it.

I’ll be posting thoughts on the game, and the world… soon.

Right now, I just wanted to debrief. I watched the Labyrinth last night, and am about to watch Dark Crystal. Peace!