Wednesday 29 June 2016

Air Combat Playtest

With only half the group in attendance for this week's Game Night ended up doing a quick and dirty playtest of the Air Combat Rules for Frozen Skies. A couple of things sprang up as we did a quick dogfight and prompted some thoughts for a couple of additions to the rules, also waiting to see whether the players had any thoughts as well.

Regardless this week sharing the Setting Rules as they currently stand along with the proposed additions.

Setting Rules

A bit more polished up much closer to what will hopefully be their final form for release, feel free to have a butchers and let me know what you think.

https://drive.google.com/open?id=0BwiYZKQvknnWak9PS0VfNU5RMEk

The proposed additions are as follows;

*When using miniatures with the Frozen Skies Air Combat Rules divide the weapon ranges and aircraft speeds by 10, you're much less likely to run out of table space this way.

*Under Aircraft Modifications looking at adding Improved Gunsights, effectively a +1 bonus on Shooting rolls with the aircraft.

Wednesday 22 June 2016

June 2016 Update

Little bit of a short post this week.

Not much to report compared to last time, things are now plodding along.

Yes, plodding along...

(Though there is new artwork!)

Frozen Skies

Work on Frozen Skies has been progressing on both the artwork and writing front, not as quickly as I'd like but its still a step in the right direction. Once I've cleared some stuff from my plate I should have a bit more spare time that I can dedicate to the writing. Though sales of the Setting Primer and the adventure have been ticking over each month, it nice getting a Sales Notification to help show there is growing interest.

Podcasts

Got responses from the podcasts that I've contacted, though nothing worked out as of yet and I need to poke them soon.

Artwork

Finally new artwork; A Genchi, a race related to the Windryders but industrial/technology inclined. Believed to have once been slaves of the Ancient Terrans, but are basically second class citizens in modern Darmonica.


Thursday 16 June 2016

Creed, Cults & The Occult

First off, apologies for this week's post being a day late. Was too busy to get it done on time, though keep an eye on the Facebook page for PSA updates if the blog post is going to be late. To sort of make up for it I've done a Patrons Only post over on the Patreon page showing a new finished piece of artwork for Frozen Skies.

Secondly, this week's blog post!

I've only talked a little about religion in Darmonica, think thus far I've only mentioned that there are a number of deities that people pay homage to. Likewise I believe that only two major religions have been stated, the Cult of the Great Maker and the Order of the Great Machine. Taran and Ares are two other deities that have been stated and given some basic details, though a full list of deities will be done at a later date.

Creed

Religion in Darmonica tends to be more important in certain areas and to certain people than others, society and the environment are typically the major factors in determining this. The Order of the Great Machine is the dominant religion in the Iron Collective since its the only religion that is allowed by the State, those that practice other religions in the Collective tend to keep a low profile. Elsewhere the Order is simply tolerated but tends to be a minor player in local affairs, it is also far less militant outside of its bastion in the Collective.

Ares, the Darmonican God of Warfare, has his largest following in the Artian Confederation with smaller followings in the armies of the various countries that make up Darmonica. Though in contrast to the Collective, practice of other religions in the Confederation is freely allowed. Tyland was a devout follower of the Great Maker, other religions were tolerated though in some cases openly practising another religion could've disadvantaged you in Tylander society. A broad selection of religions are practised in the Commonwealth, though not a single one of them is promoted more heavily than any of the others. Though nobody is quite sure who or what is worshipped in the Sultanate of Taramate...

Cults

Every religion is divided into different sects with some more radical than others, each with their own different goals and methods. The Order of the Great Machine is the prime example as being a more radical religion, having seized control of an entire country and completely rebuilt it to achieve their goals. On the flip side the Order's sects located outside of the Collective are considerably less extreme and seek to promote their religion via more peaceful means, these sects typically count academics and engineers amongst their members. As a whole the Order is closely associated with the Iron Collective which tends to colour people's view of the Order.

A more Alyeska centric cult is the Wulfen Brethren, a cult who whorship the Wulvers and whose activities has led to it being largely outlawed. The Brethren view Wulvers as being nature's ultimate form and the world's true masters, it is suspected that they may had a hand in helping the Wulver War happen but it is known that they have actively sought to sabotage the Commonwealth's war effort. Arson, industrial sabotage and occasionally assassination all over Alyeska has been linked to the Brethren as well as Wulvers being turned loose in many Commonwealth cities. Though no concrete evidence exists but it is also believed that the Brethren have been kidnapping pregnant women, something that is raising concerns for alot of different reasons.

There are other more minor cults that exists, including one that whorships the Ancient Terrans, who vary in ideals and goals.

The Occult

Talking about cults I feel some mention of the occult in Darmonica should be made.

Darmonica is a very low to virtually non-existent magic setting, it exists in a fashion but is extremely rare and one is more likely to encounter a stage magician rather than a true mage. The Windryders have what they call Weavers, but there is little knowledge about them and they are poorly understood. There are cults that claim to practice magic, most of the time this only seems involve the chanting of words with no visible effect but occasionally there is something else. Most of these so-called 'magic cults' claim to derive their power from somewhere beyond the mortal realm, though as of yet no attempt has been made to prove how true or not this is.

Wednesday 8 June 2016

Alyeskan Gazetteer: Forlorn Thule

Off the eastern coast of Alyeska is an archipelago of rocky islands stretching out as a long chain into the great ocean known as The Needles. Amongst these outcrops of rocks lies Alyeska's Theda Air Station, better known as 'Forlorn Thule' by those stationed there.

Brief History

The Needles have always been of great strategic value to the Commonwealth, they are the closest part of Alyeska to the Home Isles and often the first sight of land to many ships crossing the Mhór Farraige (Great Ocean). Historically the Commonwealth Navy has always maintained an outpost and later a wireless station in the islands, though these days the Navy's presence is limited to a single guard ship. Theda Air Station was established just prior to the Great Darmonican War to provide protection of the Alyeskan shipping lanes in response to the decline of the Navy's presence. During the War the air station was active in safeguarding the Alyeskan coast from Tylander raiders, but was and remains an unpopular posting.

The name 'Forlorn Thule' and the base's reputation in the Aerial Corps is due to the harsh climate, rough weather is common for the vast majority of the year and is not helped by the current storm wracked nature of the Mhór Farraige.

Present State

Today Theda Air Station is home to No.86 Squadron of the Commonwealth Air Force, a composite force of fighters and long range patrol aircraft. A Flight is the fighter component of the squadron and usually has at least two aircraft mounted on steam catapults ready to be rapidly launched at a moment's notice. The patrol aircraft of B Flight typically range out over the ocean on wide ranging patrols, mainly to deter smugglers and provide a Commonwealth presence in the otherwise remote and sparsely populated islands. Both Flights do have to contend with sky pirates that are known to operate in the area and prey upon shipping (both air and sea).

The Air Station is located on the barren and windswept Theda Island, the largest isles amongst The Needles. All of its buildings are prefabricated steel structure huts of varying sizes and made from a half-cylindrical skin of corrugated steel. All of the huts are frequently seen as cold and draughty, combined with the weather it is a pretty miserable place and hence its status as an unpopular posting. Yet it is considered vitally important to protect the foresaid shipping lanes and for trans-oceanaic flights of aircraft to and from Alyeska.

Campaign Ideas

One way to incorporate Forlorn Thule into your games of Frozen Skies is either as a destination for a delivery job/supply run or as a stopover for flights to and from the rest of Darmonica. Play up the basic facilities of the place and the frequent bad weather, it is cold and wet for at least three quarters of the year.

The other route is run a military campaign where the players are members of No.86 Squadron, battling the weather and primitive conditions as much as sky pirates.

Wednesday 1 June 2016

Lurkers In The Shadows

The civilisation that was the Ancient Terrans collapsed almost two thousand years ago following some cataclysmic event, but details on what actually happened are scarce. Likewise information on the Ancient Terrans have been collected piece by piece over the centuries since the 'Fall', but even this is fragmented and woefully incomplete. What is known is that the Ancient Terrans had access to technology far in advance of anything that currently exists in Darmonica, but nothing that could've prevented their doom.

...Right?

Lurkers

What isn't known is that some of the elite of Ancient Terran society (think the Enclave from the Fallout series) saw the cataclysm coming and took steps to prepare for it, there was a number of different plans but for now we'll focus on just one of them.

A number of secret vaults or catacombs (take your pick) were constructed, these were designed as refuges for a handful of elites and some of their underlings. All were placed in a sort of stasis to enable them to survive the forthcoming cataclysm and then rebuild their empire, alot of Ancient Terran tech was also put in these vaults to aid on this objective. It was expected that the survivors would be revived from stasis after about a century when the world was judged to have recovered enough from the cataclysm, as you can expect this didn't quite plan out the way that it was suppose to have done.

The stasis technology used was highly experimental and a lack of time and the survivor's own selfishness meant that the clinks in the system were never ironed out. A number of vaults became little more than tombs for their inhabitants, but in others the inhabitants were somehow changed during their time in stasis. Those that eventually emerged were altered to be neither fully alive or dead, just sort of stuck somewhere in between. Undead isn't quite the right word, but these Ancient Terran survivors now need the lifeforce of others to survive.

Over the centuries that have now passed the underlings have abducted isolated groups of people from the Alyeskan wilderness to feed the rest of the so-called 'hive', usually one or two would be fed upon by the underlings whilst the rest are placed in converted stasis machines to feed those still slumbering. The biggest 'hive' is located beneath the Monolith and is mainly responsible for the disappearance of whole expeditions in the Chillwynd Marches as well people from nearby townships such as Prospector's Reach. Though only a fraction of a hive is presently awake, mostly underlings tasked with feeding the hive led by a single elite who acts as the hive's de factor ruler.

Game Terms

Though whilst I have yet to work out any stats I do have a few ideas how I envision the Lurkers work under the Savage Worlds rule.

*Life Drain: When a Lurker makes and maintains physical contact with a victim (usually though a Grapple) the victim must make a Spirit roll each round or lose one die from their Vigor. When the victim's Vigor drops below d4 they die. One die of Vigor is recovered each week with a natural healing roll.

*Weapons: To represent the Lurker's inherited advance technology I'm toying with the idea of having them use laser weapons as well as some sort of hi-tech stun weapon.