Monthly Archives: January 2019

Thunderbirds the RPG

RPG

What must be two or three years ago now, I got the Kickstarter copy of Thunderbirds the co-operative board game that I had backed. It was all in, so I had all the planned expansions along with the base game.

Much to my shame, the game has never hit the table since it arrived. Despite it being a genre that I enjoy, a theme I grew up with and love, and by a game designer I like.

I’m going to paint an image now that you will never be able to get out of your head. Copious amounts of alcohol will not work.

Yesterday I was looking for something to read in the bath. I love having a relaxed soak and a read. As you know recently I’ve been reading a lot of stuff about RPG’s. Then I remembered one of the expansions that came with the board game was an RPG.

So there I was yesterday morning soaking in my bath, reading the A5 rule book for the Thunderbirds RPG.

The RPG expansion gets you the following for your money:

  • 2 x custom Thunderbirds d6 dice
  • 56 Page RPG Book
  • 63 Card Mission Generator Deck

But as the extract from the rule book shows you can (well they say that you should) use bits of the board game itself to enhance the experience.

The actual system Modiphius have come up with is a very simple d6 system. Which would not actually take much to move over to the Genesys system. The Genesys system would be a great system to use for this.

Instead of the bonus tokens that the rules use for giving a bonus to a dice roll, a story point would work just as well. The limited skills used would easily cross over. The rules use default characters that naturally are from the show. I don’t see transferring these to Genesys characters being a problem.

The benefits of moving to Genesys would be the narrative dice, the improved combat (which is very very simple in the RPG rules) and social encounters. Plus it would be easier to do skill challenges. Which I think would be awesome in this game.

‘The random Thunderbirds Mission Generator deck will help you create exciting missions for your players or help inspire devious new schemes to test your players to the limit!” There are basically tables in the rulebook as well that cover some of the cards, that can be used for generating ideas also. But you are rolling a d6, looking on a table to decide on an emergency to deal with, then repeating for where the emergency is happening and so on. Which having not seen the Android chapter with their mix and match adventure creation, sounds similar in principle. Except instead you are rolling a die, and I don’t see why you couldn’t also do that with the Android stuff.

I don’t see this Thunderbirds RPG as a campaign thing, but more as a one shot you’d run every now and again as a break from a groups regular campaign, or as an intro to RPG’s for noobs.

You don’t really need to use the board game. It helps. But there are some fantastic Thunderbirds toys available (or used to be), especially of the iconic vehicles. I did check out the available figures for the 7TV miniatures skirmish game. Sadly no Thunderbird like ones. Although their Captain Scarlet ones sparked the idea of a spin off adventure. As did The Prisoner minis they had. Oh that would be soooo cool.

Having said all this, the Thunderbirds RPG or a Genesys version is something that interests me because I love Thunderbirds. I grew up watching them. And would love to visit that universe from time to time.

If you’d like a copy of the RPG expansion you can get it from the publisher for £4.99! Plus whatever they charge for postage.

Pick and Mix Your Adventure Comes To The Android Universe

netrunner, RPG

I think the arrival of the Android universe source book Shadow of the Beanstalk for the Genesys RPG system is imminent.

I’ve read online that one or two people who pre-ordered directly from FFG have notification that their order is on the way.

Which I’m hoping means that the copies stores will be sending out won’t be too far behind.

In the last few days a post has dropped looking at the source book from the point of view of the GM.

The original information announcing the Shadow of the Beanstalk only mentioned that there would be a chapter to help GM’s creature adventures.

Finally in the last post we are given a bit more meat to chew over before getting our grubby mitts on the book.

“The final chapter in Shadow of the Beanstalk describes how to bring these characters and situations to life as the Game Master. Through unique social encounters and an adventure builder included in the sourcebook, you can bring the conspiracies and intrigue of the Android universe to your tabletop.”

From the description below that FFG are giving us a system that works a bit like chose one from column a, one from column b, and one from column c, and that’s your unique adventure.

“Through selecting a variety of hooks, escalations, and climaxes provided in the book, Game Masters can create modular adventure frameworks, complete with twists, turns, and moral quandaries for the party to face. These modular adventure acts can be rejiggered and combined in new and interesting ways. A hook can be replayed several times with a completely different escalation and climax, resulting in a wildly different adventure. With enough change in set dressing, even the same old hook can feel completely different!”

From what I can tell we are still getting the three act structure (which will be covered in a bit more depth in an imminent post). Except they are calling them something different. The hook is Act 1, the escalation Act 2, and finally Act 3 is the climax.

In the post FFG give us a bit more info about each of the acts.

“No matter where your adventure is headed, it starts with the hook—a starting concept to get your players moving into a broader adventure. Each hook consists of three major parts; the primary goal, the challenges, and the twist. The primary goal is what your PCs are trying to accomplish, the challenges are what stand in the character’s way, the twist is an unexpected complication that take characters by surprise. These hooks can range from an airplane heist job to tracking down a rogue experimental clone, and they simply form the basis for an adventure.

An escalation is a rise, either in the stakes or in the difficulty of the adventure, and it’s usually the point where the waters of morality beomce muddy. There is often a plot twist of some kind that shows the players that the milk run they signed up for isn’t as cut and dried as advertised. Perhaps a third party gets involved in the job—whether it’s a rival corporation or an orgcrime faction, this complicates things for your players and creates new challenges.”

Finally, the climax generally represents how the most powerful organization involved wants to attempt to resolve the issue. This organization is probably a powerful corporation or orgcrime faction, but it could also be a religious group or a government. It could be that a higher-up just discovered the actions of their underlings, and orders a radically different course of action. Perhaps the organization decides to cut their losses, silencing everyone involved in the operation, or maybe they decide to place their bets in court, calling in the NAPD to cause trouble for everyone involved. While the climax represents how the most powerful organization wants events to unfold, the players still have the agency to determine how their adventure will end.

With a full data vault of hooks, escalations, and climaxes to choose from and improvise with, Shadow of the Beanstalk is the perfect starting point to your own cyberpunk adventure in the Android universe or beyond!”

It’s interesting that there wasn’t this equivalent chapter in the Terrinoth source book. Maybe FFG assume that with the wealth of fantasy based content out there that there was less of a need.

But this final chapter does sound like an interesting and welcome addition to the tools that a GM can use for creating their adventures in the Android universe. I particularly like the improvise they mention. Being able to quickly make up an adventure on the fly in response to players decisions will be a great tool to have if needed. I can see it being handy for generating one off adventures for the “gaps” between story arcs of an ongoing campaign.

While I’ve been writing these posts on creating a campaign and adventures I’ve been giving more thought to my plans for my first time as a GM and my first steps in the Android universe.

At about the same time as the source book drops, I’m expecting that the taster adventure will also go up on their website. My guess is that this will be the two part adventure they took to GenCon and Pax Unplugged.

So before I go full knees deep in, I want to see what this taster adventure is like. The plan is to run this first.

Where the taster adventure finishes, and the feelings of the group will dictate the further planning.

For me there are some nice events and themes within the Android universe that I’d like to explore or act as a back drop to a campaign/adventure. I’ll probably talk about those in another post also. FFG have such a rich setting in the Android universe, I can’t wait to share it with others.

Should My Golgari Go Sultai?

Deck tech, magic, MtG, MtG Deck Building

Listening to the latest MTGoldfish podcast they were discussing the state of Standard after a weekend full of big tournaments such as the Star City Games one, and happenings online and Arena since the release of Ravnica Allegiance. When I think Saffron Olive one of the hosts mentioned that some of the Golgari players were going Sultai, ie splashing blue so they could add Hydroid Krasis to their decks.

That struck me as an interesting idea.

I know my Golgari deck (you can find a deck list here) is not the normal one that gets played in all these big tournaments. In those decks they are exploiting the explore mechanic. But there is some common cards like Carnage Tyrant. Isn’t that the fun thing about deck building? These tournament players went one way with the explore, I went mid range/aggro playing lots of removal, John went with exploiting the undergrowth mechanic. All playing the same guild, some common cards, but all expressing ourselves differently.

But if I splashed blue as well I could add Hydroid Krasis to my deck. It’s an idea. What helped sell it was in the same discussion about Golgari decks splashing blue and becoming Sultai, was Assassin’s Trophy. In the meta the podcasters were playing in, with the arrival of Ravnica Allegiance and the availability of all ten shock lands, they were seeing more three colour decks, and decks with very few basic lands in. So often when the Assassin’s Trophy was being played the opponent wasn’t actually getting anything in return in a few cases.


Until Standard Showdown starts up again this weekend, I’m not sure if that’s something I’ll see in my local meta.

I know Dean who I’ve played against a couple of times now in the Showdown (and Commander) is planning a three colour deck. But the others who usually take part I’ve no idea what their plans are.

So with a couple of basic lands (islands), adding in the couple of Breeding Pool I have (I do need a couple more) and a couple of Hydroid Krasis, I have a second deck for this upcoming Standard Showdown season. If I make the changes to the mono blue mill deck as well that will be a third. Then each Showdown I have the hard decision of which deck to play.

On the subject of Hydroid Krasis. I’m so glad I got mine when I did. In a week (which also saw the official release weekend) they have nearly doubled in price. It’s insane. And would explain why the Simic deck was so costly. Three of those plus the Carnage Tyrants. Crazy. That’s the one thing I hate about the game. The speculation and cost of cards. It stops the game being accessible to all.

Now to decide what makes way for the Hydroid Krasis.

Ravnica Allegiance Simic Standard Deck First Draft

Deck tech, magic, MtG, MtG Deck Building


Last week I wrote a post about cards I was thinking of putting in a new standard deck for the upcoming Standard Showdown season. Which I believe is kicking off this coming weekend.

So it was about time I came up with a first build of the deck. That’s where the decked app comes in handy. It keeps track of the number of cards, mana curve etc.

Before giving you the deck listing, the stats and boring you with talk of it’s tactics, here is my boiler plate disclaimer.

“I’m not claiming these are the best decks in the world, they certainly are not top competitive decks. They are hopefully fun, affordable (subjective I know) decks. I don’t try and keep to a target price point. I try and use as many cards in my collection as possible to keep my costs down. I’m certainly not a master deck builder claiming this deck will win tournaments, if it is fun to play and does it thing then I’ll be happy.“

Tactics

So the deck wants to ramp, get lots of land out early. To do that I have Llanowar Elves, Open the Gates and Growth Spiral. The more mana I can get out the better for this deck. Or that’s the plan.

There are three cards that love having lots of mana available in the deck. The first is Hydroid Krasis. The bigger I can make that X when casting the better. Not just from being a big thing to swing in with on the battlefield. But the life gain and card draw is half (rounded down) of that value of X.

The other two are mana sinks. Which if I have multiple copies of Wilderness Reclamation are going to be abused a lot in the end step.

The first of these mana sinks is Biogenic Ooze. Before it’s end step ability kicks in, the end step ability of Wilderness Reclamation needs to fire off. For illustration of how this can be abused, let’s assume there are six lands out, two Wilderness Reclamation’s along with a Biogenic Ooze. On this turn I’ve not cast anything. So there is six untapped lands. Start of the end step the Ooze trigger goes on the stack followed by the two reclamation triggers. In response to the first reclamation trigger I tap all six lands. So I now have six mana in the pool. The first trigger resolves untapping the lands. Then in response to the second reclamation trigger I once again tap all the lands and add six more mana to the pool, which is now sitting at twelve mana. The lands untap. I can now decide to tap the lands again, or leave them untapped to cast any counter spell during the opponents turn. For this illustration I’m going to tap the lands again now in response to the Ooze trigger, taking me to eighteen mana in the pool. Still in response to this trigger I now add four 2/2 Ooze tokens to the battlefield. The trigger now resolves making these new tokens 3/3 and puts addition +1/+1 counters on any other oozes on the battlefield.

If the other mana sink Simic Ascendancy is out this little shenanigans above adds five +1/+1 counters plus on to that. Plus a similar abuse of multiple Wilderness Reclamation’s can be done on that instead. Also if I had kept the mana open and not used it on my opponents turn. During their end step I can spend it on Ascendancy’s activated ability.

Both these mana sinks force the opponent to do something about them. If they are left to do their thing as you can see things could potentially get out of hand.

But the key card for me in this deck has to be Wilderness Reclamation. I really love the card. Why decide whether to cast a creature on your turn or hold off and use a counter spell or some other trick on your opponents turn? This let’s you do both. Plus as you can see how it can be used to abuse paid abilities.

The Decked App stats

Ok here is the bit you really want to see the actual cards in the deck. Let me know what you think, or how would you change it?

I’m not sure over the land base for the deck. It may be too slow. I’ll have to see how the Memorials go. Flipping them to basics may help.

Creatures:17

4 Llanowar Elves
2 Hydroid Krasis
3 Wall of Lost Thoughts
2 Steel Leaf Champion
2 Zegana, Utopian Speaker
2 Biogenic Ooze
2 Carnage Tyrant

Spells:21

2 Open the Gates
2 Applied Biomancy
2 Blink of an Eye
3 Essence Capture
3 Growth Spiral
2 Simic Ascendancy
3 Thought Collapse
3 Wilderness Reclamation
1 Vivien Reid

Lands:22

2 Breeding Pool
6 Forest
1 Hinterland Harbor
5 Island
1 Memorial to Genius
2 Memorial to Unity
4 Simic Guildgate
1 Woodland Stream

Sideboard:15

1 Hydroid Krasis
1 Steel Leaf Champion
3 Thrashing Brontodon
1 Biogenic Ooze
1 Carnage Tyrant
1 Open the Gates
1 Blink of an Eye
1 Essence Capture
1 Simic Ascendancy
2 Slimebind
1 Thought Collapse
1 Wilderness Reclamation

Planning the Campaign

D&D, netrunner, RPG


Welcome to the next post in my series looking into planning campaigns and adventures for a role playing game. In particular I’m getting ready to start planning adventures for a party of adventurers in the Android universe for the FFG Genesys system.

I briefly mentioned in a previous post that FFG don’t publish scenarios/campaigns for their Genesys system outside of the initial taster scenario they put up on their website for each source book.

So if I want to run a one shot or campaign using the Genesys system then it’s all on me to come up with the everything (if I’m not using one of the available source books). This is a big thing for a noob GM like me, who has still to run a session.

Luckily as I’ve already established a lot of the work for me will have been done by FFG when they publish the source book for the Android universe. What is left for me to do is to come up with the campaign.

I keep bandying the term campaign around but what exactly is a campaign? The D&D Dungeon Masters Guide defines a campaign as:

“…When strung together, these adventures form an ongoing campaign. A D&D campaign can include dozens of adventures and last for months or years.”

It also gives the following advice in the opening of the campaign chapter.

“The world you create is the stage for the adventures you set in it. You don’t have to give more thought to it than that. You can run adventures in an episodic format,with the characters as the only common element, and also weave themes throughout those adventures to build a greater saga of the characters’ achievements in the world.

Planning an entire campaign might seem like a daunting task, but you don’t have to plot out every detail right from the start. You can start with the basics, running a few adventures, and think about larger plotlines you want to explore as the campaign progresses. You’re free to add as much or as little detail a you wish.

The start of a campaign resembles the start of an adventure. You want to jump quickly into the action,how the players that adventure awaits, and grab their attention right away. Give the players enough information to make them want to come back week after week to see how the story plays out.”

A lot of the campaign chapter is about planning the details of the world that the adventurers will be spending their time in. Which is kind of not relevant to this discussion and my current planning. Although once the Android source book is out the majority if not all of that has been dealt with.

With the definition that I have of a campaign what tools can I use from the comic book world to help with the planning of my campaign? I think that I can. If we treat adventures as an issue of a comic book. A campaign can be seen as similar to an ongoing series, miniseries, or maxiseries depending on how long you want the campaign to run for.

The miniseries and maxiseries have a definite end, whilst naturally the ongoing series just keeps going.

With a campaign length in mind I need to look at story arcs.

O’Neil defines a story arc as “...a story that takes several issues to tell.” Which in our context could be rewritten as “a story that takes several adventures to tell.”

How do story arcs map to the length of a campaign?

If the campaign is one of the finite lengths (miniseries and maxiseries) then the story arc would cover the length of the campaign. For instance a miniseries length campaign being the shorter of the two would most likely have just the single story arc. Whilst the longer maxiseries may have multiple story arcs. Naturally the ongoing campaign will have multiple story arcs, potentially interspersed with single one off adventures. Which may or may not be set ups for future story arcs!

When working with story arcs O’Neil gives the following bits of advice:

  • ‘…reintroduce characters and locales if they haven’t appeared for a few issues when doing an arc…” Pretty good advice. Players may have forgotten, not made notes, whatever the reason, if a character/locale hasn’t appeared for a session/adventure or two, a brief description or role play to remind them won’t hurt.
  • A rule from his miniseries section that is relevant to what I’m doing here (planning a story arc for a RPG) is “There must be a major change, development, or reverse in every issue. This is just another version of the ‘keep-the-story-moving’ dictum. Something important must happen in every issue of the series. Each must have at least one turning point or surprise. And in each, the hero must either accomplish or learn something.”
  • “Each issue should end on a reason for the reader to continue buying the series” or in our terms, give your players a reason to keep coming back. O’Neil suggests good old fashioned cliff-hangers (those 1930’s serials were experts at this) or something a bit more subtle.
  • “…incorporate a brief summary of what’s gone before.” A good GM does this at the start of each session naturally. Edmund does it on the Facebook event and at the start of the each session.

The first and least sophisticated is as O’Neil calls it the One-Damn-Thing-After-Another. It’s based on one of those 1930’s serials like Flash Gordon, Buck Rogers or King of the Rocketmen to name a handful.

O’Neil actually looks at this in the story structure section, but I think it applies also to the more macro campaign level also. This is just a series of encounters with an antagonist (who will somehow evade capture, or get free for the next encounter). At the macro level we are currently looking at this structure is best suited to the shorter campaign length. As an ongoing campaign it would soon get boring and repetitive.

Then O’Neil introduces The Levitz Paradigm. Which looks great for an ongoing campaign. In the words of the Paul Levitz himself this is…

“a plotting tool I used in the Legion’s heyday to keep track of the many fluid plots and subplots.  The physical ‘device’ is pretty simple, and the theory is one that was rapidly evolving in super hero comics in the ‘80s but which has deep roots in soap opera.”

I’m just going to save my fingers and quote from the man himself off his post. It’s not the most detailed explanation but google and O’Neil can cover the details in more depth for us.

“If the ‘paradigm’ was anything beyond a charting tool, it was a few (sometimes ignored by me, sadly) guidelines:”

“start your secondary plots low and raise them slowly (maybe as a C or D plot before it gets to be a B, much less an A).
every time you visit a plotline, it needs to progress in that visit (if it’s boy meets sheep, one of them should end the scene in an emotional moment, for example).
vary the number of beats before you escalate to an A.

And all of this is, of course, secondary to basic plotting rules like making stakes important to the characters, and flowing plots from the characters themselves.  Or one that I’ve grown fonder of in my recent years of teaching, that what reveals/defines character is choices, particularly choices with costs.”

Within the context of planning a campaign subplots are our means to “set up or introduce the main plot.” So during an adventure an npc may give a bit of information that is relevant later to a future adventure.

I do like the idea of nicking the subplot use from comic books of using them also to expand the world the characters are in, and make the npc’s more three dimensional by showing snippets of their lives. Which could at a later point turn into a story arc that the players get involved in.

O’Neil asks us to remember “Subplots are plots. They must advance toward a resolution, or at least the illusion of a resolution.”

So now I have some tools for planning a campaign from the comic book world. But could I also learn from the video game industry and how they create games like Skyrim or Zelda Breathe of the Wild? Is there cross over with what I have talked about here? This is an area I need to research. In the meantime the next part in this series will be at the adventure level, and planning an adventure.

FFG Fumble the Keyforge OP Again

keyforge

I’ve never really been that impressed with FFG and their organised play(OP) kits. Or to be fair with FFG the ones I saw from my brief time taking part in my FLGS Android Netrunner events. The make up of the Star Wars: Destiny OP kits was just as disappointing.

But what was I comparing them too? Ok WotC have had a long time to get the whole OP thing sorted and running like a well oiled machine. Although they do have the odd bump now and then in what they do. However being a MtG player this is my main point of reference for how OP should be done.

Unlike MtG OP it’s a bit harder for FFG to come up with the prize support for Keyforge. The unique decks in this situation is more a hinderance than an advantage. The one thing I do find that FFG keep doing is not providing enough prize support in their kits. Stores often having to break open more than one kit for popular events. Plus they charge for their kits.

FFG recently announced their next wave of OP for Keyforge, and revealed finally what the aember shards are to be used for within the Master Vault app that you accumulate from registering decks and taking part in OP.

To start off with there will be a prize wall at some Keyforge events. I’m assuming these will be their own events held at cons and their hq. Plus certain stores will be authorised to have them as well.

The actual initial prizes on the wall are to say the least underwhelming. The only one I’d really want from that wall would be the premium key set. And you’d want two sets to play with for when playing with friends.

The upgraded tokens like those little plastic ones for damage, has always been an issue for me. They will give you five as the prize. I don’t see the point of such a low number. There should be enough to play with. Having to play with a mixture is annoying.

Plus those alt art cardboard tokens, they are at best participation prizes that get handed out for taking part in the event. If they are going to be part of the prize wall, for your aember shards you spend on them, at least you should be getting multiple copies (at least five).

And why? Oh why? Isn’t this glossary card in every Keyforge deck you buy?


Put the turn structure on the other side, and you have the perfect player aid. This could at least have been in the starter set decks. The thing is, it wouldn’t have added anything to the final cost of a deck. Fractions of a penny or for any American readers cent. Look this is what players get in the Welcome decks aimed at beginners from WotC.

WotC give us two cards, with the fourth face used as an advert for a MtG related product. FFG could do the same on the fourth face (if they splashed out and used two cards), advertise the Master Vault maybe. FFG you screwed up here.

What they have been very cunning about is not sharing how much aember shards each prize will require. You can bet that the premium key set won’t be cheap to get. So it looks like they are avoiding any potential uproar until nearer the time.

For me who doesn’t have a LGS that runs Keyforge events I’m screwed. Asmodee UK will respond to any queries about OP kits with stores only, and pointing you to your nearest stores. Apparently they don’t think you know your local area. They also don’t respond when you point out that one store is actually much longer than 40 minutes away (as estimated by Google, but actually over an hour), takes the Friendly out of FLGS, and not a pleasant environment to say the least. Also that response assumes your FLGS is running events and even selling Keyforge. You can be assured I,pointed out my FLGS does neither.

I am not alone in this predicament. So why isn’t there an option to redeem your aember shards through the Master Vault and have your rewards posted to you?

For me FFG still don’t get OP kits, and have a lot of room to improve.

I don’t want to be all negative in this post. FFG should be given some credit for their companion app The Master Vault, and the functionality they are adding to it. It really is starting to become a nice feature of the game. Being able to track your decks casual play stats, OP stats and add notes is a really nice.

I also like their marketing fluff state of the game YouTube videos. There have been two so far. They talk OP, the Master Vault and rules questions. Ideally they would be more regular. And they aren’t completely cringe worthy to watch.

What do you think of the new OP announcement? Happy with it?

Planning a Simic Deck for Standard Showdown

Deck tech, magic, MtG, MtG Deck Building

I bet you are a bit tired with my current fixation with the Android universe, the Genesys RPG system and my untested theories about creating campaigns for a RPG.

The posting of cute attack chihuahua pictures may not be enough for you. Maybe you want a return to discussing MtG or even gaming reports.

So who am I to disappoint. Well ok I give you that, I do disappoint often. But not today, depending on your point of view.

In this post I’m going to look at my plans for my next deck for Standard Showdown and then finish off with a brief reveal of a possible update to the standard mill deck I built.

For this new deck I’m going Simic aka blue/green. So I have access to big stompy creatures, ramp, and the usual annoying blue control shenanigans.

Let’s look at some of the creatures I want to put into the deck.

Is it even conceivable to run green without Llanowar Elves? With it out early I’m casting bigger stuff ahead of curve. Which is why Steel Leaf Champion is in. Get that dream opening hand, and turn three I’m swinging in for 5 damage.

Hydroid Krasis is a card that can come out early if need be. But ideally this is the late game finisher. Pumping lots of mana into it so it comes in big, plus that when cast trigger tops up life and draws cards.

Wall of Lost Thoughts I like as a cheap blocker, buys some time to get pieces into place. In fact I also like it as an addition to the mono blue mill deck because of it’s etb of getting my opponent to put the top four of their library into their graveyard. And even though this deck isn’t a mill deck, it doesn’t hurt as a benefit. Might give my opponent the wrong idea about the deck.

Zegana, Utopian Speaker I like as a four drop. Especially considering I can Adapt 4 her and make her an 8/8. I only have one of her at the moment. A second and third wouldn’t go amiss.

Carnage Tyrant had to be in this deck. It’s the poster child for green in the current standard. Plus imagine how sick it will be with the odd +1/+1 counter on it.

Open the Gates is part of the ramp suite for the deck. This allows me to go get that key land early on. Plus that all important shuffle of the library.

Blink of an Eye cheap early removal, buys me a turn from a threat. With the ability to kick it and draw a card.

Ok Essence Capture is creatures only. But still a cheap counter spell that also puts a counter on one of my creatures. I like that.

Another piece in the ramp suite is Growth Spiral. Card draw, and being able to put out an extra land on the turn. I love it.

Thought Collapse same cost as the no longer legal Disallow. Sadly it doesn’t counter triggered abilities. But it does mill three cards. So not only a good counter spell for this deck, but also the mill deck.

Now Wilderness Reclamation is the reason why I’ve not gone with more creatures that tap for mana in the deck. I love love this card.

Vivien Reid is another card I like, and I need at least one more copy really for this deck and my golgari deck. Such a great utility card.

Simic Guildgate, comes in tapped. But on a budget I’ll take it. Plus I can fetch it with Open the Gates.

Biogenic Ooze I think has a lot of potential to be a game winner. With a possibility to abuse that activated ability with two or more Wilderness Reclamation’s out in that end step.

Applied Biomancy I like a lot. Bounce and a counter. Yeah I’ll take that. Especially with the next card out.

Simic Ascendancy. Pump up your creatures with its activated ability. Which I’ve already shown could be abused in the end step. But whether I’m abusing it’s activated ability and triggering its other ability. Or just triggering its ability another way. This is an alternative win condition for me.

Slimebind, just great cheap defanging a threat on the board.

Breeding Pool I’d love a playset of. But reality of finances means I will play with two copies.

Saruli Caretaker might make it as a sideboard creature. Nice card.

Shimmer of Possibility. Cheap. Find that card hopefully that you want, without revealing it. Yeah like it.

I didn’t pull any Mass Manipulation but I’m considering a copy in the sideboard.

Sagittar’s Volley, I kind a like. It’s removal against flying, and gets rid of the weenie flyers. Most likely a sideboard card.

The final card Persistent Petitioners not only has me wanting to rebuild the mill deck round this card. But I’m thinking maybe a Commander deck also might be fun.

I still need to work out exact number of copies for cards. Although finances do restrict one or two of the cards. But as first thoughts on the deck go, I’m pretty happy with it. Just need to see how it does in the real world against real decks.

UPDATE: Oops forgot to add in this little gem.

It’s got to be in the sideboard. Somehow!

Loki – master tactician

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I don’t often just do a totally unrelated board gaming post. But from time to time I think it’s worth sharing the odd photo of the two little horrors I share the house with.

Loki is such a loving, caring little fellow. When I shared this on social media moments ago, I claimed he was guarding the remains of a postman. The spoils of war. But in reality and removing my over imagination it’s the remains of a hotdog.

The thing is that little bit of mystery meat will be at the centre of an epic mental tug of war, between Loki and Nico. The slightest sign of weakness and the prize will swap ownership.

A battle of wits that would be similar to the one below a few days ago over the remains of a chew.


That previous battle, Loki broke concentration and lost the chew to Nico.

This time once again he is starting off with the upper hand. Possession is nine-tenths of the law. But can he maintain the focus?

The Paranoia Version Of How To Plan An Adventure

D&D, RPG

In yesterday’s post before going into the dramatic ramblings about the latest D&D session I promised to use the first half looking at how to plan campaigns and adventures. Or more to the point the process I will use that will involve a few sources out side of RPGs that I think are relevant and I can borrow from.

One of the things that got me thinking that these were valid sources of information was the Creating Adventures Quickly chapter in the 2017 update of the classic Paranoia RPG Gamesmasters Handbook. On an aside I think this is definitely a chapter that James Wallis (one of the authors of the update) wrote, after all this is a subject he knows an awful lot about.

It started off making the following promise that they would present a

“simple system for throwing a small pile of ideas into a coherent narrative that will entertain a bunch of people for three hours as long as there’s pizza.”

Quite a promise. Ok we haven’t got round to pizza at our sessions. But there are lots of sweets, and sometimes due to the start time one or two are finishing off a KFC or McDonalds. But back on track, simple is always good.

“All stories break down into a number of elements. Books have chapters, plays have acts and scenes. That’s all we’re doing here: taking the underlying framework of an adventure – the metastructure – and filling in the blanks. But to fill in blanks you need a blank framework to fill in.”

Ok they hooked me in. Started to relate the planning to something I might be familiar with. For this system all we need is a blank piece of paper, a pen or pencil and our imagination.

The start of this simple system they present is coming up with a theme for the adventure.

“What’s the big idea? What’s the adventure about? Write one line here. Ignore what your English Literature teacher told you: theme doesn’t have to be about big feels and personal growth, it’s just the layer of fertilizer that lets everything else in the story grow.”

This next little bit seems almost brainstorming like.

“Write your theme at the top of the paper. Underneath it, write down the first three things that occur to you as a result.”

Now they move onto the meat of the simple framework.

“You’ve probably heard of the Three Act Structure that is supposed to underlie all movies. We’re going to nick it.”

Oh ok I’ve heard of that structure, and one or two more (which when we start to look at story structure in a later post we will cover). It was this sentence that got me convinced about using external sources to help me with the planning.

“The three acts are: 1. Setup; 2. Confrontation; 3. Resolution. Each act has a job: Act 1 establishes the status quo, gives the central characters a problem or danger … The core of Act 2 is rising tension. Act 3 is discovering what’s really going on, thinking you’ve fixed it, realising you’ve screwed things up completely, really fixing it…

In proper screenwriting something important should happen at the moment Act 1 transitions into Act 2 and the moment 2 becomes 3. These are the Act Breaks. However, we are not writing a screenplay.”

That is a good basic and brief breakdown of the three act structure. There are books aimed at writers that look at this in much more depth. And for shadowing once more a future post, so will we.

So in this simple system they have us do the following.

“Divide your paper into three columns. Number them. At the top of each one write three things that happen in that act, either a key moment (‘find the grubby slippers’), a set-piece (‘big fight with the warbot’), or important information to be discovered (‘learn about Gehenna Incident’).

For an experienced GM that’s enough and the rest can be laid at the door of Make Some Shit Up. The rest of us may need a bit more hand-holding, a bit more detail in the metastucture.”

After that they apply the typical structure of a Paranoia adventure to the three acts. Which is for my purposes of little interest (until I finally decide to run a Paranoia one shot of my own design).

However this seems like a great simple brainstorming system. Applying a framework such as the three acts helps organise those thoughts. But it also could help generate ideas by providing a prompt or focus.

Naturally after this brainstorming/planning there will be more prep involved for us inexperienced GMs. But I’ll save that for a future post, I’m sure we will cover it at a natural point in this series of posts.

Dram the destroyer of goblins

D&D, RPG


In this first part of the post and it will be a running theme for the next few posts, I want to look at planning campaigns and adventures.

I’m not a GM, I don’t have tonnes of experience. But once the Android source book drops for Genesys I want to run a campaign in that universe.

Which as you have seen in some recent posts I’m getting together source material and inspiration to use in creating my own campaign and adventures in that world.

To help me in this mammoth task, I’m calling on not just information from within the field of RPG’s but also from comic book writing. Which in-turn makes use of the cinematic/tv world.

To me there are a few similarities between writing a comic book and a RPG campaign. Both are episodic, and usually have an over arching story that ties everything together. So the tools for one should be usable in the other. And we will see how that goes and if it holds true as I develop my campaign, and adventures.

Below are a few of the sources I will be calling upon for this series, and my journey in creating my campaign.

So now you know the direction this section of the post will be taking over the next few weeks. Although as I write this, it may spin out into it’s own dedicated posts as well. We will see how the mood takes me.

And now the moment you have all been waiting for, the dramatic retelling of the latest adventures of Dram, halfling wizard.

As the blood of the recently departed hobgoblins was pooling on the ground next to the corpses. A discussion was being held by the group as to what to do next.

Dram needed to recharge and recover from the stress and strains of casting all these big spells. But Grull, Ace and the gnome decided that they would compete in some foolish demonstration of strength by trying to throw the remaining three hobgoblin corpses into the pit.

Out of the three taking part, the smart money would have been placed on Grull winning this. What chance would an elf and gnome have against the hulking brute of muscle that was Grull? But what can only be described as a shock result, Ace won. Grull slipped and fumbled trying to toss his corpse (yes that could be a halfling euphemism). The gnome was more of a drag the corpse into the hole. Ace picked his limp hobgoblin corpse up, and threw it through the air and into the hole as if he was throwing a bag of spuds.

With the hole now full with hobgoblin corpses, the three competitors decided they’d set the pile of bodies on fire. With the aid of Nick and a fire bolt spell they finally got the burning pile of hobgoblin flesh they wanted.

Dram wasn’t impressed. This was wasting time and attracting attention. They really needed to be moving on and finding a safe place to rest.

They left the carnage behind them and faded into the forest. Hoping to avoid any more trouble that might be on the path they were following.

Finally the group made camp roughly a mile south of the ambush in a clearing. It was going to be a long, cold night. They couldn’t risk a fire. Wrapped in his fur and blanket, Dram drifted off into an uncomfortable slumber.

Dawn broke, breaking the darkness of an uneventful night.

The things I have to do, thought Dram as he chewed his cold breakfast of jerky.

After breaking camp they approached a castle. A castle that looked like it had seen better times, and was now in much need of some repair.

Ace went off scouting the perimeter of the castle looking for entrances, and see if he could spot anyone inside.

After a few minutes Ace returned and retold what he had saw and heard. There was a man and women arguing inside. Plus he had found a couple of entrances.

In hush tones the group discussed how they were going to get inside.

Eventually after much indecision they started to stealthily edge their way round through the trees to an iron door. Sadly Nick and the gnome were what can only be described as clumsy and loud. A travelling troupe of entertainers could have been more discrete.

While observing the iron door, and once again trying to formulate a plan. Ace crept up to check the door out. He heard voices the other side. That blood thirsty gnome wanted to rush in the front door and fight whatever came out.

Suddenly the iron door opened a fraction. Something peeked out. Closed the door, and the noise of bolts falling into place could be heard.

Through the front doors it was then.

Nick turned into horse and trotted up through the front doors of the castle, whilst the rest of the party from the cover of the trees watched on. Dram used his staff to cast Mage Armour.

Two goblins appeared and tried to capture Nick. I suppose fresh meat is in short supply in these parts. Horse is good as any to a goblin, thought Dram.

During the goblins failed attempts to capture Nick they spot Dram. Luckily Grull and Ace were quick off the mark. Ace kills one with an arrow, while Grull dashes forward and throws his javelin into the other killing it.

Using Grull as cover Dram ran up and stood behind Grull. But as he stood there he caught a shadow moving to his left. Dram cast magic missile at it. The shadow disappeared.

Ace and Grull enter the castle where Nick is. As the rest of the party join them, Ace is listening at a door. He hears voices the other side.

After much mumbling amongst themselves a plan is formulated to lure the occupants of the room out and ambush them.

Grull, Ace and Dram hide in a small side room, while the others went to hide in a similar room the opposite of the hallway. Except the gnome. He decided he was going to hide nearer the door. But he didn’t. The gnome set off a trap that collapsed the roof where he was, blocking that section of the hallway off.

Luckily for the gnome he managed to drag himself out from under the rubble before a goblin rushes out of the room they’d heard the voices in. Grull, Ace and Dram go unnoticed as it rushed passed them. Sadly the second goblin was not as lucky, as Grull kills it instantly with his axe, and then rushes into the vacated room. The luck of the first goblin didn’t last as Ace put an arrow in it’s back, killing it.

Dram followed after Grull into the room. Inside Grull was staring down a goblin. Dram tried unsuccessfully to cast a charm spell on it. But Grull was doing a pretty good job of intimidating it. So Dram worked his way down a passage way behind them and peaked round a corner.

In a hall that was obviously used for meals, were about six more goblins as far as Dram could count in the brief moment he had. Unfortunately one of the goblins noticed him. Dram cast darkness on them. And went back to Grull to warn him.

In a half hearted effort Grull managed to dislodge some of the passage roof, creating only a partial blockage.

Out of the darkness and over the top of the rubble a goblin appears and swings at Dram. But the goblin misses. It was the only chance it would get. In response Dram kills it with a magic missile, and uses a final one to bring the rest of the roof down. This time the passage was fully blocked with a small gap at the top.

Grull runs out of the room to go help the others, leaving Dram in the room with the goblin. This was enough to give the goblin a little bit of courage, and fancy it’s chances with Dram. The goblin throws its scimitar at Dram but misses.

Ace rushes in and grabs the goblin by the throat before Dram can react. Dangling by it’s throat Ace starts to interrogate the goblin.

During this interrogation Grull enters the room, and expresses his disappointment in the goblin to the goblin.

In the meantime Dram formulated a cunning plan. He got Grull to lift him up so,he could see through the gap at the top of the blockage. Dram then cast burning hands. Flames shot from his finger tips into the darkness of the hall. They could hear screams from the room. Dram repeated the spell. It was followed by more screams, then silence.

Grull was impressed by this magic. And started formulating plans about using in future encounters.

After extracting some information from the goblin, apparently there is an owl bear in the castle. Ace killed it.

Dram joined the others in the hall way. Scattered on the floor were the bodies of some hobgoblins. It looked like the others had been having their own fun. Why hadn’t they waited for him? Now his companions were looting the dead. Such scavengers,

With all that casting of spells, Dram was in much need of a rest. Would the others agree?

And we leave our adventurers there until the next instalment.