Kobold Press Announces 'Cozy' RPG Riverbank

Kobold Press--known for its D&D 5E compatible products--is diversifying into the world of cosy TTRPGs with Riverbank, a game of 'elegant animals, chaos, & whimsy'. The game has a page on Backerkit already, and launches in April.

Illustrated by Kathleen Jennings, and designed by Kij Johnson, the game allows you to attend tea parties, compete at the village fair, and dance at fancy balls. It uses a new game system which utilises a balance between the Animal and Poetry sides of your character.

In a RiverBank game, you join an intelligent society of anthropomorphic Animals and enter their life of cake and teatime by the slow part of the river. Here, the charm of cottagecore meets the whimsy of sophisticated critters as they navigate the intricacies—and often the bedlam—of polite Animal society.

Riverbank is a game about roleplaying, where your character choices directly impact the narrative. Weave farcical or dramatic tales of elegant characters on curious quests as you celebrate friendships, navigate social niceties, and weather the unique dynamics of Animal life. Attend tea parties, stroll through gardens, dance at fancy balls, and win the prize at the village fair—all while trying to keep a stiff upper lip and dodging difficult relatives.

 

[Marc Radle]

In Tales of the Valiant, the Labyrinth is the default planar structure. Unlike spokes and a wheel, it's an endless maze of dimensions and universes, where there's not always a clear path from one to another, new universes can pop up without warning and there are forces destroying existing ones.

Basically, it creates a less predictable multiverse where a DM can drop in a new plane without having to explain how it fits into the Great Wheel and, if it turns out to be a terrible idea, it can be destroyed by dark forces and never seen again.

(You could, of course, find your way to the Great Wheel to the Labyrinth or have those planes accessed directly through the Labyrinth if you wanted to use Avernus, etc.)

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/deepmagic/enter-the-labyrinth-5e-tov-multiverse-and-adventure-path/description

Well said!

 

[Celebrim]

I'm no BW apologist, but I have enjoyed both the 3-shot BW game and the more-shot Torchbearer games I've participated in. Never gotten Mouse Guard to the table, but I own the box set (talk about shelfware!).

That said, Ironsworn could be very interesting rules set for a MouseGuard setting...

I had considered One Ring 1e, but that's an interesting choice as well that I should look into. I love the setting but I hated the rules.

 

[Eyes of Nine]

This earns the sad face . . .

I guess what I mean is I don't know enough about the system to defend why I liked the games I played, but I really enjoyed them. It felt like the mechanisms encouraged you to do what the game was intending for you to do.

 

[pemerton]

I guess what I mean is I don't know enough about the system to defend why I liked the games I played, but I really enjoyed them. It felt like the mechanisms encouraged you to do what the game was intending for you to do.

You earn the love heart for this sincere response to a silly post - doubly so because you enjoyed the BW-esque experience!

 

[aramis erak]

Mouse Guard may look cute but it's a game about Kaiju horrors.

It's also got an almost unplayable system IMO that wastes the setting on too many fiddly moving parts that get in the way of both RP and basic action resolution.

It's a very straightforward playing system with a non-traditional play cycle.
It is highly playable, and very explicit about the way it is intended to be run.

Many who haven't played it don't realize that non-traditional cycle...
For the logical session:

1. mission establishment - defining the mission (or if continuing, reminding all) and ability to adjust Beliefs, Instincts, and Goals ("BIGs").
2. GM phase, where the GM narrates 4 encounters, and assigns an encounter resolution roll for that encounter after the players come up with a plan.
   1. If you nerf yourself with a trait, earn a "check" (a metacurrency)
3. Player Phase: every player with checks will narrate a scene or hand off narrating a scene, the GM's only allowed role is to answer questions or assign the scene resolving roll. Someone else must narrate. If only one player has checks left, they must hand off.
4. Rewards phase - Earned persona and fate now gained.
5. Next session.

• The GM can turn one scene resolution into a conflict per run through the cycle
• The players can request one be turned into a conflict.
• fulfilling the BIGs get metacurrency allowing extra dice or open ending dice rolled.
• Only Player phase narrations can be used for recovery.

It's also not really intended for one-shots; the season progression has significant color and mechanical effects, not the least of which is the obligatory weather encounter.

It is non-traditional since it's essentially scene resolutions, it has a rigid adventure framework, Mission resolution need not be one of the 4 GM scenes. If it isn't, it will require someone to address it in the player phase. It's got 3 metacurrencies in play: checks, persona, and fate. Checks let you narrate in the player phase, persona adds a die to a test, fate allows open ending a roll.
Tests are rolled on (skill)d6, 4-6 is a success, and if you spend a fate (which may be after rolling), 6's then open end.

Conflicts turn a 5-10 minute resolution into 30 to 60 minute one, but the benefit is more things can be used for experience ticks (each skill can only gain one per conflict), and because of more rolls, one can earn more checks to get more player phase narrations.

It works really well if one actually uses the rules as written; the flow generates the type of remembered story feel that reading the comics can.

 

[Kannik]

It's a very straightforward playing system with a non-traditional play cycle.
It is highly playable, and very explicit about the way it is intended to be run.

Many who haven't played it don't realize that non-traditional cycle...

Aye. While the session phases were straightforward, it took about 3 to 4 sessions before it fully clicked for me (in one of those hilarious, "just doing something around the house when it hit me" kind of ways): each of the encounters are, in a way, played backwards to more traditional cycles. There's one test, and it's done at the start of the scene/encounter. And then you narrate the rest of the encounter based on that one test... including, quite neatly, to failure if the test was failed, working to craft the best scene/juice for the characters and for the story being created out of that failure. Which explained to me why the test procedure was so very intricate -- there's so few of them and they hold that much weight.

It works really well if one actually uses the rules as written; the flow generates the type of remembered story feel that reading the comics can.

Once we groked how it was put together that's the feel we got as well, with lots of richness and oomph. (Including the player turn, oh my the great stuff you create in the player turn!) We loved it.

 

[Marc Radle]

Getting back on topic …

2,553 people so far have signed up to be notified! If you haven’t yet, be sure you do so you can keep informed and so you know the moment this launches!

https://www.backerkit.com/call_to_action/67b1a3f2-6637-4c01-a5d3-bd3f22b78591/landing

Also GAMA is going on now and the buzz over RiverBank is absolutely fantastic!!

 

[Bill Zebub]

I don't know, doesn't seem like those cute little animals would give much XP each. Maybe with Cleave or Fireball you could kill enough per session to level at a reasonable rate.

EDIT: I just read the part about 'dancing at the ball'. With enough animals gathered together in an enclosed space like that, and unarmed, xp/hour might work out.

 

[Marc Radle]

From the most recent Kobold Courier newsletter ... if you look closely you might see a hint at another element of the game

You can sign up for the free Kobold Courier newsletter here (scroll to the bottom of the page):

 

[Mournblade94]

Lol, 'cottagecore'.. seriously?

At least its not called "Cottagepunk"