Draw Steel News

[Spectral Anomaly]

Why weird? Current tariffs on Italian goods coming into U.S. are 20%... 10% during the 90-days pause period.

Why would they care about import tariffs from Italy when they're also printing copies in the US?

 

[Nikosandros]

Why would they care about import tariffs from Italy when they're also printing copies in the US?

Indeed, I'm assuming that the copies printed in Italy are not for the US market since they are also printing in the US. Anyway, nothing strange about printing in the EU, I was just surprised that they would pick Italy as I would not have assumed it would be a cheap option, but it's not like I'm an expert in the field...

 

[Elvish Lore]

Why would they care about import tariffs from Italy when they're also printing copies in the US?

No idea they were printing in the U.S.

I didn't back the KS and don't get updates.

 

[Epizarwin]

Hoping patrons get the almost final PDF this week. Can't wait to see the layout and art in the book!

 

[MNblockhead]

Are they still proceeding with developing a bespoke VTT for the system?

 

[agrayday]

Are they still proceeding with developing a bespoke VTT for the system?

that is my understanding yes, but i am not a discord person, but last video i saw said they had people working on it.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

Any additional news or looks at beta rules?

They just put out the "Release Candidate" main book on the 24th.

Rules-wise, it's crunchy so I can't do a detailed comparison with previous versions (esp. as I've been focused on Daggerheart lately), but I can say:

A) The art is pretty fantastic and has a distinctive style/vibe in a way that a lot of recent TTRPGs haven't quite managed.

B) The layout looks good and a lot of things make a lot more sense when laid out properly and not in some dodgy un-layed-out PDF.

C) The classes and races are pretty strong and distinctive, and seem to be definitely leaning into a very specific setting, one which I think will be a bit marmite.

There is some fairly wild stuff like one of the PC races weights 1000-2000lbs, and in case you thought that might be typo, dwarves who are similarly stony weigh 500-1000lbs. I'm not entirely sure what we're supposed to do with this - presumably neither can swim at all?

Reading through the game it's a bizarre mix of extremely well-considered and thoughtful ideas and "What the hell?!". For example, the XP section is very sensible and has full explanation of how to speed up or slow down levelling, different ways to do levelling and so on. This seems both more-considered and more concise and straightforward than most RPGs, which tend to be kind of difficult or prescriptive about this. Great! On the flipside, the main mechanism of the game is "Power rolls" - i.e. rolls - and they give a result - a success we might say - with three gradations. What are those gradations called? Why, Tier 1, Tier 2, and Tier 3 of course! I'm serious. You're supposed to play this game for years into the future saying "I achieved Tier 2 on my Power Roll", like, constantly. Could anything be less evocative? Less cool? I don't know, this seems like a strong effort at being as boring as humanly possible! What do they actually mean? The book clearly explains they mean Weak, Normal and Powerful, essentially - so why aren't they called that or something evocative? Why on earth are they called Tier 1, Tier 2, and Tier 3? Bloody hell.

To be fair - the vast majority of Draw Steel! falls on the "Cool, well-considered, often surprisingly concise" side of things, but there is more "BUT WHY!?!" than you'd expect in an RPG as "big" as this.

 

[agrayday]

I think its going to be interesting to look at the contrast of how different and successful these releases are from the rpg youtube/content creator sphere.

Runehammer: Crown & Skull
MCDM: Draw Steel
Evil Baby Entertainment: Broken Empires
Critical Role: Dagger Heart & Obscura
JP Coovert: Dragontown
Dungeoncraft: Deathbringer
Ben Questing Beast: Knave 2
Daniel Kwan: Wandering Blades

 

[sevenbastard]

dwarves who are similarly stony weigh 500-1000lbs.

Imagine what they can leg press!

 

[Ruin Explorer]

Imagine what they can leg press!

It's pretty wild! I get that, resolution-wise, it doesn't make any difference to the mechanics that Draw Steel! uses for the most part - but the fiction still exists, still matters, and letting PCs be 4'5" and 1000lbs or for that matter 10' and 2000lbs means like, the fiction will need to be considered at times. A 2000lb being can absolutely just Koolaid Man his way through like, entire small, poorly constructed buildings, for example, and would literally break through the floors of some others, or even cause damage with every step! 2000lbs is a LOT! A grand piano is only 600lb to 1200lbs! A horse only weighs 1100lbs on average! Even a cart horse doesn't normally reach 2000lbs! And you're putting all that weight on a couple of (admittedly probably large) feet? And a 1000lb 4'5" being would be absolute menace in a very similar way (including hilarious leg-presses as you say!). I am little confused why neither situation is even commented on by the rules, given there are a LOT of rules. I feel like if both were half that weight we'd still have the same vibe without causing quite so many problems. On the flipside, the silicone-based (not a typo, like the cookware) Memonek can be 6' tall and 50lbs, so can weigh less than a halfling (a Polder), though those range down to 20lbs, which is... less than some cats...

The primary vibe is almost... Rifts-esque? I don't hate it! It's not what I expected but... it's something.

EDIT - I'm struggling to think of another game where one corebook race can weigh, default on charts, 100x more than another! Rifts again probably the closest.