Playtesting my new game TimeWatch -- want in?

[Piratecat]

Play-testing opportunity heads-up:

I've got over 81K words (out of about 100K) written for my current project TimeWatch, from Pelgrane Press. TimeWatch is a pen and paper sci fi RPG where you play elite time traveling agents who fix historical sabotage, investigate what went wrong, and stop the people who did it. (You may also learn a lot of history and alt-history in the process, but I'm not telling anyone that. Shhhh. Our secret.) It uses a version of the GUMSHOE rules, not that you need to know what those are in order to play.

I'm gearing up for pre-Kickstarter external play-testing of a portion of the game in about two weeks. Interested? I need people who can run 1-2 games for their gaming groups in September, maybe another 1 or 2 in October, and report back to me via email about things they loved and problems they found. Both experienced and inexperienced GUMSHOE GMs/players are great. If you've never played an RPG before, though, you'll want to find someone who has to run the game for a play-test (I don't have all the GM advice written yet.)

Feel free to tell friends. If you've read all this and you're still intrigued, please shoot me an email at the project address of timewatchrpg@gmail.com. I'll get back to you once the play-test is ready to go.

I'm stupidly excited about this; it's turning out to be a really fun game, so I can't wait to hear how it goes for others as well.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

I wish I could, I really, really wish I could, but my game group wouldn't go for it.

Good luck though, and if I see it in print, I'll definitely give it a chance. Maybe even buy it.

 

[Piratecat]

Danny, I am poorer for your absence!

But don't sweat it. There's no limit, but right now I have interest from 10+ groups, so I won't be bereft.

The interesting thing about this iteration of the rules is how damn flexible I think they are. I can use these for Buckaroo Banzai, Terminator, Bill & Ted, Quantum Leap, Continuum -- although the default campaign style is based on Poul Anderson's Time Patrol.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

I'd probably have used it for this:

THE ARK: Time Hunters

Temporal portals to the past are opening up all over the globe, spewing forth incursions of creatures from all eras. At first, those who knew of the problem tried to keep it a secret: those that came through were sent back. But nobody knew whythe anomalies were occurring.

Then the answer came: the world is dying. The temporal portals are the result of disruptions in the earth's magnetic field, a symptom of some kind of exotic matter disrupting the planet's core. The apocalypse looms, but it isn't imminent- it is at least a century off. There is time.

But mankind, in order to survive, must leave their cradle. A vast starship- dubbed The Ark- is being made. Lotteries are being held to find who will go. But one thing is sure, scientists are trying to ensure that we have as much of our ecosystem as possible available to us going forward. Not only are live plants and creatures being sent along, but so are embryos, seeds and DNA samples in cryonic storage. Everything known to man that can be collected will be.

And not just flora and fauna of the present- in order to maximize the success of future terraforming and environmental re-seeding of The Ark's destination to suit humanity, teams are being sent into the portals to retrieve similar samples from the past, not only the recent past to restore biodiversity, but also those from deeper times just in case THOSE creatures or plants are more suited to the new planet.

And you are on one of those Time Hunter teams.

 

[Piratecat]

That'd work well, but TimeWatch isn't a slam dunk for that setting because it doesn't require investigation. It's different core gameplay -- my basic setup is based on the sabotage of core history, making the PCs figure out what happened based on the historical ripples, then travel to fix it.

For instance, in a recent game, North America is settled by the Chinese instead of the Europeans. Turns out that the mongol army that was about to attack western Europe in 1242 didn't stop in its tracks and turn around as they historically did. The TimeWatch agents found mountains of skulls where Paris should have been. They had to figure out why, ingratiate themselves with the great Khan, and lay a clever trap for the saboteur who would changed the course of the world. Good times -- they ended up running a 17-year long con in order to pull it off.

For The Ark, you may want to consider HEX, Savage Worlds or the new slimmed-down FATE.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

While that was what I posted in the campaign ideas thread, I personally envisioned a bit more intrigue in my version of the campaign. After all...

1) Who decides who lives & who dies? As in who (besides the hunters & the pilots) gets a slot on The Ark? Sure, there's a lottery, but is it a FAIR lottery? (3 guesses.)

2) once inklings of that sink in, the Hunters become hunted

3) optional bonus round: I thought of stealing some stuff from Julian May's Saga of Pliocene Exile and/or the failed TV series, Terra Nova- there are people in the past who are actually using it as their refuge from destruction, and are actively sabotaging the Hunters' missions.


Yeah, it's still more action based than investigation based, but what investigation there is would be core to moving through the plot.

 

[MatthewJHanson]

Sounds fun. I've only played one game of Gumshoe, but I enjoyed it a lot.

Will you include a sample adventure that we might be able to run?

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Because my mind will go 1M miles for a joke only I might find funny, I thought of running a noir time travel adventure based on my Ark idea: the Hunters are in the trail of getting samples from the extinct Maltese Barn Owl (Tyto melitensis), only to find their efforts opposed by shadowy foes...

Yes, I would be stealing wholesale from The Maltese Falcon storyline.

 

[Piratecat]

Sounds fun. I've only played one game of Gumshoe, but I enjoyed it a lot.

Will you include a sample adventure that we might be able to run?

Good question. There are a ton of sample adventure seeds in the back of the rules, but none of them are fleshed out yet. I have to detail a TimeWatch Pulp adventure for a friend anyways; although I have already spoiled it online, I may include it regardless. The risk is that people will run that, which I know works, instead of pushing boundaries.

Shoot me an email if you want to playtest!

 

[Slyfoxgamer]

Kudos to you man, Ill be following this as it goes through its process. Im currently doing the pre kickstarter play testing for my RPG PASTS, PERSONAS & PROPHECIES. Good luck to you mate, Ill keep an eye out on kick starter!