RPG Crowdfunding News 099: Spectacular Settlements, Part-Time Gods, Acute Paranoia, Agents of Concor

Modern Gods? Treasonous Mutants? 1960's Agents keeping a hidden multiverse at bay? Vikings? Return to old haunts? Guard duty? Building (and populating) a range of settlements from tiny Keeps to the Nations Capital! Or simply fancy some nice new dice and a pouch to carry them in? Well, you're in luck adventurer! This weeks crowdfunding round-up has all of the above waiting to be discovered!

Modern Gods? Treasonous Mutants? 1960's Agents keeping a hidden multiverse at bay? Vikings? Return to old haunts? Guard duty? Building (and populating) a range of settlements from tiny Keeps to the Nations Capital! Or simply fancy some nice new dice and a pouch to carry them in? Well, you're in luck adventurer! This weeks crowdfunding round-up has all of the above waiting to be discovered!


Spectacular Settlements for 5th Edition! By Nord Games
(Campaign Ends : Wednesday 27th June 2018; 04:00 UTC)

Nord Games Spectacular Settlements sourcebook for 5th Edition proclaims itself as the “ultimate guide to creating amazing trading posts, villages, towns, cities, and capitals populated with versatile & detailed NPCS!” and it’s certainly shaping up to be both an impressive looking book as well as an incredibly successful campaign.

Spectacular Settlements, the latest addition to the Game Master’s Toolbox, is the ultimate guide to creating compelling locations for your adventures and campaigns.

Contained inside are chapters devoted to various settlement types, from the smallest trading posts, to massive capital cities. Within these chapters are all the steps needed to craft a settlement with both depth and originality.

Creation takes just a few easy steps, each of which has multiple options to detail your settlement. These options are presented as tables from which you can select the outcome yourself, or roll for a random result.

Step one covers basic information, such as its age, size, environment and recent history. Step two details aspects of the community, such as resident and visitor populations, disposition, politics and crime. Step three establishes points of interest, including shops and services that can then be populated with proprietors and patrons taken from the 'Interesting NPCs' chapter.

The resulting settlement is both dynamic and detailed. The book has great utility, designed to also be an engine of inspiration for storytellers and world builders, sparking creativity and prompting GMs to delve deep into what their settlement is, how it came to be, and how aspects that might be at odds with one another may just give clues about its most compelling elements.


The current chapter list (as other chapters and content may be added as further stretch goals get unlocked) is as follwos:

1. Creating Great Settlements. An overview on settlements, when to use them, how to use them, and how to keep things both dynamic and interesting.
2. Trading Posts. One of the most important settlement types, trading posts are often hot spots for information, quests, intrigue, and excitement!
3. Villages. Often the home of simple folk with simple lives, villages dot the landscape. They can however, be the jumping-off point of many a fun adventure!
4. Towns. The beginnings of urban development, towns can be lawless communities ripe for powerful influence, or the birthplace of the next world superpower.
5. Cities. More people, more problems. Cities are teeming with all manner of folk. Some good, some bad, some just trying to mind their own business. No visit to a city is ever without potential dangers, or potential rewards.
6. Capitals. Seats of concentrated power, home to mighty bastions and the focal point of both politics and war alike.
7. Keeps. Keeps are single large fortified buildings such as towers. The nature of these structures dictates that villages and towns usually spring up around them, due to the protection they offer. They are modest when compared to full castles, but are much more attainable for smaller communities in terms of costs and resources.
8. Castles. A large, imposing group of buildings, castles are fortified against attack with thick walls, battlements, and towers. They typically have a town or even city surrounding them, with homes and shops perhaps directly outside its walls.
9. Strongholds. Like a castle, but larger still, strongholds have greater fortifications. Built to be as impenetrable as possible, these bastions are the pinnacle of what one could expect from a physical structure.
10. Shops & Proprietors. What is a settlement without shops? In this chapter you'll find all the shops you'll ever need, as well the folk who operate them.
11. Interesting NPCs. Over 100 pages of NPCs who can be dropped right into a shop, service establishment, or encountered on the streets of your settlement.



Part-Time Gods Second Edition – Tabletop RPG by Eloy Lasanta
(Campaign Ends : Sunday 10th June 2018; 23:15 UTC)

Eloy Lasanta & Third-Eye Games Part-Time Gods 2nd Edition enhances the original edition of this roleplaying game about modern gods, with a ton of new and expanded material. The game, which sees players take on the roles of gods trying to balance the mortal and divine natures of their new lives, has a range of inspirations from the likes of American Gods, The Almighty Johnsons, the Thor comics, and Percy Jackson novels, to name just a few.

In Part-Time Gods Second Edition, you’ll explore what it’s like to gain awesome divine power, battle world-threatening Outsiders, and develop relationships with fellow members of your pantheon. Of course, being a god doesn’t pay the rent and it doesn’t excuse you from missing your sister’s wedding. You’ll need to make tough decisions to make it as a divine being in modern society—do you have time to help your fellow deities fend off impending doom before your sister walks down the aisle?

This game has a wealth of potential to explore stories about budding romances, the interactions of a pantheon making friends with enemies, and unlocking strange mysteries the universe would have preferred to stay secret. Every god has their good sides and their bad, each one creating a new window into who they are as people, but, when used correctly, opens the game to a host of story potential.

Long ago, an entity known as the Source visited humanity and gifted certain people with divine power. For a time, the world existed in a state of balance between order and chaos, between life and death, between divinity and mortality. That is until the gods waged war against the Source and eventu­ally against each other to the point of near extinction.

The gods of today are shadows of what the old gods possessed. Their power has been heavily diminished and many choose to live a regular, mortal life, revealing themselves as gods only when absolutely necessary. Most have a job (or career if they’re lucky), friends, family, and everything that comes with being human, and work hard to protect these from harm. On the other side of the coin, they also possess a Dominion to command and oversee, a divine Territory to defend from intruders, secret societies they owe allegiances to (called Theologies), and other gods in their pantheon to try to get along with. This becomes their life, the balancing of the mundane and the strange. The gods belong to neither world completely, and each of them knows that delving too deeply into one means losing pieces of the other.[/hq]


ACUTE PARANOIA: A box full of treason and summary executions by Matthew Sprange
(Campaign Ends : Sunday 24th June 2018; 08:59 UTC)

Acute Paranoia is a boxed expansion for Mongoose Publishings Paranoia RPG, making your games even more treasonous and fun! “Paranoia is a darkly humorous roleplaying game full of mutants, secret societies, backstabbing, lasers, repeated death and a well-meaning but thoroughly insane ruler known as the Computer. Unlike other RPGs that take themselves rather seriously, Paranoia is all about having fun in a science fiction dystopia by encouraging skullduggery, betrayal, bootlicking and generally naughty behaviours.”

The box set includes:


  • The Troubleshooters Survival Handbook features healthcare plans, perfectly legal pharmaceuticals, disorder bingo cards, articles on getting away with treason and invaluable lessons from Teela-O. You also get rules for playing bots! (“Bzzzt bing sorry Troubleshooter but this arm needs to be removed beep!”)
  • The Gamesmasters Despotic Power Book offers locations to ‘drag and drop’ into any mission, information on the Underplex and the Outside, articles on helping players get into the Paranoia spirit (aka backstabbing) and bot secret societies. You also get tables for randomly picking interesting (and likely deadly) bots, traitors and shops!
  • Mission Book 2.0 includes three brand-new missions featuring the Outside and the Underplex. How will your Troubleshooters handle a mysterious black rectangle, a missing Armed Forces regiment and a patch to the Computer itself?
  • New cards! Besides more Action and Equipment cards, you’ll get cards for Bots, Relics from Before, completely safe R&D gear and those things that are like bots but not metal ... what’s the term ... oh, right. Beasts.
  • Wipe-clean Bot Identity Forms, which are way better than the ones squishy clones get because you are made of metal.
  • Wipe-clean Disorder Bingo Cards to make sure your teammates don’t have any issues that could degrade mission performance.

Agents of Concordia the Roleplaying game by Strangewood Studios
(Campaign Ends : Thursday 14th June 2018; 20:00 UTC)

Agents of Concordia is a good looking new RPG out of Sweden. In a multiverse, where hundreds of magical fantasy worlds exist in parallel dimensions, the game is set on 1960’s Earth, where the residents are kept in the dark regarding other worlds and races. Players take on roles of special agents, working with the Concordia Central Intelligence (C.C.I.) who investigate different occurrences, try to thwart schemes, and stop threats against the Concord.

The game is set in an alternative 1960's, where a secret organization is charged with the safety of hundreds of parallel worlds. With a myriad of species, working with equal parts technology and mysticism, the Agents of Concordia are like nothing you've ever seen.

The UVA Concordia
The game is set in a rich multiverse with countless worlds, existing in dimensional pockets. Travel is achieved through mystical gates powered by the Aether (that's the element of magic for all you non-casters out there).

Some of the gates have been in place for thousands of years; many worlds have come to co-exist in a Cluster Commonwealth called the UVA Concordia, trading goods, secrets, and culture.

Now you may ask yourself; What about Earth? Where are all the gates and fantastical, magical wonders?

For good reasons, Earth has been put under a protection protocol, forbidding all mystical activity from being carried out in the open. But even with a strict customs system in place, hindering most evil-doers from reaching Earth, some forces still slip through the cracks.

Enter the Concordia Central Intelligence.

The C.C.I.
The CCI is the agency in charge of defending the Concord from inner and outer threats. Stopping a secret coven in the midst of Concordia's senate might be just as important as holding back the towering hordes of vagrants beyond the black gate on Artifex.

Many missions take the agents to other worlds with different governments and cultures, and the CCI enjoy all levels of hospitality.

The Players
The players will take on the roles of agents from different worlds, banding together into mission-solving teams. There’s a plethora of different species and roles within the agency, each with their own abilities and perks, assuring that all characters will have a unique set of advantages and disadvantages. The missions can (and will) vary greatly in aspect. But whether your team is fighting monsters, infiltrating devious cults, investigating strange happenings or discovering lost temples and worlds, your clearance level should only give you access to a mission you (more or less) can handle.

Beside the Clearance Level mechanic that gives you access to dangerous missions, but also marvelous equipment, you will progress in different Veterancies. They will give player characters an edge in situations she is familiar with, like Exploring or Combat. This is in addition to the ordinary character progression mechanic, giving each player 3 simple but different ways to see her character grow and advance as her life story unfolds.


The book is available in both regular and limited edition ‘Black Edition’ 8.5” x 11” formats, full-color hardcovers running to around 200 pages.


Helheim Unbound: Core Rulebook by Nat Skinner
(Campaign Ends : Friday 15th June 2018; 05:00 UTC)

Storytelling is an art as old as humanity itself. History is rife with epic tales; from the Greek bards of old who tweaked the home ports of ships and soldiers in Homer’s tales, to the Norse skalds who spread the stories of the All Father, Thor, and Loki. Even today, the games we play are ultimately about storytelling and a satisfying narrative experience.

Helheim Unbound is a roleplaying game designed with quick resolutions and narrative play in mind. We have created a framework that translates a player's vision for a character into a playable champion. The end result is a system that allows a group to play in a matter of minutes, with minimal complexities to tie down the narrative.

Helheim Unbound can be used as a generic system for practically any setting, but included is an example setting at the dawn of the Viking Age. Whether players embark on daring raids with the Vikings or enlist with King Charles on his crusade to spread the boundaries of Christendom, there is a world filled with conflict and adventure.

WHAT'S INSIDE HELHEIM UNBOUND'S 64 PAGES?

  • Introduction: The Basics. A little bit of background, what you need to play, and player roles.
  • Chapter 1: Core Rules. The Core Rules cover everything from dice mechanics, how actions work, how your champion is developed, wealth, and a quick guide to magic.
  • Chapter 2: Champion Creation. All about how you create your champion, including their desires, skills, benefits and hindrances, starting resources, and how to measure success when the champion dies or retires.
  • Chapter 3: The Gamemaster. Tips and tricks for Gamemasters, including when to test and setting test difficulties, how to create creatures, and guidance on managing a rules-lite system like Helheim Unbound.
  • Chapter 4: Examples. Norse / Dark Age themed examples to help inspire players, including all aspects of champion creation, ideas for encounters, and sample creatures for the champions to face. We also have included some examples for other settings as well!
  • Chapter 5: Magic. Magic was the number one area our playtesters wanted more information on, so we dedicated a chapter to it! We include a framework for creating your own magic system, as well as two complete magic systems: One based on the 18 Runes from the Havamal and 18 Miracles from the Bible.


The Curse of Roslof Keep high level 1E & 5E gaming adventure by Scott Taylor
(Campaign Ends : Saturday 16th June 2018; 16:40 UTC)

Art of the Genre return to where it all began in their latest Kickstarter campaign. Folio #20: The Curse of Roslof Keep sees the characters return to the location of the original Roslof Keep megadungeon that was the focus of 2015’s Folio’s #1 to #6. This is the first of a new six-part mega-campaign for experienced characters starting at 10th level, suitable for both 1st Edition Advanced Dungeons & Dragons as well as the most recent 5th Edition of the game.

The Curse of Roslof Keep revolves around an adventuring company moving to the city of Tiefon, capital of the great eastern power of Thalonia, where they will match wits against other great adventuring companies as well as the intelligent dungeon known as The Infernal Machine.

Folio #20 will introduce characters to the setting, the mysterious and ancient Kasbah of Tiefon, as well as the other companies hired by the great houses to clear the magical dungeon that has suddenly appeared beneath their streets. Dungeon details include 2D standard 'blue' hex maps as well as fully 3D renderings of Level 1. A gazetteer will give background on the Infernal Machine and the city, as well as the stakes that weigh on the characters, and includes a new monster designed specifically for this campaign. It also features a fully removable stand-alone cover, and two booklets (gazetteer & adventure).


The campaign also offers a number of ‘Bridge’ mini-adventures, which help bridge the timeline between the close of the original Roslof Keep Campaign, and the events of The Curse of Roslof Keep, allowing players to build on the adventure before it has even truly begun.


High Pass Chronicles – Hold the Line by Leave The Silver
(Campaign Ends : Monday 11th June 2018; 17:29 UTC)

High Pass Chronicles – Hold the Line is a 5e adventure written for a group of adventurers starting out at 1st level. Over the course of Hold the Line the characters will ultimately advance to finish up somewhere around 4th or close to 5th level depending on their actions. This adventure is not written in a linear fashion, trying to push characters from ‘A’ to ‘B’ to ‘C’ rather, it is designed in a semi-linear fashion that allows them to make their own decisions within the limits set on them by the locale, the people teaching them their skills, and other choices. At certain points in the adventure some things will happen based on these decisions that will advance the story forward to the next stages and an inevitable conclusion for this adventure – one that may have several different outcomes.

The adventure is written to be run over the course of several 3 to 5 hour sessions, but can be tailored to run in whatever time is necessary for your group. There is no timetable required to get things completed in the real world, even if certain quests or tasks in the adventure might require some priority over others.

The adventure is designed in three parts. The first section introduces the characters to life at High Pass and what it means to be a soldier learning the lifestyle and basic duties. The characters will be given possible tasks that they can perform such as routine patrols around the fort or along the road between the fort and a nearby village. These tasks are assigned at random and give the characters the opportunity to not only role-play but also experience what it means to be a soldier – the endless grind of daily life with the occasional threat that must be countered. The second section allows the characters more freedom as they have progressed enough in experience that their leaders have them shouldering more responsibility at the fort. Routine patrols are now more dangerous than even before as are some of the special missions that can be randomly encountered. As before, role-play is still an important part of the adventure as the characters continue to interact with themselves and a host of others, including visitors to the fort. The third section contains the crucial stages of the adventure where the characters have discovered something of strategic importance that has consequences for the fort – whether these consequences are for good or for ill is a matter for the characters to understand. Along the way they will meet new allies and new foes alike, each with their own goals and ideas about the soldiers of High Pass. The characters will need to discover the intentions of those involved if High Pass is to survive the coming wave of creatures that has been reported. Alliances can be forged or broken on both sides depending on the characters’ actions and decisions, and everything will come of a head before the adventure is complete.



RPG Dice Potion Bag with Fantasy Dice Potion Flask by ARRLI
(Campaign Ends : Sunday 8th July 2018; 07:06 UTC)

This is a neat campaign for some age-old beloved accessories… dice and dice bags. Available in a choice of 2 sizes these leather RPG Dice Potion Bags come in an initial five colors: Tan (Dragon Slayer), Dark Brown (Wyvern), Black (Black Dragon), Blue Ocean (Leviathan) and Leaf Green (Basilisk), with more possibly becoming available through stretch goals.

The Dice Potion Flasks are a corked topped ‘flask’ containing a set of seven polyhedral dice, available in ten different monster colors.


**********

If you like what we do here at EN World (the Forums, Columns, News, ENnies, etc) and would like to help support us to bring you MORE please consider supporting our Patreon. Even a single dollar helps Thanks!

**********

If you have a forthcoming Kickstarter, or see one that excites you, please feel free to drop me an email on angus.abranson@gmail.com You can follow me on Twitter @ Angus_A or on Facebook where I often post about gaming.

Until next week, have fun and happy gaming!

Angus Abranson
 

log in or register to remove this ad

I like Nord Games and am excited about this product.
They had a rocky first book but their next couple are better and they do so many other neat products, like treasure cards and critical hit decks.
And a book of random towns is fun.
 


I like Nord Games and am excited about this product.
They had a rocky first book but their next couple are better and they do so many other neat products, like treasure cards and critical hit decks.
And a book of random towns is fun.
What book was that you are referring to? I’m interested in this latest book, but still not committed.
 

What book was that you are referring to? I’m interested in this latest book, but still not committed.
Their Skulduggery book of NPCs looked great, but had some shaky math (at least the first printing). But they committed to getting more editors in for the next few books.

I’m excited to see what they do here.
 

Xavian Starsider

First Post
I like the idea of the Spectacular Settlements book but have to admit the stretch goals are giving me trepidation about the final quality. For two reasons.

First if the stretch goals are all met, we are looking at eight examples of each of the eight settlement types. Stretch goals are adding more to the ones planned. Should they? Are we just now adding the ones they were cut for not being as good/interesting as the others? Are we putting the rejects back in? Or worse yet, banging out more just to meet the quota?

Secondly, 24 of these 64 settlements are going to be designed by high end backers? Should I feel good that nearly half the examples in the book come from any random Joe with a few Benjamins to burn while the rejects round out the rest?

Quantity is not always the best thing to offer. There IS a point of diminishing returns. Don't cross it. Your examples chapter will only be as good as its worst examples.

Personally I think the book should offer just three really good examples of each of the eight settlement types while the rest (including the ones made by backers) get shoved into a supplemental pdf expansion.

But I have no experience with this company. Am I being too harsh?
 

Connorsrpg

Adventurer
I like the idea of the Spectacular Settlements book but have to admit the stretch goals are giving me trepidation about the final quality. For two reasons.

First if the stretch goals are all met, we are looking at eight examples of each of the eight settlement types. Stretch goals are adding more to the ones planned. Should they? Are we just now adding the ones they were cut for not being as good/interesting as the others? Are we putting the rejects back in? Or worse yet, banging out more just to meet the quota?

Secondly, 24 of these 64 settlements are going to be designed by high end backers? Should I feel good that nearly half the examples in the book come from any random Joe with a few Benjamins to burn while the rejects round out the rest?

Quantity is not always the best thing to offer. There IS a point of diminishing returns. Don't cross it. Your examples chapter will only be as good as its worst examples.

Personally I think the book should offer just three really good examples of each of the eight settlement types while the rest (including the ones made by backers) get shoved into a supplemental pdf expansion.

But I have no experience with this company. Am I being too harsh?

Nope. Nothing to do with the company, but I would have said 1 example of each is plenty. Isn't this a book about creating your own? Not sure how more examples, likely to go unused would help. Especially if that means it will take a lot longer to get in your hands (as it sounds like it would if backers are designing).

Core book: get it out with one eg. Send PDF later with more. But for me - I have developed my own Realm Creation docs and I love using them. The creation side is why I would buy a product like this - not the egs.
 

pkt77242

Explorer
I want more than 1 example of each. Partly because I want the maps (good maps are like gold) but also because sometimes I need a place to use on the fly and 6 examples (and possibly 8) makes my life easier.

As far as backers creating them, they still have specific guidelines on what can be created.

*I am not affiliated with Nord Games but I have a fair number of their products (Skullduggery, Revenge of the Horde, and Artifices of Quartztoil Tower and I backed Warfare).
 

Split the Hoard


Split the Hoard
Negotiate, demand, or steal the loot you desire!

A competitive card game for 2-5 players
Remove ads

Split the Hoard


Split the Hoard
Negotiate, demand, or steal the loot you desire!

A competitive card game for 2-5 players
Remove ads

Top