Short Review – Ships of the Human Sphere – Infinity 2d20

Posted on November 19, 2022 by First Age

The Ships of the Human Sphere is a 190+ page book and shipyard of military and civilian ships of the Infinity Universe. The format runs through the different size classes of vessel from the huge Class 5 behemoths to light auxiliaries and fighters. (There’s a Class 9 in there, but I’m not telling you what it is…). Each ship has some descriptive flavour text and a stat block, with adventure seeds laced throughout in sidebars. You don’t get any floorplans, or an image of every ship, but lots of ready to use information to plug into your game.

The Human Sphere also delivers us the alien ships of the Combined Army, ready cut for some terrifying deep space engagements. On which topic, the book is much more than a catalogue, providing rich chapters to take combat to a fleet level, with ‘Conquering the Stars’ and ‘Interstellar Engagements’. Some material is a repeat from faction and Gamesmater Guide books, so a little redundancy if you have a wide range of the material already. I’m OK with this, as we get a lot of what we need under the cover of this book, useful anyway, but also not presupposing ownership of other titles.

The Factions get some individual space to note their approach to ships and how they are operated, with the Nomads given some more room as is right. Some of this may be copied from the Faction books as above, but I like that this is in here.

There’s a touch of the gearhead in the ‘Options and Upgrades’ chapter as you get out your hyper spanner and start bolting on optional components onto the standard designs, changing their capabilities and potential on the way. (This is a copy of the Gamesmaster Guide). Build your Q Ship now!

We also drop to the character level with ‘Extraplanetary Gear’, a catalogue of spacefarer equipment kitting out your vac Suit with mods, helpful rescue drones, drugs, armour, shielding, corsair favoured heavy pistols, smart lungs and goodness knows what else.

This book has come a little later in the Infinity production cycle, which probably tells you something about how essential it is. Although you probably already have what you need to represent the system capable and wormhole travelling ships of the infinity game, the information within is really useful, coalescing into a handy title, lots of new sections, and a shipyard of designs to throw out there, all of which you can quickly mod to make your own.

I’m glad I have this book, which is what i think of all the titles from the Infniity line. It’s easy for me though, as I am a 2015 ‘give me all books’ backer, so they just flow to me in a grand procession, every bit as impressive as the giant Circulars that carry so many ships through the Worm Holes. For the Infinity completist, but well worth it, especially if you are spending some Momentum out in the cold of space.

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Game Planning 2023 – Captain’s Log Supplemental #1

Posted on November 13, 2022 by First Age

With the release of the final part to the Coriolis Mercy of the Icons campaign, I am throwing this into my GMing mix for 2023. I started to run Coriolis with a group of close gaming buddies on Roll20, which in and of itself really dates it! (2019?)

The game floundered, despite the strength of the material. It feels like unfinished business, possibly that the sensible GM might just leave well alone. I want to make amends, as I feel the flounder must be due to my GMing, and I’d really like to guide the experience of the full cycle of this three act space opera epic.

I have been in awe of my mate Dom’s documentation for his 5e Curse of Strahd campaign. As we have rogressed he has provided sumptuous information and full session write-ups. Could I emulate? I may try.

Running this will also give me an opportunity to get some proper use out of Foundry VTT (on ), for which I am paying a regular sum for Forge Hosting and the managed LiveKit instance for solid AV. Foundry have the core rule book as premium content, providing:

  • 462 Items (armor, gear, talents, weapons, injuries, ship features, ship modules, ship problems, etc)
  • 126 Journal entries (full core rules and some example scenarios)
  • 67 Actors (Beasts, djinni, NPCs, ships)
  • 36 Rollable tables (critical injuries, failure tables, encounters, faction names, mission and system generators, travel events etc)
  • 10 Scenes (maps, locations, and player handouts)
  • Coriolis soundtrack playlist (7 tracks)

That’s an eye-watering array of assets to be used with the Coriolis character sheet system on Foundry. The first of the three campaign books is also available pre-loaded with lots of campaign assets, so I would get off to a flyer in terms of content. I have asked Free League if they plan to add the other two books into Foundry too. If not, well, I have some scraping and preparing to do. That’s OK.

I plan to restart from the beginning and just run through it. My original players would be welcome to sign up, though memories may jog at the first block of sessions.

This will be a major commitment. If the cadance was weekly I would give a first estimate of 50-60 sessions. I think I might be up for it.

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Trudvang @ Grogmeet

Posted on November 13, 2022 by First Age

I had a great time at Grogmeet22, a convention that I managed to do in a day, thanks to the central Manchester location and foregoing some of the other shenanigans that made for a yet fuller weekend experience. It has long been on my list to attend and was everything I could have hoped for. A short time with the tribe, good company and good games, with some top chat and socialising in the evening.

Matthew Broome’s medieval mystery took me back to my play of Ars Magica 2nd Edition, a game that I enjoyed so much back in the distant past. I was fortunate to play in such a strong group, where we gelled and laughed and bounced off each others characters from Magi to Companion to Grog throughout. The blended play, across three power levels of characters, was seamless, in good part to Matthew’s GMing, and we all had spotlight time to make our mark on the outcome. A fine game, and has had me scurrying to the big and over-stuffed store cupboard, to see if I can find my copy of the game. I fear it may have left my tenure. 

Trudvang at Grogmeet

I was very glad to get Trudvang Chronicles to the table once again, perhaps slaying some demons as to how complex or difficult it is to play. My only real concession was to Body Point recovery, as I wanted the characters to continue despite their wounds. Troll mauls will do that to you.

Although the game is playable RAW, I might be tempted to restrict the skill list at the Discipline level. With specialities in play there are so many skills that there are yawning gaps and a sense that you really have to specialise to get any good at something. Maybe that’s OK, maybe I didn’t build the characters especially optimally?
Still, Trudvang remains on my ‘must play more’ list for 2023.

Trains were running on time, which helped, and the walk from Manchester Picadilly to Fan Boy 3 was no more than a laden eight minutes. A lift back provided by Tom, a fellow Grog from Sheffield, added a pleasant and timely return with added game chat!

I often worry about my introverted self, solidified a little by pandemic, and how I come across. I can tend to be a hoverer and a listener, rather than a charismatic deliverer, and wouldn’t want to be thought of as aloof or distant. I’m there, in my own way. The lovely time I had socialising with such tremendous folk has persuaded me to practice more!

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Returning to Trudvang Chronicles

Posted on November 7, 2022 by First Age

 I’ve run Trudvang Chronicles at a couple of conventions now, which doesn’t yet make me especially accomplished with the system, but perhaps has given me enough to understand its quirks. The intricacies of the ‘combat capacity’ system really needs to have a short campaign in which the flexible choices have room to breathe for the players. Although not too difficult, the combat system  is quirky and complex enough that it’s probably a bit much for a one off.

I’m looking forward to running it again at Grogmeet, where I hope that my growing familiarity with the system will incrementally make the session run that bit smoother.

The Player Characters

 

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Ravenstor Holiday

Posted on October 30, 2022 by First Age

For just a few nights I managed to get away with my three grown up kids, disappearing into the nearby Peaks to Ravenstor YHA for some chill, game playing and hiking. It is rare that we all get together for any significant stretch of time, so this was quite a treat!

Here are some pictures that tell our story. We also played a great game of Mysterium on our third night, where our ghostly victim, Erin, expertly guided us boys to the right murderer.

Day 1 to Tideswell and exploring the kitchen

Day 2 – a walk along the Monsal Trail out to Hassop and back. Refreshments! 

Day 2 Eve – a riotous game of Dragonbane. Awesome!

Day 3 – Earl Sterndale to Park House Hill and Chrome Hill. I loved the challenge. Cam bought a book! 

Day 4 – Wetton and Thor’s Cave. Goblins!

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Planning Ahead for 2023

Posted on October 30, 2022 by First Age

Even now I’m considering which games will feature for me in 2023. Perhaps slightly early, but may represent how my mind works and is just the right side of embarrassing, rather like now seeing the red and green stocked Christmas ailes in the supermarkets. Early, but hope you’ll let me off for now.

The possibilities will need to be tempered by my real life and the many fun things that brings. As such this is probably a slightly unattainable shopping list of bubbling excitement that will be shaped in unexpected ways after I have hit ‘Publish’ on the blog.

My Current Games

The long running Wednesday night Strahd 5e game is due to finish this year, and by coincidence, my Saturday night D&D 4e campaign in Nentir Vale is also due to come to a dramatic ending, at least for the Heroic Tier, at the end of the year. Decks clearing, naturally freeing up some time in the gaming calendar. Darran’s 10 session or so Vasen game has morphed into a somewhat unplayable Monday nights, though I hope to play some more if it doesn’t disrupt his story arc. Thursday nights are currently well set for a Pathfinder 2e mega dungeon that may switch to fortnightly, opening up another possible opportunity for some alternatives. I have a CYBORG one-off coming from Dom.

So, it looks to me that there are two gaming nights to fill with new goodness, and some others, including convention play to come. A backseat for the D&Ds after a few years?

What’s In The Mix?

Dragonbane, and lots of it. The full first draft of the game will be out to us backers by Christmas or thereabouts. I will be all over it and keen to run through the Kickstarter adventures and start to consider how to use the game more broadly. It is altogether possible that I place the game system back into my Greyhawk ‘Bandit Kingdoms’ setting and pick up some play from there. After a terrific session with my three grown up kids, we’ll be going on adventures next year when we can get together. The game will also see extensive convention play.

I’m also attracted to the Dragonbane Third Party Licence, which might galvanise a little bit more writing out of me/ I’ve been talking to a gaming buddy about some writing collaboration. I’m looking forward to seeing what we come up with.

With fillial connection, I have a Trudvang Chronicles mini campaign pretty much good to go on Foundry VTT. Trudvang is an earlier iteration of Drakar och Demoner, sporting a somewhat more involved combat capacity system, and a skill list as long as many of your arms. Depsite some of its transparent flaws, it remains a cool game and I’d like to see more of that in play. I’ve slightly foolishly run it as a pick up convention game, with enough success to persevere, but Dragonbane clearly wins out in that context.

Whilst on the content creation side of things, I’d like to develop some more of my Eventide subsector, for Cepheus Deluxe, in a currently sketchy Hinterspace setting out on the endangered frontier. By ‘develop’, I also mean actual play too. I like the game and the way it plays out SF adventures. 

Pete has promised a slot in his 13th Age playtest, to be played out at Patriot Games. I’m looking forward to the exploration of the new iteration of this game, and to becoming a playing part of our FLGS community.

If at all possible, I’d really like to play some more games on the Dungeon Musing Channel. Kevin has recently become enamoured of the Blackbirds RPG, which looks like a ton of fun. If I can muster it, I  may also like to get into a regular game if it fits the Muser’s plans and I can actually do the CST time zone.

I’m transparently angling to get into Dr Mitch’s The One Ring 2e game, if it happens. There might, understandably, be a queue.

It would be a significant highlight to my year if we can get The Chronicles of Future Earth RPG out of Kickstarter to a delivered book, at least in electronic form, but hopefully also as a physical book. It looks great, has an interesting take on the Fate engine along with all the richness that Sarah Newton brings to the setting.

On a tangent, I have the option of an upstairs room in a very nice pub for a regular game night, for 1-2 tables. That feels like more of a project, and a time investment way beyond the night itself. Maybe, for some face to face gaming in a nice place with good food and drink downstairs. 

Elbowing Contenders

It’s important to enjoy the flux. New ideas will emerge from the chaos mire, with shadowy forms suddenly taking a tangible and consuming reality. A selection of these are below, but there will be others…

I have a slightly ridiculous amount of Cypher fantasy to do something with, in and around the Diamond Throne.

The Forbidden Lands campaign ‘The Bloodmarch’ has landed in PDF and looks to be of the same consistently high quality as previous releases. It also strikes me that these adventures could be played using Dragonbane, with some thought to a light and consistent translation process. Someone may already have produced this, or will do so through the third party licence.

Starforged will be with me in time for Revelation next year, so that looks to be a shoe in for there, unless Tribe8 progresses or I get distracted by some more A|state, or even the PbtA Hearth fantasy Stonetop, if it progresses to a published state.

Homeworld 2d20, with a companion plastic miniatures festooned boardgame really ought to get my attention, even if it only fast jumps into North Star.

Will the lure of more D&D 4e overcome me? There are Paragon tales to be told beyond Nentir Vale.

I’m running conventions as per usual next year. Additionally, I have taken up leadership of the RPG track at AireCon 2023. I hope you will come along and participate? More online encouragement to come on that. In the meantime, go here: https://www.airecon.co.uk/gms

Of course, much of this may change in the run up and during the year, not least because my good gaming buddies will also come up with as yet unknown escapist fun. I will be on the lookout for spaces.

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Homeworld 2d20 RPG – Something of a Revelation

Posted on October 15, 2022 by First Age

Something of a cazy notion to pre-order the Homeworld Revelations 2D20 RPG from Modiphius. I have plenty on the shelves already, from Traveller/Cepheus to Infinity 2D20, vectoring at full thrust past some excellent PbtA offerings, Scum & Villainy and lighting up some FFG/Edge Star Wars awesomeness. Ah well, I jumped in. In fact I also had a go at the originating RTS PC game to give me a flavour. I was unsurprised to find that I was wholly crap at it, but I got the idea.

This is probably my first, lighter end 2D20, based as it is on the Star Trek line, no doubt with some touches. Perhaps not the very lightest end, but much breezier than Infinity and housed in a 9.5/6.5″ digest sized book. I must say I am pleasantly surprised at the innovations that have come to the 2d20 stable since Infinity and Conan. It remains recognisably the same game but streamlined and honed to achieve some of the complexity of system with a simpler concept and word count. It is, perhaps, a little better explained than Infinity, though that isn’t saying too much.

I had wondered if the six Attributes and six Skills would make characters generically much the same, with minor variations in capability, whilst finding that ‘everyone can do everything’. This is cunningly mitigated by Focuses, Defining Aspects, and Truths and Talents. Focuses are suggested, but utimately freeform traits where, if a skill test succeeds, is within the skill value, and falls within the focuses’ influence, two successes are gained instead of one. This elegantly achieves the more complex 2d20 effect, without the need to keep track of focus values for the skills. It steps your character up to shine in particular situations. Defining Aspects are special Truths that can be used to gain Focus Points, most often to give you a dedicated critical for the skill task. Leverging these Aspects in play also provides Resource Units (RUs) for advancement. Talents provide specific rule benefits, in general and specific skill areas. For example, ‘Empathic’ gives you an additional d20 to Insight when determining the intentions or feelings of another character. Truths are freely expressed traits that can either provide an advantage or a complication, reducing or increasing the difficulty of a test by 1. These are used as part of scenes too. 

I like the way initiative works, with player side typically going first with one character and then handing over to adversaries to go and switching between throughout, moderated by Momentum or Threat spend to break that pattern. Usual options for holding, and spending Momentum to get an extra Major action. It looks like it will hang dynamically together really well. I may have to unlearn a few minor things to pick up the nuances of this tightly put together 2d20 ruleset.

The seven step lifepath will quickly create a Kushan character with some backstory and everything needed to get going. It looks simple and quick.  There’s also a ‘creation in play’ option, to record the very basics and find out more as you are playing the game. Nice. To round out the playable roster are supporting characters, quickly created and available to play if in the scene. I’m not sure if this is quite troupe play, but it is heading that way when you want to switch into the shoes of a haried flight specialist, or a troubled dealer on the lower decks.

I’ll be interested to see how Resource Units are spent in play, either upgrading characters, supporting characters or ships. Nice to use the RUs coined from the RTS PC game.

Starships are given a fairly comprehensve treatment in the game. Ships are rated on a scale of 1 to 6, ascending in size and power. Ships have 6 attributes, just like characters, but these are tailored to their role: Communications, Computers, Engines, Sensors, Structure, and Weapons. These are used directly in the game, replacing character attributes when using a skill that harnesses the ship capabilities. I have only skimmed, so need to get some play in to see how it all works out at the table. My surface scan has picked up lots of character actions (hoorah for action and things to do), simple starship combat rules, building on the mechanics that have come before, many starship stats with pictures, and a template set of ship creation rules. Plenty to go at.

The Historical and Society Briefings look to give a gamable set of information to underpin the setting. It’s good to see that these briefings are laced with Story Seeds to prompt adventure. I’m new to the Homeworld setting, so it looks pretty good to me, not least because it appears quickly digestible.

The book rounds out with sections on Gamemastering and Non-Player Characters, backed by a pretty comprehensive looking Index. At 332 pages they pack a lot into this book.  The GM pre-order bundle comes with a themed dice set, some cheat sheet handouts, counters, and my first digest sized landscape GM screen. Dinky, sweet, and maybe useful. 

I had wondered about expanding the game with some cool starship miniatures. It looks as though Modiphius have got that well covered with Homeworld Fleet command, a fast play boardgame of spaceship combat in the Homeworld universe. It comes with 101 starships with an expansion providing 100 more. You’d want to get them painted…

Crowdfunding will launch in November 2022, so not very long from time of writing. I’ll see what the damage to my Budget Attribute would be, expecting some immediate ‘Breaches’. What a combo that would be though!

Role VTT

The game has potential for broader re-use beyond the Homeworld setting, should you be interested. I might want to tighten some aspects of the game, such as what starship ‘short jumps’ actually meant. It might be there in the text. As it is, there is plenty of play potential at a rage of levels with this core game. I tend to gravitate to Foundry VTT these days for online play, but worth noting that the free Role VTT has a ready to play gaming room themed to Homeworld. The VTT is free to use and excellent for webcams, audio, and some sheets and dice tools around the edges. t would be the obvious place to start. It won’t calculate any of the Stress dice or successes, but you can eyeball that fairly quickly.

A fun romp of a space opera, starship based on an epic journey to the people’s homeworld against considerable odds.

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Furnace XVII – a fine weekend of gaming

Posted on October 12, 2022 by First Age

So, we get to our seventeenth outing! Furnace and The Garrison Hotel have become a part of my life, and perhaps yours? Everything from the long standing staff, familar layout of the rooms, to the TV welcome tune when you put in the key made me feel at home away from home. The Garricons form frequent islands of relaxed and convivial roleplay game actual play with the gaming family, and very welcome too. Not to be complacent though. The format is well established and delivers a good weekend, but we are always on the lookout for small incremental changes that might make it all pass just that bit more smoothly. This time around we had a few things:

Fully pre-booked. This extended the system we usually use, but stretched to more people and brought increased complexity. The timetable, a glistening marvel, moulded by the furrowed effort of our Tsarina was very tricky to get into a shape that optimised to as many of the player choices as possible. It was great to have such a rich array of top quality games from our GMs, once again. The games are the absolute core of the weekend. We will look at some possible tweaks to the system to enable fully pre-booked again next year.

Room dividers. Dom and I were constructing them on the Friday night, benefiting both from Dom’s Engineering and my Biblical Studies; hard nosed process expertise and arcane rites from a lost age. They stayed up, though embraced their price point, with a flimsy aether sail lightness. I’d welcome thoughts from you as to whether they made any difference to the play experience in the Cell and Armoury? Might be hard to tell, and we know how echoey the Armoury can be.

Saturday Dinner Sign Up by Location. The sign up sheets now have the location that you want to eat in at the top. Hopefully that’s helped getting food to people with less disruption and uncertainty? I’ll be checking in with the Hiotel to see how it was for the staff.

In the words of Timetable Sheet12, “We Survived, Furnace 2022 – The Revenge of PlagueCon!”. I have now lost track of the number that fell away before, during and after, with either COVID or shivvery nastiness. It made for a lot of fevered last minute juggling, squeezing and perhaps a bit of swearing. We really welcomed the offers of additional games from our flexible and capable GMs. The show went on, and most people got games in most slots. The attendee write-ups I have seen have been positive. I take particular delight in first timers attesting to the friendly and welcoming atmosphere, whilst bringing the gaming fun. If we have that, then we have everything.

On Friday night I managed to grab some drinks and some chat at the bar. With room/table setup complete, I could get on and enjoy the convention and the games to come…

Saturday Daytime – Bladerunner – Remi

A double session of Bladerunner, run by Rem, very abely guiding our disparate LAPD officers on a deep investigation that could have intense ramifications to the current tenuous social contract. Many a time, me as a player, imagined the opportunity to live again, in some over-hyped off-world colony idyll. The neon washed streets beckoned however, and my character had to work with supposedly ‘prefect’ Nexus 9 models, with a handful of years of life experience between them. Tension mounted throughout the sessions and flared into violence between the team and then for a dramatic denoument. Great group, atmospheric soundtrack, great map, tablet and image use by Remi as he took us through the investigation with just the right input. This take on the YZ0 Free League system was really effective. It may run with the same probabilities, but it fe lt a lot less whiffy. My main takeaway from the game was that this adventure proved to me that there was plenty going on in the Bladerunner universe, and that there are long form possibilities. Free League’s supporting material, particularly the room pictures for you to find clues were top notch. I’m pretty sure that if I ever run some of this game I will use the pre-generated scenarios.

Saturday Evening – Trudvang Chronicles – Me

I was looking forward to running this one, though the combat system is sufficiently complex looking, that it is difficult to explain. Characters are setup with prepared combat combos that can be used wholesale or adapted quickly. The scenario has a nice mix of culture, social interactions and action. A good session overall and nice to get Trudvang to the table. Tom in particular was grokking the system and enjoying the resonances  with various BRP iterations and infusion of Trudvang culture. Commercially, the game itself is over. Riotminds have divested themselves of the Drakkar och Demoner engine to Free League and Trudvang setting to CMON. I am glad I have the game and even more glad to get some actual play out of it. Maybe some more play online next year?

    

Sunday Morning – Dragonbane – Me

Speaking of Drakkar och Demoner, Free League have taken the venerable Swedish RPG and produced Dragonbane, the English speaking translated title. It’s a light, bouncy version of the game with lots of flourishes, including card initiative with swaps dynamic during a round, advantage and disadvantage, conditions, and profession/kin abilities. The light and intuitive ruleset was probably well placed for a Sunday morning game. My crew of players jumped in and rolled with it very well, picking up the game and the deadly situation with experienced aplomb. After some explosive larceny, they sensibly decided to ‘do a runner’ and legged it. I like the system and look forward to the fuller game that will come in electronic form to backers in time for Christmas.

Sunday Afternoon – Timeout

A pacey raffle and some game slot wrangling concluded my official duties and left no more than a gentle wind down to the convention. Some checks of the rooms, and an email to the hotel about sttoring the room divider screens and that was about a wrap for me. Had a few moments to appreciate the gamer chat burble and catch up with Jim.

There will be a few aspects that we will look at in time for next year. Overall, it was another really nice weekend of gaming, that we navigated together as gaming friends fell around us. I feel OK, but may take a COVID test tomorrow!

Rock on for 2023!

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Con4eR 3 – More D&D 4th Edition play and on Foundry too!

Posted on September 26, 2022 by First Age

 My enjoyment of D&D 4th Edition continues undimmed. I was glad to setup another Con4eR online space this weekend, so that people could get together and get some more actual play of this terrific version of the game.

Warhorn continues to evolve and is proving to be a super resource for managing an online event, that empowers self serve sign up for games. It really makes things simple. Yes, there are some features that I would like to see in this now open source web application, particularly in archiving old sessions, but it really has just about everything you need, with developments continuing behind the scenes.

With some Discord support, now including Forum style threads, it is a great time to be running events with powerful and free tools to keep everyone togetehr and organised.

It would be great if I could get the Con4eR community more involved in the games. We had three games planned over the weekend, though unavoidably that became two as we got to the event itself. I remain thoughtful about how I can encourage  the 70+ members of the community to actively get involved in the gaming weekends; to pitch up and play and run games. 

I actually felt a bit rusty when I came to run my game, and was using Foundry for the first time with 4th Edition. I had both Paul and, new to me, Mitchell, who are both fonts of 4e knowledge, and hugely supportive as players. It was a really nice group all round!

A screenshot after the players had left

 I must say that I think Foundry is amazing and really needs to be my VTT of choice for this type of game. I’d put some time and effort into the preparation of the game on the platform. Some nice ambience to set mood. My ‘Harpys’ Nest’ went down particularly well! The maps and tokens were all ready to go, so that players could quickly tuck into the encounters. I had missed a couple of things on the sheets, though given how much was on them, really wasn’t too bad, and everyone was very understanding. The Masterplan monster import was wonderful, quickly populating my adversaries. This would all be too much otherwise.

I got better at the targeting and automatic application of damage as the game went on. My continual dumping of damage onto poor old Andrey, the halfling rogue, became slightly amusing, even to her player, Debbie!

It was slightly rash of me to upgrade to the new stable V10 version of Foundry, though the 4e module is fully supported. I was particularly impatient to see how the new Dock functioned. Although theoretically able to place the Dock in ‘Left, Right, Top, Bottom’ positions of your choice, by placing on the Bottom it prevented the chat column from properly scrolling with most recent entries disappearing off the bottom of the screen. The ‘Left’ position seemed to be the least complicated, though players really wanted to pop the Dock out of Foundry completely to get it out of the way. I chose to dispense with the Dock and popped out all the AV windows ont the main canvas, enabling me to size and place them wherever I wanted. I’ll stick with that approach for now. The Livekit AV held up strongly throughout the session with no appreciable dropout of sound or video.

I’m feeling very at home on Foundry and will use it a lot more later this year and next.

 

 

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Owlbear and the Wizard’s Staff Convention

Posted on September 3, 2022 by First Age

I’m on the Saturday night, at my AirBnB at Leamington Spa, reflecting on a great day of gaming with the finest of company. AFriday night of socialising and curry, followed by a day of Tribes in the Dark by Ian Cooper and a return to Eventide, with a play through of some of ‘Always be Prepared’. I do love the Cepheus Deluxe version of Traveller, it brings so much to the table in a sleek set of rules. I really can’t wait for the new SRD to come out, with lots of tweaks and clarifications.

Photos taken by Mathew Broome

As an extra big bonus, Paul Tome, the cover artist of the scenario book, was there to play!

All round a super day. I stayed for just the one at the pub tonight, and I have Liminal to play tomorrow morning before heading away back to Sheffield.

Good times.

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