Time elasticity in conflicts: part I

A recent trip has spurred a few thoughts on the topic of extended conflicts, yet again. That's probably because I find them to be a powerful idea for a game system, even if often weirdly developed or awkward in its functioning. I particularly don't like the mostly seam-ful transition between extended conflict and free-play or normal conflict (i.e., resolving a conflict in only one roll), as it is framed in most story games (broad generalization, although I'm thinking now mostly about Burning Wheel and The Shadow of Yesterday).

My thesis, briefly, is that a crisis collapses time from an evenly divided continuum, where you count in seconds or any other equally long/short unit: a crisis collapses time into a dramatically organized continuum, where units are no longer equal in length, but instead organized by urgency.

What do I mean by this? When we were waiting by a side of the lane, doing autostop, we were progressively getting more impacient, complaining more and more, inventing some rituals to make a car stop for us. That gradual stress accretion wasn't an evenly spaced thing, in my perception at least, in the sense that the first 10 minutes, for example, weren't as eventful as the 5th 10 minutes of wait. As impatience was piling up, every car passing by became a unique event.

I hope an example will make it more clear, because, as usual, there's an antecedent of this idea in Apocalypse World. The harm clock (or, in general, the danger clock that the game utilizes for handling a threat or crisis escalation) is taken from the famous doomsday clock, a clock that estimated how close humanity was to nuclear apocalypsis, and it very much gauged (gauges!) political crises and human conflict, where things start getting intense as the tipping point nears.

Apocalypse World honors this not only graphically, but in design, because the first 2 segments are inconsequential, the 3rd one marks a point of no return or hard to return from, and the last 3 are when the crisis starts affecting the situation seriously.

This is already brilliant design, but I want to use it as a baseline for general time handling during conflicts. How to? First, the initiation of a conflict, in the sense of a situation that can't be easily solved in a trivial dice roll.

A conflict arises when a skill check, move, or dice roll (or whatchamacallit) fails, and the player expresses his desire to keep aiming for the goal, instead of accepting defeat. In such a moment, that simple situation turns into a conflict: for example, an excursion to gather some wood for the campfire turns into a real issue, as the characters get lost when tempted to go further and further to find what they need. They could've accepted that wood was not to be found nearby, and try some other approach. The escalation to a fully fledged conflict is decided by the players, as in the Shadow of Yesterday.

The conflict itself has no round to round dynamic. You never know whether the conflict will end this turn, or not. You certainly hope that every roll will be the last one, and the game might lure you in by providing an escalating bonus for every subsequent time you try. Blackjack is a nice mechanical simile for this, as you aim for a bigger return knowing that drawing a new card increases your risk of losing it all.

Every time you fail, there's a consequence too: you are deeper into it and can't retreat without a bigger loss. Again, gathering wood for the campfire: the further you're from the camp and the closer the night is, the harder it will be to just come back without nothing (or without enough).

The midnight point in the crisis clock should be explicited quite soon: if doing autostop or gathering wood, it might mean literally the arrival of the night. Other tipping points might be the first time there's blood involved in a fist fight with a friend, or getting lost, or a storm arriving.

The closer you are to a tipping point, the slower time goes by. When the sunset is near, every 10 minutes might matter. When the police is a few blocks away and you can hear it, every instant of the ongoing fight matters.

A crisis leads to another, which might mean chaining conflicts or develop as a single one. After the night has arrived, getting lost is the next tipping point, or you run out of water, or out of food, etc.

A final note for realism worriers. Crisis is very much, for me, a subjective situation, and time matters more as a perceived thing, influenced by crisis/escalation, than as a "clock" unit. We focus on a situation as things get dangerous and demand increasingly more attention. We zoom in and out as needed, but there's a cost involved for zooming in too often, as there's so much stress we can handle before getting exhausted. It would've been easier to just give up gathering wood, than it was to keep looking for it. 

Here, Blades in the Dark shines: Stress accrues the more you roll dice and burn resources to accomplish something. It works even if the game doesn't care that much about time itself during a roll (interestingly, the game uses an evenly spaced clock to handle crisis situations).

This is also an admonition for classic design and it's desire for rules simplicity. The payback is often framing situations, time-wise, in a weird way regarding the urgency of the in-game situation. Combats that are mechanically very easy, yet take lots of time. Dungeon exploration systems where every hour matter equally, which forces designers to circumvent this issue by overly populating dungeons in an unplausible way. The combat/exploration turn is a remora some OSR games struggle with, one which could be solved without losing that classic touch so many old school games aim for.

Addendum: A friend made me realize the article looks like a proposition for a system, but that proposition just isn't there, and he's right. That'll have to wait for a 2nd part of this article.

That's all for today! If you're new to this blog, I mostly write in Spanish, but from time to time an essay-ish piece might be published in English, whenever I'm in the mood for it. As usual, any feedback is welcome, particularly when helping my writting be more understandable.

The Shadow of Yesterday Actual Play: introduction

5 weeks ago, I started a campaign of the Shadow of Yesterday, a mythical indie tabletop rpg from their first era, in 2005, back when the Forge was still a thing. It was in that forum that this game, the Shadow of Yesterday, grew to become a community development, thanks to its author's, Clinton R. Nixon, strict adherence to Creative Commons license. This culture of freely sharing his work extended to the game's setting philosophy: instead of a set cannon, the community contributed to the setting's development with new cultures or alternative takes on existing ones, which made this game a refreshing addition to a scene often filled with cannon set in stone.

First, a brief introduction to the game. The Shadow of Yesterday is a fantasy game with an existing setting, unlike, for example, Burning Wheel, another game from a similar time which I find somewhat similar. In this game, the world's recovering from an apocalypses, from the skyfire (a meteorite) that befell the land aprox a century ago, shattering the lands, the social structures, the empire and the memory of the past. The world is only now recovering from this event, people start to travel, commerce slowly resurfaces and new social structures try to coalesce. It's a fantasy setting without the rigidity of most fantasy settings, where heroes can place their footprint into the new world, if they're brave enough.

Another interesting element of the setting is its focus on cultures: each culture has its own style, ideology, methods for organizing themselves and solving problems, all of that expressed in "crunch", in their own selection of skills, secrets (like d&d feats), and keys (like BW keys). There's more focus on cultures than on races, but they do exist, albeit with an interesting twist: elves and goblins are unique transformations of humans. A person can turn into a goblin or into an elf, and back into a human, under certain conditions, so elves and goblins don't have a culture of their own, but rather partake in the culture they're part of.

On the rules: the 3 stats, vigor, instinct and reason, are pools instead of fixed stats, and they help ability rolls or trigger secrets, which is a nice way of dealing with the distinction between stats and skills. Abilities are fixed, and are added to the result of a dice roll (using fudge/fate dice) to get the result. The 3 pools are replenished using recovery scenes that always involve an interaction with another character.

A secret is everything that changes some of the basic rules in a singular context. It's fairly similar to d&d 3.x's feats, and most of them are activated by spending pool points. This is where the crunch differs the most from culture to culture.

Keys are the main means towards gaining experience, but they come with an interesting twist: if you act against your key in a dramatic fashion, you can cancel it and gain lots of experience points, on the condition you never again buy the same key. It's an interesting design choice that rewards your character if they change under pressure.

Enough about the rules. There is a core tenet that informs the design philosophy of the game: "no gods, no monsters, only people." It's fairly simple, but it's consequences are vast: first, there's no metaplot, no bigger game played by gods, where player characters are merely pawns. There are also no monsters, no creatures doomed to be essentially evil or antagonistic. Everybody has reason to act the way they do, communication's always possible, which means every conflict is political at its core, and there is no gratuitous violence. It's easy to see how this tenet puts this game simultaneously at odds with D&D, and 90's gaming style full of metaplots and campaign arcs the players can never influence.

Back to the campaign. We're not using any of Nixon's editions of the game, nor the Spanish translation (which is really good), but instead 2008's edition by Eero Tuovinen, who split the game in 2: Solar System for a generic presentation of the rules, in theory adaptable to any genre or setting, plus The World of Near, a book containing the setting, but also all crunch associated with it. By the way, both games are pay what you want here!

Eero's edition is simply amazing. Seldom have I found so much content, so many explorations on crunch variants in a single book, so many cultures, magic subsystems, coverage for different venues of conflict, etc. It's almost too much, which, sadly, makes the book a bit hard to digest, but an amazing read if you're willing to invest in it, or merely fishing for ideas. The layout isn't particularly inspiring, again, but if you get past this barrier you'll be rewarded.

So, why this big intro? I want to reflect on my experiences GMing this game, mainly how does it feel different or similar when compared to newer story games. I figured a small introduction was needed prior to my post on the first session. I'll try not to bore you writing about rules, and insted will gradually mention them every actual play. Next time I'll write a brief introduction about the game and a few notes about first session, so see you soon!

PS: if you understand Spanish, you can watch the first 2 sessions on twitch or youtube! First session here, then second.

Speed, perception and social strata

In Aeon Flux's 2nd season, 1st episode, Utopia or Deuteranopia, Trevor Goodchild serves as the president after the former representative, Clavius', mysterious disappearance. Turns out, Trevor is guilty for this, and keeps Clavius in a sort of parallel dimension, barely visible from outside, accessible only when wearing a garment that allows the body to vibrate at the same frequency Clavius does. 

A few experiences driving and the memory of this episode helped a few ideas condense into this article about speed and perception, which, I hope, isn't too abstract.

Relative speed and perception

When your body moves at a certain speed, your perception is conditioned by such speed and direction of movement.

When you're driving your car, let's say at 80 km/h, and another car moves at 90 km/h, same or similar direction, it's movement will be perceived as it slowly distancing from you, as an equivalent object in speed. Somebody walking at 10 km/h, on the other hand, will be perceived, almost, as a stationary object. Greater contrast will be perceived if the difference in speed is even greater.

Other than suddenly crashing your car into some pedestrian, your chances of interacting one with each other are faint and brief, unless the driver slows down, stops the car, or either invites the other guy in. In that case, both of them would be moving at the same speed, towards the same direction, which would allow them to have a longer conversation than a few shouted words.

The above principle is similar to the one from Aeon Flux's episode: a body's speed, or vibration frequency in the first case, puts it in contact with other bodies having a similar movement.

Relative speed, perception and level design

A property deducted from what's already been exposed is that the same scenario may in fact contain many superposed planes, all of them geographically similar, but accessible one at a time, and only to bodies moving in the right speed or frequency. No body can access 2 planes at the same time, unless it's got 2 speeds, which for now would be impossible, but more on that later.

But enough abstraction for now, let's take this metaphor to games and level design. First, there are already games, like Zelda Oracle of Ages, which reuse maps, but allow Link to travel back and forth in time, letting him explore the same areas in the past and present. 

This is fine, but I'm interested in exploring this metaphor without time-travelling, and I think it can be applied to a whole different topic: how to make class and culture disparity seem real in an urban environment.

So, 2 persons of a different social class, cultures or ethnicities may share an environment, but both actually see and interact with a wholly different world. The same objects and bodies may take up different meanings according to the observer's position in society's gradient: the police, bank, school, the back alley, the highway, all of those things mean something different according to the observer. Each social stratum has blind spots: objects, places and people invisible to it, inaccessible, or insurmountable. At the same time, each stratum's ecosystem allows people sharing a social status to interact with each other, and provides them with opportunities invisible to anybody else.

Changing a body's speed

Cars sometimes have accidents and hit pedestrians, of course, and unexpected encounters between different strata may sometimes happen. This interaction should feel undesired, awkward, asymmetric, and full of misunderstandings: each of the participants is perceiving the other through the distortion of their own speed. True interaction is impossible unless one of the 2 bodies changes its vibration accordingly, but how could that happen?

It's your garments, your look and how you present to the world, overall, what places you in a social stratum. You might change your stratum by being introduced to another one by somebody else. In Oracle of Ages, you travel in time in a particular spot in the map, you can't do that everywhere. In this scenario, you couldn't just change your trappings in the street, or else people would react weirdly: are you one of us, have you been in disguise all this time, why are you naked now? Your current stratum is seen as your identity, so shifting it in plain sight will generate weird reactions.

Another scenario: you might collide with a body and suddenly find out your own speed changed, whether you wanted it or not. An unexpected experience might lead to an uncontrolled change in your stratum and your perception in the world. Such a change might be perceived by yourself and others as an affliction or lucky strike, and you'd find that transitioning back to your former speed is hard or even impossible.

A body in 2 worlds at once

Finally, an edge case I find quite interesting: what if you actually exist in 2 different strata, and are perceived as such by others? There are certain individuals that exist in a curious limbo: they can interact with 2 worlds at once, and are perceived to be neither fully here nor there, but instead as visitors or strangers in both planes.

Again, an example from an actual game: in Trollbabe, by Ron Edwards, player characters impersonate trollbabes, who exist somewhere in the spectrum between a human and a troll. They exist in an unique position that allows them to interact with both species in a non-antagonistic way (in theory, at least), but are shunned by both as strangers in their communities. Something similar happens in Monsterhearts, whose characters inhabit both the life of the schoolkid and the criminal errands of the monster, and this intersection creates trouble for them.

If we borrow these examples, we could characterize adventurers as bodies that get to change their stratum, to explore different planes by virtue of them being "native" to no world, which frankly suits what adventurers are/do in many tabletop roleplaying games.

Conclusion? None today, this article was more of a random brainstorming of ideas/thought about game design. Let me know if you enjoy this posting format! I'm kind of exploring how to keep writing in a comfortable way (that is, not feel it like an obligation), plus practicing a bit my written English, until I wait for some motivation to continue working in some of my other projects.

See you next time!

Some thoughts on outdoor exploration

Last weekend I went camping with a group of friends in the highlands near my city (Sierra de los Difuntos), and this experience inspired some thoughts about, of course, tabletop rpgs, specially about their treatment of outdoor exploration. I'm not by any means a skilled photographer, but I'll supplement my thoughts with a few pics I've taken this weekend.

Outdoor exploration

It's puzzling to me that outdoor exploration struggles when micromanaging movement, time and resources in a way that dungeon exploration sorted out long ago. Probably the answer to that is plain obvious: dungeons contain a structure that lends itself pretty easily to mapping, grid combat, and exploration room by room. It also contains well defined boundaries, which allow for precise level design.

But the outdoors provide a different challenge: designing environments without precise mapping, or how to design "levels" that are, in theory, infinite and uncontained.

When we went trekking, I noticed, first, how much geographical variation there is even in short distances, at least in highlands. Vegetation and insects might change a bit in 20 meters, there are differences in altitude which help creating distinctive landmarks (muddy soil, thick grass, exposed rock, a couple of trees, an abrupt fall, etc.). Rarely outdoors felt like treading on the same stuff for hours.

Regarding that, I feel like mapping, for the GM, doesn't work well for open land. It'd be hellish and also boring to try to map a forest or jungle, so the approach should be different, and I'm reminded of The Shadow of Yesterday, a wonderful 1st generation forgie game by Clinton R. Nixon, which got rewritten and expanded by several authors, one of them Eero Tuovinen. 

In The World of Near, Eero's book, there's a chapter devoted to Knotwork, the art of traversing the jungle. In this subsystem, some travelers remember knots, relevant landmarks that have a spirit associated with them. Skilled travelers may travel to a known knot after a simple roll, or if they know a path between knots, do not need to roll at all. In this game, there's no map, only a graph containing knots and roads between them. New knots may be created by a special skill, too.

I noticed that this subsystem matched quite well my experience outdoors: friends who knew paths, knew how to reach particular landmarks, and that would be stuff like a waterfall, or a small zone with trees casting shadow, ideal for lunch, or some caves where clandestine parties sometimes take place.

Subjective distance

So, we where walking towards this waterfall and pool where we'd be able to bathe, which was needed, because the day was so hot. We reached a little forest and started descending an increasingly abrupt, downwards path, but the waterfall was dry. So the guide would tell us to go further downward, because the pool would be there, but the path would get harder and harder. Eventually we stopped, took a break, ate a bit, chatted, and decided to return to the camp base before the sunset.

This bit made me think about subjective distances in the outdoors. Landmarks in a game don't need to be always equally distant, like for example 1.5 kms. The pool you sought might be dry this time of the year, or only exist further down the hill. The common path towards the ruins of a gazebo might be swampy, and force you to take a long detour and reach it by night.

In this new model, you travel by bits of time, or turns, by rolling dice and checking against a skill or table. Sometimes, you'll reach destination after a single roll, sometimes it'll take more time. You decide after a roll, whether you want to keep pushing, or go back.

The role of the guide

Another thing I've noticed, specially in tight paths, is that the role of the guide is key to the success of the expedition, but for different reasons than I thought. First, the guide's responsible for picking the path all of the expeditioners will go through, which means that their trekking skill is secondary to their ability to evaluate and pick the simplest path for everyone to follow, a path even the least skilled of us can go through. I used to dismiss the rigidity of games like Mouse Guard or Goblinville, where one character's always strongly leading a situation or roll, but now I can see how it is necessary for the outdoors exploration.

Another thing I noticed is the role of fear in an expedition. As a feature of my personality, I tend to overestimate danger, complain a lot, be overly cautious, and this strengthened in a context where the act of walking is by itself an adventure. Fear can be both a blessing and a curse, depending on the situation. Sometimes, it lets you avoid or detect risky situations just in time. Other times, it prevents you from engaging in an activity due to an incorrect gauge of its risk. It can be paralyzing, too, preventing you from acting decisively when you need to, or from reacting fast. At times, I noticed I got grumpy or slightly fearful only because I was hungry/thirsty. I could imagine a game where the main meter is not health nor hunger, but Fear (I think The Warren does this already). With enough fear, everything looks dangerous and unsurmountable, and you become a nuisance to your fellow expeditioners. Hunger, sleep deprivation, etc., only contribute to Fear, dull your senses and make it harder for you to properly perceive your current situation.

Group dynamics

The previous ramble leads me to group dynamics during moments like these. What happens when an individual is plagued by fear or a similar sentiment, and starts dragging down the group's mood? Do you share with everybody how you feel, potentially annoying them, or do you keep it to yourself and start slowly withdrawing from the group? 

There's some tactic game to be played around the group chatter, as they undertake a stressful journey. In such a game, a player might have to choose between sharing their PC's dark feelings and dragging morale down, or keeping that to themselves. What's the danger there? As you stay silent during a journey, people start forgetting about you. Welp, where's Jason? And then everybody realizes they haven't seen him for a while. It'd make for an interesting horror experience.

There's also an interesting tension between the act of leading and the act of criticizing. At some point, if you're willing to question the leader's choices, you've gotta be willing to take up their position and propose your own solutions. This truth's even applicable in other fields: politics, business management, at work, etc.

What to do when you don't lead

How do we make the game interesting for those who don't lead an expedition? I noticed that, often, those who didn't lead had some spare attention to do something else, for example taking photos, thinking about deep stuff, chatting, gathering flowers, providing advice to the leader, whatever. There are some light activities to partake in, which might make it interesting to be a follower sometimes, to the point of allowing a nice leading rotation to ensure everybody wants to take that position and cede it too. This often happened during the trip too: when cooking and when trekking, different people would take the lead, for example. Goblinville, again, provides this in a somewhat mechanical way, but it is a useful starting point to further develop.

That's it for today. I'm probably using this experience as inspiration for the rpglatam jam, which will be an origin game for Vampires & Claymores, but you'll know more about that in the following weeks. Until next time!

Diario de diseño: Infinite City Jam

Buenos días! Cuesta retomar el blog después de tenerlo abandonado por varias semanas, pero me parece un mejor lugar que Twitter para comentar en qué estoy trabajando sin los límites de caracteres.

If you're an English speaker, click here to show the crude translation I've written for the post. If the link doesn't work in mobile, try using chrome instead of, for example, Discord browser.

Primero, acá no está posteado, pero publiqué Labyrinth of Verra hace algunas semanas, para Eclectic Bastionland Jam. Sin embargo, dado que pasó hace bastante, prefiero hacer otro posteo a mitad de semana comentando en detalle sobre este juego y sobre los planes a futuro que tengo para él.

Este artículo es, más bien, para comentar en qué estoy trabajando actualmente, habiendo rendido ayer un parcial que me tenía ocupado. 

Game Jam of the Infinite City

Esta jam me viene perfecta, ya que hace tiempo me interesa explorar jugar en entornos urbanos, y cómo eso cambia la experiencia. Y éste es el concepto que fui armando en mi cabeza estas semanas:

Existen un limbo, una zona a la que van a parar todas las ciudades fallidas, aquellas que estuvieron cerca de alcanzar la máxima gloria como metrópolis, pero no lo lograron. El limbo urbano es un collage de ciudades interconectadas, pero también de líneas temporales, realidades alternativas, ucronías o ciudades que nunca existieron, en una periferia en la que los bordes de la realidad se vuelven difusos. Una de las ciudades en este limbo es Buenos Aires, sobre la que tratará este juego, pero hay muchas otras

Algunas personas llegan al limbo urbano (nombre definitivamente provisorio) buscando algo (una persona perdida, un sueño imposible, un pasado que ya no existe), otras ya son criaturas de la calle hace tiempo, y es natural que terminen acá. Otras personas buscan un hogar o un escape hacia el mundo civilizado, donde todo funciona correctamente.

Sea cual sea la razón por la que están acá, el limbo ofrece oportunidades interesantes si uno está dispuesto a alejarse de la seguridad de las avenidas: productos prohibidos, mercancías de origen dudoso a buenos precios, artefactos de otros mundos que no deberían existir ni funcionar. 

Sin embargo, a medida que uno se aleja de una avenida para adentrarse en lo profundo de algún barrio, la distorsión empieza a atacar: deambulando sin cuidado, es posible terminar en otro barrio, sí, pero también viajar en el tiempo hacia delante o hacia atrás, llegar a líneas temporales alternativas (ucronías) o a versiones alternativas de nuestro mundo en el que las cosas son ligeramente distintas (una Buenos Aires habitada por reptilianos, por ejemplo). Lo mismo es posible cruzar una calle y sin advertirlo llegar a una ciudad completamente distinta, ya que en este limbo todas están entretejidas.

Éste sería el pitch básico del juego. La idea es basarme un poco en los cuentos de Dolina y Borges sobre la ciudad, en Electric Bastionland para incorporar elementos más fantasy o extraños, en la película argentina Moebius. A continuación, les dejo un punteo de ideas mecánicas sobre las que pienso construir el juego:

• Las avenidas serían los medios seguros para viajar entre los diversos barrios de la ciudad sin arriesgarse a la distorsión, pero son también muy caros, ya sea para alojamiento o para comprar suministros. Además, nada ilegal o extraño se puede encontrar en ellas. Las oportunidades, lo inesperado, se encuentra adentrándose en los diversos barrios, lejos de las avenidas.

• Fuera de las avenidas, el juego se dividiría en manzanas o bloques. Al entrar a cada una, los pjs se arriesgan a que la distorsión los aleje ligeramente de su objetivo. El sistema de distorsión determina cómo la ciudad se deforma conforme se alejan los pjs de la avenida, y la distorsión es mayor cuanto más lejos se está.

• Cada manzana contiene un nudo, una escena relacionada a la historia o cultura de la ciudad, relacionada con circunstancias que llevaron a que la ciudad quede confinada a este limbo. Estos nudos serían comentarios políticos sobre la actualidad e historia de la ciudad y, cómo no, de la situación argentina como conjunto. Pienso en escenas como la noche de los bastones largos, por ejemplo. Otros nudos pueden ser más bien leyendas urbanas o contener elementos fantásticos.

• Para cada acción, un pj puede contribuir a aflojar ese nudo, reforzarlo aún más, o subvertirlo, aunque no es el propio jugador el que toma esa decisión. Cada uno de los 3 tipos de tirada tiene sus riesgos y beneficios, y funcionarían, de algún modo, como la dificultad de una tirada, aunque atada al mundo del juego.

• El entramado urbano funciona, de algún modo, como un laberinto, dado que al salir de una manzana, no hay garantías de que puedas volver a ella. Sin embargo, los vecinos de cada manzana pueden ayudarte a orientarte o para volver a alguna manzana ya visitada.

• Me interesaría poder hacer que el juego y el setting sean modulares. Se podría utilizar la guía de Buenos Aires con su sistema de distorsión, para navegar el limbo urbano utilizando cualquier sistema de reglas, o incorporar las reglas de este juego. También sería posible expandir el limbo urbano con guías a otras ciudades, reales o no.

• La guía a Buenos Aires contendría descripciones de cada barrio (me voy a limitar a 6 barrios, no todos), algunas tablas para generar manzanas y nudos, junto con apartados con decadas importantes para la historia de la ciudad, leyendas urbanas y elementos de su cultura. Algo que pueda encarar de manera realista en 40 días.

• Me faltaría desarrollar un poco más las posibles motivaciones de los personajes para recorrer la ciudad.

Eso es todo por hoy. Para la semana que viene, me gustaría subir un microrrelato y tal vez un post sobre El Laberinto de Verra, especialmente si pongo a prueba el juego mañana, como tengo planeado.

Nos vemos!

Hi everybody! I've been absent from the blog for many weeks, so it's a bit tough to find the time to post again, but whatever, I've had an important exam yesterday and want to start working on a new jam, so here we go:

Game Jam of the Infinite City

So, for the next 40 days I'll be working on a game for this jam, which suits me just perfectly, since I wanted to work on an urban game anyway. Without further ado, the pitch for the game:

We all know, have visited, or live in a failed city. A city that was promised the glory of a metropolis but fell short of it, or was tragically impeded from reaching that status. All failed cities coexist in a limbo in the edge of reality, a patchwork of neighborhoods, times and timelines, alternative realities, deterioration and decadence. One of the cities inside this limbo is Buenos Aires.

Some reach this haunted urban collage looking for something, some want to leave it, attracted by the promise of a distant metropolis. Some have always called the streets their home, and so it's natural that they've ended up here.

Whatever their reason to be here, the urban limbo (this name isn't definitive at all) offers the bold many opportunities, provided they're willing to leave the safety of the avenues and plunge into the deep city. In the deep city, you can get unusual and cheap offers, weird products that shouldn't exist, even recover someone lost forever, if you wander there long enough. But there are dangers too: the more you drift away from an avenue, the more reality and time distort: you might end up lost in a different neighborhood, sure, but also travel back or forward in time, reach a parallel timeline or an alternate world with slightly different rules, or cross a border and reach a different failed city, since they're all stitched together here. Wander long enough, and you might never be able to return to your native reality.

A few mechanical concepts for the game:

• This would be a guide for Buenos Aires for this urban limbo, a system for traversing it and dealing with distorsion, and finally a game, but the game and the guide should be fairly decoupled from each other, to allow Buenos Aires to be explored using other game, for example Electric Bastionland.

• The distortion sub system would allow to determine how the reality distorts as you travel from one block to the next one.

• The spacial unit will be the block, each one containing a knot, some sort of ongoing issue tied to the history or culture of the city, that keeps it in this limbo. Untying this knot has effects throughout the entire city. A knot may also be an urban legend or contain fantasy elements, specially inspired in writers like Jorge Luis Borges or Alejandro Dolina.

• The game would work like a labyrinth, similarly to my previous game "The Labyrinth of Verra", but neighbors may help you get oriented.

That's all for today! Damn, it's hard writing the same thing in Spanish and English, so don't get used to it. What the hell, go and learn some Spanish, it'd make my designer life much easier. See you all next time!

Eternal Prometheus' playtest!

If you're an English speaker, click here to show the crude translation I've written for the post. If the link doesn't work in mobile, try using chrome instead of, for example, Discord browser.

So, I've playtested a published game of mine for the first time! Eternal Prometheus, to  be specific, a game I designed for the "Attack and Dethrone God" jam, about which you can read here in my blog, or else directly in itch.io, so I'm not going to explain the rules here (go to one of the links above for a brief explanation of the game, or buy/grab a community copy).
So I'm jumping to some notes I've gathered after the session:

• A player dropped out of the session shortly before playing, so we got to be only 3, which I discovered isn't the ideal setup for this game: 2 moiras need to vote the same sin for the doom pool to grow, so with only 2 of them, all moiras should vote equally. Still, interestingly, in 2 challenges we (I played as a moira) voted the same sin, so perhaps there's an emergent property that makes players' votes attune. Still, I don't want there to be any chance the game ends with an empty Doom pool, so I'll have to fix that.
• The first challenge was the hardest, as the collective vision of how the setting is and how's the game supposed to work isn't yet fully formed, so it was kind of messy the first minutes, but we gained an understanding early on, and by the second challenge things ran pretty smooth. Last challenge was actually pretty easy to make up. My take on this is that perhaps moiras will need extra guidance for the first challenge. Perhaps more story cues for inspiration.
• We didn't use that much the challenge ideas, but did use some of the unexpected and question ideas, which seem to be useful. I might still keep the challenge ideas, as inspiration for the facilitator or if the leading moira doesn't know how to start a scene.
• Prometheus' player, Mauro, told me his role felt the most demanding one, and requiring a bit of creativity. He also told me he felt at first unsure about his narration role and boundaries, and I discovered, during play, that Promethea's role feels more GM-ish than moiras', which at most get to interrupt, ask questions, and set the scene. So in a future version I'll try to state clearly how's Promethei's player supposed to narrate.
• Heli, the other Moira, hadn't GMed before, and told me his role was interesting and fun, since he could just be cruel and mean to Prometheus, knowing the player in response could narrate just whatever he wanted.
• Overall, both players told me the shift in focus from conflict to a predestined path allowed them to showcase other aspects from Promethea and the situation, other than the logistics and minutiae of problem solving. They got to inspect Promethei's flaws and motivations instead, and this shift also helped showcase a path already determined by fate.
• In the aftermath, Promethea got to unlock 2 of the 3 "good" endings, which feels about right, mechanically. I was a bit worried about the math behind that, but for 3 players it seems to work fine. It might not scale properly for 5 players, though, I'll need to check that.
• I specifically asked Prometheus' player if he felt a bit of antagonism having the moiras vote the sins he displayed during challenges, but surprisingly Mauro said he felt that the moiras' vote worked for identifying what about his performance could be further explored and interested them. It's an interesting take on the mechanic I hadn't considered.

Overall, I'm quite happy about how the session, although I know my presence as a facilitator might have skewed the results. I've gathered a few notes towards a new version of the game, though I'd first like to play it with the standard set of 4 players.
Also, it's quite a huge step to have tested a published game for the first time. It's nice to actually play what you've written, to pull stuff out of the world of ideas.
I'm working on another submission for the "Attack and dethrone god" jam, so I might post sth about it if I manage my time well. See you soon!

¡Grandes noticias hoy! Probé por primera vez un juego diseñado y publicado, en este caso Eternal Prometheus, juego que diseñé para la "Attack and dethrone god" jam, sobre el cual pueden leer en el blog, o directamente en itch.io, por lo que no voy a detenerme en explicar las reglas (pero pueden reclamar una community copy o comprar el juego para averiguar más).
Así que paso directamente a listar las notas que tomé:

• Un jugador se tuvo que bajar de la sesión poco antes por motivos de fuerza mayor, por lo que terminamos siendo 3 y no 4. Inmediatamente me alarmé un poco pensando en que 3 jugadores no era la cantidad ideal para este juego, dado que las Moiras (como GMs) son 2, y el juego depende de que al menos 2 Moiras voten igual tras cada desafío para que Prometeo acumule puntos, por lo que todas las Moiras debían votar igual. Inesperadamente, esto resultó no ser un problema, ya que en 2 desafíos voté (fui Moira) igual que la otra Moira. De todas formas, no quiero que sea una posibilidad frecuente terminar el juego sin 1 sólo punto en el pozo de Perdición (Doom pool), por lo que estoy pensando en alguna forma de arreglar esto.
• El primer desafío fue el más difícil, ya que la visión colectiva de la ambientación, la historia y cómo se juega estaba todavía algo verde, por lo que me ofrecí para introducir la escena. Para la 2da escena, ya había una idea grupal del tono de la historia, del juego, y de la ambientación, y para la última el desafío fue muy sencillo de plantear, casi que emergió orgánicamente. Estoy pensando en agregar algún tipo de ayuda extra para que ese primer desafío no resulte tan difícil.
• Las listas de ideas para desafíos de cada categoría casi no se usaron, creo que porque el mito que se fue construyendo ameritaba un desarrollo ad-hoc, y supongo que esto va a ser el caso cada vez que se juegue. De todas formas, esa lista puede aportar al imaginario del facilitador, y ayudar a una Moira a cargo de la escena indecisa sobre cómo proceder.
• El jugador de Prometeo, Mauro, me dijo que su rol le pareció el más demandante del juego, y que al principio estaba inseguro sobre sus derechos de narración, ya que presenté su rol como el de jugador. Mientras jugaba, sin embargo, noté que incluso el rol de Prometea tiene mucho de GM, por lo que voy a señalar esto con más claridad en el texto (Mauro había leído el juego previamente).
• Heli, el otro jugador, que fue una Moira, me dijo que su rol le pareció bastante entretenido, dado que podía ser "cruel" sin culpa, sabiendo que Prometei posteriormente a sus interrupciones podía llevar la narración por el rumbo que quisiese. Además, la lista de interrupciones y preguntas le sirvió bastante, creo, para soltarse y animarse a intervenir en las escenas.
• Ambos jugadores me comunicaron que el cambio de foco, de la resolución de conflictos, a recorrer un camino predestinado (ya que se sabe que Prometea va a robar el fuego), se sintió distinto e interesante, y permitió enfocarse en otros elementos de la narración, antes que en la logística y táctica. La sesión tuvo bastante de explorar los defectos, virtudes y motivaciones de Prometeo, y además este saber cómo iba a terminar la historia contribuyó a la sensación de construir algo mitológico.
• En cuando al final, Prometei logró desbloquear 2 de los 3 finales "buenos", lo que mecánicamente se siente correcto. No estoy seguro de cómo escalará la cosa con más jugadores y desafíos, lo que podría favorecer mucho al Doom pool, especialmente con 5 y 6 jugadores. Voy a tener que testear eso.
• Le pregunté a Mauro, jugador de Prometea, si sintió algo de antagonismo ante el hecho de que las Moiras votaran sus virtudes y defectos, pero me dijo que al contrario, que le interesaba ver qué defectos las Moiras encontraban en su personaje y explorar eso en futuras escenas. Tal vez puedo agregar algún componente al juego que premie acumular Doom pool.

Puede que haya más notas que me esté salteando, pero en resumen quedé bastante contento con el resultado de la sesión, y con el importante paso como diseñador de testear mis juegos. Los experimentos mecánicos de este juego los pude poner a prueba y, en su mayor parte, parecen funcionar y producir resultados interesantes. Obviamente estoy consciente que estar en el testeo de mi juego hace que los resultados de un testeo no sean del todo reveladores, pero es un primer paso interesante. Estoy tomando notas para una nueva versión de Eternal Prometheus, pero antes quiero probar el juego con 4 jugadores.

Estoy trabajando en otro juego para esta misma jam, pero no sé si haga tiempo de armar un post bilingüe, dado que me quedan 19 días nomás. Habrá un microrrelato durante la semana, probablemente el miércoles. ¡Hasta la próxima!

Una de las ilustraciones de Gianni Cignetti para el juego

The Blob

If you're an English speaker, click here to show the crude translation I've written for the post. If the link doesn't work in mobile, try using chrome instead of, for example, Discord browser.

Buenas tardes! Lamento el abandono en que tengo al blog, pero le estuve metiendo pilas al diseño de juegos y a participar en jams, y el fin de semana pasado entregué otro juego nuevo, The Blob, para la Index Card Game Jam. Para el juego, conté con la colaboración de Mantis, quien participa de la campaña de Burning Wheel que estoy dirigiendo actualmente. Pueden revisar su portfolio y seguirla en Twitter, es una excelente artista! Les dejo la portada, para que la aprecien:

Eres una masa sin forma en un mundo en el que todos y todo tienen una forma precisa asignada. Eres apenas tolerado, pero todos quieren que te adaptes y tomes una forma estable.

Este juego, que debía entrar en una tarjeta de 3x5 pulgadas, fue un gran ejercicio de síntesis, y de paso me sirvió para experimentar un poco más con la maquetación. Aprendí bastante de Inkscape y perfeccioné un poco mis conocimientos en Scribus, a la par que, gracias a los consejos de Rodrigo y Bruno, aprendí un poco más sobre cómo elegir paletas de colores y combinarlos.

En cuanto al sistema, continúo probando con una distribución de tareas similar a la de Eternal Prometheus: 1 pj, el protagonista, y todos los demás jugadores son GMs. Me parece que es una buena distribución de roles para favorecer la introspección, e historias con un único protagonista.

Y la mejor noticia, tuve mi primera venta! De este juego, que también tuvo al día de la fecha una cantidad decente de descargas, por lo que estoy bastante contento con el producto. Estoy planeando testearlo la semana que viene, en cuyo caso postearía un reporte acá mismo. Por último, voy a aprovechar las vacaciones de invierno para traducir el juego al español y publicarlo, para no ser tan cipayo.

Se vienen más juegos, así como un microrrelato mañana o pasado mañana, así que estén atentos!

Hi everybody! I've been silent here because I've put more time into finishing a submission for the Index Card Game Jam, and here it is, The Blob! Featuring a wonderful cover by Mantis: go check her portfolio and follow her on Twitter! Appreciate how good the cover looks:

You're a blob in a world where everyone has their shape assigned. You're barely tolerated, but everyone wants you to find a stable shape.

The layout took me more than it should've, but in the process I've learnt quite a bit about Inkscape and Scribus, so I hope all that effort carries on to future projects. System-wise, I'm using a similar role distribution to Eternal Prometheus', that is, 1 player and the rest as GMs. I feel it helps telling introspective stories with a single protagonist.

Best news are, somebody paid for a game of mine (The Blob) for the first time! I feel quite motivated to keep making games, so I'm probably submitting games for a few other ongoing jams. I'm planning on playtesting this game, or either Eternal Prometheus, soon, so I might be posting here about that too.

Eternal Prometheus!

Hi! I'm writing this quite exhausted after a few hours of crunching to finish my first game fully written in English for a jam, and I'm quite happy with it! It's been a tiresome but interesting process, through which I got to put in practice a few design ideas I had been entertaining for many years. I've also got to learn a bit of Gimp and Scribus in a rush, but perhaps that's the best way to learn those things.

So, without further ado, a brief introduction to the game, copied from its itch.io page:

Where there's divine fire, there are Promethei seeking to steal it for all of us, whatever the time, whatever shape humanity, the gods, and the fire take. Prometheus is an eternal figure, in representation of our ambitions and desire for self-governance. His quest is that of all of us, her actions shape our destiny, his punishment ours too. 

Eternal Prometheus is a story game where one player takes on the quest for godly fire, while all other players channel the Moiras, the sisters that decide and weave everybody's fate, including the gods'. The will test and judge Prometheus' performance by placing obstacles in his way and voting what is he worthy of. Prometheus' vices and virtues will be appraised, and in the end Fate itself will determine the consequences for his defiance.

Here the game, and take a look at its cover too:

I'm quite proud of it. It's not that fancy, but I crafted it (collaged it?) with my own hands and hammer, which feels amazing.


I've experimented removing conflict resolution for this game, so no rolls to check if the character succeeds or fails. Instead of that, conflicts are a medium for the player to showcase his motives and heroic quality to the audience, which then votes on his performance, highlighting virtues and sins. 

If you want to know more, go ahead and buy or claim a community copy for the game, and if you've liked it, drop a comment or review!

-----------------------------------

Para mis lectores hispanoparlantes, pido disculpas por la esnobeada de postear en inglés y por mi ausencia esta semana en el blog, pero los invito a revisar el juego si se dan maña con el idioma, y sino, mañana mismo ya estoy posteando un microrrelato nuevo para levantar esa depresión de domingo!

Diarios de diseño / Design log: La fractura I

Buenos días! Éste sería el primer artículo de una serie semanal, en la que voy a contar de mis avances con el juego que estoy diseñando, compartir elementos de las mecánicas, reflexiones, etc. Me va a venir bien para obtener un poco de feedback y también organizarme y motivarme más.

If you're an English speaker, click here to show the crude translation I've written for the post. If the link doesn't work in mobile, try using chrome instead of, for example, Discord browser.

What's the Dream Rift?
Ok, now a short pitch in English of the game I'm developing, not as long as the original in Spanish, since I'm tired. If any English speaker's interested in reading more about the development of the game and its rules, please show up in the comments or tell me in a PM in Twitter, so I know whether or not to keep it bilingual.

A few test subjects have just run away from a lab, without any clue about how they ended up there, what they were doing in the lab, or anything about their past. They've a recent scar in their forehead, probably caused by a surgery. They're surrounded by jungle. 
Only sure thing is, they need to get to the coast, where a boat may help them escape the island they're in. 
They're being chased, not only by the lab security staff, but also by strange horrors that show up in their nightmares at first, but later on too in the jungle. 
Why is that happening? Can they trust their senses? Sometimes those horrors turn out to be a product of their imagination, sometimes they're goddamn real. 
Their dreams leak more and more into reality as the days pass: they know its only time before they finally lose any grasp on reality, so they need to hurry to reach the coast.

A few observations about concept, rules and influences:

• The game consist on hexagonal map exploration, and the map's generated by rolling in tables as they explore them.
• Faintly influenced by OSR, specially by Electric Bastionland: few stats, no modifiers to rolls, no attack rolls, no levels. Also, it uses tables to generate content.
• Players generate their own nightmare in structured freeform gameplay similar to Fiasco scenes, and GMs have to incorporate stuff from those nightmares into the jungle.
• One of the stats, Wit, has special mechanics: it's tested when player come up with inventive plans that don't simply depend on sheer strength, speed or desperation. There's a feedback mechanism baked into the stat, as it might rise or fall, depending on players' feedback.
• Players will gain weird powers influenced by later seasons of JoJo Bizarre Adventures. Those powers are deliberately incomplete, so the players get to rule their limits, rules and special uses with the mechanics of Wit.
• The Dream Phenomena rule is the core of the game, and my main drive for designing it. Nightmarish horrors that come from the dream world exist in the fringe of reality, and thus they're assigned a probability of existence from 1 to 5 (as in 1 in 6, 2 in 6, etc., since a d6 is rolled for it). The GM will describe the horror as real, but hold on the existence roll until the best time for the horror to attack, or until a survivor attemps to attack it. That's how I'm trying to foster a distrust in the survivors' senses.

Stay tuned, because more design logs will come, at least one every week!

Qué es La Fractura?

La Fractura nace de una idea para una mecánica que tuve hace unos años, y que quería testear para ver en funcionamiento. Cuando comenté la mecánica a un amigo, me sugirió un pitch muy similar al del juego, y así me decidí a avanzar con esto:

Un grupo de sujetos de prueba acaba de escapar de un laboratorio, sin memoria alguna de cómo llegaron ahí o de su vida anterior, con una cicatriz en la nuca de una operación, y rodeados de selva.
Lo único que saben es que en la costa hay una lancha que pueden usar para escapar de la isla en la que están.
Están siendo perseguidos, no sólo por las fuerzas de seguridad del laboratorio, sino por monstruos recurrentes que los persiguen en sus pesadillas, y que a medida que avanzan por la selva empiezan a aparecer también en el mundo "real".
¿Pero lo son? Ya no pueden confiar del todo en sus sentidos: a veces ven cosas que no están ahí, otras veces, por ignorar una alucinación, son atacados por ella.
Las alucinaciones empeoran con el tiempo, y empiezan a aparecer lugares de sus pesadillas a sus alrededores, conforme avanzan por la selva. Deben escapar de la isla antes de perder toda noción de la realidad.


La Fractura, nombre provisorio, hace referencia a una fractura en la realidad, por la que empiezan a filtrarse entidades y lugares de los sueños y de otros universos, mientras se juega. En esencia, es un juego que comienza realista, tal vez con un toque de extrañeza similar a Lost, pero empieza a mutar en un mundo de fantasía conforme se va jugando.

• Es un juego-escenario con condiciones de victoria claras: llegar a la lancha y escapar a tiempo. Las condiciones de derrota también: que el mundo onírico se termine de fusionar con el mundo real y ellos sigan en la isla.
• El juego consiste en la exploración de un mapa hexagonal que se generaría tirando en tablas, mientras los pjs lo exploran (esto podría cambiar a futuro).
• El juego está levemente influenciado por el OSR, especialmente por Electric Bastionland: pocos stats, sin modificadores en tiradas, sin tiradas de ataque, directamente de daño. También, el uso de tablas para generar contenido.
• Los jugadores van a generar sus propias pesadillas en escenas freeform similares a Fiasco. De esas pesadillas surge material que debe ser incorporado en el juego.
• Uno de los stats, Ingenio, permite a los jugadores proponer soluciones creativas a los problemas, y luego testear su efectividad. Sin embargo, este stat puede subir o bajar, según los demás jugadores consideren o no apropiado el plan desarrollado.
• Los personajes irán ganando poderes conforme vayan pasando los días, influenciados por Jojo Bizarre Adventures. Los poderes están deliberadamente incompletos y exigen al grupo desarrollar su funcionamiento conforme los usan, utilizando las mecánicas de Ingenio.

Por último, los Fenómenos Oníricos, la mecánica que más me interesa testear para este juego:

Los fenómenos oníricos son horrores del mundo de los sueños que habitan el límite entre la realidad y el mundo onírico. Por esto, hasta que no atacan, estos horrores tienen asignada una posibilidad de existencia, en la forma de un número entre 1 y 5 (1 posibilidad en 6 de aparecer, 2, 3, etc.), ya que se tira con 1d6. El GM describe estos horrores como si fueran reales, pero hasta que no tire el 1d6, los monstruos pueden existir como no existir. El GM esperará a que el superviviente ataque al horror, o a que el horror esté en la posición óptima para atacar, antes de tirar y corroborar si existen o no. Lo mismo podría ocurrir que el superviviente ataque algo que resultó ser una roca, o un arbusto, o bien que el horror ataque a un pj desprevenido.

• Reaccionar contra horrores aumenta la paranoia del superviviente (a explicar en otro post, pero es un efecto negativo a la larga).
• Por lo menos por ahora, los jugadores conocen la posibilidad de existencia de un horror, así que pueden especular con tomarla o no en serio.

Eso es todo por hoy. Aprecio cualquier comentario o pregunta. Mañana o el jueves habrá nuevo microrrelato

La Gaceta de Bastion I, Bastion gazette I

Éste es mi intento de salirme de escribir teoría y orientarme a algo más práctico, así que se me ocurrió empezar con material que de todas formas estoy creando para mi campaña de Electric Bastionland. Si no saben de este juego, les dejo la página en drivethru con reseñas, y el blog del autor. Algún día puede que me siente y escriba una reseña más personal.

If you're English speakers, click here to show the translated version and hide the Spanish one.

Everyone is desperate for guidance and order in Bastionland, and thus they turn to its many newspapers, journals and radios. Use this table (and the ones to come) to make up content for media, in whatever form it is consumed. In this opportunity, the table generates the scandal of the week, but there are a few more tables on the way.
If you don't know about Electric Bastionland, check drivethru for reviews, or here for its author's blog.

The Celebrity and the Scandal

Roll 2d20	Who?	What they did/What happened to them?
1	The new minister of Identity	Got lost in the urban labyrinth, and there's a reward for any information about them
2	The Nameless Elephantine Deacon	Was found dead in their home, with an unintellegible farewell letter
3	The vaudeville star Miranda Saturn	Shows us EVERYTHING, after their recent body trasplant
4	The war toys' manufacturer Andromacus	Has fled Bastion, after being exposed as a traitor and thief by their colleagues
5	Famous elbow model, Cerezo	Calls brave and desperate adventurers alike, in seek of easy riches and misfortune
6	Ruby union leader, Scarnio	Applied as a local candidate, receiving death threats as a consequence
7	Seeked forgery burglar, Noto	Was threatened to kill by *roll*
8	Orphanage inspector, Raccusa	Might be linked to pie smuggling, according to undercover informants
9	Condestable Remina, along with her court	Their daughter was born recently, and she tells us about her first proyects
10	Famous still life un-painter, Sigur	Was found, no memory nor identity, in the Scarlet Zone
11	Ze ontológique transformist, Sonja Dazeinja	Got divorced, amidst great scandal and fireworks
12	The conquerer urbanist, Ptolemo	Has yet to return from their dreamed holidays in exotic tourist center X-AE-23
13	Emeritus Professor of the Chromatic University, Scarletine	Was engulfed by fans and haters, while leaving the theater
14	Puddle king, Fonso II	Their economic and spiritual property got confiscated, due to a debt with local casino
15	Rising gestural dancer, Samsamoro	Has put a prize for the left hand of *roll*
16	Young fictional real estate entrepreneur, Igor Boris Trasevich	Released their new parfum
17	Neighbourhood leaderless, purposeless committee	Was seen with *roll*. A possible affair?
18	Subliminal anarchist, Dato, if truly him	Lost it all in a wager, and is desperate
19	Emperoress from Somewhere Far Away, Njaska	Tells us about their difficult recovery from addiction, and newfound faith
20	Memory sculptor, Sotolongo	Writes to us from their pacific spiritual retreat in the countryside

En el caos indominable que es Bastion, todos están desesperados por encontrar un faro que ordene sus rutinas y que les dicte la verdad, y para eso recurren a periódicos, revistas y programas de radio. Pueden usar las tablas de esta serie de artículos para generar contenido mediático.

El famoso y el escándalo

Tira 2d20	Quién?	Qué hizo/qué le pasó?
1	El nuevo ministro de Identidad	Se perdió en los laberintos urbanizados, y hay recompensa por información sobre su paradero
2	El diácono elefantino Sin Nombre	Fue hallado muerto en su casa, con una carta de despedida
3	La estrella de vaudevil Miranda Saturno	Nos muestra todo, tras su reciente trasplante de cuerpo
4	El fabricante de juguetes bélicos Andrómaco	Huyó de Bastion, tras ser denunciado como traidor y ladrón por sus pares
5	El famoso modelo de codos, Cerezo	Convoca a valientes y desesperados en busca de riqueza fácil e infortunios
6	La dirigente del sindicato del rubí, Scarnio	Declaró postularse como candidato, y recibió amenazas de muerte
7	El buscado ladrón de falsificaciones, Noto	Fue amenazado de muerte por *tirar*
8	La inspectora de orfanatos, Raccusa	Tendría vínculos con el contrabando ilegal de pasteles, según informantes encubiertos
9	La condestable Rémina, y todo su séquito	Acaba de tener una hija, quien nos cuenta de sus primeros proyectos
10	El célebre des-pintor de naturaleza muerta, Sigur	Fue encontrado sin memoria ni identidad, en la Zona Escarlata
11	Le transformista ontológique, Sonja Dazeinja	Se divorció con gran estruendo y fuegos artificiales
12	El urbanista anexionador, Ptolemo	Todavía no vuelve de sus vacaciones en el parador exótico X-AE-23
13	La profesora emérita de la Universidad Cromática, Escarlatina	Fue devorado por fans y detractores, a la salida del teatro
14	El rey del charco, Fonso II	Sus propiedades físicas y espirituales fueron confiscadas por una deuda por el casino
15	El bailarín gestual en ascenso, Samsamoro	Puso un precio a la mano izquierda de *tirar*
16	El joven emprendedor en bienes inmuebles ficcionales, Igor Boris Trasevich	Sacó su propio perfume
17	La asamblea vecinal sin líder ni propósito	Fue visto con *tirar*.¿Posible romance?
18	El anarquista subliminal, Dato, si es que es él	Perdió todo en una apuesta, y está desesperado
19	Le emperoratriz de Algún Lugar Lejano, Njaska	Nos cuenta sobre la difícil recuperación de su adicción
20	El escultor de recuerdos, Sotolongo	Nos escribe desde su pacífico retiro espiritual en la campiña

Para despedirme, un tema de Belvury Poly, el proyecto de uno de los fundadores de Ghost Box Records, discográfica bastante recomendada. De vuelta, no quiero arriesgarme a decir qué género es esto, pero me recuerda a los 70s y al rock progresivo sin lo estridente. ¿Tal vez más cercano al krautrock? Como sea, me pareció apropiado para el estilo de este juego.

Como siempre, no se olviden de comentar o compartir el post si les interesa. Hasta la próxima!