LANCER One-Shot Module Jam

[onyx fractal]

Oh absolutely

[hollow turtle]

White stands out better but for the overall visual look black is better

[idle cedar]

i kinda don't like how the title looks almost centered but not quite

[fierce sedge]

This is something I've noticed some authors like, such as for mothership modules, and it tends to assume certain screen brightness or capacity for contrast; things an ereader or a dim lighting don't allow.

[idle cedar]

and like, it's not even trying to be centered, right? it just happens to be there

[onyx fractal]

It looks better in context of the rest of the book. Basically: this is a 4-column grid layout, where the main body text covers 3 columns and one columns acts as a sidebar. The Header is over the main boxt text

[hollow turtle]

Big fan of the little sidebar GM tips

[hollow turtle]

The formatting really makes them stand out like the author is popping in to say ‘here’s a tip!’ Without being overwhelming

[fierce sedge]

Just wanted to see what black looked like with the other brown background.

[hollow turtle]

It’s gotta be a no from me, though I understand it’s just a quick a dirty thing

[onyx fractal]

If I go with a black color I'd definitely go with a lighter background

[hollow turtle]

Contrast between the black and ‘gold’ is off

[onyx fractal]

And thanks! I went through several designs on these before I settled on something I felt fit well within the text and flowed visually

[hollow turtle]

My Graphic Designer bones reject this color combo XD

[onyx fractal]

I could go with an entirely different color. I tried to pull a representative color from my cover image and basically mess with the luminance

[hollow turtle]

Oh the lighter gold works fine

[onyx fractal]

Going for a sort of sandy/desert tan, though gold is also a good callout

Since the setting is under a "gold rush" scenario

[hollow turtle]

It’s got good contrast without being overwhelming, the black on the darker tan just is not a vibe

[onyx fractal]

So you prefer black on the ligher color then, option 1️⃣

[hollow turtle]

Yep! It’s what I voted for

[onyx fractal]

Cool. I'll probably keep both options for now and send it to my copyeditor to see what he says once it's ready to go

Also I think I have color fatigue at this point, need fresh eyes

[hollow turtle]

The second white on darker feels like it fits more into Lancer formatting

Because Lancer loves to put white text on colored backgrounds

[onyx fractal]

Heh

I haven't been going out of my way to mimic Lancer formatting but I suppose it's a happy accident

[hollow turtle]

But I personally don’t think the white text is doing much for this layout

[onyx fractal]

Fair enough! Appreciate the feedback

[hollow turtle]

Lancer formatting is honestly iconic but it definitely takes a careful eye to pull it off

And time

[onyx fractal]

There are some things I like about it and don't like about it. I just wanted to try something different

[hollow turtle]

Time as a factor will always get ya

I am a big fan of seeing different designs around for Lancer stuff!

Idk if anyone else feels pressured to copy Lancer formatting but sometimes it feels like it’s just expected

Of course we have a lot of good resources to help that along, but still

[onyx fractal]

Unsurprisingly, I've been very influenced by OSR/NSR information design (and game design) over the last couple years, so I wanted to see what that looked like in Lancer. Like, I appreciate a lot of what Stolen Crown pulled off from a graphic design perspective

[hollow turtle]

It’s a pressure none the less

[fossil ice]

I think she was at 18-20 IIRC, but I kept bullying her PC with hackers and didn’t even bother with physical attackers so she made some adjustments for survivability. Invis + 17 evade is honestly more absurd to deal with as a GM imo.

[onyx fractal]

Following Lancer "trade dress" has the advantage of people already being familiar with the formatting and design conventions

[hollow turtle]

True.

[onyx fractal]

So going off the beaten path definitely presents new challenges for a designer when communicating to that segment of readers

And I expect a few people may discard adventures that don't follow that trade dress out of hand

/shrug

[hollow turtle]

Also true

[onyx fractal]

I'm just tryna make a thing I think is cool

It's been very fun so far, and educational

[hollow turtle]

I’m definitely much more likely to try and figure out a new third party mech if it follows The Format than something else

[onyx fractal]

Heh, I'm avoiding that problem by not including any new third party mechs :P

[hollow turtle]

But I am also a Graphic Designer who enjoys layout stuff! So my ability to make something readable is probably above that of most people

It colors my perception of stuff gotta remember that

[onyx fractal]

Yeah, that's where I've definitely appreciated this article lately. Making something you think is cool is the point. Do as good a job as you want, don't worry about achieving "professional" standards https://seedlinggames.com/blogging/discourse/what_is_a_zine.html

[hollow turtle]

One day I will participate in a zine

One day

[onyx fractal]

One might argue that you just did

[hollow turtle]

Mayhaps

[onyx fractal]

It would be gatekeeping of me to suggest you didn't :P

[hollow turtle]

I do occasionally get into the literal side of things. This Jam was never called a Zine ergo Idid not participate in one even if it fits the definition

[onyx fractal]

Heh fair

I personally have been approaching my project with big zine energy

To the point that I would love to make a lulu printing once it's done

[hollow turtle]

I’m honestly considering make an IRL print poster of my cover

[onyx fractal]

And in fairness, I don't think the idea of a zine has a lot of mindspace in the Lancer scene

Even if I wish it did :P

[hollow turtle]

I’ve read your article and seen a few and still what a zine is eludes proper understanding

For me at least

They’ve always come across a ‘fandom things that are online, fan made and I always see them announced, possibly that they were published but never where to find them’

[onyx fractal]

To me, a zine is just a homemade book

very low bar to clear

[hollow turtle]

The CAIN one I saw in #the-gallery a few days ago is probably the very first one I’ve ever laid eyes on as a finished product

[onyx fractal]

Usually self-published, made by a very small number of people

Like, when went to GenCon this year, my goal was to buy a shameful number of zines

[hollow turtle]

And not just ‘hey I made this for a zine’ post on deviantart or blusky

[onyx fractal]

Sadly, Exalted Funeral wasn't present

But just browsing stuff on here is rad as hell https://www.exaltedfuneral.com/

Like, look at this stuff https://www.exaltedfuneral.com/products/b-e-a-n-s-r-p-g

So out there

I love it

[sweet gale]

I have to tell myself that I gotta stop shrinking the map as I design it because it's gotta accommodate a size 4 noodle

[honest pawn]

I feel the map design woes

I've fluctuated from "rectangle" to "square" to "21x21 including a 3-width IZ margin" to "20x20 including 2-width IZ margin" and now I'm questioning my inclusion of Goliath, my favorite defender

[hollow turtle]

Map design do be doing things

I will admit my map design for Bleed the Heart was mostly for Size 3s and smaller, if theres a Size 4 Barb on the map idk how BtH would work with it, but I've always been a 'make a gridless map and adjust to desired size' type so

GMs could always scale the grid size to what works for them

(least on my own stuff,)

[onyx fractal]

I admit that I didn't really spend much time on my map. I might end up making a few different versions of the map since combat could happen in like six different locations, but I also don't want to imply that the GM has to prep all those contingencies. Would love to have a map with fairly generic visuals that the GM could flavor as-needed

Then again, I am also mister "lower your standards" when it comes to map making

Hurl 10 or 15 d4's onto a chessex hex mat -- wherever a die lands, place an obstruction there the size of the die value

done

Or, keeping in Lancer parlance, hurl D6s:

1-3: Size 1
4-5: Size 2
6: Size 3

[hollow turtle]

I do enjoy myself some randomly generated maps

[slow topaz]

That's so horrifyingly effective I need to try it at some point.

[onyx fractal]

lol me too. just made it up

[sweet gale]

I've gone from a rectangle to a "circle" to a "cliff"

Purple is PDZ/OZ. Orange is the lower edge of the map where the enemies come from/a dropoff into The Bad Place.

[idle cedar]

coming this summer, lancer zine jam
just make anything remotely lancer related, but must look like it was scanned in

[weak nacelle]

Mapwise, I started out with 'just the village from the Magnificent 7', and then started adding a giant dragon (or maybe primordial goat? Who's to say) skeleton

And then moving stuff around during playresting

Live fire tests are the best way to figure out funnels/sidelines imo

[onyx fractal]

Update

Best map ever? No

Would I play on that map? Hell yeah

[charred crow]

that's awesome, what are those pieces you're using for terrain?

[onyx fractal]

The Upgrade Factory on Etsy (also #1280938291889176637)

[honest pawn]

I'd be "hell yeah let's go" for the bottom right 2x2

looks like 18 dice on 18x18 would be good for my density feels

[onyx fractal]

This is a 30x27 map for context

My default IRL play size

[honest pawn]

you know me and my small map enjoyer status lol

[onyx fractal]

lol

[honest pawn]

regardless, I dig it, and the method looks sound

[onyx fractal]

Sound? Maybe. Good enough? I think so

All you need is good enough

I dropped the dice in the center of the map from about 1ft above

That took what, 10 minutes? Including hauling my terrain box downstairs and back upstairs

About the length of time of a bio break

[honest pawn]

perfect for that moment at the table of "okay you're getting ready to scrap, let's take a bio break while I setup"

[onyx fractal]

yup

[idle shale]

If you’re gonna put a lot of thought into it, my personal handy dandy map tip is to think about it like a river delta. Tis all about how the PCs and NPCs flow from deployment to different zones 😌

Im a sleeper nerd on this matter of design though I think. One tangible mark I still feel from my game dev courses

[honest pawn]

Assets from Santy's RPG Conundrum, feeling good about this map

[onyx fractal]

Found some WAY better hex map assets...

https://dgbaumgart.itch.io/hex-and-tile-terrain-sample-set

[left mirage]

typing up the last of my "how to run" notes now, I figured out this could be run as a kind of tournament module with multiple groups assaulting the ship at the same time? Are there any tournament-style or multi-group modules out there?

[onyx fractal]

Not that I know of! Make the first one!

[left mirage]

well shit

[honest pawn]

Fuck yeah do it

[undone yarrow]

Got my first every donation on a piece of writing for Trawl the Deep today. Thankyou guys so much for the views and encouragement!

[honest pawn]

Hell yeah!! Happy for you 🥳

[spare jolt]

Congrats!

[idle cedar]

first donation just hits different

[tepid pecan]

true

[onyx fractal]

Getting reeeal damn close to a v0.9. Almost ready to submit this for copyediting

[split flame]

I will echo the masses, hell yes. Adventurer's League epics is one of the best reasons to play DND lol

[sweet gale]

I think I've finally finished the NPC, combat sitrep, and narrative segment (playtest results pending).

How's a freak with only 3 default traits for functionality and 15 optionals sound

[honest pawn]

3 default traits sounds like a dream

[sweet gale]

If memory serves, they are

• Can only be deployed underwater+EVA
• Even though it's biological, you can hack this fish. The energy damage is AP and things that trigger when going over heat cap trigger when structuring it instead.
• Trait that constrains how many optionals it can take at once (up to 3 +1/tier currently)

May increase it to 4 baseline because all 3 of its weapons are optionals

Currently codenamed "Chomp," "Smack," and "Zap."

[weak nacelle]

what's the heat cap of a fish?

[slow topaz]

Grilled?

[sweet gale]

Zero. Hence the "if a feature would trigger when exceeding a target's heat cap, it triggers when the converted damage results in structure damage instead"

This allows a chomolungma to system crusher the fish

[weak nacelle]

Last Argument of Kings: Well Done

(though I guess that actually wouldn't work?)

[sweet gale]

Last Argument doesn't work, no.

[fierce sedge]

Heat being AP is very neat.

Considering that most hostile sources of heat tend to inflict it in increments of 2, meaning that any armour at all severely mitigates it at best.

[sweet gale]

It was a concession to bump the HP up a little too

||I want it to be able to survive a max damage TCB hit without losing a structure when it's an ultra||

[fierce sedge]

Mm that's fair, ||I hadn't quite considered how TCB probably sets a pretty clear damage threshold now for enemies to pair up against.||

Might have to take that into account myself with some hp balancing for other enemies, mainly the Berserker in a rehash of it.

[sweet gale]

My last playtest reminded me that it can be taken at LL0 and vascilates wildly between "player loses their turn" and "trivializes an NPC"

[weak nacelle]

Tbf, LL0 in general is a series of coinflips that occasionally produce explosions

[fierce sedge]

Between ease of access and popularity across tiers, I do understand why it would be something worth taking into account.

[onyx fractal]

Man. I really want to add Limitless to my Veteran Scourer when running the module for higher level play. Someone hold me back

The issue I'm facing is that I don't want to add too many extra turns or too many defensive features to my NPCs because those are all things that make combat take longer, so that means increasing difficulty by adding more offensive features, which I worry could increase variance and turn into rocket tag despite the players possibly having more resources available to them

[honest pawn]

Add limitless but change Overcharge to reroll attacks/checks/saves instead of make an extra action

Even as like, a one-shot streamlining rule

[onyx fractal]

I'm going out of my way to not change RAW rules for this

Just to keep things simpler

[honest pawn]

Fair enough, then don’t add limitless

Extra flex actions is never worth it when time is on the line

[onyx fractal]

I think I've been eyeing features that mimic extra turns, which is why I was looking at Limitless to begin with

Like Moving Target for Sniper

[honest pawn]

Moving Target

[onyx fractal]

lol why that emoji

Am I behind on the NPC meta

[honest pawn]

I just don’t like it, it’s a huge swing for Snipers who suffer hard without it

Makes me wanna brew better action compression options

[onyx fractal]

I'm increasingly of the belief that Sniper's Mark is a debuff

To the Sniper

It sounds scary but surprisingly often the base damage without the Mark can do more than 1 structure

so Sniper's Mark makes you lose a turn to do less damage

[weak nacelle]

Imo a big balancing factor can also be tactics

Like, I had to experiment a bit because my sitrep has like... a fuckton of npcs in it, and giving different types of npcs different, not necessarily advantageous tactics/behaviours can go a long way to dialing in encounters imo

[onyx fractal]

I'm kind of yoloing my "at higher LL" recommendations. I did one LL3 playtest and it was okay, all I learned was that I needed to make it harder and I definitely forgot a few super important features

This is the first time I don't feel terrified about adding Supreme Melee to a melee-based character though

[onyx fractal]

in my defense it had been like a year since i last run Lancer

[onyx fractal]

Oh my god I think I'm ready to send for editing

So close to done

Gonna sit on it for a bit

[sweet gale]

By structure count, my sitrep seems sane.

But then I look at effective HP totals because all the NPCs are RPV and I'm

[fierce sedge]

Easy, give them all +5 armour instead of health.

How much of a problem a tanky opfor is I feel is proportional to the need to headbutt them to win the scene.

My anecdotal example I invoke here is the Ultra Aegis I've ran for a while now, who cumulatively over the course of several one-shots hasn't even taken one point of structure damage I suspect.

Which on its own can sound horrifying to some, but that disregards whether or not dealing damage to the Aegis was conducive to winning. Hint; it wasn't. You just needed to distract them.

[sweet gale]

At the moment it's:

||```Holdout Sitrep. All Core Book NPCs are RPV+Spacer. All scouts have System Flayer.

3p: U. Leviathan, Engineer, Scourer, G. Scout
Reserves: 2x Archer, Scourer, 3x G. Scouts

4p: +Archer
Reserves: +Scourer, +Engineer, +2x G. Scouts

5p: +Commander on U. Leviathan (no commander optionals).
Reserves: +Scourer, +Archer, +2 G. Scouts```||

205 eHP, 270 eHP, and 335eHP respectively

[fierce sedge]

Oh lol ||I was debating RPV archers for a replacement for a Shadow of the Wolf combat, so fun to see the same concept here. Superior Sentinel helps make them a tad bit more interesting than most other NPCs.||

It is a tanky opfor so I see where your concern comes from, but since this is for a oneshot that's not inherently a problem.

Especially since they remain weak to tech.

[sweet gale]

I have a custom template already made that gives them the downsides of RPV and movement from spacer without the HP boost, but I've been thinking about cutting it because the design is super parasitic

[fierce sedge]

For what it's worth there is design space for a template that just makes NPCs worse, whilst giving them an EVA on top of it tends to just be the cost of doing business with some encounters.

[sweet gale]

What the custom template does is:

• Immunity to actions that effect the pilot
• Auto-fails all saves when the source is the Leviathan
• Isn't slowed underwater, but can't fly
• Are all instantly destroyed when the Leviathan is destroyed

Flavorful, but parasitic as hell.

Also maybe soft implies that enthralled have to be deployed with a leviathan, but I've explicitly designed the leviathan where it can just be a small, nasty fish to fill out an aquatic opfor

[fierce sedge]

That last one especially sounds like something which can be baked into the map instead.

[sweet gale]

Yeah. That can very much just be a thing I include in the notes about the combat, though leaving it in the template made the party chomolungma feel super cool

"Alternate wincon! Kill the fish!"

I could also just go "RPV Spacer, but remove bonus HP"

It brings the eHP down into a more reasonable range

[fierce sedge]

That ought to work, or you can just give them the tech vulnerability/no pilot stuff and scrap RPV altogether. Though I think RPV Spacer may be better.

The usual conundrum of how to communicate things best, and what to leave out.

[sweet gale]

It's certainly more elegant since it just uses core stuff instead of making a whole new template

Though not spelling out that beating the fish as an alternate wincon could be fodder for not-statblock scan info

[weak nacelle]

The 4-5 Player variant of my Sitrep is only|| 228|| hp at minimum, you're fine 😛

[sweet gale]

My 4p is 40 more than that

[weak nacelle]

I'm pretty sure it's way less activations though

[sweet gale]

Short of late-stage extractions, I try to keep activations tame

[weak nacelle]

the villain in the first magnificient 7 film explicitly said his gang is him and forty guys, what was I supposed to do?

[idle cedar]

Idk if it's so much parasitic as like, it being effectively a map effect

like sure you can't really mix and match it outside of this one composition
but also that doesn't make the metagame unhealthy or anything like that, which is a problem with parasitic effects in games like mtg

[charred crow]

parasitism isn't especially relevant in an inherently-curated game

[idle cedar]

yeah it's an issue when it makes other strategies unviable due to its power level and the deck is not designed to work with other cards well
and on that note, you don't even have to give this template to everyone! you can mix and match other templates

[charred crow]

the need for deck/format diversity isn't present, Lancer has enough NPC content that you don't need to worry about new stuff having a limited space, and this is inherently material for a one-shot so the social contract is kinda that all this stuff doesn't need to be reusable

[sweet gale]

I may stick with keeping enthralled around then

They become more capable of offense, but less durable with it, and have a secondary effect of trying to pull this highly range-based opfor into range with the hopes that they get caught in the boss's big AoEs

[hollow turtle]

This jam and all its cool submissions really making me go 'what if I made another one shot but like, specifically broke all the Lancer format rules?

[sweet gale]

I'm having it so a party can hack into a fish and forcing movement onto your allies is a key gameplay element. If there was any time to get silly with the system, it seems like now

[hollow turtle]

Honestly just got struck with An Idea that sounds cool but is gonna take some work to get across and put mechanics down for

[honest pawn]

Hell yeah, getting some fresh layout takes

[onyx fractal]

yusss

I love all the wild takes

Ugh laying this out properly for print is gonna be a pain in the ass

[rigid grail]

Got my party's sprites all made for A Wake Writ in Void!

[nova umbra]

That empakaai

[rigid grail]

I'm honestly really proud of how the colors on that one came out, I mayyy tweak the collar area or the main body of the termano-unguis later though

[fossil ice]

Ooooo that’s such a great palette

[rigid grail]

The pilot for it is Sparri so the player basically recommended just lifting the Atlas palette

[left mirage]

gonna ask for feedback on this later today, certainly going to need it 😆

I'll host the lancer tourney if it's well received

[slow topaz]

That's a rad party

[sweet gale]

I hope a GM pulls this off someday

[hollow turtle]

They will

[idle cedar]

+accuracy to stunned is so rude (positive)

[sweet gale]

It has difficulty by default

[idle cedar]

oh i see

[sweet gale]

So it only swings at +1 accuracy against stunned targets swinging at neutral was a previous version

[honest pawn]

The one shot is real: https://valkyrion.itch.io/kill-the-noise

Needs a playtest, but it's PWYW in early access until that happens

cc @final maple since this is what I mentioned in #gm-corner

[onyx fractal]

Yoooooooooo

Congrats!

[honest pawn]

amazed at how much I was able to squeeze into a single US Letter Trifold

[onyx fractal]

It's very impressive

And revelatory

[honest pawn]

Thank you! 😄

[onyx fractal]

Hooray for condensed fonts

I'm going to be sad if I have to move on from Barlow

I like it a lot

[honest pawn]

Barlow Condensed my beloved

[sweet gale]

I think I'm at the "pencils down" stage of making this thing

[rigid grail]

Workshopping a map for Wake Writ in Void based on a czepeku scifi map, gonna just ask PCs to ignore the biodome forest, but does this generally match the intended sitrep?

Gonna mark the blue stripes as ramps, the lower membrane as a negative height and place a few objects for the vertebrae

[sweet gale]

If it's a gauntlet, I may set the OZ/EDZ back a bit

Because atm it seems like some builds could zip right into that thing on turn 1

[onyx fractal]

I'm officially at the "pixel bitching over my cover" stage

I need to be "pencils down" lol

I'm going to send it to my editor tomorrow I think

I'm just second-guessing every tiny thing into the floor now

Like my brain is trawling the depths for mistakes to fix

[sweet gale]

To clarify I'm pencils down on the NPC. I had the urge to mess with what is far and away my favorite ability, but I kept it simple

[onyx fractal]

I feel like I'm a nearly-empty bottle of shampoo, at the point where you squeeze it over and over and it just wheezes as very little comes out

[sweet gale]

I still gotta

1. make the map
2. write a bunch of shit
3. make some friendly infographics about rules interactions
4. Make the player-facing LCP
5. [optional] make sprites

[rigid grail]

oh its a Control mission that I had somehow mistakenly prepped as a Holdout, gonna rework this actually

hmm now I'm actually kinda torn between doing the nice thing (reworking this combat as a Holdout mission because my party coincidentally built for a tower-defense minigame anyways) or doing the proper rules-as-written thing (redoing the map markings as a Control mission, but maybe with one extra concession for the players)

[fossil ice]

This is a super cool map! It’s fairly similar to what I threw together for my test run of it (except much better looking).

I’ll preface by saying we do have an interest in putting out a battle map for this but we didn’t find the time for it in the jam and we needed to take a few days off from staring at the damn thing, lol. From my experience running it, I think the big things are that:

1. you don’t want those ramps to be too narrow (should accommodate at least a s3 getting up there), although it helps that you’re putting your deploy zones on the upper level, and
2. If you keep it a Control SitRep, you’ll want to be sure the CZs aren’t too far apart from each other or from the deploy zones. I definitely found that I placed my CZs too far apart and neither the NPCs nor the PCs could try to make a move on one without spending a whole turn boosting there lol. Especially bad for those slower Demolishers.

I do like splitting the control zones across the upper and lower levels since it gives sort of a dynamic battlefield, but I could also see putting them on the upper levels and creating a scenario where characters are getting American-gladiator-ed off the zones.

I can definitely see the idea of it being a Gauntlet too! It doesn’t take a ton to re-flavor it. Obviously, enemy tactics change a bit so you may need to rethink a little bit. Edit: I saw you also thinking about Holdout, which would definitely suit the Breacher Painmaker/Priest wombo-combo and the Cataphract charge!

[honest pawn]

Rereading my v0.9 and realized I forgot to put the initial opfor into the combat 🤦 EDIT: AND the pc deployment rules 🤦 🤦

This is what editing is for folks, lol

[onyx fractal]

Oh boy

Do you have room?

[honest pawn]

I’m gonna have to make room

I might wait until the playtest is done though, since that may inform what can be cut

[onyx fractal]

True

Barlow giga condensed

[honest pawn]

I can slightly shrink the map and reduce the spacing slightly between the bullet points

And/or maybe the spacing between everything else on that panel

That and simply consolidating the paragraphs

It’s gonna be a tight fit though lol

[sweet gale]

I've gotten brainworms to make a ransom note meme to promo my module once it's finished.

"Have you ever been playing Lancer and thought 'If only I had a reason to grapple or even possibly ram my squadmates'? What about 'I wish RA would let me perform acts of electronic warfare against an unreasonably large fish'? No? That's normal, but have you considered trying-"

[honest pawn]

I suppose I’ll poll here first: Anyone interested in helping playtest my one-shot next Wednesday evening, Eastern Time? 😄

I’ll be posting the app form in #lancer-game-recruiting soon, but folks here will get priority seating

[onyx fractal]

Ooh, I'm uncharacteristically available, depending on time

[honest pawn]

6 or 7pm ET?

[onyx fractal]

Ok. 7pm would be easier for me

I have a hype track in mind already

[honest pawn]

That makes 2 folks so far, nice

[slow topaz]

You'll only be getting snores from me at that time (CET here) 😄

[honest pawn]

Rest in peace

[buoyant snow]

should I add another encounter to my oneshot? We only have one, and its meant to be a low level one (ll0 to ll1), but we only have 1 encounter

[charred crow]

1 encounter is going to take up most of your session time

[honest pawn]

Do you expect to be able to run both encounters in a single session, along with the rest of the one shot?

If not, my vote is “don’t”

One shots are not necessarily “one mission”

You are not obligated to make it so

Treating it like “one job in a series of jobs” could work well

[buoyant snow]

with our playtest the setup, scenario description, light roleplay and battle (3-4 or so rounds if I count the first round which was a bit of an intro) that took us 4 hours

[honest pawn]

Sounds like a complete one shot then

[charred crow]

I would consider adding a 2nd encounter if:

• That encounter isn't mech combat. I think a lot of folks are doing something akin to this (Valk and myself at least)
• One of the encounters is short / you have tools to bleed one encounter into the other (Acatalepsy did this)

[onyx fractal]

Have you done any playtesting to see how long it takes as-is?

[buoyant snow]

at a minimun it is 3 rounds, or 4

once

[honest pawn]

Trust the playtest

[buoyant snow]

and it was with a completely new player and 2 veterans

[idle cedar]

you could make the one combat harder instead of having two easy sitreps to breeze through

[buoyant snow]

one one of us got structured, and it was due to a sniper, so...idk

[charred crow]

sounds like it's around the right point imo

it's easier as a GM to add stuff than take away, so having published content be easy/fast is preferable

[honest pawn]

There’s merit for publishing extra stuff as long as it’s modular for easy addition/subtraction, but given that the goal here is a self-contained one-shot, I think you can just run what you have playtested

[rigid grail]

Oh yeah again, its just some czepeku assets for a bioship thing repurposed (their scifi stuff has been great for Lancer, highly recommend)

I do think that I am gonna end up running this first run through as a Holdout just because the party unintentionally built for slow tower defense (we got a barbarossa, a drake, and an iskander notably, with some big sal LLs mixed in), and while I could punish them for that with a more movement-focused challenge, I do think that'd just result in combat turning too slow to fit into a oneshot. I do also think the enemy selection is pretty perfect for this group, with the breachers and demolishers running up against the walls the party throws down, Blood & Thunder probably going after the party Empakaii and the mourning cloak being able to go on priest assassination duty.

For future runs I'll most likely run it as intended with a control mission, esp if there's an official map set up for it all by then! I tend to keep a few oneshot adventures on deck for "Well the usual game won't work for today but I still have most of a party", and this is absolutely perfect for that sort of day.

[fossil ice]

Nice! That sounds like a well thought-out modification to the combat. I look forward to hearing how it plays!

[buoyant snow]

im trying to format our document in google docs and I want to add in some red lines and lancer esque page art and design. You know the red things near where the page numbers are? Something that happens on every page independent of the text and actual images there? What do you call that?

[onyx fractal]

A footer

[buoyant snow]

yeah somehing like that

[onyx fractal]

I'll defer to @honest pawn on that since he made the lancer format doc

[buoyant snow]

I wanna add that red triangle that is on the footers around the page number

[onyx fractal]

If you can spare $5, this is very worthwhile if you don't want to have to mess with layout that much https://valkyrion.itch.io/lancer-rpg-template

[nova umbra]

I can 100% vouch for how this template works in GDocs, I was very happy with the results

The Lancer icons font doesn’t translate directly in GDocs but that’s about the only difference in functionality from Word that I noticed

[onyx fractal]

valk wins the jam by being the first person reviewed by the legendary pinpanar9

(For those not in the know, this dude rolls around itch and reviews tons of RPG modules five stars with the word "good")

(Occasionally he gives the legendary review of "great")

[sweet gale]

I shall endeavor to receive a great from him

[buoyant snow]

hey, could I ask for some advice? We are making an enemy template named Leviathan Tentacle. It is supposed to represent a tendril of the Leviathan. So far we have Tier 1 stats, but dont know what to do for tier 2 and 3

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1z2rKBW_F7lU6OTFMEB2yoYRIwUNITxVYwYTlH82L4i0/edit?usp=sharing

[honest pawn]

So #homebrew-design may have a better idea, but I’ll note this:

1. if you don’t bump EVA by at least 2 per tier, it’s effectively becoming easier to hit and losing hp. Same thing for EDEF though I scale that more slowly at like 1/tier for average joes
2. Save target should go up by at least 2 for the same reason, grit scaling
3. Speed and Sensors usually don’t need changed. Imo, neither do Armor nor Heatcap, but that’s my preference
4. (I should’ve led with this) Look at which NPC class this is trying to emulate and then loosely model its stats after that. Note whether the NPC you’re modeling after has an easy to use Resistance to all feature or consistent Invisibility, since those effectively double resiliency and may need accounted for in HP if they’re missing from the new NPC

[left mirage]

Asking for advice (I will love you forever) abt Winter Scar for my remix here:
|| If the Rio Grande had time to incorporate a system, what kind of system would it use? Would it prefer an escort slot or an extra wing? Or something else? If the captain/ship had a legacy or any additional traits, what would they be?||

[slow topaz]

I think my GM brain exceeded it's heat cap just now due to PC Web of Creation master bond power. 🔥

[split flame]

Well, it's also possible pinpanar has subbed to Valk and saw the announcement througgh that. Because I got a seperate announcement that Valk's was released from anything else lol.

[charred crow]

||I imagine it would be something for escorts, since they go in expecting a diplomatic mission.||

[sweet gale]

Opinions on this map?

Context:

• LL0, so no chance for barb
• Holdout sitrep
• Players can deploy size 2 obstacles to close chokepoints off to ground units
• Vents can be pried off to turn areas with those labels into dangerous terrain

[idle shale]

Hm, I really like the vents but I don’t think the map layout really sells them

[onyx fractal]

What did you use to make this?

[sweet gale]

Custom terrain colors and labels with THT in Foundry

[sweet gale]

Diagetically, the size 2 things are buildings that are connected to them

[idle shale]

They don’t appear to be in particular nexuses of traffic to the center, is my thinking

[fierce sedge]

Is terrain destruction involved?

[sweet gale]

With the right reserves, it is possible

[idle shale]

Upper left fits great, I can see how people will be moving in here

[idle shale]

Ok hear me out

[fierce sedge]

Based on general drawing of lanes, it overall looks fine though Seeking or Arcing between the six zones will be quite strong.

[sweet gale]

LL0, so really only gotta worry about arcing

[fierce sedge]

You can consider throwing in potential asymmetry, I've got some examples of past maps if you want to see what I mean, but I think it's fine as is.

[fierce sedge]

Mm, and with the NPCs you've mentioned I don't think they'd be a concern either.

[idle shale]

I’m thinking put terrain where I’ve marked on red, creating more direct lines and more specific zones of ingress for your players to read.

[fierce sedge]

IE you don't have an Exotic Rainmaker with teleportation.

[fierce sedge]

If that's the aim I think you can be even more aggressive. The ones you've marked I don't think change the flow a ton other than make it awkward to try to rotate from the top left to the top-centre.

[idle shale]

It limits the possibilities of entry, but it gives the PCs a better idea of where enemies are coming from - and, more importantly, how lines can be drawn from them through the vents

[sweet gale]

I def. agree with connecting that area on the top left

Top right is more negative space/greebling ngl

[idle shale]

Hm yes you’re probably right there. I was hesitant to chunk too much xD

[fierce sedge]

Admittedly I'm also of the opinion that with the map being overall fairly symmetric at a glance, which is fine with the pool in the middle being the focal point, I would be tempted to just throw a huge gash through it.

[sweet gale]

To be fair, there's something that'll be making a gash through the middle

[fierce sedge]

Don't take this as an example to use

But rather how if you want to, you can probably just blow up a big section as the players have the vents for transportation.

[sweet gale]

The vents are dangerous terrain

Not travel

[split flame]

hehehe, you thought they were amongus too

[fierce sedge]

Ah, lol misread in the beginning then

Dunno how, but in that case

[fierce sedge]

Oh I really thought the leviathan would begin in the centre.

[idle shale]

Here’s a question

[sweet gale]

The idea is that players pair with a pried vent and barricades to create hard chokepoints

[idle shale]

How do you envision the leviathan flowing through the map

[split flame]

I thought it'd be funny if they were situational prospector bonuses. But no, dangerous.

If the opfor has little to no size 2 (besides the big big), it seems like they'll mostly be ignored though (The vents), unless they can afford to just tank the damage and not care they'll walk around.

[sweet gale]

It drags players away from the zone while ground troops move into it, leaving it so they can't focus on it entirely, but can't ignore the goobers

[fierce sedge]

Tis why I wondered about map destruction early on, as it read like a map to be destroyed by some large creature.

[idle shale]

Ok, so it’s circling the zone then?

[sweet gale]

Yep. Zips in. Yoinks a player via grapple, zips out, drops 'em at the feet of approaching ground troops, and goes back in

[idle shale]

Oooooh ok so it’s diving in and out

[split flame]

oh no, they're going to be punished by their own choke points lol?

[sweet gale]

Only size 1s. The vents close to the zone are for chomolungmas or the industrious everest/sagarmatha to chuck someone into

[sweet gale]

If they've got EVAs, they can fly over them

[idle shale]

I think… you should go harder. Make the holdout vents all right next to the zone. That way each one explicitly and clearly denies the beast one of say… 4-6 angles of entry

[sweet gale]

The NPCs don't, so they can't

[idle shale]

Or maybe place one in the center. Make it so the PCs can try to kite so it’s strafing runs enter the zone, but watch out! It’s real easy to walk into and you’ve made part of your zone dangerous for you

[fierce sedge]

But to answer the original question, I think the map as it is right now is decent in terms of how it may flow, but due to the density of cover it feels at a glance weirdly symmetrical/homogenic.

Or put another way; I'm not sure the fight plays out meaningfully differently depending on which section of the map one approaches (west, east, south being the three presumed primary direction from OZ).

[sweet gale]

It's starting there because

1. it's an ultra, so it's contesting the zone at the end of R1

2. chomolungma exists and I want them to move out of the zone before they never move for the rest of the combat and just full tech invade for the next six rounds

[fierce sedge]

Oh I'd presume the line of sight breaks would make the 2nd point more difficult.

Unless they just go for the boss I guess.

[sweet gale]

Size 4 fish, yeah

[fierce sedge]

Can't remember, but this fight is underwater so do you have special rules for prone? Since assumedly the fish is swimming, IE flying.

Or is it just not flying and that's not a thing to worry about.

[sweet gale]

The leviathan has a lot of abilities that push people back to ground and then prone them. You're only immune to prone when flying.

I'm also being a little rude and giving it repulsion field.

[fierce sedge]

It's less for the Leviathan knocking folk prone, and more folk trying to knock the Leviathan prone.

[sweet gale]

Unstoppable, thankfully

[fierce sedge]

Mm okay, if so yeah then Chomolungma just hacking them shouldn't be much of an issue.

[fierce sedge]

Oh I wasn't considering them being knocked prone a big problem, and was more asking to make sure that you hadn't missed that it probably couldn't be knocked prone by the players.

[sweet gale]

Maybe doing something like this could break the symmetry, though it feels kinda obvious like

"ah yeah she had it all on a cliff edge and then kinked one of the sides in"

[fierce sedge]

The small edit at the top right does already help at least.

Silly as it may sound I'd consider just flipping the sides of the proposed changes marked in red.

This is not for tactical reasons, but visual

[sweet gale]

It is weighted a little better that way, yeah

[fierce sedge]

Approximation

[fierce sedge]

This is more accurate, but difficult to draw without the reference at hand when drawing

So don't mind the direct locations nor shapes

Just wanted to show that I did mean flip, and not that it should be on both sides.

[sweet gale]

I understood

[onyx fractal]

Well, I've definitely dug myself a hole

I need to make a map that could feasibly be used in like 7 different biomes

[charred crow]

abstract map tiiiiime

[onyx fractal]

Hmm, I think this works well enough believe it or not

[split flame]

Unless the biomes are predefined and radically different I guess you're fine!

But rocks'll do that.

[idle cedar]

sometimes you don't have to go all out and it's just fine

[hollow turtle]

One of my players gifted me with this wisdom while presenting them a slightly off season map:

"This is what theater of the mind is for"

[delicate geode]

Everything on the map is made of crabs.

PROBLEM: SOLVED

[unborn bridge]

TERRAFORMING NEXUS

[weak nacelle]

The same intrusive thoughts that bullied me into participating in this jam told me "hey, you should write a campaign". That was two hours ago. Planning for four books are done now. Brain why

[buoyant snow]

can someone give me an example of how to write a correct attribution for the AI-Free assets pack? Ive seen that around and I wanna use this

[spare jolt]

'Assets were used from the <Name of Asset Pack> by <Name of Creator>. These were use with respect to the <Whatever the name of the licencing agreement they have is>' is generally how I do it.

[buoyant snow]

you see, I have 1 piece of cover art made by comission, and then the map was made by myself in inkarnate. I have the comercial license, so I techincally dont need to say MADE WITH INKARNATE anywhere, though I'd like to mention it

Can I go:

Cover art made by disastrousfeline at https://www.tumblr.com/disastrousfeline, maps made by Oscar Sanchez using Inkarnate.

[idle cedar]

there's a thing you can copy paste on the itch page

for the made by humans thing

[spare jolt]

It's generally good form to credit even if you don't need to.

And yeah, if they're cool with it. I generally reach out to the artist and go 'Hey, so how would you like to be credited'

As maintaining good relations with artists is just smart. XD

[buoyant snow]

Cover art made by disastrousfeline at https://www.tumblr.com/disastrousfeline, maps made by Oscar Sanchez using Inkarnate. This work is AI-Free. It does not include content or media that was AI or Machine Generated. Supporting this work means supporting real people.

Sounds good?

[idle cedar]

i think the ai free one asks people to provide a link back to the itch page as well

but otherwise i think it's good

[honest pawn]

All you need is the CC-BY attribution

So @buoyant snow this is how I did it for Technophobia:

The blue hyperlinks go to the assets page, creator page, and CC-BY 4.0 deed page, respectively

[onyx fractal]

How do you hyperlink in a printed book :(

[honest pawn]

Hahaha fuck

Yeah I don’t know

Usually cc-by is about “do your best” though

[onyx fractal]

This is what I have. The bold text is linked in the PDF

[honest pawn]

Seems reasonable to me

[jolly hornet]

Hey how do I add the content creator role to myself? I think I qualify for that now

[honest pawn]

message an Orange Name or Red Name (curator or mod) and they can hook you up

[fierce sedge]

Yeah what Valk said.

[honest pawn]

Did a test print and holy shit this is real

[onyx fractal]

Hellll yeah

What printer did you use?

[final maple]

Yooooo that prints so nice.

[honest pawn]

HP Envy Pro 6455

Very much just a home printer

[final maple]

I was also surprised and impressed by your absolute dedication to fitting the entire thing on one double-sided page.

[honest pawn]

Cornylius did the same with theirs!

But aw shucks lol 😊

[nova umbra]

Did you end up getting the opfor for the first combat to fit in the existing layout?

[fierce sedge]

Oh this looks great!

[honest pawn]

Yup I got it to fit, I expect to have more edits but this printed version is a little more squeezed. It’ll be my 1.0-alpha until I do my playtest and edits next week

[honest pawn]

And thank you!

[last frigate]

https://fixupx.com/PublicDomainRev/status/1877034753926300102

seems like it could be useful

[idle cedar]

more public domain art 😌

[nova umbra]

Nice, I’m super impressed! Is the updated version on itch or are you waiting until after the playtest?

[honest pawn]

Waiting until after the playtest, should land late next week

[onyx fractal]

I'm starting to wonder if copyediting might be more expensive than I expected. Might skip it

And just read my own shit a trillion times

[slow topaz]

That's why editors are a dying breed. (explains the hole in my heart/wallet)

[onyx fractal]

If this were something I expected to be a big payoff, then maybe. Based on downloads thus far, I have my doubts

I haven't done a big advertising push (and we haven't even done a #lancer-news announcement for the end of the jam), but still

[idle cedar]

ah sorry I've been busy with a move and some other personal life issues
I'll try to push that out soon

[onyx fractal]

I actually appreciate the extra time haha

Still waiting on my 1.0

[honest pawn]

tbh I figured you were waiting for the late submission window to end

[onyx fractal]

Me too

[honest pawn]

like, I'm cool with it to be clear haha

[sweet gale]

Just do what I did

[onyx fractal]

heh

[honest pawn]

self-deprecating jokes aside, I do advocate for presenting one's project with confidence, without self-deprecation

[onyx fractal]

I concur

[slow topaz]

It's something you, or your and your team achieved. Nobody can expect you to do all the jobs a published product usually requires, so yes, be proud of what you created.

[onyx fractal]

Just did yet another reading pass. I think I'm having trouble finding things to change. It definitely feels better with every pass, but the returns are diminishing

Strong possibility this revision is 1.0

Just waiting to hear back from the editor on rates, where I'll make my decision as to whether to pull the trigger on that

[honest pawn]

alrighty, I've spent enough time today polishing the pamphlet, it's time to set the edits aside and wait for playtest data to roll in

[split flame]

@sweet gale also the fact that published books still have errors, at least books like rpgs. Maybe novels see less minor editing mistakes, since that's their entire deal. But having an editor or copy//edit doesn't preclude errors.

i.e. I wouldn't really call it obvious. Plus at a small enough document size it's pretty easy to catch all your own mistakes

Honestly the best thing for anyone is just having people who purchase content offer up minor mistakes and keeping a list to fix at some point.

Unless you are pushing out single drafts with no looking over it yourself, then it might be obvious no one did editing lol

Like doing a one-stroke, no lifting drawing challenge or something.

[left mirage]

If anyone is looking to get a last minute submission/credit in, I have a few last edits to make on my v.8 before release but won't have time to finish them over the weekend. It's small stuff like selecting optionals, fleshing out scene/npc descriptions

Shoot me a DM tonight or tomorrow!

[left mirage]

@idle cedar what's the extended deadline again?

[idle cedar]

I don't have the date off my head but it's 1 month after original deadline

[left mirage]

AHA ty ty!

[onyx fractal]

Decided to send the module off for copyediting after all. Probably not financially the best decision, but helpful for me to better understand the usefulness of copyediting in the future. Hard to know if I'm any good at self-editing without a copyeditor to tell me

[honest pawn]

I’ll probably ask you about your experience in that process later haha, all I’ve done is self-edits even when I arguably should’ve looked for a copyeditor

[onyx fractal]

Will do for sure. I figure I might as well do it for a "smaller" project like this instead of a bigger project

(still 5k words lol)

[eternal dagger]

One Point Oh Baybee LFG!!!!https://ktrails-studios.itch.io/with-tail-betwixt-teeth

[onyx fractal]

Woooo!

[crystal wigeon]

QR code. Bit unwieldy though

[onyx fractal]

Ha true

[honest pawn]

Hm, QR code to a bibliography…

[nova umbra]

Does anyone have any idea why my google doc keeps printing to PDF with this stupid one-pixel gap at the bottom of every page

[idle cedar]

it might be because it measures shape position based on offset from top left corner

and rounding causes some issues with that

you can try extending it further out off the screen

[nova umbra]

tyty

[onyx fractal]

If you're using @honest pawn's template you might ask him

[nova umbra]

I am indeed. I'm...decently sure it's an issue with Chrome? I experimented with a different browser and didn't get the gap but the image quality was trash

[honest pawn]

I don’t know, might just need to nudge it down some

[buoyant snow]

does anyone know how to easily copy paste an image into google docs so that it fills up the entire page? Every time I move it around the cursor while dragging the image it tends to scroll down for some reason and I cant eliminate the white margines from the top and bottom of the image

I want to use this image as cover art for the google doc

[nova umbra]

do you have the image set to either "In Front of Text" or "Behind Text"?

[buoyant snow]

I cant get rid of this thin white line

it is behind the text

I still cant remove that white line

how do you all import your images into google docs?

[nova umbra]

ok, great, if you set it to Fix Position on Page instead of Move with Text, you can put its x/y position at 0 / 0 and the image size to whatever your page size is

[nova umbra]

I just used Import > Image

[nova umbra]

Caveat - this would work best if your image is already the right ratio for your page size, otherwise you may need to fuss with cropping it

[charred crow]

turning things into PDFs is super hard bc PDFs suck. I would try:

• export as pdf vs using print-to-pdf
• several other browsers, like MS Edge
• if you can, another OS

[nova umbra]

THANK YOU! I had tried a few browsers but the Export option hadn't even occured to me

[onyx fractal]

Got my adventure back from the editor, lots of good fixes and changes to make

[split flame]

So, positive experience I take it?

[onyx fractal]

So far, yes

[sweet gale]

Does anyone notice anything wrong from a rules perspective in this little write-up I added to my one-shot?

Most of this was (indirectly) vetted by #rules-questions but I am more than aware that I could have made some mistakes.

[buoyant snow]

how does one change the image in the little square before you click into the project? I have a banner image, but nothing shows up when I look at my submission in the list of submissions to the oneshot. Its blank

[honest pawn]

You mean the thumbnail? You can change that on the main edit page

[buoyant snow]

yeah the thumbnail i guess. how? Where is the button I could have sworn I looked

cover image?

[honest pawn]

Yup

[buoyant snow]

ah it works now

then that is it

[sharp summit]

I believe that for flight systems the text should read 'must fly horizontally and/or vertically in a straight line'. At the moment it only reads 'horizontally and vertically', which could be interpreted as characters having to change their elevation by an amount equal to how far they move.

I am aware this is rather pedantic, but I find it a little unclear

[buoyant snow]

@deft wigeon https://ozu95supein.itch.io/operation-kaitiakitanga

Operation Kaitiakitanga now has cover art made by the lovely individual pinged above

a short and sweet adventure made for LL0 players

[sweet gale]

Playtest 3 went well

(they won!)

[slow topaz]

Someone got wrecked!

[slow topaz]

Seems good so far - only thing I was wondering: Is it also zero-g? Otherwise, I'd suppose stuff should not start to fall, but at least sink if not using propulsion. Tbh, since full verticality adds a lot of system strain, I'd probably handwave it unless a player brings it up.

[sweet gale]

It is explicitly zero g because it's underwater. Not falling is mentioned in the last sentence of the first paragraph below "underwater movement."

[sweet gale]

After saying "this is feature complete" it occurred to me that I should probably test the NPC in a not boss fight scenario since it's supposed to be able to he used when not The Giant Fish Who Makes (players think about) All Of The Rules

But it'll probably be fine and I'm just procrastinating on doing the rest of the work (writing)

[onyx fractal]

lol I'm definitely publishing some stuff that is untested

[sweet gale]

I had a worst-case scenario last night that at least was a proof of concept for the module. What I'm testing is applying the NPC to settings outside of the module.

And I got a crew set up for tonight, so depending on how that goes, I'll have a lot of confidence shipping this thing (or be sent into a loop of doubt and confusion)

Worst case scenario was 3 everests and two of them packing TCBs that missed a lot

It was a bloodbath, but the joy of holdouts is that as long as there aren't enough scoring NPCs in the zone, they still win

[split flame]

The joy of objective play in general 😂

[onyx fractal]

We've arrived at the home stretch. One more final read-through. If I'm happy with it, we publish 1.0 tomorrow.

[sweet gale]

A leviathan-specific fight playtest tonight

[idle cedar]

pls just publish it exactly like that

it looks amazing

[red stratus]

"Alternate cover."

[sweet gale]

Because the leviathan had 15 optionals, I assembled 2 entirely different leviathans to fill the roll of an offensive grappler and a defender respectively and sic'd 'em on the party in an escort

It had to be cut off because I need to go to bed

But they seemed to really like it and how flexible it was!

[onyx fractal]

Ladies, gentlemen, and those that lieth betwixt:

It is finished.

https://gordianblade.itch.io/the-demon-of-dogwater-gulch/devlog/868432/the-demon-of-dogwater-gulch-10-is-out

If you participated in the jam, feel free to claim a community copy!

Just glad I got it done before the promo push

Now I can allocate brain energy to new stuff 👀

[slow topaz]

Darn, I just ain't enough time during workweeks. More like slow and steady.

[onyx fractal]

Well as I understand it, the promo push comes after the late submission deadline (feb 5 I think)

[sweet gale]

Oh. So we save our propaganda posts until then?

[onyx fractal]

idk I am making a few assumptions based on what Suji has said. I'm not planning on doing an independent marketing push for my adventure to Lancer communities until the Jam is complete

[honest pawn]

Dogwater Gulch looking mighty fine

[slow topaz]

Love how concise it looks. Very jammy.

[sweet gale]

I'm certainly happy buying a little extra time for me to make my ransom note about hacking into a fish

[onyx fractal]

I'd like to give special thanks to the Project Wingman soundtrack for keeping me in the zone and headspace while working on the project

[slow topaz]

That is a good soundtrack.

[honest pawn]

good playtest for the oneshot tonight; I've got a fair amount of edits to consider now lol

[honest pawn]

Something that may be a “me” problem: I seem to be notoriously bad at inflicting structure damage on my players lol

But I’ll be dialing up difficulty on my one shot at least lol

[onyx fractal]

I'm pretty sure all the stress we took was self inflicted

[sweet gale]

I had a thought about that this morning and added another point to my feedback message

Me? Advocating for more NPC fragsig? Nooooooo.

[slow topaz]

Can you further pin that issue down? What opfor did you use?

[honest pawn]

I already have ideas and feedback on how to intensify the fight, no need to discuss here

[sweet gale]

I know I said I'm pencils down on the NPC but I keep ruminating about it at work and just wanna change things here and there

Mostly stuff to streamline it and make the text cleaner

[ebon panther]

OMINOUS SKY RAVAGED LAND is ready to be run! https://donkeyponius981.itch.io/ominous-sky-ravaged-land/devlog/869662/ominous-sky-ravaged-land-is-ready-to-be-run

Please go ahead and download it! I would love to hear everyone's thoughts on it!

[onyx fractal]

Congrats!!!

[honest pawn]

Kill the Noise v1.0 is now live! 😄

[onyx fractal]

Hell yeah!

Get alll the submissions

Makes me happy to see my Lancer adventure folder growing larger

And looking forward to the community reading through them all and running all sorts of one-shots

[hollow turtle]

waiting patiently for the day i notice an ad for someone else running my one shot

It might be forever but hey

It'll be cool when it does happen

[honest pawn]

it's a good feeling, absolutely

[onyx fractal]

I've posted my adventure in a lot of places, but I've been waiting until the #lancer-news/reddit announcement of the completion of the jam for the bug push

[hollow turtle]

I'm probably gonna make a Vex-style meme about my one shot for reddit ngl

Funny advertising

[rigid grail]

gonna be running A Wake Writ in Void tomorrow and I'm so excited!

After that wraps up I'll probably start shopping around for other oneshots in this jam, a lot of stuff looks really appealing 👀

[onyx fractal]

Hype!

[slow topaz]

https://djed-moros.itch.io/sisyphus/devlog/870653/wip-v07-upload

Sisyphus 0.7 push.
Need food.

[split flame]

@honest pawn do you know if your format set works with affinity design?

[honest pawn]

My format set? For my oneshot? I used affinity publisher for it yes

It’s fairly barebones and I just used a quick searched-up tutorial for setting the guide lines for the columns + gutters

[split flame]

I meant the uh, the template you had on itch, I wasn't sure if it was only for gdoc, or the likes

[onyx fractal]

Not valk but my understanding is that it's gdocs/word only

[honest pawn]

It’s exactly what it says on the tin: Microsoft Word and GDocs. If you wanna try your hand at importing it to Affinity, be my guest, but I make zero guarantees

[sweet gale]

It seems to work with Libreoffice too

Though it's a bit fussy and something broke that I'm just... Not gonna think about until the end

https://tenor.com/view/never-give-up-fist-pump-motivation-motivational-gif-4892451

Me trying to get the formatting for this thing right

[hushed mason]

Are all of the submissions in yet? I wanna go through them but don't want to miss any

[idle cedar]

there's like a week left until final deadline i think

[hushed mason]

Oh, I thought it was already concluded

My bad

[onyx fractal]

There's a late submission deadline

Feb 5 I think

[slow topaz]

That's what I was working with, so I hope it's correct.

[buoyant snow]

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1z2rKBW_F7lU6OTFMEB2yoYRIwUNITxVYwYTlH82L4i0/edit?usp=sharing

Forgive me if I have asked this before, but can someone point me in the direction to rules, guidelines and good practices on the design of NPC tiers? I have tier 1 of an enemy here and I would like to make tiers 2 and 3

[honest pawn]

#homebrew-design though it may be kinda vibes based unfortunately

[onyx fractal]

One of the tricks Lancer pulls is the veneer of meticulous balance calibration when the reality is that there are a lot more vibes under the hood than you'd think

Which, imo, is pretty liberating

[sweet gale]

Behold. Fish. (I'm not changing anything unless there are typos or formatting oddities)

((there is one formatting oddity but it effects the entire document so I'm not changing that until the end))

And then instantly noticed some mistakes. My master plan is successful.

[onyx fractal]

So far I've only heard of one typo for mine so I'm happy enough

I'm sure I will hear of more once it has more eyes on it

Anyone know how to test screen reader accessibility of a PDF?

[honest pawn]

Well there’s NVDA for windows iirc, and adobe reader should have its own screen reading tools (as hard as they are to find/manage 😒)

[buoyant snow]

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1z2rKBW_F7lU6OTFMEB2yoYRIwUNITxVYwYTlH82L4i0/edit?usp=sharing

this is my idea for the different tiers for my leviathan's tentacle, how is it? is it OP, Underpowered?

[sweet gale]

Hard to tell without playtesting, tbh

[charred crow]

seems ok to me

it's good enough to the point where you should playtest it

[sweet gale]

If you make it biological, you can cut "living creature" since heat to energy damage conversion is innate to the biological category

[buoyant snow]

we did playtest it, but only at tier 0 since the oneshot is ll0

what should I change exactly?

[split flame]

Thank gosh too, right?

Because I make stuff up constantly 😂

[hollow turtle]

I constantly, and I mean constantly just throw stuff at wall and watch what sticks

It’s worked out pretty well

[sweet gale]

Some inspirations are getting shown directly in the text

[rigid grail]

Okay, so one of my players had a work emergency that means I'm splitting up my run of it (luckily we can all meet back up in a few hours), but A Wake Writ in Void is going great so far!

Solid bit of narrative intrigue that let players fuck around with bond powers a bit without the time getting out of hand, good comedic NPCs on the table for side convos and the combat is off to a good start with one round down and the players already teeing up to do some crazy shit

[nova umbra]

I'm so happy to hear this! Let us know how the second chunk goes as well, we're trying to hit a couple stretch goals for the Feb. 5th deadline so this would be a perfect time to incorporate feedback

[rigid grail]

Cool! are you looking for more mechanical or narrative feedback?

[nova umbra]

Either way, tbh

[rigid grail]

So for narrative, I'd say there's 2 small points where I could see presenting the information a bit differently being helpful for GMs

A lot of Lancer modules feature a longer intro sprawl that you can just read off of to set the scene, usually waxing poetic about the setup a little bit to add flavor and stuff. This module has some really nice text describing the setup, and a decent opening paragraph to read off, but merging some of the exposition about The Yawn and the "You're just coming back into the hangar" intro bit might be fun. Its not hard to merge em together, but having it all in one place is good

I'd also say that a small sidebar or table of things to get up to in the shipyard station would be good for drawing players out of the hangar to open with some light roleplaying, there's the obvious thing of going towards the observation deck and I was able to improvise a few things based on the shopping arcade's description, but a small table of what shops are selling might be a fun addon!

[nova umbra]

those are both very useful suggestions! Thank you!

[rigid grail]

I improvised stuff like some kinda goofy looking hastily-made Yawn plushies, and some cheesy IPS-N branded keychains and charms, its probably on the less necessary end, but is kinda fun to have flavor gimmicks like that

[nova umbra]

okay, no joke, my wife was really pushing for mascot t-shirts of the Yawn being incorporated into the conclusion, and I vetoed it. @fossil ice, consider yourself vindicated

[nova umbra]

Yeah, this was why we had the flotilla table! it's definitely not necessary to run the module but you can probably tell it was some of the most fun we had with it

[rigid grail]

Mechanically all the skill challenges went fine and we're only one round into the combat so I don't have the full scope yet, but the only standout thing to me would be a potential lack of enemy variety. I'm running the 5-player version which means there are 4 breachers on the field, which is the highest concentration of one type of non-grunt NPC in one battle that I've seen in any module. Replacing 2 of them with Ronin, Archers or something like that could be fun mayyybe

But at the same time, a simpler encounter flows a bit smoother for oneshot purposes, the repetition isn't that noticeable or major and breachers function really well in both defending and attacking roles for this oneshot so I can also see why it is the way it is

[rigid grail]

Yeah! I'd picture something simple of like a d6 table flavoring out a handful of different businesses to flesh out the shopping area is just a lil fun aside

But yeah overall I'd say that any critiques I have are pretty minor, things are going well and I'm looking forward to wrapping this up! I'll also ask my players how they felt once things are all done

[fossil ice]

I was going to name the mascot Yawnie

But nooooooo

This thoughtful story about humans interacting with the unknowable couldn’t have it 😛

[rigid grail]

honestly it does fit the vibe that there's a portion of IPS-N people who see this grand cosmic arrival and immediately jump to "Oh my god! A marketing opportunity!"

[fossil ice]

I definitely erred on the side of simpler composition because it was a one-shot, yeah. But on the other hand, if we’re looking at LL6 characters, I think we can assume enough familiarity with the system to throw in a curveball reinforcement for the combat to change the flow of the fight a bit. I’ll think about that, thanks.

[onyx fractal]

It didn't occur to me until too late that I broke my rule of no more than 5 distinct NPC classes in a given combat

[honest pawn]

Lol, well at least the exception is your Boss Monster

Having a well-characterized rival team allows for some extra distinct-ness anyway imo

[rigid grail]

Okay, so I chatted with players about A Wake Writ in Void and they all had a good time, but we threw a few ideas around about tweaks that could be made if space allows!

• One of the first things that was noted was that some tweaked exposition might've helped with getting right into the intrigue instead of spending time figuring out what's going on. That might be helped by increasing the opening narration like I mentioned or this next thing, or this next thing
• One player suggested the idea of some special secrets and/or side objectives that might be available based on the background hook that you chose, maybe with IPS-N Trunk security knowing more about Broken Wing, Union employees being given more warning of SSC and the "Rubberneckers" option being the carte blanche "talk something custom out with your GM!" option
• Doing some extra intrigue could also present some opportunities for the GM to offer rewards in the final combat, like maybe there's a window for taking out or detaining a broken wing pilot before they launch, eliminating that NPC from the combat. Or maybe taking the time to get a proper bead on Adelaide and pressure her into letting you use the Aiperion class ship to land lets one PC start anywhere they want on the battlefield instead of in the control zone. Operation Solstice Rain/Winter Scar have some really great examples of stuff you can do like that.
• Some players threw around the idea of a harder end combat, as having 5 core powers go off lets players do some CRAZY shit. I do think this one's a lot more subjective though, as difficulty is kinda up to taste and I was using a kinda wonky version of that combat anyways. I personally trend towards easier for the sake of time myself.

• One big idea that came up was attaching an optional bonus scene towards the end, basically making for a more high-risk finale for any groups that don't neccesarily plan on using their characters outside of the oneshot. It could take two forms depending on what you think fits;
• One player suggested something where a single PC needs to stay behind on The Yawn as it disappears into the blink to either disable the snares fully or guide it away safely, giving them either a cool sacrifice moment or a chance to find some clever alternative solution with their toolkit.
• The version that came to mind for me was a big skill challenge to make it off The Yawn before it dives again, which also presents an alternative to reward clever character ability use or earlier roleplaying for stuff like access to the Aperion class that makes the challenge a LOT easier.
• Players did also agree with me on liking the idea of another flavor table/sidebar describing some of the shops and stuff on the station, just as a lil side for funsies though not super neccesary
• Players also agreed about the lack of enemy variety, as well as pointing out that the enemy team was VERY melee/cqb heavy, which both seem like they could be fixed by replacing 2 of the breachers with archers or something similar
• There are also a few small technical discrepancies I noticed with the enemy statblock formats, but those are pretty minor and if they're intentional it 100% makes sense as a way of simplifying things

Sorry about the absolute wall of feedback btw, but I will overall say that the party had a fantastic time! Everybody liked the NPCs, got pretty into the premise and had at least a few really fuckin rad moments in combat, so I'd call this oneshot a smash hit!
Def plan on running this again for a few other groups down the line

Oh other fun lil thing I implemented as a table rule because my party is unhinged:

• Effects that would cause noticeable physical damage to The Yawn (IE firing a fully charged apocalypse rail to hit one fucking guy standing directly on its spine) immediatley causes it to flinch, simulating the effects of an Earthquake environment hazard for all entities on the map, with the DC being something I was willing to increase with damage.

[sweet gale]

once more I am getting silly with the map

Notes: holdout sitrep. players can pry vent covers off to turn them into dangerous terrain and can deploy size 2 obstacles that NPCs will either navigate around or attack to destroy. LL0 so size 3s are impossible

Designed mostly to play in the upper rectangular portion, with the southern wedge acting as a buffer that delays the arrival of the reinforcements so all the waves don't crash on the PCs at once

I continue to fiddle

[hollow turtle]

Size 3 PCs are impossible

Goliaths still exist remember

[sweet gale]

And that's precisely why the opfor doesn't have a goliath in it

[hollow turtle]

[sweet gale]

I know

[hollow turtle]

Why u gotta do my boi Goliath dirty like that

[honest pawn]

Can’t hurt to include a 1-sentence for captain Morgan rules for PCs, if you have space

[sweet gale]

Because there's a size 4 flying freaky fish in the fight

[hollow turtle]

https://tenor.com/view/jazz-emu-the-jazz-emu-jazzemu-thejazzemu-you-know-what-gif-6224324081104126967

[sweet gale]

It's also playing the defender/grapple pest role, which is how I tend to mess with Goliaths

[hollow turtle]

scribbles down 'Goliath as fish???'

[sweet gale]

What if goliath, but burst 4 AoE

(specifically "burst x AoE where x equals its size")

Wanted to call the ability galvanic blast, but it's a burst and I could smell the "literally unplayable" from a mile away

[honest pawn]

Size 4 fish holding the VIPs hostage, call that Hans Grouper

Sorry, free association took over

[sweet gale]

If I wanted to be incredibly corny, I'd call it "The Current" because the module is named "Against The Current" so you'd be fighting... you know. You're fighting the cur- fighting the-

-# you're fighting against the current

[honest pawn]

It makes sense that in Lancer, where you fight for the future, you would inevitably wind up fighting against the current

To say nothing of the past

[sweet gale]

The name is like three levels of entendres

There's an environmental effect that pushes players away from the zone. The leviathan is a big electric fish. The whole reason the party is in this mess is because of a company that is resistant to changing its business practices.

[fossil ice]

absolutely no need to apologize, this is super great feedback! Thank you for your detailed report back, I think this gives us a ton to chew on.

[rigid grail]

Glad to hear about that! If it helps, I can try formatting stuff in terms of what's easier to implement without reworking things

[weak nacelle]

And that's why Nasty, Brutish and Short has a Goliath in the sitrep, whose sole purpose is to lumber at the controlzones menacingly :v

(Shoutout to the player in one of the playtests, whose Balor exploded and who then climbed onto the goliath and killed it by ripping out enough cables to overheat)

[hollow turtle]

Its done

Had to dig through all the modules for this one

turns out Wallflower has a lot of swearing in it

[unborn bridge]

BALATRO? HEART?

[crystal wigeon]

OK so don't be mad but I kind of did it anyway 😄 I couldn't get the idea out of my head
Late submission for your approval: https://karidyas.itch.io/lancer-1-shot-the-quest-for-the-holy-leviathan-cannon

@idle cedar I must now asleep but I hope for good things :>

[idle cedar]

late submission link DM'd!

idk how intentional it is but i think it's funny that the cannon vaguely looks like a raised middle finger

[crystal wigeon]

😂 Not at all but I'm glad it's funny, comedy is the goal!

[onyx fractal]

This is way too fucking funny

Bravo

What did you lay this out in?

[sweet gale]

For the sake of feeling like I've made something real, I may release a 1.0 version that's feature-complete but has a developer art map

Then I can put out a 1.1 later with the pretty map, fix up the things I'll inevitably find after publishing, and maybe make a retrograde faction

(unless that's against the spirit of a jam)

[onyx fractal]

I think the spirit of the jam is "release literally anything, even WIP"

[sweet gale]

Then I may have something posted by the end of the week

Probably not tonight because sleepy

[last frigate]

Gotta read the 1e manifesto

https://200proof.games/manifesto/

[crystal wigeon]

Affinity Publisher 🙂 I had zero problems with it, worked exactly like how I'd expect and even beyond in certain aspects like the layer effects and adjustment layers. Only stumbling block was numbers not matching when setting up internal page links. I've used InDesign before so am vaguely familiar with publishing software on a basic level, like master pages and text styles and asset management, so that might help, but I thoroughly enjoyed the experience and would recommend it 🙂

Glad I picked it up in a bundle on Black Friday sale 😄

[onyx fractal]

Very cool!

I'd like to learn it sometime

I've been using Typst but I feel like I owe it to myself to learn Publisher

I also got it in the Black Friday sale

It looks great!

[crystal wigeon]

Honestly as soon as you learn how to link text boxes so the content flows between them and to apply and manage text styles, that's like 90% of it unless going for something specific haha

[onyx fractal]

Heh fair

[last frigate]

just wanna say this is amazing. p.15 in particular gave me a good laugh

[slow topaz]

Love your commitment to the style.

[crystal wigeon]

Thanks! I certainly committed to style haha, and I think it paid off

[onyx fractal]

I do think that blackletter body text can be challenging, but it's a concession to the form so I get it

It's very very fun

[onyx fractal]

I'm still pretty newby when it comes to layout. My goal was to not make any major "mistakes", which I think had the side effect of resulting in something functional but not especially fancy

I like having experience with the rules of design before feeling comfortable breaking them

I think my writing style could stand to have a lot more character in it too. I think I default to a somewhat sterile "technical writer" tone, which has pros and cons

[slow topaz]

I can relate. But that's one of the downsides of writing within a very limited timeframe - need my creativity to get the project done, not write at my best.

[onyx fractal]

I'm very very happy with and proud of what I made as my first thing. Just thinking of what I want to focus on improving in the future

Looking foward to hearing what people think of it

[slow topaz]

Some of the entries really make me wanna run a one-shot Lancer event.

[honest pawn]

good, go for it

[idle cedar]

https://tenor.com/view/thats-why-im-here-obi-wan-obi-wan-kenobi-star-wars-gif-18535648

didn't ask people to make oneshot stuff so people don't play with it

love to see people playing with this stuff

[honest pawn]

I’ll say that compared to my last two outings with publishing adventures, writing this one shot was a breath of clean fresh air

[onyx fractal]

In what way? Why do you think that was?

[honest pawn]

It’s very nice to write 2 pages and keep it to 2 pages instead of letting it balloon into a huge dungeon that took months to complete

“Ah, I can write a thing without it becoming a monster. Excellent”

Granted I was brand spanking new to writing so maybe that’s growing pains lol

[idle cedar]

without it becoming a huge, unwieldy endeavor, or a Leviathan, if you will

idk when next jam is gonna be but it will probably be:

• spring or summer break
• maybe longer timeline? maybe the 2 weeks+1 month timeline is good though actually
• thinking of some sort of "beginning of something new" or "sequel to something" as the theme, no length limitation

want to ensure new folks can still sign up without feeling like they had to have been there for the first one

[honest pawn]

Allow me to be the voice of contrariness and say: “actually maybe put a length limit on it”

[onyx fractal]

I think I'd prefer 1 month + 2 weeks, myself

[idle cedar]

i hear that

that sounds good

[idle cedar]

i feel like a lot of people didn't like it being oneshot and wanted to do more

[honest pawn]

Right, I mean that giving more slack is good, but maybe not too much slack

[idle cedar]

i see i see

[onyx fractal]

Maybe it could be "any supplement of any sort" not just modules

[honest pawn]

Put in a page or word count target

[honest pawn]

I can see the appeal but I’d also hope for more modules more than anything

[onyx fractal]

Fair

[idle cedar]

i feel like modules are generally the most in demand

[honest pawn]

The barrier to entry for player content is super low with people always designing in #homebrew-design

Part of the benefit of the jam is to cultivate a cohort of everyone doing the same thing at the same time, imo

[idle cedar]

npc remake jam

[honest pawn]

That and “constraints good”

[onyx fractal]

True

[idle cedar]

mhmm

[onyx fractal]

I think I'm just used to seeing a lot of jams being open to any sort of third party whatever

But I agree that adventures are the most needed

And are the things that get Lancer to the table more than anything else

[idle cedar]

I'll make it looser this time but still have some sort of upper bound next time
and also allow for using any third party content as part of the intended requirements

or paid content, I mean

there's plenty of beginner content now

[honest pawn]

Hear me out: Jam intentionally for Tier 2 adventure content

It can have tier 1 and tier 3 if it wants but it must support tier 2 at minimum

[idle cedar]

ooh cool concept

[honest pawn]

“We made room for the wallflowers, what do we do now”

[onyx fractal]

Tier 2 Jam

Seems rad

[honest pawn]

Plenty of folks complain about a lack of tier 2+ offerings (regardless of ease of uptiering) so

https://tenor.com/view/gays-give-the-gays-sassy-phone-call-gif-4964090

[fierce sedge]

Could be fun for a jam, though I'll admit I am still on the hunt for statistics about the "levels" people tend to play modules at in rpgs.

[honest pawn]

Absolutely; I know that I tend to run a lot of t1 stuff since that’s what has published content lol (and also what I’ve published)

[fierce sedge]

Since whilst a game jam doesn't need to cater to anyone other than being fun, the lack of tier 2+ of stuff does also presume a market for tier 2+ stuff.

Though at this point it's a nice way to distinguish things as well.

[idle cedar]

i def want to do some sort of "okay, what now" type of content

i wasn't thinking necessarily tier 2, but that's one way to say "this is for a party that's been playing for a bit"

[honest pawn]

Yeah no I am definitely presuming there’s a market for it, and tbh it’s something I’d want to work on myself probably

[fierce sedge]

If there are any DND statistics I would kill for, it would be interest in various starting levels, coupled with experience at various starting points and level distribution among folk playing.

Basically where do people tend to begin and end, and where would they have an interest in beginning (which I suspect to be overrated, since it's easier to say you have an interest than it is to commit to it).

[honest pawn]

Oh, I hear you. Would be neat to see, for example, the impact of high level adventures released on the average party level in campaigns on dndbeyond for example

Like charting it over time and then Vecna: Eve of Ruin drops

[fierce sedge]

Sales data on modules alone would do so much, but I'm not expecting to get that information.

[honest pawn]

It’s the weird supply/demand ouroboros of “folks are playing X” > “therefore more content is for X is released” > “therefore more folks are playing X” > repeat ad nauseum

[fierce sedge]

Yup, though here I believe part of it to also be that there's a population pyramid present, with the lower levels having a broader base than the upper ones.

However since at this point the lower levels are more saturated that does still leave a niche for the upper regions.

[honest pawn]

I think tier 2 is a sweet spot due to ll6 build proliferation thanks to stuff like Dragonkid’s Custom Werks series

[hollow turtle]

Me: sees everyone and everything being low to mid teir

slaps down highest level One shot because if I don't who would

[honest pawn]

Frankly I’m glad you were bold enough to do so, someone’s gotta do it haha

[sweet gale]

Freaky fish has a high-difficulty mode and statblocks for every tier, so if someone wants to sic turbosherman gang against it, that's on them

and I wish them luck

They'd get two more mutations at T3

I didn't write those in but there's 6 more that aren't used so it's dealer's choice

but this one's probably good

[hollow turtle]

I find high level Lancer so fascinating and extremely difficult to balance for

Some builds can really just ruin your day

So that's why i build npcs that'll make most people double take 😌

[sweet gale]

I just looked at some stuff 1st party NPCs did and followed similar statistical trends and growth patterns

It's vibes based, but those vibes got cosigned by a couple people, so good enough for me

[fossil ice]

So, I will say my own preference here is, on a longer timeline, I’d love to do more than a one-session module, but I wouldn’t want to do a whole long campaign doc either. My preference would honestly be one Mission length!

I think there’s a good amount of content that has stretches from LL0-6 or 0-3, but as a GM, I really like the idea of being able to say, “I need a mission that takes place on a space station that has some of these enemy types in it” and have a whole mission just, ready to go from a catalogue (especially with reference to earlier comments about lacking enough mid-to-high-level content out in the ether, it would be great to get a bunch of modules made to be, well, modular)

and I think looking at the kind of work we’ve put out here, that’s only an incremental reach from what we’ve already had experience doing

I think 1 mo + 2 week stretch is a great timeline for drawing up a detailed mission doc without having to sweat working out an entire campaign of content

[sweet gale]

I'm writing so much (flavor) stuff for a one-shot that I live in fear of what something longer would bring out in me

I curse my insufferable watsonian urges every day

[slow topaz]

But nobody can stop you!

[sweet gale]

While a little silly to do for a one-shot, I've decided to add exotic rewards based on the freaky fish's ability at the end of my thing in case people wanna drag those elsewhere

Because who doesn't want a superheavy called "THE MAW"

[half obsidian]

I'm also adding way too much flavor and some exotic gear rewards at the end. You're not alone! 🙂

[onyx fractal]

I'm curious who out there is still working on something for the jam, how many entries we can expect to see before the late deadline

[half obsidian]

I misread the initial deadline, figured I might as well finish the thing anyway, then saw that there was a late submission deadline and figured I should definitely finish! Lol

[idle cedar]

i might try to finish but a lot of things are happening around me so idk if I'll end up finishing

[honest pawn]

I believe in you

But also: do what is healthy for you

But also also: release the beta

[half obsidian]

Doing what is healthy for you is one of the rules 🙂

[split flame]

I think my one-shot idea is extremely similar to one adventure someone already submitted with tons of art and a giant space fish

I haven't looked at anything of the submissions yet, besides what's been posted here.

[onyx fractal]

comparison is the thief of joy

make something you think is cool

[charred crow]

Pending my time, I'm going to try making LCPs of the custom NPCs I've cooked up. Is there an easy way to do that without spending a bunch of time struggling in a text editor?

[idle cedar]

there's the lcp editor, ask #lcp-tech-support for details

otherwise there's like, json parser

[honest pawn]

Release it anyway, something like this was bound to happen when the prompt is Leviathan

[split flame]

Yeah, that's not the reason to not release it if there were, not sitting down to actually write it all out would be the biggest problem lol

Although I have been learning some things in the mean while. I started setting up an Affinity template for Lancer dressing, I actually found out how to straight up make your own fonts, so that's intersting.

But I need to write down the core and release an "un-perfect" one or not at all, and keep fiddling with things besides.

[sweet gale]

My one shot is fighting an NPC called "The Leviathan" so it's not exactly a shining beacon of originality

The point of the jam is to make something more than anything else

All I need to do is finish writing the read-aloud+flavor text, the conclusion, and an appendix that's meant to be a physical handout for the narrative section's mechanics

The read-aloud text is proving to be the most time-consuming part

[onyx fractal]

My solution was to not include any read-aloud text

(Though I generally don't like read-aloud text to begin with)

[sweet gale]

Mine could totally be done without it, but, well-

[sweet gale]

I've said it already

[sweet gale]

In spite of those urges, I think I'm on track to post a 1.0 sometime early next week.

[sweet gale]

Looks like the final page count is 24

[hushed mason]

Why did we get a seperate news announcement for one of the jam oneshots? Is it the winner or something?

[red stratus]

Anyone who makes something can contact the mods for an announcement post.

So, I suspect we'll be getting a fair few news posts with all the oneshots being made.

[idle cedar]

also I think it's not an official submission for some reason?

[hollow turtle]

Its not

Maui's one shot was something they made just kinda on their own. Inspired by but not really fitting the Jam

[onyx fractal]

I was under the impression we were doing a single announcement for the Jam as a whole specifically so it wouldn't flood the feed

[honest pawn]

Yeah it’s not part of the jam, and there’s no winner in the jam either, as it’s not competitive

[onyx fractal]

The real winners are the GMs

[sweet gale]

There's a lot of dead space on the last page of the leviathan's statblock, so I'm gonna take a bunch of photos and screencaps of my notes and make a collage to fill the space

[charred crow]

I didn't find any cool public art, but I'm calling this 1.0! https://ilovethegrid.itch.io/grim-trigger/devlog/874785/100-is-available

• Added T2/T3 stats to the NPCs
• Wrote up an LCP
• Did some adjustment to my TI/AT, now they're a generic grunt alternative called the Goon

doing a playtest tomorrow evening, probably gonna make some changes based on that fight and then I'll be happy

[idle cedar]

the goon

[sweet gale]

I cannot stress how much this place sucks enough

[spare jolt]

I know it's not what you meant but I did laugh a bit when I got a notification from 'Lancer One-Shot Module Jam' that just read 'I cannot stress how much this place sucks enough'.

Turns out it doesn't make you aware there's also a picture

[sweet gale]

I got rid of the original image and replaced it, though I don't think that would have helped

sorry

[spare jolt]

Hahahah, not your fault

Just amused by DIscord providing the Worst Possible Notification

[slow topaz]

Good stomping grounds.

[sweet gale]

It's so strange seeing this stuff I wrote import into compcon and not be weird

i've had to do a lot of troubleshooting

[half obsidian]

I arrive...late but not over time! There is at least one lingering typo I know I'm gonna have to fix tomorrow lol, but I couldn't look at this file any longer today 😛
https://itch.io/jam/lancer-one-shot-module-jam/rate/3281051

This is my first real homebrew for Lancer so I'd love feedback from anyone who checks it out 🙂

[hollow turtle]

Time travel module lets go

[hushed mason]

Are all of the entries in now?

[honest pawn]

Dunno, might still have some submissions leading up to the cutoff

[hushed mason]

Oh, I thought the cutoff was 2 days ago

[honest pawn]

Cutoff is a month after the end iirc

Should be first week of February?

[fierce sedge]

5th I believe

[sweet gale]

February 5th. There's at least one more getting submitted that I'm aware of for very particular reasons

it's just two more blurbs, the map, and proofreading. I'm so close aaaaaaaaaaaa

[slow topaz]

That's rapid deployment cranked to 11.

[half obsidian]

Hmm?

[slow topaz]

Just read the intro and getting yanked out of transit directly into combat is probably almost as unexpected as the spanish inquisition.

[half obsidian]

Oh haha yes, wanted to kick off with an extra hot start 🙂

[slow topaz]

Also like the "give your own pep talk if you think you got time for that" bump for max one-shot efficiency.

[half obsidian]

I knew I was stretching the session length already 😅

I do think I could do it in one session with a group of experienced players, but it'd be tight

[slow topaz]

Two combats seem ambitious, but I've seen it done. Didn't have time to check your composition, though and I'm really not an expert since I'm mostly winging it for my players

[hollow turtle]

two combats is very doable!

it'll definitely make it longer

but if your running the objective more than trying to deathmatch, you can do it

[unborn bridge]

tbh you can just run a holdout and end it at round 2-3, thats still quite a lot of time

[last frigate]

man, after working on the jam i wanna make more lancer stuff

but idk what to work on lol

[honest pawn]

What’s calling to you? Another one shot? Player content? NPC classes? Hooks and settings?

For me, I got back into my NPC brewing

[last frigate]

either a single mission or some npc stuff, none of it concrete atm

[honest pawn]

Got any leftovers from your brainstorming for the oneshot?

[hushed mason]

As a GM, I appreciate new NPCs, sitreps and stuff. If someone made new Eidolons I'd kiss them for it, I love using those

[honest pawn]

Literally my one brainstorming session from back in 2022 that yielded Pierce the Heavens also yielded Technophobia and Kill the Noise, conceptually

[hushed mason]

What I personally don't want any more of is new player mechs, there's already a billion out there and they are hard to actually use because they might break the game in some unexpected way.

[last frigate]

not particularly, just some other lancer ideas i had floating around but never started up

[last frigate]

i feel it, player side stuff isn't relevant for me as a gm

[honest pawn]

Imo the greatest irony and secret of player-side content is that it’s actually GM-side content, since the GM needs to approve it for their game

[hushed mason]

I want to run a campaign with those bad mechs one day. That expansion with a company that makes cheap ones for backwater dictators

Forgot the name

[last frigate]

one of the ideas i had floating around was something like mgs 2, where the pcs are in a situation thats completely fabricated by ssc as a way to train them and get some live genetic research or whatever

entirely unbeknownst to the pcs

[half obsidian]

This jam inspired me to take a random campaign idea I had and start turning it into a full module. I wasn't sure what system it'd be best for but it turns out the setting of Lancer makes it a perfect fit.

So I'm very thankful and excited for everyone here 🙂

[hushed mason]

Waffenfabrik Zalewski

That's the one

[onyx fractal]

If there's one thing I've taken away from this jam so far, it's that the best thing for me to do in terms of creating RPG content is that it's most important to me that I work on stuff that I think is fun and cool, rather than stuff I don't find as interesting even if it's something people might have more demand for

Not sure if I'll make more Lancer stuff in the near future. Right now my muse is elsewhere. But it was fun, and I'm glad I did it, as it was something I'd been wanting to do for a long time

[honest pawn]

The best part about TTRPG adventure writing is that the skills are 100% transferable, even outside the hobby. I’m glad this Jam came around to get people out of their shells and try their hand at adventure writing. Because hey, if you can do this, think about what else you’re now capable of!

[slow topaz]

Gotta check that one out. Mostly stuck to the officials so far, but I like bad-tech.

[half obsidian]

Having written a ton of stuff for other systems I'm also pretty surprised by how easy I find it to write for Lancer comparatively. Not sure if that's just the excitement of novelty or something else

[hushed mason]

I think it would be good for a short silly campaign
I was bouncing ideas around with my players and we though of a cash crop farming banana republic type planet that genetically engineered it's serfs to be allergic to whatever they were growing and rsising to prevent subsistence farming and using produce for personal food

[onyx fractal]

If I did do another Lancer thing, I'd like to make a mission that didn't have any pre-set combats and instead give the GM all the tools they needed to feel comfortable setting up and running combats ad-hoc

[last frigate]

i dream of making a lancer depthcrawl

[hushed mason]

I find it difficult. Unpopular opinion but I don't like the default setting. It doesn't inspire me, except for the NHP eldritch stuff which is great. I always end up making my own stuff. My current game is heavily Lovecraft inspired and loosely based on Deus Machina Demonbane

[onyx fractal]

I don't mind most of the base setting stuff, but I find that it can easily get lost inside its own weeds. I intentionally avoided a lot of lore stuff in my module to make it more accessible to newcomers

[hushed mason]

One idea I have that would be difficult to realize is a Fafner campaign. That anime is amazing but it has very little plot armor and pilots dying and the legacies they leave behind are a big theme. The game would be a meat grinder with pilots dying a lot and players making new characters after tragic deaths or heroic sacrifices

https://tenor.com/view/soukyuu-no-fafner-anime-kazuki-makabe-mark-sein-mecha-gif-21206948

If you want the next best thing after Evangelion, watch Fafner. It begins very bleak and you need to push through that at first, but it's all about finding hope in despair

Exodus especially hits so hard

[buoyant snow]

so i checked out, was there a prize for this?

[charred crow]

no

well, I would say the prize is getting to download everyone else's one-shots, but that's probably not what you meant

[onyx fractal]

The prize is 22+ one-shots for your enjoyment

[idle cedar]

reward is exposure

but also I'm just kind of just a random person, not affiliated with massif press and not some successful figure in indie ttrpg scene

so i don't feel comfortable picking winners (and don't want to bother finding people to be judges), and also i just don't have the resources to give out meaningful awards

[onyx fractal]

Are jams usually judged by judges, or is it community voting?

[weak nacelle]

I feel like a lot of Jams are more for people to get together and make stuff

them resumes don't pad themselves

[sweet gale]

Sir please I just need to update the table of contents

It's the last thing I need to do other than the map let me finish this

[hollow turtle]

Nope, pay attention to the cat

[half obsidian]

Having participated in several, I've seen both! And sometimes a mix, where community votes create an upper tier and then judges select from those (typically if there are a huge number of entries and going through all of them would be hard)

[sweet gale]

Just gotta make the daggum map in a good format now

[sweet gale]

Oh god the tabs on it are so screwed up

Uuuuuh. Problem for 1.0.1 me at this point.

[crystal wigeon]

A new hand touches the beacon. I helped out with layout and art 🙂 author is @night rivet https://draig120.itch.io/wolf-to-a-stranger

[last frigate]

just glancing through this, this is sick

the layout just makes me think of serial experiements lain

[hollow turtle]

God this looks so badass. adds to library

I Stan the robot dog

10/10, no notes

[hushed mason]

I'm my own master now

[night rivet]

@idle cedar can you message me the jam link for itch?

Apologies for never actually appearing in the thread until now, life was supremely crappy for a while and then the brain damage got to me, my apologies to Karidyas for taking so long, and thank you to him for going along with my idea of making a Lancer Zine and being so good with art, layouts and design

They're awesome

I would've loved to have been more active if not for... Waves at myriad of brain recovery things.

So many modules were about fighting or saving or around a leviathan. So I decided to birth one.

[hollow turtle]

You heal, we're happy to have you round in any capacity

[idle cedar]

just sent it!

[night rivet]

👍

[sweet gale]

Making a map for public use is a lot harder than just scribbling some zones in on a glossy jpeg with THT

[unborn bridge]

Tell me about it

I basically spent most of the jam mapmaking

Had to do draft after draft

But I liked the challenge, good change of pace and I learnt how to use Inkarnate

[sweet gale]

I used dungeondraft but because I don't want to mess with assets and prefabs atm, I just used color coded area patterns

But couldn't get them to outline so I had to do the outlines manually in Krita, which is something I'd have to do anyways and will stay on the full version with props, but still

At this point, all it needs is labels, a legend, and a north arrow

[unborn bridge]

Yeah I need to check out dungeon draft and all that other engines

I can't remember the name of the other map maker tool out there

[buoyant snow]

I used inkarnate for mine

[honest pawn]

I used Dungeondraft and Santy’s RPG Conundrum assets for basic-ass lines and cross-hatching

But then, I wanted to have something easily B&W printable and reproducible

[half obsidian]

I crave an easy hex-map solution 😭

[honest pawn]

Suji knows of one? But Dungeondraft also has a hex snapping mod now, and a hex pattern that’s existed for a while

[sweet gale]

I gotta get that hex snap mod for the next time I make a public map for my own sanity

[honest pawn]

Tbf I also just don’t care much about grids when making most of my maps; if the hex is >= 50% occupied, it’s occupied. If line of sight is unobstructed by map objects, you got LOS

[slow topaz]

I really hate that Inkarnate doesn't support snapping to grid with hexes. That and the lack of measurement tools. But before I mess up my workflow even more, I just decided to wing it and go with WIP ugly.

Btw, does anyone know a good workaround to create overlays for zones and stuff in Inkarnate?

[buoyant snow]

Use the foreground. You can paint in green or red hexes with .5 opacity and you can toggle it on or off when you want to

[slow topaz]

Godsend.

[buoyant snow]

https://discord.gg/inkarnate

[slow topaz]

Pushed an update including map. Semi-happy with the map, but it might be playable enough.
https://djed-moros.itch.io/sisyphus/devlog/871426/wip-v08-upload

[slow topaz]

Wow, someone tipped me on itch. First time sharing stuff I built with this jam, so: Thanks. 🥰

[sweet gale]

https://tenor.com/view/tyler-lie-lol-not-telling-the-truth-that-was-a-lie-gif-13885912

Because the release time is NOW

https://isatheengie.itch.io/against-the-current

[honest pawn]

hell yeah

that makes 24 entries to the jam!

[slow topaz]

Baaaaaam

[onyx fractal]

Jaaaaaaam

[half obsidian]

The map is incredibly sick! I saw so many people recommending Inkarnate but had no idea it could do stuff like this. You need to be a premium member for the scifi stuff on Inkarnate, right?

[slow topaz]

😊
Yes, I think the sci-fi assets are still beta and you have to be premium for that.

[sweet gale]

It occurred to me that I should probably talk about the NPC in the description of the post

What with it kinda being the all-consuming monster of design time for this thing.

[weak nacelle]

You made rules for actual giant monsters, not enormous mechs, right?

[sweet gale]

Yes?

It's a big fish you can hack

[night rivet]

with a machete

[slow topaz]

What I need to know ... can you eat it? Asking for a friend.

[sweet gale]

You'll have to kill it first

But there's nothing stopping you from eating it afterwards