Delayed by plague and slow winds, the ship has taken a little longer to deliver it’s cargo to port than anticipated, but I am thrilled to announce that everything for Corsairs has now landed! From books and envelopes, to everything else required. We will take a little time to assemble the cargo for distribution among the new inhabitants of the isle of Teboa, but it will be done quickly, and shipping will begin next week!
I anticipate that the time it will take for packages to leave the customs house here and wend their way to your doors will take a little extra time given the current state of events, but hopefully it won’t be too long delayed!
Printed by Mixam, Corsairs has a lovely feel to it, with a laminate cover and silk finish paper for the interior. I am thrilled with how everything has come together, including the wonderful art by Felicity Haworth. This game has been a lot of fun to write, and I hope those of you who get a chance to play it, enjoy it as much as I have.
So what is next? Well, the next week or so will involve me finally shipping out the physical copies of Corsairs to backers. I am hard at work on the follow up supplements: Smoke and Oakum, and Speed, Strength, and Wits. I am really loving some of the stuff that is in those supplements, and I hope they manage to add a bunch of flavour to your games. I’ll be able to show off a little more on the supplements very soon!
If you’re interested in Corsairs, you can get a digital copy on DriveThruRPG and Itch.io, the downloads include the core book, a character sheet, ship sheet, and rules summary sheets for the characters rules and the ship rules.
There are still some physical copies of Corsairs available, so if you have the digital version, and would like a physical copy, you can still get them, I’m in the process of setting up a store here at Caradoc Games, but until then you can email me here!
It’s been a little while since I wrote about anything other than my latest game: Corsairs, but other things have been happening as well!
In the last few months three new source books have been released as a part of the Infinity: The Role Playing Game line. Going back over my spread sheets, across the three latest source books I wrote 7 chapters, totaling a little more than 53,000 words. It’s nice to finally see them released!
I have to say the cover art for these books is fantastic, and I am immensely proud to have contributed to all three of these source books. With the number of books left to produce from the Kickstarter dwindling, I wonder how long I’ll be working on Infinity. I can’t say at this stage, but I have enjoyed my time exploring and helping to expand this universe!
Soldiers of fortune, bodyguards, pirates, cut-throats, and heroes. The worst villains and the greatest heroes of the G5 can all be found in this great melting pot of freelancing warriors. From the flickering bulbs of Novyy Bangkok’s fighting pits to the luxuriant skyscrapers of San Pietro, there is always someone willing to pay for their problems to be met with belt-fed subtlety and under-barrel discretion. Lone wolves, invisible techno-pirates, and even squads of murdering reavers, the mercenaries of the Human Sphere follow age-old traditions and work for the highest bidder, adapting and using all the latest technologies. Strangers to the ideals of patriotic love or loyalty, hard cash—or even better, solid quantronic credit accounts!—is the way to their hearts, and even more cash is the key to their loyalty.
From the construction of the first orbital elevator to the ongoing conflict in Paradiso, many factions have turned to mercenaries for cost-effective violence and intimidation. Whether escorting doctors and refugees out of Ghezirah, providing close protection for paranoid executives across Neoterra, or brutally resolving a miner’s strike in Human’s Edge, the mercenaries of the Human Sphere will take your money and get the job done. Never have mercenaries been in higher demand thanks to the political situation in the various theatres of the Sphere, and both Hypercorps and G5 governments employ the services of these soldiers for hire. Sometimes in the open, sometimes undercover, it seems these lords of war are a necessity in the power games of the future.
But the life of a merc isn’t all bullets, venture onto the War Market where the cold and pragmatic business of war has never been so civilized. Meet Free Company Captains and review their units according to their performance both in the battle and in Maya. Your preferred company may be cost effective, but are they giving their extra with the WarCors and livestreams? Because in the Human Sphere, everything is about how good you look to the public!
The 114-page full colour Mercenaries PDF Sourcebook includes:
Information on six of the major mercenary companies in the Human Sphere plus independent units such as the glamorous Foreign Company, the despicable Ikari, the discreet Spiral Corps, and the formidable Dahshat Company.
Rules and guidelines to develop your own career in the War Market, plus Lifepaths for Warmongers, Wardrivers, Recruiters, Arms Dealers, and others.
Weapons, equipment, and vehicles to kit your up-and-coming mercenary troops in order to fulfil their latest contract including antitank weapons, supplies, enhancement drugs, and pulpibeer!
Detailed rules on how to create your own Free Company and play a campaign focused on mercenaries.
We have fun, games and the bloodiest war in the Human Sphere! One of the most fertile planets known, living in this angry planet is a test for the hardiest settlers and warriors. Keep your wits about you or the jungle, its inhabitants or something worse will swallow you whole in an instant.
Hiding a tragic and terrible past, Paradiso is home to dark secrets and intrigue. Even before the NeoColonial Wars, the jungle planet has been the theatre of brutal conflict, destined to loom through the histories of numerous civilisations, human and alien alike. Never have the stakes been so high for Paradiso is the grandest trophy in the Sphere. Not only for the vast wealth offered by the system itself but with wormholes connecting to two alien powers, Paradiso is a Rubicon that if lost would lead to the Downfall of the Human Sphere.
Fame, glory and fortune wait for those brave or foolhardy enough to risk the dangers of Paradiso, so gear up and don’t miss the next Orbital Elevator planet side! Join the Human Sphere’s mightiest warriors and try to stop the Evolved Intelligence’s onslaught or lose yourself in populous cities under siege while you try to figure out who the infiltrated spy is feeding information to your enemies. Make sure you bring all your best equipment and don’t forget your bathing suit, for things are about to get hot in the Meat Grinder also known as Paradiso.
The Paradiso Sourcebook includes:
Information on Paradiso system, from the binary stars Nakula and Sahadeva to Orgoglio and Purgatorio asteroid fields, intriguing planets like Virgil, Dante, Ugolino, Beatrice and more!
Details on the current situation in the Paradiso theatre, the race for the last known Cosmolite in the planet and the truth behind the Penny Arcade.
Rules and guidelines to play your own Paradiso based campaigns including jungle warfare, terrain and the background of all three Combined Army Offensives in the system!
Weapons, equipment and vehicles to prepare for your jungle escapades: caltrops, machetes, flamethrowers, jammers and missiles! Lots of missiles!
Detailed rules on how to organize encounters in the dark jungles of Paradiso, wicked bandar-logs, cauchemar cats, nematodes, yorogumo. Brutal vegetation and deadly fauna are just some few of the dangers the paradise planets holds for you!
From the darkest reaches of the galaxy, an implacable tyrant looms slowly and inexorably, searching for intelligent races, studying them, contacting them, and ultimately absorbing them. Behold the Evolved Intelligence, an alien virtual entity bent on achieving the godlike state known as Transcendence. To reach its objective, the EI will use every tactic and strategy necessary to increase its almost infinite knowledge of the universe. This includes shrewd political alliances, peaceful unification, and where necessary, all-out war.
The Combined Army sourcebook gives players the opportunity to approach the Paradiso conflict from the other side and GMs a vast array of information to better understand the implacable enemy of the Human sphere.
This 112 page PDF features:
History of the Combined Army, the different races composing it, their strategies, armed divisions, and the terrible secrets of this ever growing empire. • Details on the true nature and origins of the Combined Army’s omnipresent leader—the feared and worshipped Evolved Intelligence. Learn about its drives, ambitions, and trepidations! • Rules and guidelines to play several of the Combined Army’s warrior races! From the violent Morat, to the cruel Shasvastii, vengeful Sygmaa, and traitorous humans! • Weapons, equipment, Voodoo Tech, and more! Enough gear to wage war on those who would dare turn their backs to the EI and the Transcendence project!
A little later today the files for Corsairs will be heading off to the printer. At this point, everything is set in stone. I am nervous, and excited. Once printing is finished we will begin the process of fulfilling the physical copies of Corsairs!
In other news, progress on the follow up zines has been slow, but ongoing. There are some fun new things for Ships and Sailing in the upcoming release Smoke and Oakum, and expanded options for characters and development that I think add some nice features in Speed, Strength, and Wits. Felicity has completed the art for Smoke and Oakum, and it is looking fantastic! I am really impressed with the work she has done to help bring life and energy to Corsairs, I’m sure you will agree.
It’s been a chaotic time, from a bush fires to a pandemic, to social upheaval. Given these very real and very important events I have felt that trying to push and market Corsairs in this time is insensitive to those issues. So Corsairs sits, at the moment, slowly ticking away. I have been pleased to see Corsairs gather a few more sales on DriveThru and Itch, and hopefully this continues with the release of Smoke and Oakum. I am considering developing and writing a mini-campaign for Corsairs to supplement the line, but that will depend on how the follow up zines progress. Beyond that, there are a few more games in development that will either see light later this year, or be more fully realised for 2021, perhaps as a part of the ZineQuest then, if it runs again.
I know I have been quiet of late, but things have been ticking along. I hope to shift back to posting more regularly soon…
Corsairs hit DriveThruRPG and Itch.io on June 2nd, and has since been downloaded 348 times across both platforms. There have been a few extra sales, which has been nice, but almost all of them have been downloaded by Kickstarter Backers.
If you are a backer, and have not received your email, please reach out and let me know!
So what’s with the seven bells? Bells were a way of keeping time on a ship at sea, bell times were used not just to signal the passage of time, but eight bells would signal the end of a four hour watch…
So seven bells?
I left Corsairs ‘open’ for a period of time after the digital rewards were fulfilled. The object was to gather any feedback or corrections, and to generally ensure Corsairs was as tight as it could be before sending it off to the printers. That time is fast approaching. There are but a few days remaining before I ‘close’ Corsairs, and send the files off to the printers.
This is exciting, daunting, and generally thrilling moment, as I take a step I have never taken before – to send something off to be printed, and prepare for the fulfillment of the physical rewards.
This means of course, that the window to get in any feedback is fast closing. If you have had a chance to look at Corsairs, and have noticed any embarrassing slip ups or mistakes, please let me know at caradocgames@gmail.com using the subject line: Corsairs Errata. I have had some feedback already, and it has been much appreciated!
So with the seven bells rung out, we wait the approach of eight bells and the changing of the watch… Corsairs will be sent to the printers, and the next stage of our little Kickstarter will begin in earnest!
Right now on Itch.io there is a bundle of indie RPGs available called ‘Indie Games for Bail Funds‘. 100% of the proceeds will be donated to Bail Funds for Protesters.
#BlackLivesMatter, and protesters are doing the work of heros and champions. But because people on the other side of riot shields and barricades don’t get that, sometimes people get arrested, and that sucks. So this is A Charitable Aid Bundle, the proceeds from which will go to bail funds and other causes related to the BLM movement and the protests for real change on streets all around the world.
All of these amazing indie TTRPG creators have kindly donated their work to the cause. Please buy these games, spread the word, and give back to the community!
All proceeds go to Bail Funds for Protesters, which is splitting all donations between bail funds in cities across the United States.
Earlier this week I wrote some of my own thoughts on the current situation in a Kickstarter update, which I am adding below:
2020 has seen us gripped by fires, a pandemic, and now I watch what is unfolding in the US… The Black Lives Matter movement that has risen so loudly, defiantly, and powerfully in the US is a storm of energy pent up over generations of abuse and a power differential unfairly weighted against black people. As a white man, I have no context for what this feels like, what this means, and the weight with which it is felt every day. As an Australian I know that Indigenous Australians have suffered too, and continue to suffer a loss of culture, land, language, and self that can never be repaid. I hope this movement in the US brings about positive social change, and I hope it will have ripple effects around the world, not least in my country.
Over the coming weekend there are going to be protests across my country in support of the Black Lives Matter movement, and with a voice that echoes that of the black American community in calling for awareness and change in how Indigenous Australians are treated here in Australia. These protests are going ahead in many states despite some state Governments asking for them not to proceed, threatening fines, and declaring them illegal. I do not know how they will proceed, or what the result will be, but I hope the end result is change.
We are a stronger society together than divided.
Indie Games for Bail Funds has currently raised over $1000 USD, and while that may not be a huge amount, it is something. In that bundle are a host of games, up to 37 items all told, including some wonderful, lavish, and expensive games, reduced and available on sale, with all proceeds going to a fantastic cause. I thoroughly recommend checking it out, and once again, you can find the link here.
Corsairs has set sail! After the Kickstarter launch as a part of the ZineQuest in February, backers have finally been sent their digital copies of the Corsairs RPG! Before hitting send I was a mix of nervous and excited, immediately afterwards elated and relieved! Corsairs has been released!
Corsairs is a role playing game zine containing the full rules for character creation, and character actions, as well as for ships and sailing the skies of the Molten Seas. Scattered throughout is background information on the floating islands, and the setting of Corsairs, as well as wonderful art from Felicity Haworth. When you buy Corsairs you will also get separate files for the character sheet, the ship sheet, and two rules reference sheets.
If you get a copy, please consider leaving a rating or review!
For the next two weeks I’ll be gathering feedback and questions on Corsairs, before I send the files off to be printed. I’m excited, and I hope anyone who gets a copy enjoys reading and playing the game half as much as I did writing and developing it!
It won’t be long now before the backers of my Corsairs RPG Zine Kickstarter get their backer surveys, a short hop from there to the digital copies being sent out, and another short hop to the physical printing and shipping…
Things are starting to move!
For now the most exciting thing I wanted to share is the cover for Corsairs. This piece of art was created by Felicity Haworth, and I think manages to bring the setting of Corsairs to brilliant and exciting life!
In between numbly scrawling through Twitter and news updates about the state of my country and the world at large, trying to focus on what remote learning might look like for my class next term, and attempting to keep my kids entertained, there have been a few little rays of sunshine…
Red Scar Publishing just released Devil’s Run, a role playing game set in a post-apocalyptic America. The game is designed to use it’s own spin on the Modiphius in-house 2D20 system, with additional support for playing using the Savage Worlds system. I had the opportunity to write various bits and pieces for this core book, and while I had a lot of fun writing some of the background material, the piece I think I am most proud of is the section on group creation which can be found at the end of the character creation chapter. I really enjoy the 2D20 system, and obviously, yes, I am biased. Having said that, I really do like the in-game economies at work between the players and the game master, it adds a lot of story and agency to the game experience.
Devil’s Run is a lot of fun. I know this game has been a labour of love for Marc over at Red Scar, and it shines through every aspect of the game. I am thrilled I had the opportunity to work on it, and even more thrilled that Marc has the opportunity now to take a breath, and enjoy the feeling of having it out in the world. Who am I kidding, Marc is too busy to get to take a breath… but the sentiment remains!
Like everything everywhere at the moment, the production and shipping of the physical game is being held back by the global pandemic. Devil’s Run is available digitally on the Red Scar website, through DriveThruRPG and through the Modiphius Webstore.
Alongside the release of the core rules book, the first of the Collaborative Campaign adventures has been released online. I had an absolute blast developing and writing this adventure, and I hope anyone who has a chance to play it has half as much fun as I did! Life and Death (Echoes) is the name of the campaign, and the first adventure is called Out of the Night. My playtest group caused absolute mayhem (not unusual) when we were testing this adventure, and my fingers are crossed that anyone who gets the chance to play it leaves an equal amount of wreckage in their wake. If you’re a GM who’s planning to run this adventure, I hope you get a kick out of the Scene headings… and that they help set the appropriate mood!
Lastly, some news for the Infinity Role Playing Game, from Modiphius and Corvus Belli: the Mercenaries book is very soon to be released digitally. Like Devil’s Run the physical copy will need to wait, but very, very soon the book will be available from all the usual online conveyors of digital RPGs.
I wrote a few of the chapters in this book, and tried to sow a whole collection of adventure ideas and seeds throughout. There is a lot of awesome background material, a ton of neat equipment, some excellent rules and guidelines for running a mercenary company in the Human Sphere, and a whole bunch more! Plus, the cover art, by Bagus Hutomo, is just stunning!
That’s enough from me tonight, where ever you are, whether you made it this far or otherwise, I hope you’re safe, well, and looking after yourself!
Well, my intention was to continue with my series about the ZineQuest, and I will be getting to it, but right now I feel the world is reeling in a state of shock. The onslaught of the coronavirus covid-19 has been swift, frightening, and shocking. The impact it has had on communities around the world is absolutely awful. Sitting here with a sense of uncertainty about things like the printing, delivery, and shipping of my little zine Corsairs pales into insignificance against the backdrop of events currently unfolding around the world. In my corner of the world we have just entered a shut-down, all non-essential businesses have closed and all non-essential travel restricted. My town has recorded it’s first couple of cases, and undoubtedly there are more in the community, people either not feeling particularly sick, or sick but untested. But it is also true that we are faring so much better than many places around the world.
I never envisaged, as I wrote in the ‘Risks and Challenges’ section of the Kickstarter, that Corsairs was well planned and would meet deadlines barring any unforeseen events, that unforeseen events would indeed step in to throw things into confusion. Of course, this is exactly what unforeseen means, but writing and experiencing it have proven to be two very different things. There is a sense of uncertainty, and of shock, at the way word events are unfolding. I feel obliged to write about the steps being taken to mitigate the challenges posed, and keep people up to date with progress on Corsairs, but it also feels like I’m disregarding the impact current events are having on the lives of so many us when I focus on such a comparatively trivial thing.
Nonetheless, it is important, I think, to keep up with these updates, and it’s something I plan to do with more regularity. Partly because backers deserve to know they have not been forgotten, but mostly because making that contact, sending that message, communicating, is an important and unifying act, however small it may be.
There is uncertainty. As the states in my country all enter different stages of lock down there is no news or forecast as to when certain businesses will open again. No certainty over whether I will be able to have Corsairs printed next month, or whether it will be in three months. No certainty that it will be able to be shipped to me, or that I’ll be able to post it out to backers within days, weeks, or months.
Corsairs will be printed. It will be shipped to backers. But uncertainty is a product of this rapidly changing and evolving global pandemic.
Amongst the chaos of the current world climate I hope that you, wherever you are, are ok. Stay safe, stay well, reach out if you need someone to talk to, and follow health guidelines (ie: wash your hands)!
Previously I wrote about ‘Why ZineQuest‘, but let’s back up a bit and ask why Kickstarter?
In late 2018 I was getting the urge to scale down the freelance writing I was doing, and start working on projects of my own. This led me to start development of a large fantasy RPG: Ashmerl, and a collection of smaller RPGs. I wasn’t sure about what the the best way to sell these games was. Just whack them up online for purchase? Look at fleshing some out for self-publication? There were many potential avenues and I was undecided. Then Patreon announced it was changing it’s fee structure…
In mid 2019 I accelerated my plans, had a logo designed, set up Caradoc Games, and launched my Patreon. I did it because Patreon were changing their fee structure and getting in before that happened meant I could avoid some of those fee changes, having a uniform identity from the start would prevent messiness later on, so I did it all at once. In the months after setting up my Patreon I wrote and released four micro-RPGs, both in basic and expanded versions. The goal was this: To write basic games that people could download for free, and include links in each to my Patreon. On Patreon my patrons would have access to the expanded versions of these games. Simple: drive traffic to Patreon in the hope it would encourage people to sign up as patrons in order to get the expanded games.
It did not happen.
I might have been a relatively successful freelancer (well, busy at least), but I did not have an audience. My email list languished, the views on my site were minimal, on the upside the number of downloads were great, but the next step, getting people to Patreon… it did not happen. This could be related to the audience, it could be related to the quality of the games, it could be that I didn’t or don’t market it well, it could all manner of things. To be honest, I think a lot of games that get downloaded for free don’t end up getting played a whole lot. Read perhaps, but played? Maybe I am thinking too much about the number of games I download vs the number of games I actually manage to get to the table, but it is also a potential reason, so… Obviously this is something I need to spend some time considering. Is it worth going back and rethinking how I am doing my Patreon? Is there something I could be offering or doing that would see a change? I think there is, but that is a subject for another day.
Originally Corsairs was intended to be one of the Patreon games. It would have been a smaller game than it is now, but that was the goal when I first started to develop the idea. Then whispers starter to circulate… ZineQuest was coming back in 2020. In October/November I knew this was something I wanted to take part in, for all the reasons I wrote about in my previous post. Namely: it offered the potential for an audience I lacked, it offered the chance to try Kickstarter with as many elements tilted in my favour as possible, and it challenged me to actually do something different, and learn a whole slew of lessons in the process.
With the methods I had been trialing in the middle of 2019 broadly unsuccessful, here was an opportunity to try something different, during a promotion that I hoped would help provide me with the best opportunity to be successful.
Of course, while the timing seemed ideal to trial running a Kickstarter, crowdfunding offers other benefits. With an upfront injection of capital I would be able to do things that I could not have justified otherwise. It allowed to me to trial printing physical copies, something I would not have considered otherwise. I mean, I could have printed physical copies of course, but what would I do with a couple of hundred copies of my game sitting in a box? Hope to sell them slowly? Set up a webstore to sell them? Sell them through my site? eCommerce additions to WordPress cost money, as they do through any other platform. If it was a book to be sold through Amazon or similar, then I might need to consider getting an ISBN and barcode, which costs more money, and I would have no way of knowing (without an audience remember) whether I would sell even half a dozen copies, let alone more than 100.
Upfront capital also allowed me to commission an artist, in the case of Corsairs: Felicity Haworth. Without the upfront capital I could have commissioned an artist, potentially, but it would be a cost I wasn’t confident I could recoup. Prior to running Corsairs I spent hours and hours drawing all the artwork seen on the Kickstarter page myself. Now, I’m can put together a reasonable drawing, although I am better with a pencil than a stylus, but being able to hire someone who is far more capable than I is going to give Corsairs a quality and life I couldn’t have achieved on my own.
Of course, assuming the risk in the hope of reward is how businesses have run since Glob decided to sell amber beads through Ötzi. But Crowdfunding provides opportunities for small time businesses and indie creators to take risks on their ideas through a safer and more defined pathway. For me, creating an indie game, having a small or next-to-nonexistent audience, and wanting to create something that looked nice and could be physically handled, was going to be cost prohibitive. Kickstarter provided a vehicle through which I could mitigate the financial risks, and have a greater opportunity to grow and connect with an audience.
The process of running a Kickstarter, gaining backers, and getting funded, cuts out many of the uncertainties. I know how many physical copies I need to get printed, I have budgeted for art, I have budgeted for shipping costs. All of these things have been considered and accounted for. Running a Kickstarter has defined what my budget parameters are, and given me the exact number of zines I need to print (plus a margin for error). There may be complications along the way, and Kickstarter is by no means a perfect solution, but it is a very useful one, especially for small time creators trying to share their work with the world at large. Is it also widely used by big companies, you bet, and I can see why, but that’s a different topic.
Corsairs hit Kickstarter as a part of ZineQuest. What was going to be a small PDF-only game released on DriveThruRPG and Itch, as well as to Patreon, has grown to a 32 page Zine. Kickstarter has allowed me create something that will be printed, with high quality art from a professional artist. In the process it has also allowed me to learn about laying a document out, printing processes, commissioning an artist, fulfillment, and perhaps more important than all of the above, gain an audience of over 200 backers. I am pretty happy with this humble beginning…
Why Kickstarter? Well, if you managed to make it this far I hope the answer is clear!
