Why I wrote this thing (Also Art)

I got a random message from a friend of mine who had been looking through BREAK!! stuff that basically amounted to: "This is actually pretty cool, I've been reading this and my eyes didn't immediately glaze over". I laughed and sent a message back thanking them, saying that made me inordinately happy.

My friend has often joked about how the Ye olde aspect of most fantasy bores them (a jokey term that actually would take a lot of time to unpack and really says a great deal about tabletop rpgs and perhaps the entire genre in general) and while I know for a fact some of that's in BREAK!! enough different things are there that they had something to hold onto. That's good.

It's why I wrote the thing.

Well, one reason at least - I'm not going to say I think wrote a game that can bring all those left behind by the numerous mainstream and indie efforts that have come out over the years. First off, it's not true, secondly it would be absurd and unfair for anyone (let alone myself) to say. But I did want to write a game that I liked, that did the things I wanted, and in my heart of hearts believe that there are enough people that will enjoy it to justify the effort.

Also Grey has been posting a lot of cool art, come take a look!

Grey's Twitter

BREAK!!cast Round up!

For those who might have missed these, all three podcasts where I answered questions about BREAK!! are linked here:

BREAK!!cast 1 -Where Sam and I talk about character options.
BREAK!!cast 2 - Where Kelsey, Produce and I talk about system stuff and the Shadowlands
BREAK!!cast 3 - Where Kiel and I talk about Game Master-centric stuff.

Thanks for listening everyone!

More Thoughts on Setting

A brief discussion on TRPG settings the other day actually had me feeling a bit at odds with a number of posters involved - in no means a bad way, as exchanges were pleasant and of the "this is my preference" variety rather than the "this is the absolute truth" you see so often in hobbyist debate - but still, I was much more invested in things than I normally am, especially since it revolved around The Outer World, BREAK!!'s standard setting.

A significant number of people expressed desire of a fully (or at least well detailed) area being more useful than a more zoomed out view of the world. There are a number of good reasons for this thinking, and I believe it is a reasonable and worthwhile viewpoint.

In contrast however, The BREAK!! rulebook provides a sort of broad overview of The Outer World, each known realm is covered more or less equally and the numerous factions and odd geography is outlined.

There are two big reasons for this (beyond my own stubbornness):

• There is a setting chapter, but the setting itself leaks all over the rest of the book. The Callings, Species, Gear, Character Origins - all connect to the Outer World in someway. Not so much that they could not be divorced from it by an enterprising gaming group, but enough that the Setting Section itself ends up being a sort of net to bring that information together to make it more meaningful overall.
• Even straight, out of the box character creation will yield characters of numerous archetypes and homelands. This is intentional, as an underlying theme of the game is people of various backgrounds coming together to do cool things. I feel like having one part of the world featured as the "main setting" would take away from this; that part of the world would seem more real, the rest becoming "exotic" by proxy.

However, as a compromise there is a small region that is presented afterwards as a sample map. This area includes numerous adventuring sites, settlements, hooks and a random encounter chart (with monster stats, even!). The hope is that this provides a place that can be used right off the bat, but also gives people a chance to see how to take the world and themes provided by the book and make it into something game-able. 

I do worry this might undermine my previous reasons just a bit, but I can't deny it's utility. My hope is providing it as a sample of what you can do (rather than as a definitive) will let me have my cake and eat it too.

(As always, I thank poor Grey for indulging me with this; I always end up making more work for him!)

Lets talk about the Game Master Book - Part 1

BREAK!! is currently divided into two books (it was originally going to be one huge book, but we've since decided to split it up a bit for various logistical reasons) the Player's book and the Game Master's Book. The former contains everything you need to play, including a little bit on the game's standard setting and a couple of sample maps and various Game Master Entities (our catch all phrase for monsters and NPCs). The latter is more information on the setting, a bit on making adventures and campaigns for BREAK!! and some guides/systems for creating your own monsters, relics, settings and what not.

Splitting them up as such hardly revolutionary, but it does make things easier on Grey and allows us to cater more specifically to the purpose of both sets of information. I'm not sure exactly how we'll do it, maybe offer a bundle of both, as well as options for one or the other? (Same with PDF versions).

Anyway, I thought I'd write a bit on the GM's book as I've really not talked a lot about that half of the game.

The first chapter of the GM's book is called The Basics. It's pretty straightforward, and covers three topics overall:

• Using The Rules
• Tone and Themes
• Doing right by your gaming group

The first one is a guide on when and how to apply rules while running BREAK!! - it probably won't surprise anyone, but BREAK!!'s rules are intended to be bendy and broadly applicable. Since that's easy to see, this part gives suggestions on how to utilize the basics in a way that keeps the game fair and fast.

Tone and Theme is a lot more fluid, but it's more about the sorts of things BREAK!! naturally lends itself to and how to steer these things into directions that work for you, if you so desire. (There is a bit on not trying too hard, as players tend to go their own way sometimes and that's OK too!)

The last one is the most important to me, as I feel like a lot of books don't get this quite right, usually treating players as adversaries to your enjoyment as a GM, or singling out different play-styles as being dangerous disruptions, and so forth. What I tried to do here is to give advice on keeping things fun (and yourself sane) that has worked for me.

Next week we'll go into chapter 2 of the GM's Book: Your Campaign.

BREAK!!-ing Random Encounters

I saw a bit of talk about Random Encounters in Tabletop RPGs flying around social media today and it inspired me to talk a bit about how they work in BREAK!!.

It's assumed that most maps in BREAK!! come with a Random Encounter chart. These are generally custom built and used to represent various things that would be moving about the same location as the players are. The intent is to make the world seem dynamic and like it's its own place, rather than a construct made just to serve the player character's adventures. The encounters include other wanderers from the outside, as well as inhabitants whose opinions on intruders range from apathy to murderous hostility. Each also has several entries that simply say "No Encounter" - this means the primary Roll becomes a one that determines both if there is an encounter and what that encounter is, if any.

They do function a bit differently depending on the sort of map being used.

Larger scale maps (such as those detailing a region or province) have a Random Encounter Table you consult each time you cross a significant distance during a journey ( this determined by a quick use of the Overland Travel Rules). The sort of encounters should vary quite a bit depending on where you are travelling, but a lot of them are potential allies, built in adventure hooks or the results of other dangers going on in an area that warrant investigation. An important thing is that it's encouraged that the GM cross off an encounter when used and write a new one to replace it to keep things fresh.

Smaller scale maps (dungeons and other adventure sites, mainly) have a chart that represent the mobile inhabitants of the area or other things that might have wandered in. This is rolled on every time characters make a lot of ruckus or spend a significant amount of time in a particular area. Every time an encounter is "dealt with"" (slain, pacified, etc) it's crossed off the encounter chart. Only so many things can live in a particular place at one time, right?

Also important is that there are less stationary encounters in BREAK!! (I.E "6 goblins in room c") so these often make up the bulk of the things player's can run into.

There is more too things obviously, but these are the bits that come to mind. I'm very excited to talk more about these sorts of things once the book is published.

I know you're all dying to hear my voice:

This is only tangentially related I suppose, but I recently was in a podcast. I do think it's still pretty relevant to anyone interested in BREAK!! because I dump a lot of my RPG-thoughts into it.

I hope you enjoy!

Gen Con 2015 OR How BREAK!! is not Ryuutama (And that's probably good for both)

So this year was my second Gen Con, and maybe my third or fourth big chance to shamelessly shill BREAK!! to a gaming audience. And shill I did, in the forms of running for Games on Demand. Well, when I could at least - I also ran Ryuutama, a great game that proved to be very popular.

Ryuutama is a lovely game. It is very linear, but in the best way possible - it's straightforward and honest in both theme and mechanics. I was nervous about writing my own scenario since I had never Gm-ed it before, so I used an example one from the website (though I added an encounter with a troublesome NPC styled after a famous green hat wearing video game hero to pad it out). 

It focuses on travel and party interaction in a very clever way: The mechanics for daily things like camping, overland movement and even just how you feel in the morning are very procedural, providing players the what while freeing up the why for them to play out to their heart's content. This led to a lot of complaining about Moogle cooking, tone deaf minstrels singing about raspberries and a particularly funny bit where a noble woman told the rest of the party that her refined interpretation of a camp site was simply too advanced for them to appreciate (She had failed her roll pretty miserably).

Very different from what I normally run - but still a lot of fun!

BREAK!! on the other hand, is very focused on location-based adventuring. I am quick to admit that it is structurally close to classic RPGs in that manner, but I don't think that's a bad thing. I think there is enough differences in style, tone, and specific mechanics that I can afford (hell, probably benefit) from a certain amount of familiarity.

Grey provided me with some choice props, huh?

Trouble in Sprocket seemed to work well for the groups I ran it for. I was nervous about how the game would handle what was essentially a whodunit style scenario (with a small dungeon attached, because I cannot help myself) but it turned out to be a lot of fun. The setup lead to a lot of choice moments, including:

• The Battle Princess using her Heart's Cry ability to discern the emotion currently motivating various NPCs and use that to assist investigation.
• The group's Factotum playing hardliner with the Battle Princess as her chipper foil during interrogation.
• The Mechanoid Champion slicing clean through one enemy, leading to the immediate surrender of another.
• "Did they teach you about horrific vivisection back in Happy Little Person Academy?" says the Mechanoid to the Chib.
• Another session where said Chib managed to take down an explosive wielding antagonist via kamikaze run with a Fireberry Grenade and miraculously surviving the aftermath. He had a minor wound and a broken right leg for his troubles, though.
• Pretty much everyone's reaction to the "Very Useful Cloud" and Burr the Puppymole.

I was surprised how much each group seemed to pity a particular figure in the adventure. I'm not sure if I made them too sympathetic or if I hit a sweet spot I shouldn't ruin.

Anyway, we plan on having Trouble in Sprocket along with some playtest rules available for you all soon! Then you can let me know if I'm being big-headed about it.

(One of the BREAK!! play-testers was a gentleman who is a member of the Off the Table podcast, though I don't remember which. His Mechanoid Champion voice was inspiring.)

A little sad, always brave; themes in Break!!

The rules of Break!! are intended to be helpful and encouraging. The easily shouted title is a deliberate choice - my hope is that everything about the game encourages creativity, action and energy. Even failure should be an invitation to try something new, especially if it is because said failure has radically altered the situation somehow.

This doesn't mean things always work or are always easy - the world of Break!! is as dangerous for the characters as they are to it. The setting is diverse and contrasting; while the Wistful Dark is gloomy and foreboding and the Blazing Garden is full of wonder and oddities, both are home to a villainous Status quo. The Outer World has seen several "Golden Ages" rot away or end with abrupt violence and those that have risen to power in the current age range from malevolent to troubled. The dark twists and corrupts those trapped within it, the Bright turns a blind eye to those that suffer under it's gaze.

While some of the occasionally adorable or amusing inhabitants of the world even a lot of it out, it still ends up being a little sad.

But that too is intentional - the point is that it's not meant to stay that way. The world is filled with danger because it's assumed that adventurers will brave it. It is a dark place, but not a hopeless one. There is beauty to be unearthed and hope to be spread. Even the most mercenary parties may dredge up something wonderful, or oust some terrible threat to the people so they can loot its ill-gotten horde.

The game is likely best summed up by several sketches of Mariah the Battle Princess, defiantly staring at some unseen evil with tears in her eyes. Sorrow is understandable, valor is a must.

   

All in the manual

Hidden in a recent column written by a favorite creative type of mine is a lament about how video games have become increasingly secure, straightforward things. You slowly build up a set of established abilities and utilize them against a final boss who generally is a bigger, badder versions of the challenges set before you prior. Older games circumvented this by (sort of) withholding information, which generally meant you spent as much time exploring the game's controls and features as you did playing it.

While I don't think the change is really a negative - while spiking in esoteric complexity for a while there, I think video games have become much more accessible in recent years, so much so that I think nearly everyone I know plays some sort of game here and there - I do miss the sort of experience he mentions in the beginning of that column.

I don't think you can perfectly replicate the exact feeling with tabletop games. In fact, it's undesirable. While I think it can be very entertaining in a video game to wander about and try out things in an experimental fashion, doing so in a big group of friends while referencing a rule book constantly would likely just be frustrating and awful. RPG rules, first and foremost, should be clear in mechanics and purpose.

That said,  a similar sense of exploration can be had in a pen and paper system. While the rules should be clear, their application should be intuitive enough that they can be applied in situations that could surprise GM and Player. All but the most narrative constrained sessions have a sense of non-linearity to them; a "final boss" can be waylaid by a clever player sabotaging them with an otherwise innocuous ability early on or an insignificant NPC could become vital when an oddball feature of theirs comes into play thanks to some unforeseen catastrophe. 

This is what I'm attempting with Break!!, mainly by keeping the rules as "common sense" based as I possibly can while retaining the...er..."integrity" of the game's tone. I want the players to be able to foil the Emperor of Sol because lard isn't technically a weapon, or free a sealed sword from it's stone prison by using an alchemist's solvent to dissolve the rock around it as opposed to actually being the chosen one. The final outcome of a session should be able to be a surprise for everyone.

...Of course, if you want, you should be able to win by proper application of sword, magic or skill as well. Part of the freedom to act out of the box is that you need to be able to act within it, too.

Oh yeah, happy new year and stuff.