Hello, hello, hello, and welcome to Morris' unofficial tabletop RPG talk.

I am Russ, aka Morris, or Morris, aka Russ.

And with me this week is...

PJ Coffey from the Southampton Guild of Roleplayers, also of Homebrew and Hacking TTRPG Design.

Joining us as ever, we have the illustrious and wonderful person who is best known for their desire to provide you with the books that you want, but also to go walk amongst the valleys, feel the rain upon her face, and just generally stare upon the amazing granite that makes up the area of measurements that is best known throughout the United Kingdom.

It's the one, it's the only, it's...

It's me, Jessica, from EN Publishing.

Hey, hi, hello.

How are we all this fine, miserable Grey Friday?

Wow, I got something really good this week.

oh yeah i have chicken box i have got a battle cat have you got a battle cat because i have a battle cat i'm very proud of my battle cat i think for those uh cool battle cat for those watching uh or listening to the podcast that cannot see as we are recording live and if you're watching live you can see the visuals would you like to describe what we are seeing russ in all its majesty well this is a 1980s masters of the universe toy so battle cat basically the green cat with the armored saddle and head thing and also i've got a bunch of i've got a skeleton and a he-man and a beast man and a man-at-arms as well but yeah i found him on ebay for like 14 pounds i thought i've got to have that that's pretty cheap so hit the quiet now button and he arrived this morning and now I have a battle cat and I'm very very happy, this might be the best thing that ever happened to me or possibly to anyone ever maybe what Jessica might not know about the toys we're looking at is that the He-Man figure and all of them, If you turn them to the side, you could turn the top half of the torso 90 degrees.

The elastic inside would then make them come around so you can make them hit each other.

That's good wholesome fun.

I was going to say, are they toys or are they collectibles?

Toys.

I mean, they're toys that I have collected?

I don't know.

No, fair enough.

I know that there's a distinction in some communities about whether it's a toy or whether it's a collectible.

So um yeah it had to be on like the cardboard inside like little plastic insert or like the plastic hood that it came in and you'd have to have human having like a sword as opposed to, a uh battle axe uh i do believe that is yes a metal optimus prime that is yes that was an, 1980s optimus prime in the background yes yes in answering rise question there anyway anyway anyway Yeah, I mean, you can nowadays, you can nowadays got Optimus Prime's that will transform upon the word, command, transform.

And that's pretty impressive.

Well, isn't that what the future of technology is for?

Do you have one of those?

I have one.

Because in fact, I'm not going to do it right now.

Yeah.

They need a bit of space.

Well, I think at some point we need to have a podcast or a stream where we go through all our toys that we have.

Because it seems between the three of us, we have a lot.

Yeah.

No, Sharon got me that Optimus wave from my birth, my 50th, in fact, two years ago.

A year and a half ago.

And we are coming into the festive season.

And I noticed on EM World we have got some articles on gift-giving guides because I think this is kind of nerdy stuff that people's friends like in our kind of community.

So good to know what you do and don't have already, Russ.

Um yeah but also christmas thinking of buying me a really expensive transforming optimus prime which maybe i assume you were not well you don't know me just in case you were i have one now i've got the space up there for a megatron so hey yeah one thing with christmas and gaming all the holidays and gaming because you know wherever you are in the world whatever you celebrate um i think sometimes gaming groups can kind of go on a bit of a hiatus because everyone's busy with stuff but this weekend is not the case for me because i'm gaming role-playing games on friday saturday and sunday evening so i'm doing very well for myself this week i have uh so i thought i'd brag really to share it with everybody so on friday i've got warhammer fantasy role-playing game uh i've got saturday i've got some dungeons and dragons fifth edition and then i've got iron kingdoms on sunday so i've got a very nice smorgasbord of different games but i don't know, a few folks are still up to gaming now with the...

The rusher-up, that's still Death on the Reich, still ongoing.

The Enemy Within.

Enemy Within, yeah, yeah.

Nice.

And Iron Kingdoms, is that its own system?

Because I think it's actually like a forfeit, but not that.

Yeah, it started off as a D&D setting.

And then they decided to make, I think like in the late 2000s, they decided to turn it into their own system.

Yeah, it's the one in the late 2000s that has like, you pick two careers and you use it like that.

At its core it's a you roll 2d6 and add your stat so it's actually very simple to play like as a new player i think there is more mechanical crunch going on behind the scenes but luckily because we're all learning and the gm knows them if we come across one of those rules like it's not grappling rules it was something like that but that had a whole thing so we're there in the book saying hang on this is different um but yeah i'm really liking it i'm really liking the combat and because of all the different career combinations and abilities you can make really cool different characters.

I'm really liking it.

I think now the published version, it's gone back to being a 5e setting again, which I think is a shame because the thing I'm liking most about the Iron Keenest campaign I'm in is the system and what that does as opposed to the setting necessarily.

You know what I mean?

I was thinking about, I haven't got a slide or anything for this and it isn't a news item.

It just goes to me there.

Mongoose...

Publishing is traveler they there's a fifth edition version of that dnd fifth edition powered version of that that was announced in the last couple of weeks it's a licensed right it's not produced by mongoose but someone's presenting it from mongoose and just like you were just saying there jess for me traveler is less the law and the setting and it's more the mechanics it's the life path system of traveler that iconic life path system it's the the the planet um the scripture codes um right You can have like an eight or 10 digit little numerical code for a planet.

And that describes everything about that planet.

Like a technology score, a cultural score, and a law score.

Yeah, bio, temperature ranges.

I mean, yeah, because...

I agree as well, because whenever I've played Traveller, the GMs already had their own setting in mind, and Traveller system has been the toolkit to achieve that.

Like, I had one that was very Firefly-themed, and then I've had others that have been, you know, a bit, you know, different type of space sort of themes.

And so I always think of it as the system is the thing.

And I also think you take away the Lifepath system from Traveller, and Traveller is kind of very equipment and gear-based.

Like, you get power mainly by getting...

Like, science fiction, yeah.

Yeah.

so it's not like the zero to hero thing that dnd has you go and stick that into dnd, where you're gaining new abilities and powers and going from you know a peasant up to a superhero that's not the feel of traveler either is it that's not what travels.

Being scrappy in space yeah as there's yeah there's there's a lot to be said about this there's um um oh gilfest says there was a t20 version of traveler which used a d20 license, which I've actually played.

That's quite interesting.

Yeah, went through the Life Path creation system.

That's quite good.

It had a Life Path creation system, despite the Final Fantasy D20 system.

Oh, interesting.

Yeah, just gave you various bonuses to stats and so forth, which seemed reasonable.

Ended up with a level 5 character.

We pulled you around.

Some people had laptops.

They did some trading and stuff.

Got attacked by pirates.

I was like, oh, now's my time to try.

I've got a level 5 marine.

Ramped up on combat drugs lots of dual wielding assault cannons let's go uh got hit by a laser died instantaneously oh which which was like in the 30 to 40 hit point range so this was like the tuition this was the tutorial encounter so i wasn't expecting to be vaporized on site so at least it wasn't like earlier traveler games where you could literally die during character creation yeah i would say that's like yeah it's it's all right um like having that sort of thing because at least you're doing it during character creation and you're like oh okay well at least i'm not wasting my time in the game see i i feel like is a mini game in itself for trouble that's what i mean i do feel like i have wasted my time if i've got so far into making this character and i stop it's like all right back to the beginning i'm like i just don't know this paperwork you know, I don't think later editions do have that you can die in character creation, which is probably a lot.

They looked at it and said, yeah, actually, this isn't as fun as we hoped it would be.

We can't have it be badly made, which is always fun.

Yeah, I mean, that's fine, I think.

I don't mind that, because there's like a consequence in part of your character backstory, but just saying no, you're dead, start again.

I played a game where I was in a wheelchair as a character.

Just through the results of the character creation system and the die rolls, I ended up being in a wheelchair.

I ended up turning it basically into a combat wheelchair, because you would, wouldn't you?

You know, mounting weapons and making it able to hop on it.

Future space magic.

Absolutely.

I mean, it's just like, I have heard, I've read online, lots of people complaining about this 5e conversion.

And incidentally giving it publicity.

Whereas, you know what I haven't seen a single thing about, except for our conversation, because it came up, it's Mongoose's Near Earth Exploration.

We covered it like two weeks ago.

Do you remember the...

Pioneer, yeah.

Pioneer, yeah.

Which, I don't have my back, but I was like, that looks really cool.

I packed it.

Yeah, no.

I might come and steal your books at some point.

I'll read it for you, honestly.

But yeah, I've not seen that anywhere else.

and people are like, ah, we want sci-fi, we want exciting stuff.

Oh, no, but the only thing they'll talk about, the only thing they'll talk about is fifth edition.

Just to say they hate it.

I'm like, if you hate something, don't talk about it.

That's a terrible plan.

The thing is...

That is a thing that some people enjoy doing in itself.

That is an activity that some people derive pleasure from.

And online algorithms push that more.

If you make a post saying, I love this game system that is I don't know, you know, whatever, that will get less traction than someone saying, I hate this game system for these reasons.

Right, yeah, yeah.

And so all the algorithms, you see that on Twitter, you see that on YouTube.

That's why YouTube's like it is.

Yeah, and that's why I think it feels like such an angry place online.

I think there is a lot of positive content on there, but we're just not seeing it because it doesn't get the traction.

This is, like, yeah, I mean, like, it's just so wild for me because it's like, I haven't been on Twitter, in years now because like as far as i'm concerned it's the nazi site along with true social so i don't go there um and youtube and any place with algorithmic media i'm like no because i do terribly that no one wants to listen nor talk to me whereas on some places without algorithm people like me because i actually get to see myself so yeah that's my experience yeah but um yeah but that's that's an algorithm mission but anyway we've actually been waffling for about 15 minutes and haven't actually done any news.

Should we talk to people about what's happening?

I haven't even had a chance to talk about what I'm going to be doing.

Oh, yeah.

I've got loads of stuff that's coming up in terms of role-playing, but we should probably crack on with the news because it's more interesting to people.

Should we talk about the stuff you're doing next week, then, at the top of the show?

Let's put that in there.

Oh, well, on Sunday, I will be playing an organised play of Starfinder, that second edition so i'm i'm really quite excited about that because uh i've tried part on second edition great design not something i've personally enjoyed starfire second edition is going to be exactly the same game but for some reason i'm like no no but this will be perfect i don't know why it's just it's just how my brain works but yeah i'm very excited about it um.

Ah, dear to me.

Eric, good to hear from that comment.

Roy says, it's good to see that PJ's tea is the correct pantone of beige.

I have a friend who swears that the correct colour of tea is the colour of He-Man.

That's how you know when your tea is the correct colour.

Oh, that's too strong.

This is a very British conversation to talk about the correct way to make tea.

So I'm going to, I'm going to dodge it completely and, uh, and say, let's, let's talk about the news.

Let's move on from this.

My, my, my tea is not stewed is all I'm going to say.

Anyway.

Here's our first bit of news then, shall we?

A new video game has been announced.

A Dungeons & Dragons video game.

By Invoke Studios, which is a subsidiary of Wizards of the Coast.

And this video game is called Warlock.

Dungeons & Dragons Warlock.

And it is coming out in 2027.

it features a character called, Carti K-A-A-T-I played by Trisha Helfer which you may remember from Battlestar Amactica amongst other things oh wow okay yeah that's telling me a lot about how they're seeing the character because if you want someone to play like.

A mad goddess then you just like have Trisha Helfer on speed dial because that is the end direct response brilliant in Battlestar Collector, also did a very good turn as Gaia in Lucifer, which is not a show I found myself compelled to watch, but every time she came on screen, I was like, oh, that's good.

That is...

I haven't seen that show.

But I did see all of Battles, Gaia, I can't say that word.

Battles, Gaia, I can't say that word.

I saw all of that.

Yeah, BSG, let's say that.

Yeah, so this is a third-person action-adventure game.

Players will use spellcraft to solve challenges and take down monsters.

And it doesn't use the D&D rules.

No, no, I can't, no.

It is a video game experience first, a third-person adventure.

So it's not like Bowser's Gate or something which actually translates the D&D rules onto screen.

I think we knew that.

They'd already said it wasn't going to be, that it was going to be, yeah, I think they'd already said they're doing, when they announced they were doing a project, they said it was going to be third-person sort of action.

I mean, from the name, from the casting of Trisha Hellfire as the voice actress.

And we're expecting this to be exploring the dark side of the formation of a pact with a patron.

I mean, possibly the fiend, although I have heard speculation that it might be the Raven Queen, which I believe is the one who does magic weapons quite fond of.

Not too familiar with my FR lore, I'm afraid.

but yeah um and it's going to be exploring all sorts of tortured psychological choices which yeah this this sounds like it's going to go together really nicely they've got a solid concept, i've been a champion of the raven queen in my time yeah what time that's a good guess i mean looking at the uh there's these shoulder pad there's a trailer which you can watch which i'm not trying here but i'll put a link in the show notes you can go and watch the trailer and the trailer's mainly a camera zooming around some patterns and things it's not gameplay or anything like that and it's there's not a lot of solid images zooms around some patterns and things and then zooms out and you realize you're coming out of her eye and then it ends in the picture that we can see on screen there which is the picture of her face and you've zoomed out of her eye which was i got to say like a big visual prompt uh Because the art style has a white woman in her 30s, got a bit of gray in her hair.

Absolutely top quality malevolent expression with a heterocromia.

It's got an amber eye and a purple eye and some sort of, and some really on-point high.

I think you'll find that's a warlock eye.

A warlock eye.

A warlock eye.

I'm guessing.

Because now I am a warlock.

Yeah.

So this company, Invoke Studios, used to be called Tuque, T-U-Q-U-E Games.

They changed their name, but they made Dark Alliance in 2021, which is a D&D game that people didn't generally love all that much.

Yeah, it had terrible reviews on Steam so I never got around to picking it up.

And then they shut servers, I think.

Well, the servers are shutting this February?

Or was it last February?

I can't remember.

But the servers are shutting so you can't play it anymore.

I haven't played it so I can't pass comment I'm afraid.

Yeah, it was like some sort of battle themed one which could have been very good But as I say, it's like they...

Really got panned so i was just like it was ever cheap enough for me to risk it, well anyway for this one there's a link to the show uh the uh trailer in the show notes i mean like i said the trailer doesn't show much at all it's just like a pattern zooming out and then you come out of your eyes it's vibes opposed to gameplay yeah yeah yeah um apparently some gameplay will be revealed in 2026 and then the game will be coming out in 2027.

7.

Well, we'll cover that news as soon as it comes out, because I'm keen to keep an eye on this to see what they do with it, because as some people may be aware, I did quite enjoy Baldur's Gate 3, so...

Really?

Yeah.

I never got that, no.

I was playing it just this Wednesday.

Oh, yeah, perfect.

About it.

Okay.

We got a couple of, basically, staff changes to talk about.

Ooh, industry news.

One of us is the coast and one at White Wolf.

Oh, okay.

Tell us more.

So let's just start with the order.

I've got them on the slides here.

We'll start with Wizards of the Coast.

So this is Justice Ramin Arman.

Mm-hmm.

Who is the new game design director for Dungeons & Dragons.

Okay, cool.

Previously, he was the managing game designer.

He's worked for Beadle & Grimm's, has published on DM's Guild, freelanced for Critical Role, MCDM, and 2C Gaming.

And he announced on social media that he is now, instead of being a managing game designer, is now a uh where is it a game design director okay it's a different job um people were somewhat confused what the difference was so we asked and we got an answer and that is what he said um uh thank you all previously my role was managing game designer i a game designer who managers in this role i'm directing the game design department as a whole not just managing its individual members and contributing to or leading projects projects it's a step up from what i was doing before yeah it feels kind of like a creative role um with like high level responsibility but you don't actually do any of the detailed work yourself it feels like yeah yeah yeah well it's it's not leading individual products he's like managing the whole team and he's got people below him i assume who are then leading individual products is what i i'm getting from that i guess i don't know.

Um hopefully he will be able to help avoid some of the missteps the old rake stomp fandango which uh some of the previous releases of dnd have been bogged down by and uh yeah just remembering to credit people yeah that sort of thing like avoiding repeating word for word um problematic tropes and so forth so yeah um i have faith in him he seems like a good chap uh from this live seen of him okay it's real well done um i think you also wanted to talk about a staff change, yes um over in white wolf we've got a yeah have a go it's portuguese name uh diogo no guira apologies uh portuguese is not one of the languages that i am good with uh he's a brazilian designer so that seemed like a pretty pretty hefty change because traditionally brazil has not been well served by the role playing game community in the rest of the world, despite having an absolutely fantastic and thriving internal scene.

So, yeah.

If you've not heard the name before, that's pretty reasonable to be fair.

Diego self-publishes under old school publishing and I quite like the style of what I'm seeing.

Does a lot of his own artwork and It hits a nice middle ground between OSR work, so the old school revival, like doing very original, d20 dnd and also looking more at storytelling based games with um possibly the biggest one that he's selling called sharp swords and sinister blades one with solar blades and cosmic spells dark streets and darker secrets and then moving on to breaking the chain with the dead are coming um and his item is that he has become the lead designer for white wolf yes.

Um yes lead designer for white wolf which is pretty cool no which is like and it's like you know so this is this is somebody who's done a lot of work uh and has out been got got quite a high position which again um hopefully will be able to avoid previous problems that have uh been bothering White Wolf.

Fingers crossed!

Fingers crossed!

Looks like an exciting time.

I look forward to seeing certain innovative ideas coming out of both White Wolf and Wizard of the Coast.

Yeah.

Okay, okay, okay.

Okay, our next news item is all about some game assets, I believe.

Yes, yes.

Oh.

Like...

This is 10,000 game assets for 10 US dollars.

That's quite good value.

Yes, yes, I believe so.

It's 100% human made, no AI.

It comes out of checkered ink game assets.

And it seemed pretty useful to people who are working on indie RPGs because they cover Avenger, RPG, Darts, board games, card, puzzle, platformer, pool, pixel icons, HD icons, dice, meta tiles.

What is meant by a game asset?

A game asset is a visual bit of art.

It looks like a lot of 8-bit stuff, but if you like 8-bit video games, which I know a lot of indie designers are super keen on, this looks like this could keep you going for a couple of years because, while not all the assets will be big there are still i'm gonna say again 10 000 of them and at ten dollars which is around about eight british pounds that could keep you going for a while so i'm like this is this looks like the i mean yeah i like i like the moxie they're like we're not going to have anything to do with ai so we're going to offer you this vast library of human-made assets i'm like yeah you could design a lot of games out of this and yeah i mean it's video games mainly isn't it sort of video game assets rather than um yeah i mean sure but like pixels are pixels russ uh art is art and this is just like an enormous collection of stock art but more relevant.

As i say this could be useful for prototyping like if you're doing a board game or a card game and you don't want to use ai to just before you've paid the artist and your display testing that could be really good to put those in to be like we're going to have a picture of a tree here's a random tree that you don't want to you know yeah like uh as i say it's like this is, Art is not free, but the existence of a repository of guaranteed no AI material, to give your thinking some sort of potential dimension, it felt like a really powerful opportunity for people.

Like I say, it is what it is, but then again, you're paying so very little for it.

So, yeah.

Yeah.

I mean, on the subject of you can buy this for $10 instead of using AI, should we open that can of worms that is algorithmic-generated AI things in the gaming space and open that conversation?

So I missed the story entirely, so you've got to fill me in on this.

Something about UK Games Expo.

Yeah.

Like, back, I think it was last year, not this year, when I was last at UK Games Expo, I remember seeing there was a couple of weird-looking AI art things from people I'd never heard of who were exhibitors there.

Um and then events on my life overtook me as an artist selling art which was ai is that what game companies selling art which looks because at that time it was pretty bad so i asked i said oh did you did you do ai did you use ai for that and they said oh yeah yeah we we think it's really good i'm like good to know um and made and then made a list to never buy anything from them which um i only regret my leniency at this time uh but yeah essentially on instagram uk games expo um supported a company which is very clearly doing ai art and they were challenged on this and it became an action Like, yeah, we talked about the internet being unpleasant sometimes.

It became a very unpleasant comment section because there are a lot of.

Understandably, angry artists and the designers felt the need to defend themselves vigorously with much muting and blocking and the general deplatforming.

So what actually happened exactly?

I'm not clear on what happened.

So was a trader at UK Games Expo who had a product that used...

Algorithmically generated art in it right and part of the uk games expo when you sign up as an exhibitor you can buy a package where the uk games expo will will post about you and say hey this person's coming to the show look at their stuff okay they did that for a company that used algorithmically generated art and because a lot of people in the games industry as we've talked about a lot aren't cool with that said hey why are you why as the uk games expo are you supporting creators that use this a lot of other conventions like comic cons have a policy about product that contain algorithmic generated art that say you can't be on the artist's alley if you use this or they have various policies at this time of um us commenting i don't believe the uk games expo has a policy on on that so they don't have a policy that says hey if you use ar you can't be an exhibitor or have things there they don't have that policy and i think a lot of people online were questioning that and but perhaps not in the most uh constructive way because I mean sometimes people on the internet have a lot of big feelings that come out via the keyboard um on both sides of the discussion.

There has definitely been a lot a lot of undiplomatic questioning but also there's just been a lot of ignoring of actual perfectly reasonable questions.

Yes.

So why they're going on with this, we don't know, but it does feel like it's a sort of a telling silence.

It's like, yeah, make your minds up.

Do you support artists and creators in the industry or don't you?

And it feels like no is the answer, but we don't know.

They haven't said.

Looking at the link, which we'll put in the show notes there, they did respond to someone who emailed them asking about it, not with anything substantive.

But they said, thanks for the email.

This year we had a lot of challenges as the event grew by about 20%, etc.

I have personally avoided AI use and used human artists.

We will consider your point when we have recovered a bit.

That was basically the response.

I think at the moment they don't have a policy or a stance on it.

And they maybe are thinking about what that would be.

I think it would be useful to know because people would like to know.

So I think it's strange they haven't put it out now because at the moment they're taking bookings for it.

We've booked our stand there for next year and it would be useful for people to know because, for example, if I was a publisher that used AIR to come out with a policy saying that I couldn't be there, I'd need to know that before I booked my table with them, really.

To clarify the timeline, that email was 2nd of June, which was just very shortly after the UK Games Expo.

This Instagram debacle was just inside a month ago.

I'm not following myself, but I'm seeing a lot of screenshots and yeah, not great, not a great look.

Well, we can but hope that UK Games Expo comes out with some kind of proper formal.

Or statement regarding this sometime soon then and yeah i agree i agree jess it kind of they need to do that before they started taking bookings rather than after yeah because what if we did ai stuff and then we've already booked it it's a bit like well i didn't know at the time you didn't accept me like because at that point it's unfair to those people and you know never mind the unfairness to people that don't want to be part of something that has that but yeah i think the main thing with any AI conversations is transparency.

If there are creators that are using it, as long as it's clear and transparent, then I think people can make their decisions about what they want to do with that.

That's, yeah.

I think, and also part of the reaction to the criticism on the part of this creator was everybody else is using AI assets in their game.

And that was just like throwing water onto the chip pan.

It was like a massive explosion because no, no, everybody's very much not doing this.

There are definitely some.

I mean, sometimes you'll see a Kickstarter or something.

And sometimes a small new-ish publisher will come on to, say, someone like the end world and post all about it.

Clearly not being aware of what the temperature of the industry was regarding that topic and being completely surprised when they get a massive load of backlash immediately.

Like they just don't even see it coming.

Obviously, they haven't done any prior research whatsoever or anything like that.

They've just gone, oh, these tools let me do this thing for free.

i'm gonna do it then we were talking about this um off the podcast the other week for us we're saying outside the industry actually a lot of people don't feel like in in the game a lot of people that are anti a little bit of a bubble yeah yeah a lot of people that aren't in creative fields don't aren't anti ai at all so i think if you weren't in that bubble and you didn't know it would be really surprising most people are like yeah cool i think like i've said before for a lot of people ai is just an app on their phone that lets them do some funky things and to them it's no more than that they don't understand or even you know think about the ramifications of it beyond that yeah i mean where did that art come from for example where did you know i i don't i don't really blame people outside of the space for not knowing about it because it's been the single biggest marketing campaign like possibly in human history like the.

Staggering volumes of money thrown at it, which has created this AI bubble with Nvidia stocking up, on on processors which nobody can install which they don't have the power to data centers to install is absolutely incredible it's yeah um why it's being done not speculation but yeah um i could see why people would be using it if they don't know and i'm i'm just lucky like that i know some people who clued me into what was going on and then i was able to do my own research and by my research by the way i mean i went and found people who are experts in ai and read what they had to say about it just just to be clear like i'm not i'm not only researching my way into back scenes stuff like that but um wow i'm actually paying attention to people who are experts in space and who know what they're talking about yeah i think we're just saying stuff that we said a million times before yeah it would be it would be nice if the uk games expo did you know make some kind of official statement and put up some kind of policy or, you know, make it very clear what their stance on the subject was.

Yes, whatever that stance may be.

Okay, the next news item.

Back from the 1980s, we have a second edition of Toon, the cartoon tabletop RPG, coming from Steve Jackson Games.

I don't know much about this.

Well, it came out in 1984.

Okay.

You play cartoon characters.

You can't die.

All that can happen is you basically get knocked out of the scene for three minutes or so, and then you're back.

Um it's all slapstick fun you know noony tunes type slapstick fun you can be flattened by pianos blown up by dynamite whatever you'll be back three minutes later yeah yeah yeah um uh so they're coming up with a brand new edition of the game which is going to be crowdfunding on the 17th of december so what's that next week next week yeah yes yeah yeah nice little christmas crowdfunder there um i've got a picture of the uh cover of the book oh that looks like it's pretty pretty heavy yeah yeah like that's a decent sized book we're looking at yeah and hardback yeah i played tune once in the 1980s i could barely remember it i think they had like four stats one of them was called chutzpah i remember that and there was like strength or might or something and or brawn or something and a smarts or something one no it's like four stats.

And i think you could have then basically not not quite superpowers but basically traits they had a name for them i can't remember what it was so you could have a trait or two as well which will let you do some you know wacky stuff but it's you know it was a rule frame it was rules like game it was all about fun and fast oh oh yeah i mean this type of game is yeah it's it's exactly what you'd expect from it if you want to sit and play this silly fun light-hearted game i don't think you're like what are the grappling rules on this when you're playing, you know this sort of uh yeah yeah, That's cool.

I like it.

I like seeing games like that.

That's very clearly what it is.

You know exactly what you're going to go in for and you have an idea of what that experience is going to be straight from the front.

Yeah.

So why can't I just think about the sort of source material like Roadrunner and Looney Tunes stuff.

I imagine like most people really aren't all that familiar with that.

They're not a big thing anymore, are they?

So I wonder if they're going to be updating the actual subject matter to more modern cartoons that kids watch these days.

I don't know.

I'm utterly guessing here.

The cover doesn't look that way.

The cover looks like all those references you just said.

Obviously, none IP infringed versions.

Yeah, it does.

You've got an off-brand Bugs Bunny front and center.

It's brown rabbit.

It's a bit shaggier, but light.

It's Bugs Bunny, yeah.

Yeah, yeah.

Not a whole bit.

Yeah, there's...

Yeah.

Um i don't know because i don't think like modern day cartoons have quite that same zany wacky uh i couldn't tell you what kids saturday morning cartoons look like to be honest i i've no idea i think i don't got plot now it's wild.

I know bluey that's a that's a great tv show, I enjoy that very much.

Maybe Bluey will be in it.

Who knows?

Oh, I'd love that.

That's less wacky and zany, though.

But I think that Saturday morning cartoons aren't as much as a thing now.

Because media's on demand, I know my nibblings, they all watch TV on demand.

So they also don't see adverts in the same way.

Because I remember I used to be very susceptible to what I wanted from Christmas.

My boy adverts will come on and be like, ah, get this thing.

And my young brain will be like, I need this thing.

But they don't really they don't get exposed to that as much because they have all their on-demand media so which takes a full circle on-demand through He-Man, takes a full circle back to He-Man Transformers yeah, like extended toy adverts which were very effective I've got to say and the TV shows were part of the strategy to sell the toys they were literally the ads basically yeah they really were yeah the primary the business model was toys the TV show was the thing that made you buy the toys yeah i i cannot argue and yeah uh they're pretty compelling um it definitely worked yeah um.

Maybe the star wars movies were like that to an extent as well because the merchandising and toys of those were massive weren't they next thing you'll be telling us that old canard about how in return of the jedi is spiteful of ewoks rather than wookies because george luke has thought that ewoks would be cute and sell better i'm delighted by ewoks and i'm still waiting for the opportunity to play one in a star wars game i've been in two star wars games and both times i said i would like to be an ewok and i've been told no um and i disagree, Well, they said because I wouldn't be able to communicate with the rest of the party, and I was like, no, I couldn't make myself known without language.

Because I think even though we as the audience don't know the Ewoks language, I know exactly what they're feeling and thinking, and I can very much roleplay that.

In Star Wars, basically, whenever a droid or anything talks in a different language, everyone always understands what they say.

Yeah, like R2-D2.

I know exactly what that guy's saying.

Yeah.

Yeah, well, Chewbacca, you know what you're saying, don't you?

Yeah.

I didn't realize you were flimmed in Smash yet, so understanding Arterito.

Yeah.

Anyway, yeah, I would very much like to play an Ewok, and I think I would do a really good job.

Maybe in order to support your argument for wanting to play an Ewok, you should cosplay.

Turn up to the game in cosplay as an Ewok.

You're the right height for it, so, you know.

You're going to laugh, Russ, because I did.

I have an Ewok snooze.

It's this little hood thing that has an ear.

So I even tried that.

And it didn't work.

Oh, no.

I know.

That's a dream.

Wow.

Even that didn't work.

Wow.

That's a hard audience.

Yeah, I haven't even got Snood ready.

How would you feel about maybe a jam?

No.

I want to be an Ewok.

Do you want to be an Ewok?

I want to be a cute little angry teddy bear.

Fair enough.

Catalystic teddy bear?

Well, it's not a catalyst.

No, they eat people.

They don't eat themselves.

Carnivorous.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Carnivorous, yeah.

I want to be a carnivorous cute teddy bear.

Why not?

Why not?

Okay.

That's what I thought.

Okay.

Ooh.

Something.

Space 1999, the role-playing game from Modiphius has hit drive-thru RPG.

Ooh, lovely.

You can go along there and pick it up.

That was, I think it was kick-started like a year ago or so.

It was.

I did interview Andy Peregrine on the Not D&D podcast.

So if you would like to have a deep dive into that, we have like a 45 to an hour, put a minute to an hour chat about that.

Probably an hour because it was Andy Peregrine.

Probably it was an hour.

Andy likes to talk, does he not?

He's the perfect guest for a podcast.

He's one of my friends, I can say that, but he does love to talk.

And that's why he's the ideal guest for a podcast.

The worst podcast guest is one that doesn't talk.

Yes.

Yeah.

I don't really prefer those.

They're much better.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Anyway, moving on.

Before we get ourselves in trouble.

Oh, yes.

Memories back to podcast interviews where you're literally trying to drag answers out of people like drawing from a stone.

You're literally trying to work your game.

Say something.

We just had to use the big pliers.

It was fine.

Oh yeah but yeah shall we talk about space 1999 like what is it yeah so it's a british tv show yes it was 1970s yes looking at the futuristic 1999 i mean you know it's before all of our time um i didn't see it i don't know if you've seen it in reruns or anything i've never have typically seen it i'm aware it existed i've not seen space 1999 um but i have a weird love for terror horse yeah i remember yeah yeah absolutely that was that stuff was just crazy loved it this is not that uh space 1999 is this one where the moon explodes or something was an explosion on the moon moon base alpha yeah i think so yeah yeah moon base alpha there's big explosion like from some from their nuclear hit waste or something it knocks the moon out of trajectory it goes off on wacky space adventures yeah they're far flung in space and they um they're they're far away from humanity so they're kind of yeah unadventious trying to survive a cataclysmic accident has sent earth's moon hurtling into space leaving behind a broken planet yes okay.

And one of the key things, of course, is that as with all Jerry Anderson stuff, it was good in puppet vision.

So you had like a little marionette working away and doing cool stuff.

But yeah, like surprisingly compelling.

Like quite a few series that dealt with some interesting themes.

Not seeing Space 90-99, but like stuff like Captain Scarlet, Stingray, uh they've all mentioned terror hawks um thunderbirds most famously of that ilk shall we say, yeah i've not seen space 1999 but it's on a drive-thru you can go and pick it up now and keep it for people but i think it's also just a nice space system if you want kind of a it's hard it's hard sci-fi the right term where it's quite grounded like The technology is like not magic space stuff.

It's quite grounded.

Like, gosh, you need to get these gears to work.

Otherwise, we're going to be in trouble.

And it's, yeah.

And it's very easy to do sci-fi that's kind of adventure of the week with different things coming in.

So, yeah.

So, sort of a grittier...

In that there's more, not so much mechanic, but like in the themes, like reality is very important and will get in the way, is more consistently, as we understand it, reality, rather than say Star Trek, where reversing the polarities on something is just your go-to.

Yeah, no, they can't do that.

It was written in the 70s.

We didn't conceive of such things then.

Right, we're nearing the end of the news.

Nearing the end.

That's not much left so the next piece is crack the sun the draw steel new draw steel batter kit project from mcdm which after its first day made a million dollars it's now 1.7 almost 1.7 million dollars with nearly a month to go yeah what was their goal was their goal really high for that it was 1 200 1 million 250 000 dollars yeah that was that goal, I mean, they smashed it in day one.

That's what they needed to make it.

I'm not entirely sure.

I don't know.

But yeah, this is a big thing.

I need you moment.

Yeah, I know.

Yeah.

This looks like sci-fi.

Yeah.

Sorry.

Yeah.

So seven products.

So it's a big, it's a big back of gear.

The average pledge level is quite high.

Um, but, um, so we've got Encounters, which is their third core rule book, which is a bunch, just a whole book of pre-made Encounters for the game.

We've got Between Sun and Shadow, which is eight new ancestries for the game.

We've got the Beast Heart, which is a new class.

Oh, okay.

Yeah.

Um, then we've got four new adventures.

We've got the Red Road, which is a short second level quest.

We've got the Dark Heart of the Wood, another second level quest.

The Condemned, an exhilarating high octane third level adventure.

Oh, okay.

All right.

And then what they call the main event, Crack the Sun, which is what this really is all about.

This is their big epic campaign for draw steel five acts each act is a whole levels worth of avengers so five levels worth of avengers um and it's designed to really show off draw steel so it's their first big official campaign adventure type thing i was assuming fantasy but i'm looking at the graphic which has cracked the sun and it appears to be a spaceship flying above the surface of the sun.

So I guess they're not getting around.

So let's have a look.

It is, well, it's an adventure set in Vastloria, their version of a medieval fantasy land.

So it's not, yeah.

I'm not sure how that picture ties in exactly.

So there's an army of hobgoblins marching on the city of Dalarath.

And there's an alliance with shadow elves.

I'm not sure where the sci-fi stuff comes into it.

Yeah, but that is definitely a spaceship.

It does look like a spaceship flying over a sun, though.

That is for sure.

That is for sure.

I mean, they've got sci-fi on it.

So, yeah, maybe they're just leading into weird fiction.

Oh i don't have money for this oh have you got because you'd have to get that as well, yeah i know it'd be just very expensive but it just looks so exciting you put it on your christmas wish list yeah but you know i found that the pledge levels some of them are pretty big sort of three hundred um dollars for the uh box set a thousand dollars for the everything under the sundal.

Everything under the sundal bundle, they call it.

Sundal bundle.

That's fun.

That's fun.

Yeah, I like that.

So, you know, it is a hefty.

I mean, you can get, like, everything in digital from this Kickstarter for $135.

Okay.

Well, they reckon they're going to get it out by December 2026, so they've got a year.

Wait, so that's pretty interesting.

Well, you've got a year to save up for when it comes out in retail, then.

That's the other option.

because it's funded now so it's definitely happening yeah that's another one in the Million Dollar Kickstarter Club yeah and I think MCDM is like fourth maybe fifth yeah definitely, at least fourth campaign in the Million Dollar Kickstarter Club mm-hmm.

Good for them.

Good for them.

Yeah.

Probably for them.

That's great.

Oh.

We'll see where it ends.

When does it end in January, I presume?

I'm going to...

24 days from now, whenever that is.

Yeah, that'll be in January.

So I guess when that ends, we'll see what figure it ends on, because that'll be a multi-million dollar campaign, I imagine.

So Bracker Kit is predicting at the moment...

Let's have a look.

About 2.9.

So about $3 million.

Well, we'll see you in the new year.

We'll keep you updated.

That's what the projection currently is.

Yeah.

How close that comes to the end.

It's pretty interesting.

Like, they've got fairies and gnomes.

And the fairies look like they're actually small.

And the gnomes are described as being four inches tall.

Okay.

It's about my height then.

Which is...

I mean, that is a whole new level of tiny gnomes.

So I'm just wondering how it's all supposed to work because if reading the rules for the D&D in the tomb didn't mean anything, it's like an appreciation that they put a great deal of thought into it and they're not so much guided by natural language as being pretty precise about what they're expecting you to take away from it.

So, you know, interesting stuff.

Yeah.

Well, Trostia was very influenced by fourth D&D fourth edition, as I understand it.

And that was very, very precise language and not, not, um, not language at all.

So that's, if that's kind of one of its major inspiration, I can, I can see that for sure.

Oh yeah.

It's got Theo Sabadea working on it.

Very nice.

Yeah.

Hmm.

I don't know.

That's good.

Yeah, you get what you're paying for.

Oh, and all the plushes are short.

I don't count shipping.

So, yeah.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Yeah, backer kit usually does shipping in the pledge manager separately.

So that's quite a normal backer kit thing.

Yeah.

I mean, you do that.

And James Intracurso is working on it as well.

Yes, that's, that is.

I've worked on the Drawsteel core game.

I've been working with NCDM for years now.

Oh, yeah.

That's good stuff.

Right.

I'm just thinking.

Yes.

I'm sorry.

Are we drawing to a close?

Or is there just one?

We are.

We are.

This is it.

This is it.

We're doing a thing.

Yeah.

We have a Kickstarter coming up next week.

A little Christmas Kickstarter.

Mm-hmm.

Do you want to talk about this one, Jess?

Yeah.

Speaking of this, it's coming up to the holidays.

if you want to give your players little gifts in game, we've got over 500 little enchanted trinkets for your games.

So these are magic items.

They're not like big game unbalancing things.

These are things that add like fun flavor and depth to the world.

Magic something for us.

Yeah, I mean, there are weapons and armor and wearable items and things like that, but they're not big hitting game unbalancing things.

But there's those fun stuff in it.

and like there's a section on toadstools that's that's really fun because you know and you know what happens if you misidentify one on a roll and you eat the wrong thing you die what's the best analogy you know like in the harry potter films where basically the school is just like everything is just little magical things like the candles are magical and the paintings are magical and just yeah that none of this stuff is important stuff like you're not going to break a staff and.

Kill a dragon with it or you know it's not massive stuff it's just like things that wizards would have around them and the rating was a ubiquitous thing yeah yeah yeah that sort of stuff 500 yeah yeah 500 magic items which will just make your your game world feel more magical but won't break it yeah i mean if you have uh now we have already published enchanted trinkets one and enchanted trinkets two uh the first one only had 65 enchanted trinkets in so these are like smaller zine kind of ones but this the complete edition contains all three and is a hard cover book but if you already have one or two we do have also enchanted trinkets three which is a soft cover which doesn't have the first two in so if you've already got the first two and you're like i don't want to buy them again no worries we've got you covered um but yeah so that'll be coming out next week i think is our plan um but yeah i'm really excited for it i think it's really fun um yeah Yeah, I mean, but what do you want?

Yeah, a super useful hardcover book, which you can just grab stuff from and plunk it down in your game without unbalancing or breaking your game.

And they're all quite nicely themed.

So some are themed around books and libraries, and others are like piracy navigation things.

So if you're doing that section of your campaign, they're things you can litter around the world.

Well, I'm afraid the best magic trinket has already been invented, and it was done by Hasbro and the Coast, which is, of course, the Cloak of Billowing.

Which is a cloak that has a bonus action you can command to pillow even when there's no wind.

The magic item that players at my table consistently love is the bag of cheese, from level up a5b it's a bag and when you put things in it it turns the things into cheese yeah if it's food um and or and it puts a cheesy room around it and it does nothing else beyond that and, everyone loves it.

Yes.

Everyone loves it.

It's a hilarious joke.

Especially when you buy it for a survival game.

Everyone loves that even more.

Yes.

Everyone loves it.

I imagine mice love it.

They're actually their best magical item.

Yes.

Well, I think that does bring us to the end.

And we forgot to say the top show, so I'll say it at the bottom, that we have been recording this live on the internet.

If you're listening to the podcast, you can join us live and watch the live recording every Friday at 2 p.m.

British time, which is 9 a.m.

Eastern U.S.

time.

And if you're in a different time zone, you can convert that yourself.

And you can watch it on Facebook, YouTube, and Twitch.

Sorry.

Yes, that also, that also, that also.

Yes.

All right, that's it for this week then.

Shall we go and do our weekends, shall we?

Yes.

I'm about for dinner in Brockenhurst tonight.

That would be nice.

We can train, going to have dinner in Brockenhurst.

It's going to be cold and wet and windy.

And someone has asked if this is the penultimate episode of 2025, and I believe so.

I haven't looked at the candor, is it?

We will be because we will be recording next week, Friday the 19th of December, but Friday the 26th.

Not be recording because we don't want to that is correct so this is the penultimate episode of 2025, yeah ta-da ta-da see you next week for the last episode oh one last thing on the end rule you can go and nominate your most anticipated RPG for 2026, and votes come the nominations come to an end in about a week after which we'll have the voting process remember the link otherwise rest won't remember to count it Yes, include the link.

Yeah, just read the instructions and do what the instructions say.

Never!

Because you're told.

You're gamers.

You should be good at that.

Following rules.

Have you met gamers?

Anyway.

All right, let's go.

We've made a mess of this closing.

Thank you very much.

See you next week.

Bye, everybody.

Bye-bye.