Latest / Sessions Canceled / Draw Steel, Tactial Heroic Cinematic Fantasy | Tabletop Shoutout - Part. 2: Ep. 165

Transcript

Draw Steel, Tactial Heroic Cinematic Fantasy | Tabletop Shoutout - Part. 2: Ep. 165 · Sessions Canceled

• 0:10
  The GM and one of the players got into a heated argument about
• 0:13
  the minutiae of XP systems in games and how it should be
• 0:19
  distributed, and they're not talking to each other anymore.
• 0:24
  Everyone's just kind of sit awkwardly sitting at the GM's
• 0:26
  kitchen table. I can play in the Switch or
• 0:30
  something, so let's just cancel. The enthusiasm clear in your
• 0:35
  voice. I was I What am I supposed to
• 0:43
  be? Am I supposed to shout the shout
• 0:45
  the intro? I mean, you just, you're just
• 0:48
  like, this should happen, I guess.
• 0:51
  I mean, I was kind of putting you on blast, so I was expecting
• 0:53
  you to. I mean, I figured, but when?
• 0:56
  I was expecting you to like jump in there and say something.
• 1:01
  I mean, I was gonna, I was like, what do I look like, Matt, to
• 1:03
  you? But it's fine.
• 1:05
  Yes, yes you do. Damn damn Matt's.
• 1:12
  You're not as ostrich shaped as Matt is though.
• 1:15
  No, correct. I am not ostrich shaped.
• 1:18
  I stand my ground firmly. Man's ability to just fill his
• 1:24
  brain cavity with sand is impressive.
• 1:31
  I'm just I'm I'm really going to hold him to.
• 1:36
  I'm just, I just I really can't get over.
• 1:39
  I don't understand how this game works or I don't understand how
• 1:42
  the how this works. How what works the game.
• 1:45
  Did you read it? No.
• 1:47
  What? When did he say that?
• 1:53
  You not remember this are. You talking about when he was
• 1:56
  trying to learn Dungeon World? No, he was talking about draw
• 1:59
  steel. Oh no, I do not under this, No
• 2:02
  he. Was like posting the art or
• 2:04
  whatever. And he was like, he was like, Oh
• 2:06
  yeah, the game's out. He was like, I have no fucking
• 2:08
  clue what's going on, but the art's cool.
• 2:10
  And I was like, what do you mean you don't know what's going on?
• 2:12
  Matt? He was like with the game, I
• 2:13
  have no idea what's going on in the game.
• 2:14
  I'm like, did you read it? And he was like, no, I was like,
• 2:18
  so then why would you? What?
• 2:22
  How do you not? I can't believe you don't
• 2:24
  remember this. Conversation.
• 2:25
  I don't know, I I feel like he probably meant like what the
• 2:29
  game is about, no? No, he literally said he didn't
• 2:32
  read it so he didn't understand how the game worked.
• 2:36
  Like that's straight up what he said.
• 2:38
  Me and Sam put them on black. You can scroll back in the chat.
• 2:41
  Hold on, it's right there. We're doing this live in, the
• 2:43
  old in. It's it's in the old chat 'cause
• 2:45
  he keeps posting shit in the old one that and forgetting not to
• 2:48
  use it. It's.
• 2:50
  It's right there. Oh, it's literally right there.
• 2:54
  You know, if he said like I don't here you go back to the
• 2:57
  starter. Art is very cool.
• 2:58
  Other I have no idea what's going on.
• 3:00
  I mean, you don't know what's going on.
• 3:01
  I don't understand the rules. I haven't read the rules yet.
• 3:04
  My brother art is pretty tough. I feel like there needs to be a
• 3:09
  counter. Whatever.
• 3:10
  Matt doesn't read something. I think it'd overflow into a
• 3:13
  negative if it were retroactive. Like, so like, there's digging
• 3:20
  your head into the sand and then there's just no, I will not
• 3:23
  read. You're like, what?
• 3:24
  Then how are you gonna? You did OK.
• 3:27
  And again, this is a game he backed on Kickstarter.
• 3:31
  I think, I think that's that's real impressive.
• 3:35
  Yeah. That's he backed it.
• 3:37
  He backed it on Kickstarter. That's arguably the most
• 3:39
  important bit. Oh my goodness.
• 3:42
  So like, yeah, I don't know do with that which you will.
• 3:47
  Oh, Matt. Oh, Matt, you're so silly.
• 3:49
  Yeah, yeah. So anyway, Speaking of Matt not
• 3:54
  reading Draw Steel, we have read Draw Steel, although admittedly
• 3:57
  not all of it yet. I actually have read more than.
• 4:00
  Most of it we're like, we're like 80% of the way through.
• 4:04
  We're not. We're not finishing due to that
• 4:06
  today surprise, I knew that wasn't happening.
• 4:11
  I just, I knew it in my heart. But we have read the book and we
• 4:18
  are going to continue talking about said book that we did
• 4:22
  read. And this makes it sound like I'm
• 4:24
  making a joke that we didn't. But we we did.
• 4:27
  Actually, I'm not. This is not a facetious thing.
• 4:30
  I did get farther in it than I thought I would, but again, I
• 4:33
  did a lot of like, OK, this is this is exactly like 5V.
• 4:35
  OK, this is fine. All right, this is OK, this is
• 4:38
  fine. Oh, that's new.
• 4:38
  OK, cool. That's new.
• 4:39
  Yeah, I mean, I I would say I went out of my way to be pretty
• 4:42
  like try to catch the minutiae bits just because this game kind
• 4:51
  of exists on the minutiae. Like on the broad strokes.
• 4:55
  It is a, you know, DNDS heroic fantasy game on like the high
• 5:02
  level and the minutiae is where you actually notice the minutiae
• 5:08
  is where you see the value in the product, if you will.
• 5:10
  You know what I mean, 'cause yeah, if you're just like it, it
• 5:15
  is fantasy game where I fight monsters, then like, yes, it is
• 5:18
  fantasy game where you fight monsters.
• 5:20
  And if that's the only criteria you need, then yeah, you could
• 5:23
  just keep playing five year or Pathfinder or whatever other
• 5:25
  fucking Shadow Dark or whatever. But yes, the, the, the
• 5:30
  distinctions here are relevant because this game is going for a
• 5:36
  vibe and I think it executes quite strongly on that vibe,
• 5:41
  which I think is important. So before we get back into all
• 5:48
  that habit, ha, yeah, pause, take a moment, hit, hit your
• 5:55
  best Michael Jackson. I don't know why I did that.
• 6:02
  Hit the follow subscribe button or whatever fucking platform
• 6:07
  you're listening on right now, right right now.
• 6:12
  You don't actually have to pause or anything.
• 6:14
  Just hit the button at the same time as listening and when you
• 6:22
  do so, it will initiate a series of code.
• 6:28
  I don't know I was going to from over there.
• 6:30
  I was like, should I just keep going on for like an
• 6:32
  uncomfortably long time? But I wasn't actually going to
• 6:34
  commit to that, OK. OK.
• 6:36
  But I thought about it. There's a brief moment.
• 6:39
  All right, so where the fuck did we leave off?
• 6:42
  Last thing we talked about was advancement and then we left off
• 6:46
  on ancestries. So this is where we get to the
• 6:51
  actual making your character stuff.
• 6:57
  And so ancestries in this game, if you are familiar with the
• 7:02
  older lingo, ancestries are your races in this game or as D&D
• 7:06
  calls them, species. Now, I'm still really partial to
• 7:10
  ancestries. I think that's the better word
• 7:13
  of monks. All the other options I have
• 7:15
  heard personally. So I'm I'm happy they went with
• 7:19
  ancestries. You're so you're what's, how do
• 7:30
  I phrase it? So your character's like overall
• 7:33
  background is is broken up a bit more than in D&D or something
• 7:40
  similar. I think Pathfinder actually
• 7:42
  second edition does a similar thing to draw steel also where
• 7:46
  your ancestry is like what you are physically, you know, it's
• 7:49
  like who your parents are dictating who you are kind of
• 7:54
  your, you know, your ethnicity if you apply it to a more real
• 7:57
  world example, but your background is instead chopped up
• 8:06
  into culture and career, which are are.
• 8:13
  Why can't I think of the word I? Am I having a stroke?
• 8:21
  Are you look both arms are above your head.
• 8:24
  I don't know. I think, yeah, arms up.
• 8:26
  Yeah, Yeah. OK.
• 8:27
  OK, so you're. Good.
• 8:28
  They're not connected is the point I'm trying to make.
• 8:30
  Your, your, your ancestry, your culture, and your career are not
• 8:34
  connected. They are three distinct pieces
• 8:36
  that make up your character's overall background components
• 8:40
  when making your character. So which means ancestries are
• 8:46
  not going to give you any kind of abilities that are culturally
• 8:51
  bound or would be based on whatever kind of career your
• 8:54
  character would have before. So instead ancestries give you
• 8:58
  like weird cool superpowers. Basically.
• 9:03
  It's kind of what they end up being.
• 9:04
  They do. They are pretty neat and I'm
• 9:08
  really happy. I so I was make using a
• 9:10
  character sheet but it was on Google like it was on Chrome and
• 9:13
  then my computer updated and restarted so I lost all that.
• 9:16
  But I am proud to say that even humans have some really cool
• 9:21
  shit going on. Yeah, pretty much everyone has
• 9:23
  good shit. The the God damn, I'm really
• 9:33
  jump my brain. I'm jumping over into too many
• 9:35
  different directions and losing myself.
• 9:37
  There's 12 ancestries Acacia curious.
• 9:39
  So you have an ample selection. I would say we did not talk
• 9:45
  about the setting of the game just because it's a lot and I
• 9:48
  just didn't feel like going into all of it.
• 9:51
  More worried about the game itself, obviously some static
• 9:54
  we're gonna have to explain some minute, like some bits of the
• 9:58
  setting stuff when you're talking about ancestries, 'cause
• 10:00
  it's kind of hard not to, you know?
• 10:03
  1 is linked to the other. So 12 ancestries are humans,
• 10:09
  devils, polders, time Raiders, the weird one, orcs, woad,
• 10:16
  elves. I'm sorry, Tie Raiders, Legally
• 10:19
  distinct. What is it GIF?
• 10:24
  Sorry. Yeah.
• 10:26
  What? They look like this.
• 10:28
  Not not this one. Not Wood Elves.
• 10:31
  Wood Elves WWODE, don't you? See that word used very often
• 10:36
  anymore? It's kind of an old English
• 10:39
  word. High Elves, Dragon Knights,
• 10:43
  Memonox or Memonex, which are also kind of the weirdos.
• 10:47
  Dwarves, Hakons and revenants. Quite a few of those are going
• 10:51
  to sound familiar and then a couple of them are going to be a
• 10:54
  little odd. Don't you can't really assume.
• 10:59
  Well, a couple of them you, some of them you can assume kind of
• 11:02
  what the vibe is. The other ones I would say less
• 11:05
  so. So we're just going to go there.
• 11:09
  They're set up in alphabetical order.
• 11:11
  So we're just going to kind of go down by alphabetical order,
• 11:14
  which means we start with devils.
• 11:15
  Funny enough there is there is a a couple of pages on where some
• 11:26
  of the species come from. Like what their?
• 11:30
  Original cosmology. Yeah, yeah, like a cosmology
• 11:33
  origin thing. And then if you're curious about
• 11:35
  names, there's breakdowns of the different ancestries and how
• 11:39
  they use their names. And then the one that you're
• 11:41
  probably going to reference every once in a while is the
• 11:45
  measurements, which is to say like how tall, how much do they
• 11:49
  weigh, What's their life expectancy averages?
• 11:52
  Those are all in there unless it specifically tells you otherwise
• 11:59
  from the ancestry. All ancestries are size 1 medium
• 12:03
  and have a speed of five and a stability of 0.
• 12:08
  This game does not use feet for distances and stuff like that.
• 12:13
  It uses literally just squares, like squares on the grid.
• 12:17
  So speed 5 means you move five squares.
• 12:20
  That's it. No, yeah, very for E and I would
• 12:28
  say I'm I'm mixed on on if I like that or not doing it that
• 12:35
  way. Oh, interesting.
• 12:37
  I feel like I remember you saying you liked that more.
• 12:41
  Well, so. I.
• 12:45
  I do, and I like I like. I like the game.
• 12:48
  Not trying to pretend like I like that the game is upfront
• 12:52
  about using a grid, which 5 E is kind of weird about and doesn't
• 13:00
  like to admit that it is played on a grid for some reason.
• 13:05
  But I don't know, I do sometimes want distance measurements and
• 13:11
  this game does give you distance measurements.
• 13:13
  It it literally says one square is is a is a 5 foot cube on a
• 13:19
  side. So like, if you do need to
• 13:20
  measure that distance for some reason, you can, but it requires
• 13:24
  a little bit of conversion. So I don't know.
• 13:28
  I'm like, I don't know. I go back and forth on it.
• 13:31
  I mean, my favorite games don't use any distance measurements of
• 13:35
  any kind. So there's that, you know, Or
• 13:41
  they use like really abstracted different distances like Dungeon
• 13:45
  World with the distance tags or Apocalypse World the distance
• 13:48
  tags. So you know, that's my most
• 13:52
  preferred method. But anyway, yeah.
• 14:00
  And then size 1M is you're you are a size 1 creature.
• 14:04
  You're a medium size 1 creature. The reason it says 1M is because
• 14:10
  size 1 covers a pretty wide range.
• 14:15
  Everything from a Pixie up to like an 8 or 9 foot tall half
• 14:19
  giant man qualifies as size 1. So size 1 medium is like human
• 14:25
  size and then like size one large would be like giant man
• 14:28
  size, and then like size 1S is Hobbit and then size 1T is like
• 14:34
  Pixie size. So there's a little extra
• 14:36
  variation within the medium within the size 1 category.
• 14:43
  The other categories do not. From there it just goes size 2,
• 14:46
  size 3, size 4, size 5. There is no upper limit.
• 14:51
  This game very explicitly says there's no upper limit on sizing
• 14:55
  Get as big as you want. All right, so first ancestry,
• 15:03
  first ancestry. So as I said, the first one,
• 15:06
  because they're alphabetical, is devils.
• 15:10
  They're T flings more or less with a little with a little bit
• 15:17
  of a distinction lore wise in that devils in the world of draw
• 15:22
  steel, which is to say the world of Orden and the timescape are
• 15:27
  they're not people like cursed with devil blood.
• 15:31
  And so a human turns into a tiefling kind of thing.
• 15:34
  They're actually just devils from hell.
• 15:36
  Yes, they are the children of devils from hell.
• 15:39
  You're straight up devils there. Yeah, and or you might not.
• 15:44
  You might not be the child. You might just be a devil who
• 15:47
  got stuck. You might just be a devil.
• 15:48
  Now you're really pissed about. Yeah, you're just mad that
• 15:51
  you're stuck here. Yeah.
• 15:52
  Like, it's not 'cause like tieflings and D&D, it'll be
• 15:55
  like, oh, you're born a human and you, like, manifest your
• 15:58
  tiefling shit. Or like you were cursed as a
• 16:01
  young boy and then you got turned into AT, you know,
• 16:02
  there's a little more, like, nuance there.
• 16:04
  Now. These are just devils from hell.
• 16:07
  I the lore kind of hints at the way this happens is that someone
• 16:12
  summons a devil for like a demonic contract, but another
• 16:17
  devil ratted out that devil's name so they closed the portal
• 16:22
  on them through some fuckery and it once the portal closes you're
• 16:25
  stuck in order. So it's just devils who are like
• 16:31
  literally doing the Dinkleberg. Yeah, the other fun thing, the
• 16:36
  other thing that's funny too, is it says one of the paragraphs.
• 16:40
  On rare occasion, though, the summoning goes wrong and the
• 16:42
  supplicant dies before the deal can be struck, stranding,
• 16:46
  stranding the summoned devil on Orden permanently.
• 16:49
  Some stranded devils seek to return to hell, but some prefer,
• 16:53
  But most prefer life in Orden, where the phrase stabbed in the
• 16:56
  back by a colleague is usually a metaphor.
• 16:58
  Yeah. So some of them get stuck and
• 17:01
  they're like, yeah, I'll just hang around.
• 17:04
  That's fine. Yeah, it's like.
• 17:06
  They they get over a refractory period of panic, but where
• 17:08
  they're like, yeah, fuck it, it's whatever.
• 17:12
  It's not that bad up here. Another interesting thing that
• 17:17
  they did with this this is a this is a Matt Colville explicit
• 17:22
  decision. They every species and I think
• 17:31
  do the classes have them? No.
• 17:35
  All of the ancestries have a little bit of fiction written
• 17:40
  about them or related to them that is attached to their chunk
• 17:44
  in the book. So they each have a little short
• 17:46
  story attached. I didn't take the time for the
• 17:50
  for the sake of speed. I didn't take the time to like
• 17:52
  read any of them, although I kind of like briefly looked over
• 17:55
  them. Although I believe I've, I have
• 17:57
  listened to Matt Koval read a few of them on stream and
• 18:01
  they're just fun little like fiction short stories that just
• 18:04
  add to the world and flesh things out.
• 18:06
  I kind of wish they committed to this idea more to be honest,
• 18:14
  because the idea of a tabletop game where all of the fiction
• 18:18
  stuff is delivered via in universe short stories only.
• 18:23
  I actually really like that concept and think that would be
• 18:26
  really sick and I kind of wish they did it more.
• 18:30
  Well, so do you know what game did this really well?
• 18:33
  What? Kane.
• 18:35
  True, true. Where it'll be like, oh, these
• 18:38
  are your things. Exorcists are not considered
• 18:41
  human due to the like like the the covenant of worms in 1846
• 18:45
  and you're like. What the fuck?
• 18:47
  Yeah, that's true. Actually, yes, Cain does do a
• 18:50
  lot of that. So, yeah, I I love, I love that
• 18:54
  they exist. I I wish they did more of they
• 18:56
  did something more with it and draw steel and maybe they will
• 18:58
  in the future. All right, So what is what is
• 19:02
  your ancestry dictate? You know it it this is tabletop
• 19:06
  game. I want to know about my
• 19:08
  mechanics. What the what does your ancestry
• 19:10
  do? Basically gives you a couple of
• 19:14
  points. It gives you 3 points to spend
• 19:18
  what they call ancestry points on different traits and they're
• 19:22
  kind of like little mini feats. It's kind of the easiest way I
• 19:26
  would put it. All of the ancestry start with a
• 19:30
  signature trait that you get automatically, and then you get
• 19:34
  your three points to spend on other bits.
• 19:38
  So the devil, you start with Silver tongue.
• 19:41
  Your innate magic allows you to twist twist how your words are
• 19:44
  perceived to get a better read on people and convince them to
• 19:47
  see things your way. You have one skill of your
• 19:50
  choice from the interpersonal skill group, and you gain an
• 19:53
  edge on tests when attempting to discover an NP.
• 19:56
  CS motivations and pitfalls during a negotiation.
• 20:00
  So basically you're good at talking, you know, shmooshing
• 20:03
  and talking people up, like almost magically good at it.
• 20:08
  Devils have a whole bit that they love contracts, much like
• 20:12
  much like devils in in D&D, they're big on the contract
• 20:15
  thing. So they're they're smooth
• 20:17
  talkers a lot of the time. Some other potential things you
• 20:21
  could buy beast legs, which makes your speed 6.
• 20:25
  You can get hell sight, which lets you see through darkness
• 20:28
  and fog. Impressive horns.
• 20:32
  Whenever you make a saving throw, you succeed on a roll of
• 20:35
  five or higher, so it makes you better.
• 20:37
  It basically you have big ass horns and you have a stronger
• 20:40
  will wings. You can get wings if you spend
• 20:44
  2. You start with three points.
• 20:45
  You can. Some abilities cost 1 and some
• 20:47
  abilities cost 2 points. Wings cost 2 points, but they
• 20:50
  allow you to fly. It's pretty sick.
• 20:54
  One thing that's funny, well using your wings to fly at third
• 20:57
  level or lower you have damage weakness 5, which means you take
• 21:03
  5 extra damage from everything. So.
• 21:08
  You could find the idea that you should get blown out of the sky
• 21:11
  very easily. Yeah, yeah, you're just really
• 21:13
  easy to get knocked the fuck out.
• 21:14
  So you can fly, but do be a little careful.
• 21:16
  You take extra damage from literally everything.
• 21:21
  So yeah, for double S you get Barb tail, beast legs, glowing
• 21:23
  eyes, hell sight, impressive horns, prehensile tail, and
• 21:26
  wings. Just to give you an idea.
• 21:29
  I guess I'll just kind of go through Barb tail once per hour.
• 21:32
  When you make a melee strike, you can deal extra damage with
• 21:34
  the strike equal your highest characteristic, the beast legs.
• 21:37
  I mentioned glowing eyes. Whenever you take damage from a
• 21:40
  creature, you could use a triggered action to deal that
• 21:42
  creature psychic damage equal to AD 10 plus your level, which is
• 21:46
  it's it's hellish rebuke the hell side.
• 21:49
  I mentioned the horns and then the prehensile tail.
• 21:52
  You can't be flanked because your tail like defends you from
• 21:55
  the back. And that's that's that's your
• 22:01
  base as ancestors are pretty simple.
• 22:03
  So like that's your structure for all of them.
• 22:08
  Next we have the dragon Knights. They're dragonborn.
• 22:14
  They're. Dragon.
• 22:15
  I don't like that they're called Dragon Knights.
• 22:17
  Did you read Why I? Did yes.
• 22:20
  I still don't love it. So to yes explain the reason
• 22:25
  they're called dragon Knights is they are not naturally occurring
• 22:32
  people. They were created by a very
• 22:34
  powerful wizard in the setting, but basically a long time in the
• 22:40
  go in the a long time ago in the setting when there was more
• 22:42
  peace. There is this guy, good King
• 22:45
  Omen, who his wizard made these dragon Knights or he made the
• 22:50
  what was called the dragon phalanx.
• 22:52
  And every dragon within it was a dragon knight because they were
• 22:55
  all explicitly created to be nightly soldiers.
• 22:59
  Like that was their only job. So they're they're called
• 23:03
  Knights because they're they're all referred to as Knights
• 23:06
  because that was their original intended purpose.
• 23:08
  And they're kind of like weird homunculus people.
• 23:10
  They're not naturally occurring, they're not born from Dragons or
• 23:14
  anything like that. An evil wizard did or not.
• 23:16
  Actually a good wizard did some functionary and made superhumans
• 23:20
  superhuman lizard dudes. Right.
• 23:23
  It's it's just weird that like Orthoc, the Baker is called a
• 23:26
  Dragon knight, you know what I mean?
• 23:28
  His ancestry is a dragon knight. Yes.
• 23:33
  The I feel like I don't know. They probably would have a more
• 23:37
  casual name right? Like I could see myself running
• 23:41
  this game and people calling them like dragon kin or lizard
• 23:44
  folk or something like that. Like they call them something a
• 23:46
  little less intense. I I feel like they missed a
• 23:48
  perfectly good opportunity, although it's it's Pokémon just
• 23:51
  call them dragon Knights. Dragon Knights you would get
• 23:56
  like linguistically you would get just a natural shortening of
• 24:00
  those two words from dragon knight to Dragon Knight ITE.
• 24:05
  Dragon Wright? Dragon Knight.
• 24:06
  Yeah, you could. I suppose.
• 24:07
  You might get in trouble with Nintendo though.
• 24:10
  I Nintendo just copyrighted the idea of summoning and using and
• 24:13
  things to fight for you, which doesn't make.
• 24:16
  I know it's. Fine, It's fine.
• 24:17
  It's fine. It's fine.
• 24:17
  It's not fine. It's not fine, but yes, I know.
• 24:22
  So yeah. So they're.
• 24:25
  But other than that, they're Dragonborn. 2 notable things
• 24:28
  about Dragon Knights. However, they all explicitly
• 24:31
  have wings and tails. No, no lizard dudes lacking
• 24:36
  wings or all have wings and tails.
• 24:38
  Not all of their wings work. Some have essentially defunct
• 24:42
  wings that aren't big enough to carry them, but they all have
• 24:45
  wings. Vestigial.
• 24:47
  Vestigial, yes, that's the word I couldn't that I could not
• 24:50
  think of. They also have one of my
• 24:51
  favorite art pieces in the book I think is the Dragon Knight
• 24:54
  species art. Their art is pretty cool.
• 24:56
  The. The green, the green dragon and
• 24:58
  the red dragon. They look pretty good actually.
• 25:01
  The red dragon is very D&D red dragon coded.
• 25:04
  I noticed that it's like. What what?
• 25:08
  OK, what is your what is your take on the art overall?
• 25:11
  Because. I'm happy you brought that up.
• 25:16
  I have a very specific opinion that's going to sound a little
• 25:19
  negative and but I have to like explain it.
• 25:22
  Well, so I think the art relies on two or three design
• 25:33
  aesthetics and it gets very old very quickly and there is some
• 25:39
  weirdness going on generally. Like it depends on the picture
• 25:45
  of course, but like I have a couple, like I have a couple.
• 25:50
  Just please do yours because mine are just like I've got like
• 25:53
  5 or 6 small ones. I mean the I definitely, my
• 25:57
  problem is not necessarily that they they reuse a design thing.
• 26:01
  I know that it was a relatively small art team that did a whole
• 26:04
  shit load of work. So like, that's not that
• 26:06
  surprising to me. My problem with a lot of the
• 26:09
  art, OK, I need to be very, very clear about this.
• 26:14
  These artists are a lot better than I am across the board.
• 26:19
  They are very, very skilled. However, I don't like most of
• 26:24
  their art for two main, and this is mostly about an aesthetic
• 26:30
  preference thing. So my first big problem with the
• 26:34
  art is that all of it is really, really highly rendered.
• 26:43
  And again, as an artist, I am well aware of how difficult it
• 26:47
  is to get to get to the level of rendering quality that the art
• 26:53
  in this book has. And they're very good at it.
• 26:57
  I don't like the way it looks. The the overly renderedness
• 27:03
  makes everything feel very stiff, sterile.
• 27:07
  OK. It's not sterile, but stiff.
• 27:10
  A lot of art pieces lack a lot of motion, a lot of feeling of
• 27:14
  motion or just energy. Like they just don't have a lot
• 27:17
  of energy. They feel very locked in place.
• 27:20
  I know exactly. OK, that's kind of what I meant
• 27:22
  when I said sterile, like like so perfect example, right?
• 27:26
  The the art for the orcs. That one orc is like shredding
• 27:30
  on this like sick handheld harp like thing and his hair's
• 27:34
  flowing in the background. This.
• 27:37
  That orc looks like a statue of an orc that doesn't look like a
• 27:40
  living. Breathing person.
• 27:42
  It doesn't yeah, the the IT lacks energy.
• 27:45
  It lacks a lot of energy. And again, part of that is
• 27:50
  because it's so highly rendered and when you render up a drawing
• 27:54
  a lot, you lose out on energy pretty much without fail.
• 27:58
  It's almost impossible not to. This is, and just to be clear,
• 28:02
  this is what I'm saying right now, is the thing that I've
• 28:05
  heard from other professional, well seasoned artists who have
• 28:10
  taught me. They all agree.
• 28:12
  If you render something up like, you know, closer and closer to
• 28:16
  reality, you're going to get stiffness and you're going to
• 28:19
  lose energy and you have to make a decision on if you want it to,
• 28:24
  if you want. Basically, you have to decide,
• 28:25
  do you want to push that realism or do you want the energy in the
• 28:28
  movement? You kind of can't have both, you
• 28:31
  know? So yes, there's that.
• 28:36
  My other problem and this one, this is 1 scenario where I do I
• 28:40
  this, this is a more genuine critique.
• 28:43
  I think a lot of the art in this, they're not good at
• 28:49
  action. A lot of the action shots, the
• 28:56
  action poses just are really not working for me.
• 29:00
  There's a lot of like awkwardness to the posing and
• 29:06
  I'll give you my prime example. The one that bugs me maybe the
• 29:09
  most is if you scroll, if you go to the classes, the Knoll.
• 29:15
  That drives me crazy because it doesn't.
• 29:17
  So I'm going to just this is going to be hard, but I'm going
• 29:20
  to describe it. So it's like a shirtless Hakan
• 29:22
  dude, which are the the half giant people we haven't gotten
• 29:24
  to there, but the the shirtless Hakan dude and he's like
• 29:27
  uppercutting a devil dude in the face and like punching his soul
• 29:31
  out of him because the Knoll has these like psionic type powers.
• 29:36
  The way the devil dude is positioned relative to the
• 29:39
  uppercut looks like he missed. Like it doesn't look like he hit
• 29:45
  the devil dude in the face. It looks like the guy's falling
• 29:48
  over and he whiffed the punch and he's just kind of awkwardly
• 29:52
  leaping into the air doing nothing.
• 29:56
  You see what I mean? I do, yes.
• 29:59
  And so there's a lot, there's there's a lot of art pieces I've
• 30:01
  noticed where the the posing of the action feels very odd.
• 30:07
  And some of it I understand because sometimes you have to
• 30:13
  make a concession where a certain pose isn't going to work
• 30:18
  because you would see so little of the character that it just
• 30:21
  doesn't register. Like it just looks weird.
• 30:25
  So you you tweak the pose to look a little more awkward so
• 30:30
  that the character stands out better.
• 30:32
  And that's a concession you have to make sometimes.
• 30:35
  So there's other times where I feel like that concession was
• 30:38
  made maybe too much. Yes, and a perfect example on
• 30:42
  page 143 the lycans rope with the with like the lightning
• 30:46
  claws. OK.
• 30:50
  I cannot tell what this character is trying to do.
• 30:57
  That one doesn't bother me too much.
• 31:01
  It's a little, you know, they're kind of like, yeah, they're
• 31:03
  running forward. There's a lean like it's a
• 31:05
  little vague. But are they running forward?
• 31:07
  Are they jumping to the side to dodge?
• 31:09
  Are they? Running and jumping it doesn't.
• 31:11
  I mean it doesn't really matter too much because it's just a
• 31:14
  single character kind of posed in a shot, so it doesn't bug me
• 31:17
  as less. As soon as they start getting
• 31:20
  multiple characters I feel like is where things get wonky most
• 31:22
  of the time, you know what I mean?
• 31:26
  Yeah. I mean, I, I think we have
• 31:28
  different complaints, but like for me it's a lot of.
• 31:29
  Like, well, so like, OK, look at the tactician.
• 31:34
  The the splash art for the tactician.
• 31:38
  That one this that I what? This one genuinely bugs the shit
• 31:43
  out of me because the pose of the tactician character makes no
• 31:47
  sense relative to the guy that he's supposed to be punching in
• 31:51
  the face. Question mark, right?
• 31:55
  Oh, that's not how I read that at all.
• 31:58
  I think he's supposed to be hitting him in the face with his
• 32:00
  sword. That's in his right.
• 32:01
  Hand, I can see why you'd say that 'cause you get the little
• 32:04
  swoosh lines coming off the sword, like almost like he's on
• 32:06
  the backswing, but that's not at all.
• 32:08
  I'm reading it off the guy's cut chest and blood coming out of
• 32:11
  his. Mouth, Right, right, right.
• 32:12
  But like the the motion there, you're getting some like energy
• 32:15
  swooshes on the backswing. Yes, I do see the cut.
• 32:18
  I Yeah, I don't know. I don't know.
• 32:20
  I kind of read that. It's funny.
• 32:21
  He kind of looks like Chadwick Bozeman.
• 32:23
  I read that as him like strutting through a fight, but
• 32:26
  yeah, I did not read it as him attacking that guy.
• 32:29
  See, that's and that's kind of what I mean.
• 32:30
  The action posing is is wonky. So it it there's like a
• 32:34
  unclearness to a lot. Not all.
• 32:36
  There are some shots that work a lot better, but some of them,
• 32:39
  yeah, it's just like. Yeah, I mean, I, I unclear you
• 32:42
  said it before, but I think if the the art is very good.
• 32:46
  Again, it's very detailed. Yeah, it's.
• 32:48
  Very good. It's very early.
• 32:49
  Render anatomy is fantastic. All that coloring is fantastic.
• 32:53
  Texture works very good, all that shit.
• 32:56
  Well, texture working I, I think, I think all of the
• 33:00
  clothes, any cloth in this looks like leather like there's no
• 33:03
  inclination that any of this is cloth, which it almost certainly
• 33:06
  has to be and the metal doesn't look like metal to me a lot of
• 33:08
  the time but like besides. I think a metal definitely looks
• 33:11
  like metal. I definitely don't see that one.
• 33:14
  Depends, I I haven't seen anywhere I feel like there was
• 33:19
  weirdness on metal texture. That's one of the things I think
• 33:23
  they got the most right. But, and it's not every pose
• 33:27
  either, like the shadow splash art, I think that pose works
• 33:30
  pretty well. Actually, so Speaking of art in
• 33:33
  the shadow, did you notice that one the one Wode elf doing the
• 33:39
  the the rogue assassin dark elf pose like better?
• 33:44
  Yes, I did. I I saw, I was like, no, this
• 33:48
  has to be a dig, right? This has to be a dig.
• 33:51
  They're in the exact same pose. They're both like assassin dark
• 33:56
  elves with the shadow magic around them.
• 33:58
  It's the same pose. I'm not going to say it's a dig,
• 34:01
  but it might be a reference. So.
• 34:04
  What I say is referring to is there's an awkward drawing in
• 34:08
  the rogue section of the 2014 Player's Handbook where he's
• 34:13
  kind of like stepping forward and kind of crouching, and he's
• 34:16
  holding the knife in a really weird way.
• 34:18
  It's like a drow dude. It's just a really
• 34:21
  uncomfortable, weird pose that just doesn't work.
• 34:25
  And in the Draw Steel book, it's a very similar pose, but the
• 34:28
  character's coming forward and the camera's facing at her
• 34:32
  front, so it it. I posted that in the wrong chat.
• 34:36
  It looks, it looks like it looks like what the D&D pose was
• 34:41
  trying to do, but just yeah, like better execute it.
• 34:45
  God, I hate that rogue painting. Every time I see it, I hate it.
• 34:48
  It's bad, yeah, but I just every.
• 34:50
  Time I see it, it bugs me more. It's not the worst painting in
• 34:52
  the player's. Handbook.
• 34:53
  But no, it's not. No, I still argue.
• 34:55
  It's the fucking. Vinegar strokes Halfling, Yeah.
• 34:59
  Vinegar stroke, sapling barred baby.
• 35:02
  How else do you describe it? No, that's exactly how I
• 35:06
  described. She is just full on vinegar
• 35:09
  strokes. Yeah.
• 35:10
  So all this to say, yeah, for me personally, really for me, it's
• 35:15
  just not a style of art that I like that much.
• 35:20
  So it it comes off a little weird for me.
• 35:22
  And there are some technical elements where I'm not
• 35:25
  necessarily saying I could do better, but I'm saying I see
• 35:30
  problems. I look I I on a on a separate
• 35:33
  argument. I have problem with the like.
• 35:35
  Could you do better? It's like, no, but that's not
• 35:37
  the fucking point, no. No, I'm definitely not saying I
• 35:39
  could do better. I'm just saying as someone with
• 35:42
  drawing knowledge, I could see some weird gaps, like I could
• 35:46
  see some awkwardness. So, you know, I will point out
• 35:52
  to side note that the tactician when I was talking about that
• 35:57
  piece of art of the the dude Sir John, who's kind of like the the
• 36:02
  by the way, they did the D&D thing where all of the the
• 36:05
  classes have like a character attached to him.
• 36:06
  So Sir John's the tactician guy I.
• 36:09
  OK, I had a feeling because all of the like all of these
• 36:13
  characters are repeated across. Yeah, they repeat, yes, they
• 36:16
  repeat a lot. Sir John, that painting of him
• 36:20
  was done independently of that background painting, and I know
• 36:23
  that for a fact because I've seen that art in different
• 36:28
  things prior during like play tests and stuff.
• 36:31
  So he got maybe awkwardly slapped in there a little bit.
• 36:34
  I don't know. I don't know, I don't know how
• 36:37
  he was put into that scene, but I know that art was made
• 36:39
  independently. Anyway, let's get back to the
• 36:43
  game itself. I just felt like we had to
• 36:44
  mention the art thing a little bit because a lot of people are
• 36:46
  saying it's very good and I get it, but yeah, it just doesn't
• 36:49
  hit for. Me, I mean.
• 36:50
  I much prefer the art of a game like Cain where you're going, or
• 36:56
  or Lancer or fucking Root, or you know you're going for a vibe
• 37:01
  or Fabula like I like. On a technical level, the art of
• 37:05
  fabula is not as technically good, but I like it infinitely
• 37:11
  more. Oh I agree, I think the art and
• 37:14
  Fabula is technically fantastic and I think it's because it they
• 37:17
  mastered the art of subtlety. Well, what I'm saying is
• 37:21
  technically good as in the rendering and the detail and the
• 37:25
  lighting, all of those things are not as as high on a
• 37:29
  technical proficiency relative to the the kind of detail you're
• 37:34
  looking at with draw steel. But it was a deliberate choice
• 37:38
  and I like it better. Like it's the style that that
• 37:40
  artist does it in. But I mean, I prefer it that in
• 37:45
  that fashion. Fair enough.
• 37:47
  I think my I I told you I talked about this before.
• 37:49
  I think an issue I have with the art of draw steel is it looks
• 37:52
  very MCU. Yeah, I mean that I have to make
• 37:55
  that. I don't.
• 37:56
  But I don't really, I don't know, I I guess I don't really
• 38:01
  give a shit about that. I'm just looking at the art on
• 38:03
  somewhere. I'm not even really comparing it
• 38:05
  to it looks like XY or Z. I'm just.
• 38:08
  Saying on its own MCU is like highly textured like.
• 38:15
  Yeah, it kind of it has a little bit of an MCU concept art thing,
• 38:19
  I guess. But like, I don't whatever.
• 38:22
  I just, I haven't, I didn't again, I'm not, it's not about
• 38:27
  the comparison thing. It's about how it exists on its
• 38:31
  own. It's just not stylistically.
• 38:32
  I don't prefer it like the, you know, I mean this, this is very
• 38:39
  similar to my opinions on like animation, right?
• 38:42
  Like I much prefer the JJK style, the Usher's Wrath style
• 38:50
  of like just absolutely fuck the model, break the shit out of it,
• 38:56
  Go ballistic for the sake of the motion.
• 38:59
  Like, I'll always prefer that over the much more Dragon Ball Z
• 39:03
  style of like, stay on model as tightly as possible at at at all
• 39:07
  times kind of method. You know what I mean?
• 39:10
  Yeah, this is this is basically that, like this is the same,
• 39:14
  this is that, but we're talking about like still drawings.
• 39:18
  It's like the same kind of thing.
• 39:24
  Anyway, that was a that was a whole lot of shit.
• 39:26
  What do you get as a dragon Knight?
• 39:29
  Just very briefly, your your signature trait thing you get as
• 39:32
  a dragon knight is you get damage immunity.
• 39:36
  You pick much like Dragonborn, you pick acid, cold, corruption,
• 39:39
  fire, lightning or poison and you get a damage immunity to it.
• 39:43
  You can change it out on a respite so long rest you can
• 39:47
  swap out your damage immunity. I don't know if the colour of
• 39:52
  your scales are relevant to the damage immunity or not, like
• 39:55
  lore wise, so I don't know if you're changing colours, I
• 39:57
  assume not. Then you get your, you get, you
• 40:03
  get your three points to spend. You get a dragon guard ability,
• 40:07
  which is you can reduce incoming damage.
• 40:09
  You get a Dragon's pride, which is basically a big scary roar
• 40:13
  that pushes people away. You get dragon breath, which is
• 40:16
  what you would expect it to be prismatic scales where you gain,
• 40:22
  you gain like an additional immunity, damage immunity.
• 40:27
  And then remember your oath, where it's just this one's fun.
• 40:33
  As a manoeuvre, you can recite the following oath until the
• 40:36
  start of your next turn. Whenever you make a saving
• 40:37
  throw, you succeed on a four or higher.
• 40:39
  The default succeeding on a saving throw is a six or higher.
• 40:43
  Saving throws don't work how you might be thinking though.
• 40:46
  Yes, they don't work on the tier system.
• 40:48
  They don't work. They don't work on the tier
• 40:49
  system and they don't work like DND saving throws.
• 40:51
  They're more like luck saves, but that there's an oath.
• 40:55
  Even should the sun stop in the sky, even should the night last
• 40:58
  1000 years, I will stand forever.
• 41:00
  I shall not yield those who suffer and yearn for justice.
• 41:03
  I am your sword and shield. I will yield no ground.
• 41:06
  I will speak no lies. I will stand against all tyrants
• 41:09
  until the last villain dies. I just like that they took the
• 41:13
  time to actually write the oath out.
• 41:15
  Yep, that's a cool one. And then you can have wings.
• 41:18
  Much like the devil, you can have wings.
• 41:21
  Your next one are dwarves. I have to say I'm sorry.
• 41:25
  I appreciate that this game is not afraid to let their fucking
• 41:27
  player characters fly with no weird restrictions.
• 41:30
  Well, there's a little bit of a restriction.
• 41:33
  You could stay. Off for a certain sky.
• 41:34
  But like, well, no, there's a limit number of rounds.
• 41:38
  Now is it? You stay a lot for a number of
• 41:40
  rounds equal to your might score before you fall.
• 41:42
  Yeah, but you can also just keep doing it.
• 41:46
  So it's not like true, there's no, there's no ammo count on it.
• 41:53
  Yeah, I guess. I don't know.
• 41:59
  It doesn't say you possess powerful enough wings.
• 42:01
  While using your wings to fly, you can stay alive for a number
• 42:03
  of rounds equally. I guess it's it's one of such a
• 42:07
  weird. If you're not in combat, I guess
• 42:08
  it doesn't matter. You could just kind of fly
• 42:09
  whenever, however. If you're not in combat, yeah,
• 42:11
  for sure. If you're in combat I I guess
• 42:17
  you would have to keep using a manoeuvre to keep yourself
• 42:20
  moving. Right.
• 42:22
  But if you're not, if there's no action economy being tallied,
• 42:25
  then you have that perpetually. Yes, I just realized it doesn't
• 42:31
  specify if it's like a manoeuvre or an action or a what.
• 42:33
  So that's actually kind of weird.
• 42:35
  If it doesn't, presumably it's just it's.
• 42:37
  It's presumably a free action if they don't quantify.
• 42:40
  Yeah, but if it's a free action then you could just re up at
• 42:44
  every turn. So why would you have the might
• 42:46
  score limiter? It's a good point.
• 42:50
  I'm slightly confused about that.
• 42:52
  I didn't notice that before. OK, next we have dwarves.
• 43:02
  Dwarves are mostly kind of sort of what you would expect, except
• 43:06
  they are not fleshy. They're rock dudes.
• 43:10
  Well, they're hybrid. I think they're they're fleshy.
• 43:17
  And. Stony.
• 43:17
  They're Stony. Flesh with yes, with tough metal
• 43:22
  like a muscles and like Stony. Skin, stone skin, yeah, but they
• 43:28
  they are mostly in your standard dwarven, they're miners kind of
• 43:33
  vibe for the most part. There used to be steel dwarves
• 43:38
  back in the day in the ancient times.
• 43:41
  Just kind of a fun little Lord Tibbit.
• 43:42
  They look interesting, I would say.
• 43:44
  I don't know if I love it, but they look interesting.
• 43:47
  But I like that they tried something different.
• 43:49
  Yeah. Oh, I forgot.
• 43:50
  Actually, I did forget to mention we were talking about.
• 43:51
  We were kind of shitting on the art a little bit.
• 43:55
  There's a big stained glass art piece that shows all of the
• 43:59
  ancestry's lined up. The big stained glass art piece
• 44:02
  I like a lot that I think looks sick.
• 44:07
  Again, not all like, OK, one last thing in the art right
• 44:10
  before they talk about the devil's, there's that like
• 44:12
  Market Square art, Yeah. That one's good and.
• 44:15
  That looks fucking amazing, yeah.
• 44:17
  That one's good. Yeah, I.
• 44:20
  Do love dude in the corner talking to the flying monkey?
• 44:23
  See the thing I like is that the dude up in the top left corner
• 44:26
  who's like I'm Batmanning, Yeah, just Batmanning real hard up on
• 44:30
  the just edge lording it out. Thought that was funny.
• 44:34
  Yes, the mouse dudes are pretty cool.
• 44:37
  I think they mentioned making adding the mouse dudes to the
• 44:40
  game soon. Oh, perfect, that's what I want
• 44:42
  to play. So dwarfs your signatures, you
• 44:46
  get runic carving. You carve a rune into your skin,
• 44:50
  which is to say your stone skin, and you either get magical
• 44:56
  detection, you shed light, or you get telepathy.
• 45:00
  And then for your purchase, things you can get you, you're
• 45:06
  immune to weakened, which is like a status effect.
• 45:09
  Basically. You can get plus one to your
• 45:11
  stability, which makes you harder to move and push around
• 45:13
  on the field because again, moving and pushing people around
• 45:16
  is a huge thing in this game. Spark off your skin is you have
• 45:21
  a + 6 bonus to your stamina, which is stamina's health in
• 45:24
  this game, and that goes up each that goes up at 4th, 7th and
• 45:28
  10th level, which I believe are the echelon thresholds stand
• 45:33
  tough, which your might is treated higher for resisting
• 45:37
  things and for resisting potency tests, and you gain an edge on
• 45:42
  mic tests when called to resist environmental effects or stone
• 45:45
  singer. You talk to rocks, you talk to
• 45:51
  rocks and can move the rocks. Actually I shouldn't just say
• 45:53
  you can shape the rocks like an earth Bender by talking to the
• 45:56
  rocks. Yes, that's a better way to put
• 45:58
  that. Then we have the Wode elves.
• 46:01
  I fucking love these dudes. I don't know about you, I love
• 46:05
  the Wode elves. I think they look sick.
• 46:06
  Their art is very reminiscent, like the way their faces are
• 46:10
  drawn. Yeah, are very reminiscent of
• 46:12
  the Spider bit Chronicles. I don't know if you read those,
• 46:14
  that book series growing up. Nope.
• 46:17
  I mean, they're books for kids or like young adults, young
• 46:21
  teenagers, I don't know. It's they look like the the wood
• 46:26
  elves from that. It's fine.
• 46:27
  I see. They're.
• 46:29
  Yeah. So the wood elves are like,
• 46:32
  they're kind of your wood elf equivalent, but instead of just
• 46:35
  being slightly stinkier elves, they're like bat people.
• 46:41
  They have like huge bat ears and big ass weird eyes and their
• 46:44
  skin is furry and blue and I don't know, they're just like,
• 46:49
  they're just a little unsettling in a way that I really like.
• 46:52
  They are just a little uncomfortable.
• 46:54
  They are distinctly Fay folk like.
• 46:57
  Yes, they're described as. Being like kind of Trixie and
• 47:01
  carefree. They're like wood elves and
• 47:03
  everything, but this time they actually kind of like, look,
• 47:06
  they. Look like they also have
• 47:07
  abilities that lean into it, so for example their signature
• 47:11
  trait is Wood Elf glamour. You can magically alter your
• 47:13
  appearance to better blend in with your surroundings.
• 47:16
  You gain an edge on tests to make hide and sneak, and on
• 47:20
  tests to hide and sneak and tests you make to search while
• 47:23
  you're hidden. Take a bane.
• 47:26
  An edge is a + 2 to a roll. A bane is a -. 2 to a roll.
• 47:31
  I think their coolest one is the woe defends, which basically
• 47:35
  just if you try to attack them, yeah like brambles erupt out of
• 47:40
  the ground and lock you in place.
• 47:41
  Yeah, and protect you. You can be swift.
• 47:44
  You get a bonus of speed. Yeah, Forest Walk, which is your
• 47:47
  sort of rangery ignore terrain thing.
• 47:51
  I just realized there's not really a Ranger class in this
• 47:53
  game. No.
• 47:55
  Which is weird because the they made the beast heart for 5 E
• 48:00
  that just hit me just now. Yeah.
• 48:03
  No, it's yeah. I mean you can play a shadow
• 48:05
  with some. A shadow, yeah, is what I was
• 48:07
  like. Yeah, you have quick and brutal,
• 48:12
  which is whenever you score a critical hit, you can take an
• 48:14
  additional main action and an additional move action instead
• 48:17
  of just a main action. Because when you get critics in
• 48:20
  this game, you take a dish, you take a whole nother action,
• 48:23
  which is kind of wild, otherworldly grace.
• 48:29
  When you make a saving throw, you make it on A5 or higher
• 48:32
  instead of a six, but revisit memory.
• 48:35
  You gain an edge on test to recall lore.
• 48:39
  Then you have your high elves. So oh, sorry, I I just
• 48:44
  remembered something. I meant to say this when we were
• 48:46
  talking about dragon Knights and the the high elves of the dragon
• 48:50
  Knights are are the high elves made me think about this.
• 48:54
  So the reason that the Dragon Knights exist the way that they
• 48:58
  do is because Matt Colville, every edition of DND that he
• 49:03
  played, he updated his setting to like account for the new
• 49:07
  stuff in the game. So when 4th edition came out
• 49:10
  that's when they introduced Dragonborn and he didn't want to
• 49:14
  have like weird alien dragon people so he came up with the
• 49:19
  dragon Knights lore to make them like fit in his setting.
• 49:24
  So there's this good king omen dude he used his wizard.
• 49:27
  The wizard made the dragon dot people and that's why there's
• 49:30
  the dragon. That's why dragonborn exists for
• 49:34
  the high elves. The the little extra tidbit of
• 49:38
  lore is that like high elves are low key celestial alien deity
• 49:45
  being people. And the reason I know about this
• 49:49
  is because Matt Colville's novels share setting elements
• 49:55
  with his DND game. Actually it might be the same
• 49:58
  world exactly, I forget. I forget if they're one and one
• 50:00
  or just really close. And in that elves are like
• 50:05
  people made of stars that come down from space.
• 50:10
  So high elves in this game, they're like weird otherworldly
• 50:14
  alien beings that use magic to make themselves look more normal
• 50:19
  and bearable to regular people on the planet basically.
• 50:26
  So do with that what you will. I don't know.
• 50:29
  It's, it's kind of a weird take on elves.
• 50:31
  People may or may not like that. I kind of vibe with it.
• 50:34
  I'm not going to lie. You know, it's funny, you were
• 50:36
  talking about this and I can just think about the the Matt
• 50:39
  Coville has a, all of his Dragonborn have a very
• 50:42
  particular inflection that I cannot like recreate.
• 50:48
  No, I can't do it. He does this thing where.
• 50:52
  Yeah, so he does a thing where he tries to imagine how they
• 50:54
  would talk because they don't have lips, which means they
• 50:58
  would have to talk different, which is true.
• 51:00
  He has a very valid point there. I don't know what that would
• 51:04
  sound like, but he's not wrong. But yeah, the other thing he, he
• 51:15
  basically said his idea for like high elves is kind of an
• 51:18
  extension, like a logical extension of what Tolkien
• 51:23
  thought about of elves, where they're kind of like mystically
• 51:26
  above humans. They're like almost a little
• 51:28
  angelic. So he just kind of took it to
• 51:30
  like a logical extreme basically.
• 51:32
  So I was like, that's an interesting opinion.
• 51:34
  It's kind of weird. I have to say too, as I decide
• 51:37
  it's kind of weird reading through this game because I have
• 51:40
  this like, extra background lore about the game 'cause I listen
• 51:45
  to Matt Colville's like streams and videos and stuff all the
• 51:48
  time and he throws in these little tiddly bits and I read
• 51:50
  his novels. So I have these like weird extra
• 51:53
  bits of information that come in.
• 51:55
  Yeah, I mean, this probably is why this is better for you to
• 51:58
  talk about because I I'm just kind of here nodding along like,
• 52:00
  uh huh, uh huh. Yeah, it's there's all this Matt
• 52:04
  Colville will be like my OC do not steal, you know, which is, I
• 52:08
  mean, it's fine. So the default trait if you're a
• 52:11
  high elf is you get high elf glamour.
• 52:13
  A magic glamour makes others perceive you as interesting and
• 52:17
  engaging, granting you and granting you an edge on presence
• 52:20
  tests using the flirt or persuade skills.
• 52:24
  This glamour makes you appear and sound slightly different to
• 52:27
  each creature you meet, since what is engaging to 1 might
• 52:31
  differ for another. However, you never appear to be
• 52:33
  anyone other than yourself, so you're just just a little bit
• 52:37
  hotter to every whatever they prefer.
• 52:40
  You just got a little more of that going on.
• 52:43
  And then for your purchase ones, you have glamour of terror,
• 52:45
  which whenever you take damage you can use triggered action to
• 52:49
  make the creature frightened. You have graceful retreat, you
• 52:52
  can get a + 1 bonus when you shift which shifting is you take
• 52:57
  the disengage move action and then you move one square away
• 53:01
  and you don't take an attack of opportunity.
• 53:02
  But it's only one square. So this an elf took graceful
• 53:05
  treat. They can move 2.
• 53:08
  You get an high senses, you get an edge on tests made to notice
• 53:12
  threats otherworldly grace. Your elf body and mind can't be
• 53:16
  contained for long. Whenever you make a saving
• 53:18
  throw, you get you roll a succeed on A5 or higher, revisit
• 53:22
  memory, which is the same as the world elf one, and then
• 53:25
  unstoppable mind. You cannot be dazed, which is a
• 53:29
  status effect. Then we have the the Hakan,
• 53:33
  which are the human giants, half giant they're.
• 53:39
  Golias. They're straight up.
• 53:40
  Golias. But they're also made of rock.
• 53:43
  Or rockier. I don't know.
• 53:46
  I'm right. Aren't they also rock?
• 53:49
  Yes, they are like we, I, I, they put it somewhere.
• 53:52
  Yeah, they're like rock people, right?
• 53:57
  And there's some lore about how they made a deal with a
• 54:01
  trickster God and so all of their species are cursed.
• 54:06
  So some of them have a thing called the Doom site, where you
• 54:09
  just see your own death and you're just kind of like, well,
• 54:13
  guess that's how I die. And if you.
• 54:16
  Try really you can take. It's also.
• 54:18
  It's very cool. If you try to resist your doom
• 54:20
  site, you fuck up, make things worse for everyone around you.
• 54:29
  Also there's a there's a superstition against Tekon that
• 54:32
  believes that they bring doom around them, which is not
• 54:35
  actually how it works, but you know, that's what people think.
• 54:40
  So yes, ability wise your signature trait is big.
• 54:44
  You are size 1L so you are you are just below size 2 for
• 54:53
  purchasing. You can take all as a feather.
• 54:56
  You gain edges on tests made to lift and haul heavy objects
• 55:00
  'cause you just that strong. You can have forceful, which is
• 55:04
  if you do force movement you can push someone farther.
• 55:07
  You can have great fortitude where you can't be made
• 55:09
  weakened. And you have stand tough where
• 55:12
  your might score is treated as higher for resisting things.
• 55:15
  And you gain an edge on might tests like the dwarfs.
• 55:18
  And then you get fucking doomsight, which.
• 55:22
  So you predetermine an encounter, which you will die.
• 55:28
  When that encounter begins, you become doomed.
• 55:30
  Well, doomed. You automatically obtain tier 3
• 55:33
  outcomes on tests and ability roles, and you don't die no
• 55:37
  matter how low your stamina falls.
• 55:39
  You then immediately die at the end of the encounter and can't
• 55:41
  be returned to life by any means.
• 55:43
  If you don't predetermine your death encounter, you could
• 55:46
  choose to become doomed while you are dying with the
• 55:48
  director's approval. Doing so should be reserved for
• 55:52
  encounters in which you're dying as a role of suitable heroism,
• 55:55
  such as making a last stand against a boss or saving
• 55:57
  civilians, or when the consequences of your actions may
• 56:00
  have finally caught up to you, not because you're playing A1
• 56:02
  shot and have nothing to lose. They call out somebody's name
• 56:06
  here. Hakarl I.
• 56:08
  I assume that's a play tester who probably did that would be
• 56:10
  my guess. The name call out on that one.
• 56:14
  Additionally, when your stamina reaches the negative of your
• 56:17
  winded value and you are not doomed, you turn to rubble
• 56:20
  instead of experiencing death. You are unaware of your
• 56:24
  surroundings in the state and you can't regain stamina or have
• 56:27
  this effect undone in any way. After 12 hours, you regain
• 56:29
  stamina equal to your recovery value.
• 56:31
  So if you're not doomed, you can't die, but when you're
• 56:35
  doomed, you die. I kind of just love that you you
• 56:39
  just get turned to grumble. You just just turn crumbles and
• 56:44
  now you're like, can someone pick up Steve?
• 56:47
  Someone gets a wheelbarrow. Put Steve, put Steve in the bag.
• 56:50
  Yeah, he's going to the bag. Put him in the bag of holding.
• 56:54
  And we have humans. Humans are, you know, they're
• 56:58
  they're they're basically humans.
• 57:00
  The one notable thing about humans in the setting of Ordon
• 57:03
  is that they can like, smell magic.
• 57:07
  They can sense it just naturally they just notice it more.
• 57:11
  They're just like a little bit more attuned in that way.
• 57:15
  So their their signature ability is detect the supernatural.
• 57:19
  As a maneuver, you can open your awareness to detect supernatural
• 57:22
  creatures and phenomenon. Until the end of your next turn.
• 57:25
  You know the location of any supernatural object or undead or
• 57:28
  construct or creature from another world within 5 squares,
• 57:31
  which is say 30 feet. Even if you don't have line of
• 57:35
  effect to that object or creature.
• 57:36
  Line of effect is what this game refers to as line of sight.
• 57:41
  You know if you're detecting an item or a creature and you know
• 57:44
  the nature of any creature you detect.
• 57:45
  So you have the paladin's divine sense thing, but better and not
• 57:49
  shite. So you know, I guess I can't
• 57:53
  really say that anymore. They kind of fixed divine sense
• 57:54
  in 2024 they. Did, yes.
• 57:58
  I'll never forget though. Then they also have can't take
• 58:01
  hold. Your connection in the natural
• 58:03
  world allows you to resist super certain supernatural effects you
• 58:06
  gain. You ignore temporary difficult
• 58:08
  terrain created by magic or psionic abilities.
• 58:11
  Additionally, when you're forced to move by a magic or psionic
• 58:14
  ability, you can reduce the force movement by 1.
• 58:17
  Again, getting pushed around. It comes up a lot in this game,
• 58:20
  so that might not seem immediately useful, but is
• 58:23
  determination. Your tolerance for pain and
• 58:25
  distress allows you to push through.
• 58:26
  If you're frightened, slowed, or weakened, you can use a maneuver
• 58:29
  to immediately end one of those conditions.
• 58:31
  Just fuck you. I'm built different
• 58:34
  Perseverance. Giving up is for other people.
• 58:37
  You gain an edge on tests made to the Endurance skill.
• 58:41
  Additionally, when you're slowed, your speed is reduced to
• 58:44
  3 instead of 2. Resist the unnatural.
• 58:46
  Whenever you take damage that isn't untyped, you can use a
• 58:50
  triggered action to take half damage.
• 58:52
  Oh yeah, damage in this game by default has no typing, which is
• 58:59
  a little weird in my opinion, but I guess works outside.
• 59:03
  Well, so all physical damage is untyped.
• 59:06
  Any magical or explosive elemental damage is typed.
• 59:10
  Well yes, but what I'm saying is if the if the game does not
• 59:14
  specify a damage type, then it is by default has no typing.
• 59:19
  Yes. As opposed to something like D&D
• 59:23
  or like Fabula, where if it doesn't specify then you
• 59:26
  generally are going to assume, you know, physical.
• 59:28
  Or in the case of D&D you would assume slashing, piercing, or
• 59:31
  bludgeoning. Right?
• 59:32
  Like there's no it just has no type at all.
• 59:36
  Which again, slightly weird to me.
• 59:39
  I feel like they could have just made it physical and been good,
• 59:42
  but whatever. And then staying power, you
• 59:45
  increase your recoveries by two, which is actually quite useful.
• 59:49
  You could just heal yourself more.
• 59:50
  And then Memanox, they're robot people, but like not War Forge
• 59:58
  style robots. Like they look like normal
• 1:00:01
  people but they're like they have metal skin and fucking
• 1:00:05
  glowy eyes and shit and gold like gold vein thingies on their
• 1:00:11
  like faces and skin and you know, they're weird robot people
• 1:00:16
  but they're hot. Yes.
• 1:00:18
  I mean, the best way I can describe the female one is it's
• 1:00:20
  just Moto Kusanagi from Ghost in the Shell down to the purple Bob
• 1:00:25
  and the like rippling ABS. I mean, I would say that her
• 1:00:28
  hair is black and that, but sure, the the important thing is
• 1:00:34
  that they're all hot. I don't, I don't know what it
• 1:00:36
  is. All the Memonox are drawn really
• 1:00:38
  hot. They're they're from the
• 1:00:42
  outermost plane of law, which is kind of like the where the
• 1:00:45
  modrons come from AD and D the like plane of order or whatever.
• 1:00:49
  It's that kind of idea. They're robots from a different
• 1:00:51
  dimension, alien world type situation.
• 1:00:56
  Their signature trait is fall lightly.
• 1:00:58
  When you fall, you reduce the distance you fall by two
• 1:01:01
  squares, so you take less falling damage.
• 1:01:03
  Because I think they're like lighter than people or whatever,
• 1:01:07
  because they're made of like really flexible metal or
• 1:01:10
  whatever. They're making, they're made of
• 1:01:11
  silicone. That's what it was.
• 1:01:16
  And then light they're they actually get 2 signature
• 1:01:18
  abilities. They're one's lightweight.
• 1:01:19
  Whenever you another creature attempts to force move you, you
• 1:01:21
  treat your size as one size smaller than it is.
• 1:01:25
  And then you have for the purchasable ones.
• 1:01:28
  I am the law or I am law. Enemies can't move through your
• 1:01:32
  space unless you allow them to because you're just too fast.
• 1:01:38
  Then there's Keeper of Order. Once per round and you're an
• 1:01:41
  adjacent creature makes a power roll.
• 1:01:43
  You can use a free triggered action to remove an edge or a
• 1:01:45
  bane, or turn to turn a double edge into an edge, or turn a
• 1:01:50
  double bane into a bane. Nimbleness.
• 1:01:54
  Your speed is 7, which is actually quite fast.
• 1:01:58
  Or lightning nimbleness non-stop.
• 1:02:00
  You can't be made slowed. Systematic mind you treat any
• 1:02:08
  language you don't know as if you know a related language.
• 1:02:11
  You also gain an edge on tests made to parse schematics, maps
• 1:02:14
  and other systematic documents. Unphased you can't be made
• 1:02:18
  surprised and useful emotion. You you know how to turn your
• 1:02:27
  paint in the OH at the start of any combat you gain 1 surge.
• 1:02:29
  That's right you have like a weird they get like world sweery
• 1:02:34
  being not on their home planet or something like that.
• 1:02:37
  I I forget exactly what the deal was there.
• 1:02:39
  Then we have orcs. If I remember correctly Orcs are
• 1:02:46
  related to Dragons in Oregon you have like a dragon blood or
• 1:02:52
  something like that in them I think is what it is.
• 1:02:55
  Why they have the spikiness and the like ears and shit.
• 1:02:58
  I think I might be wrong about that to be honest.
• 1:03:02
  The other thing is they have this like weird natural inbuilt
• 1:03:04
  inbuilt fury thing where when they get real fuck off mad the
• 1:03:07
  veins in their face glow burning red.
• 1:03:11
  Oh, that's what that's about, OK.
• 1:03:12
  Yes, that's what they like carve that's like cut insurance on
• 1:03:14
  their face are for traits. You know orcs are mostly your
• 1:03:20
  DND esque orcs. But again, I I'm pretty sure
• 1:03:22
  they have like a dragon relation thing.
• 1:03:27
  You your signature trait is relentless.
• 1:03:30
  Whenever your creature deals damage to you that leaves you
• 1:03:32
  dying, you can make a free strike against that creature or
• 1:03:36
  against any creature actually. If the creature is reduced to 0
• 1:03:39
  stamina by your strike, you can spend a recovery.
• 1:03:40
  So basically if the if you get taken down and you hit them back
• 1:03:44
  and they die, you just get the fuck back up and you're like
• 1:03:46
  Nope I'm good. Blood fire rush for spendable
• 1:03:51
  things. You have blood fire rush, the
• 1:03:54
  first time in any combat round that you take damage you get a +
• 1:03:57
  2 bonus to speed because you're just.
• 1:03:59
  You're just so fuck off mad slowing recovery.
• 1:04:03
  Your bloodline lets you recover faster whenever you use the
• 1:04:05
  catch breath manoeuvre. You can spend as many recoveries
• 1:04:08
  as you like. Normally you can only spend 1
• 1:04:10
  recovery and a recovery is a currency you spend to recover
• 1:04:14
  1/3 of your health, so you could spend more than one grounded.
• 1:04:21
  You gain a plus one disability. You're just difficult to move
• 1:04:25
  non-stop. You can't be made slowed and
• 1:04:28
  passionate Artisan. Oh yeah, or orcs are like
• 1:04:30
  crafters I believe is another thing with them.
• 1:04:32
  When you gain your initial skills from your career, culture
• 1:04:34
  class or other source, choose two skills from the crafting
• 1:04:37
  skill group, whether you have those skills or not.
• 1:04:41
  Whenever you make a project role for crafting project that uses
• 1:04:43
  these skills, you gain a + 2 bonus to the role.
• 1:04:47
  Yeah, and then we have the polder all.
• 1:04:51
  Right, OK. They're hobbits.
• 1:04:53
  They're gnomes. In the art, maybe a little, it
• 1:05:00
  looks a little minstrely. I think he's supposed to look
• 1:05:05
  kind of like Jimi Hendrix. I I get that, Maybe not the best
• 1:05:11
  vibe but I get it. I don't think he looks minstrely
• 1:05:17
  I I just thought of Jimi Hendrix.
• 1:05:19
  That's honestly or or. So he's dressed like a medieval
• 1:05:22
  minstrel with like the the bonnet in like the big poofy
• 1:05:25
  pants and. Yeah, well, but that's like the
• 1:05:29
  Bard outfit. He's a Bard.
• 1:05:31
  Yes. I don't know, I think maybe the
• 1:05:33
  Hidozi thing has poisoned my brain.
• 1:05:36
  I mean, I yeah, I'm not on that page with you.
• 1:05:43
  Hobbits. They're hobbits.
• 1:05:45
  They're gnomes, you know that? They're the little folk.
• 1:05:49
  The cool thing that they get though is they have like they're
• 1:05:53
  like naturally in tune with the shadows so they can flatten
• 1:05:58
  themselves into a shadow against a wall or a floor and become
• 1:06:02
  hidden from any creature you have and become hidden from any
• 1:06:05
  creature you have cover or concealment from or who isn't
• 1:06:08
  observing you. So you can like push up against
• 1:06:11
  the wall and just disappear. Well in shadow form you have
• 1:06:14
  full awareness of your surroundings and strike made
• 1:06:15
  against you and tests made to search for you.
• 1:06:18
  Take a bane. You can't move or be forced to
• 1:06:20
  move, and you can't take main actions or maneuvers except to
• 1:06:25
  exit from this form. Any ability or effect that
• 1:06:29
  targets more than one square effects you from this form only
• 1:06:31
  if it explicitly affects the surface.
• 1:06:34
  You can exit whenever. So they have this like naturally
• 1:06:37
  sneaky, I disappeared to the shadows thing going on, which is
• 1:06:41
  sort of like a a take on Bilbo being a thief, you know, and
• 1:06:47
  they're small. You are size 1S and then you
• 1:06:51
  have corruption immunity equal to your level +2, which is like
• 1:06:57
  a type of damage basically or no, not basically is a type of
• 1:07:00
  damage. You have extra corruption.
• 1:07:01
  You have corruption immunity because you have like weird
• 1:07:03
  darkness powers in you. You can't be made frightened or
• 1:07:07
  is one of these are the against the ones you the traits you can
• 1:07:10
  buy? You don't get all of them
• 1:07:13
  Graceful retreats. You get a + 1 bonus to the
• 1:07:15
  distance you can shift when you disengage.
• 1:07:17
  Like the elves, you ignore difficult terrain.
• 1:07:20
  With Nimble step. You ignore difficult terrain and
• 1:07:22
  can move at full speed with Poltergeist.
• 1:07:25
  This is my favorite one. This is my favorite.
• 1:07:27
  Start of each yeah, the start of each year turns during combat,
• 1:07:30
  if no enemy is line of sight of you or if you're hidden from or
• 1:07:33
  have concealment from an enemy with line effect of you, you can
• 1:07:36
  gain a + 3 bonus to speed until the end of your turn.
• 1:07:38
  You can just you can just zip away.
• 1:07:42
  It's it's also a funny name. I just it's.
• 1:07:45
  Just so funny that you're like, I do not wish to be here
• 1:07:47
  anymore, therefore I will not. Yeah, I'm just, I'm going to
• 1:07:50
  move now and then Reactive Tumble, although I don't know
• 1:07:56
  you like Poltergeist over the Shadow meld.
• 1:07:59
  Shadow Meld is cool. I just, they're both really
• 1:08:04
  good. I don't know, I just so maybe
• 1:08:05
  this one that was a little different.
• 1:08:07
  That's like a, that's like the signature trait, but like the
• 1:08:10
  ones that you can pick. That one's my favorite.
• 1:08:11
  Fair enough. And then you have reactive
• 1:08:13
  tumble whenever you're forced to move, you can use your free
• 1:08:16
  triggered action to shift one square after the forced movement
• 1:08:18
  is resolved. And then we have revenants.
• 1:08:22
  I, I, I love that revenants are like a base class or a base
• 1:08:26
  ancestry that you can pick. So revenants work a little
• 1:08:32
  differently because obviously revenants are dead people from
• 1:08:35
  their respective whatever ancestry they were, they are now
• 1:08:39
  a dead person from that. So your signature traits are
• 1:08:43
  former. One of them is former life.
• 1:08:48
  Choose an ancestry you were before you died.
• 1:08:50
  Your size is that ancestry size. Your speed is five.
• 1:08:53
  Unless you select one of the previous light traits from
• 1:08:55
  below, you don't receive any other ancestral traits from your
• 1:08:58
  original ancestry. And then their other signature
• 1:09:01
  trait is Tough but withered. You're immune to cold,
• 1:09:04
  corruption, lightning, and poison damage equal to your
• 1:09:07
  level, but you have Fire weakness 5.
• 1:09:10
  You can't suffocate, and you don't need to eat or drink.
• 1:09:12
  Additionally, when your stamina reaches the negative of your
• 1:09:15
  winded value, you become inert. Instead of dying, you fall prone
• 1:09:19
  and can't stand. You continue to observe your
• 1:09:20
  surroundings but can't speak, take main actions, maneuvers,
• 1:09:24
  move actions, or triggered actions.
• 1:09:26
  Well, inert. This way, if you take any fire
• 1:09:28
  damage, your body's destroyed and you die.
• 1:09:30
  Otherwise, after 12 hours, you regain stamina equal to your
• 1:09:32
  recovery value. So kind of like the Hakan, if
• 1:09:35
  nobody hits you with the coup de grace on the fire, you just
• 1:09:38
  cannot die. Coup de grace, yeah.
• 1:09:42
  OK like me, did you also read this and go so I can have 8
• 1:09:47
  chronic long swords to the chest and actually have a chronic
• 1:09:50
  condition? I didn't.
• 1:09:52
  But now that you're pointing it out.
• 1:09:55
  Your car just wakes up. You're just like 8 long swords.
• 1:09:59
  Like why is it always 8? What the fuck?
• 1:10:01
  I'm still here. Like looking like a pincushion.
• 1:10:03
  Yeah. So for the revenant traits, you
• 1:10:10
  only have two ancestry points or three ancestry points if your
• 1:10:14
  size is 1 S So I guess if you're like a polder or you know, or
• 1:10:20
  what other, what other future ancestries we get ancestry point
• 1:10:26
  ones. You can pick bloodless your,
• 1:10:29
  your opens wounds are indistinguishable from the
• 1:10:31
  scratch. You can't be made bleeding even
• 1:10:33
  while dying, which is a big deal 'cause when you go into the
• 1:10:36
  dying phase, if you're not bleeding, you can't like bleed
• 1:10:40
  out and die. Somebody has to hit you to kill
• 1:10:43
  you, whereas everybody else can bleed out and die.
• 1:10:46
  So you're just really hard to take down or potentially harder
• 1:10:51
  to take down one of your previous lice options.
• 1:10:55
  You can so to 1:00 they have previous life one point and
• 1:10:59
  previous life 2 points. So you can spend one point or
• 1:11:03
  two points to get an option from your previous life, which is
• 1:11:06
  where you select an equivalent cost from one of the other
• 1:11:09
  ancestries. And then another one they get is
• 1:11:11
  undead influence. Your supernatural gift allows
• 1:11:14
  you to gain influence over other undead.
• 1:11:15
  You gain an edge on reason, intuition, and presence.
• 1:11:18
  Test made to interact with undead creatures and then
• 1:11:21
  vengeance mark as a maneuver. You place a seal on a creature
• 1:11:26
  within 10 squares, which is quite far or 60 feet actually,
• 1:11:30
  so it's not that crazy. When you place that sigil, you
• 1:11:33
  decide whether where it is and if everybody can see it.
• 1:11:37
  You always know the direction to the exact location of a creature
• 1:11:39
  who bears one of your sigils and is on the same world.
• 1:11:42
  You can have a number of active sigils equal to your level, and
• 1:11:44
  you can remove a sigil from a creature at will.
• 1:11:46
  No action. If you already have the maximum
• 1:11:49
  number of sigil activated, you place a new one.
• 1:11:50
  Your oldest sigil disappears with no effect.
• 1:11:52
  Additionally, you have the following signature ability,
• 1:11:55
  Detonate Sigil. Which is to say you point at
• 1:11:59
  that loser and blow that shit up.
• 1:12:00
  And then they take. They can take some damage and
• 1:12:03
  you can also make them slide either one square, 2 squares, or
• 1:12:08
  three squares. And slide means you can make
• 1:12:10
  them go in any direction, so you can move them closer to yourself
• 1:12:15
  with that too, potentially if you wanted.
• 1:12:19
  But yeah, you just point at them and go kablooey.
• 1:12:23
  You literally do it's kind of like a holding it in, but it's
• 1:12:26
  so funny. Can you think about how fucked
• 1:12:30
  this is and like because I you have to think about these
• 1:12:32
  abilities. Every one of these creatures has
• 1:12:36
  something like this, right? Maybe not this ability, but
• 1:12:39
  like, all polder have that weird shadow shit, all the Can you
• 1:12:43
  imagine? There must be laws like
• 1:12:45
  revenants. You're not allowed to place
• 1:12:46
  vengeance marks on things. Yeah, yeah.
• 1:12:48
  Don't just do shit out. Yeah, don't just stick vengeance
• 1:12:51
  marks on the people in the city. Please can.
• 1:12:53
  You imagine if your boyfriend's like a revenant, it'd be a
• 1:12:55
  little weird because you're a horse, but like, you know what I
• 1:12:56
  mean. If your boyfriend's like a
• 1:12:57
  revenant or whatever, or your girlfriend rather, and you know,
• 1:13:02
  you pissed through your your significant other off when a
• 1:13:04
  little rune shows up on you and you're like, don't you fucking
• 1:13:07
  damn. I swear to God.
• 1:13:09
  And they've just got their hands in the snap fingers motion.
• 1:13:11
  Like, I'll do it, get out, get out of the house.
• 1:13:12
  I want to see you like you. That would be And it just got to
• 1:13:17
  the outside of the apartment. It's a puff of smoke through the
• 1:13:19
  window. That would be a little extreme,
• 1:13:21
  seeing as how you are causing them physical, magical.
• 1:13:23
  That'd be like shooting your partner in the foot or something
• 1:13:26
  if you're mad at them. And yeah, it's like like, damn.
• 1:13:30
  Also, it's funny you say that revenants in the city, because
• 1:13:34
  in the in the city capital there's literally like a
• 1:13:37
  revenant district, I'm sure so. How often do you like especially
• 1:13:42
  if you're dating another revident, how often do you think
• 1:13:44
  explosions just go off in there I.
• 1:13:46
  Probably more than people would like.
• 1:13:49
  Yeah. And then we have the last race,
• 1:13:52
  which I absolutely just cannot stand the way they.
• 1:13:55
  Hate them? No, I don't I.
• 1:13:57
  Don't like them at all. I.
• 1:13:58
  Don't like the I don't like their name.
• 1:14:00
  I don't like that they're just weird.
• 1:14:01
  Punk GIF Yeah, so so anything about them?
• 1:14:05
  To describe this for since we're an audio, you know, audio only
• 1:14:08
  here to describe they, they they have kind of a gift thing going
• 1:14:13
  on. They have very yellow skin and
• 1:14:15
  and pointy ears and they have kind of the sallow faces like
• 1:14:18
  the gift. They have the nose thing.
• 1:14:20
  They have the nose thing. They have the Voldemort noses
• 1:14:24
  now. The other the two other notable
• 1:14:26
  things is they have forearms, which I never really liked the
• 1:14:29
  forearm aesthetic. I'm going to be honest, that's
• 1:14:31
  just not a vibe for me. It never has been like even for
• 1:14:35
  even in Ben 10 forearms. I'm like, Nah, that's not my
• 1:14:37
  guy. Nah, that was my guy.
• 1:14:40
  I just don't like the forearm thing I thought.
• 1:14:41
  I always thought Goro looks stupid too.
• 1:14:44
  Damn. The thing that really bugs me
• 1:14:47
  the most about the time Raiders, though, is they're a don't have
• 1:14:50
  eyes. Their eye is a single piece of
• 1:14:56
  metal that's like a that's shaped like visor sunglasses
• 1:15:00
  that's like embedded in their face and it just makes me
• 1:15:05
  uncomfortable. I I did not know that.
• 1:15:08
  I did not know that they didn't have eyes.
• 1:15:10
  I thought they were all just wearing cool punk sunglasses.
• 1:15:12
  No, no, that is their eyes. Oh.
• 1:15:15
  That's. Their eyes dislike that greatly.
• 1:15:17
  Yeah, it makes it really uncomfortable.
• 1:15:21
  So yeah, weird for. Oh, and they all, yeah, they all
• 1:15:24
  dress like eighty 80s punk like rocker dudes for the most part.
• 1:15:28
  They have a lot of like mohawks and shit going on, I assume as a
• 1:15:31
  reference to the way the GIF kind of had that vibe at one
• 1:15:34
  point, I guess. But yeah, there's there's not a
• 1:15:40
  lot. Yeah, there's a little bit, but
• 1:15:41
  not a ton. They're not actually called Time
• 1:15:45
  Raiders. They're called Karanzoi.
• 1:15:49
  But Time Raiders is the name that they like, gave themselves
• 1:15:52
  because they fly around basically they're the spell
• 1:15:55
  jammer guys. They fly around on ships in
• 1:15:57
  space, on the sea of stars and like go to can go to different
• 1:16:03
  different manifolds of reality and shit.
• 1:16:05
  So they call themselves time Raiders.
• 1:16:09
  Yeah, they're they're they're the weirdest ancestry by far.
• 1:16:13
  They're the weirdos of the of the base game of the base, like
• 1:16:16
  book for sure. So what do they do?
• 1:16:21
  So their signature is they have psyche community equal to their
• 1:16:24
  level because they're GIF, they're GIF.
• 1:16:27
  So they have the psychic stuff going on beyond sight as a
• 1:16:32
  maneuver. You can adjust your vision to
• 1:16:34
  let you see through mundane objects.
• 1:16:38
  Yeah, they can see through things as there's a little more
• 1:16:40
  to that, but yeah, they can see through things.
• 1:16:43
  They also have foresight. You automatically know the
• 1:16:46
  location of any creature with with concealment who isn't
• 1:16:49
  hidden from you within 2020 squares.
• 1:16:53
  And you can negate the usual bane on strikes against such
• 1:16:56
  creatures. Basically, you can see invisible
• 1:16:57
  dudes. Additionally, whenever you're
• 1:16:59
  tagged targeted by a strike, you can use a triggered action to
• 1:17:01
  impose a bane on the power roll. 4 Armed Athletics.
• 1:17:05
  You gain an edge on tests that you climb, gymnastics, or swim
• 1:17:08
  skills when you can use all of your arms. 4 Armed Martial Arts
• 1:17:13
  Whenever you use the grab or knock back maneuver against a
• 1:17:16
  adjacent creature, you can target one additional adjacent
• 1:17:19
  creature using the same power roll for both targets.
• 1:17:21
  Additionally, you can have up to two creatures grabbed at a time,
• 1:17:26
  and then they get psionic gift, where you can choose a
• 1:17:30
  concussive slam, a psionic bolt, or minor acceleration.
• 1:17:34
  Concussive slam lets you push dudes away.
• 1:17:36
  Psionic bolt does more damage or not actually does the same
• 1:17:39
  damage, but lets you slide somebody.
• 1:17:43
  Oh, concussive slam can also knock somebody prone.
• 1:17:45
  That's the benefit of that one. And then minor acceleration you
• 1:17:49
  get a bonus of your speed equal to your reason or intuition
• 1:17:52
  score, Reason, intuitions or present score.
• 1:17:55
  And then the last one is unstable mind.
• 1:17:57
  You can't Unstoppable minds are you can't be dazed.
• 1:18:01
  A favorite of the ancestry is Out of Curiosity.
• 1:18:09
  I'm not going to lie, probably humans.
• 1:18:14
  I had a feeling you might say that.
• 1:18:16
  But if it's not the humans, it's probably the Wodelves.
• 1:18:21
  It might be world elves for me too.
• 1:18:22
  It's either world elves or dragon Knights for me.
• 1:18:24
  Although I really do like the devil's.
• 1:18:25
  I think the devil's lores really.
• 1:18:27
  Maybe I, the devils have devils for the humans.
• 1:18:29
  Devil's do have a fun lore, that's true.
• 1:18:31
  I like, I kind of like them all beside besides time Raiders,
• 1:18:35
  besides Orc and time Raider, I think orcs are just a little
• 1:18:37
  more all right. Like I like their design.
• 1:18:41
  I like they're cool like frilled faces, but like they're they're
• 1:18:43
  lores just kind of like me. Fair enough.
• 1:18:45
  I can't see why I can see myself building pretty much every class
• 1:18:48
  other than an orc and a time Raider.
• 1:18:52
  Every ancestry but fair. Enough.
• 1:18:53
  That's what I mean yeah by the way, I I'm checking I'm checking
• 1:18:57
  the book. Besides the two pieces of art
• 1:19:00
  for the time Raiders, there is only two other pieces of art for
• 1:19:04
  them in the entire book. The definitely and the least
• 1:19:08
  art. I I don't know that 100% for a
• 1:19:10
  fact because I'm only on page 354, but they might.
• 1:19:14
  They might have two pieces of art and none of them are good
• 1:19:17
  shots of their faces. Well, that would be. 4 four.
• 1:19:20
  Yeah, well, I mean, there's there's every other page has a
• 1:19:25
  fucking Hakan on it. There are a lot of cons, true.
• 1:19:30
  Then we get so then we get to the background steps.
• 1:19:33
  So you pick your ancestry and have you pick your background.
• 1:19:35
  So there is some breakdown about.
• 1:19:41
  There's a lot of languages in this game by the way, I don't
• 1:19:44
  know if you noticed. That a lot of someone.
• 1:19:46
  Is there someone who likes the language thing?
• 1:19:47
  There's a lot. So I do like the language thing,
• 1:19:51
  but this creates the annoying thing where you could just have
• 1:19:55
  built a character who doesn't know anything and like you could
• 1:20:00
  have 4 languages but they could never come up like and like yes
• 1:20:04
  like ask the GM, but that's one of those things with the GM
• 1:20:06
  might not think about it. It it just feels like more
• 1:20:10
  headache than it's worth to have that many language, and
• 1:20:12
  specifically it's a little annoying that half of the
• 1:20:15
  languages are just human dialects.
• 1:20:19
  Well, I think there's a, there's something.
• 1:20:21
  I think I remember. I remember it saying something
• 1:20:23
  about brain where like if it's a dialect you can figure it out
• 1:20:30
  kind of thing. Yes you can.
• 1:20:32
  I also believe. I think there's.
• 1:20:34
  Rules for picking up languages too.
• 1:20:36
  I forget where though, now that I'm thinking about it.
• 1:20:38
  I wouldn't doubt it, but I can't imagine it's going to be any
• 1:20:41
  easier than it is in DND, which is like, you know, 300 days of
• 1:20:44
  cut of spending. No, I think it is.
• 1:20:46
  No, I think it's like a, there's more of a, there's more support
• 1:20:50
  for it, that's the thing. But either way, so in the IT
• 1:20:57
  starts with the culture section giving you kind of archetypal
• 1:21:02
  cultures and it mentions it gives you each of the ancestries
• 1:21:07
  and then breaks down the typical language, environment,
• 1:21:11
  organization and upbringing of each of those.
• 1:21:14
  So language is their language environment being, do they live
• 1:21:17
  like in an urban area or a wilderness or something like
• 1:21:19
  that? Organization being is it a
• 1:21:22
  bureaucratic or communal organization?
• 1:21:24
  And then upbringing being academic, martial, creative, or
• 1:21:28
  labor based. And then there's another table
• 1:21:34
  of archetypal cultures. So like if you want to have a
• 1:21:37
  mercenary band, their environment would be nomadic,
• 1:21:39
  their organization would be bureaucratic, and their
• 1:21:42
  upbringing would be Marshall. So basically what you do is you
• 1:21:48
  build to make your character's culture.
• 1:21:53
  You build from those pieces. So you build, you pick an
• 1:21:57
  environment, an organization and an upbringing.
• 1:22:03
  You know the language of your culture from from the
• 1:22:10
  environment, organization, upbringing, aspects of your
• 1:22:11
  culture. You gain access to skills and
• 1:22:17
  you gain an edge on tests made to to recall lore about your
• 1:22:20
  culture and on tests made to influence and interact with
• 1:22:24
  people of your culture. So you get a bonus when you're
• 1:22:27
  you're when it's yo, I'm dealing with my kindness, my peoples.
• 1:22:32
  So your, your culture's language aspect determines how people,
• 1:22:37
  your culture communicate language and ordinance.
• 1:22:40
  Below discusses the many languages in the world of
• 1:22:42
  ordinance, including Kalian, which is kind of your default
• 1:22:44
  language. So environment options you have
• 1:22:47
  nomadic, which will give you exploration or interpersonal
• 1:22:51
  skills. Reminder skills are broken up
• 1:22:54
  into groups, so if you choose Nomadic you get one skill from
• 1:22:59
  the Exploration or interpersonal skill group.
• 1:23:02
  If you choose Rural you can get Crafting or lore skills.
• 1:23:08
  If you choose secluded, you can get Interpersonal or lore
• 1:23:11
  skills. If you choose urban you can get
• 1:23:13
  Interpersonal or Intrigue, and if you choose wilderness you can
• 1:23:17
  get Crafting or exploration skills.
• 1:23:20
  And then they also give you a quick build's suggestion option
• 1:23:25
  if you don't want to pick 1. So for example, for rural it
• 1:23:27
  says just take the nature skill. For nomadic, it says take the
• 1:23:32
  navigate skill. And then you have the
• 1:23:36
  organization of your culture. So like how they function, this
• 1:23:41
  is either going to be bureaucratic or communal.
• 1:23:44
  There's only the two. Bureaucratic gives you
• 1:23:48
  interpersonal or intrigue skills, and then communal will
• 1:23:51
  give you crafting or exploration skills, and then your upbringing
• 1:23:56
  which is either going to be academic, creative, labour,
• 1:24:00
  lawless or martial academic. You get one from the Lore skill
• 1:24:08
  group. If you do creative, you can get
• 1:24:10
  the music or perform skill or one skill from the crafting
• 1:24:14
  group. If you do labour, you can get
• 1:24:16
  the blacksmithing skill, the handle animal skill, or a skill
• 1:24:19
  from the exploration group. If you do lawless, you get one
• 1:24:23
  skill from the intrigue skill group.
• 1:24:25
  If you do Marshall, you get one of the following.
• 1:24:30
  You get blacksmith or fletching, climb, endurance or ride,
• 1:24:35
  intimidate, alertness or track or monsters or strategy.
• 1:24:41
  So Marshall's a little more specific.
• 1:24:43
  Oh, and then I forgot that there's also noble and noble.
• 1:24:47
  You get interpersonal skill group.
• 1:24:50
  So you essentially to, to set up your culture, you go, OK,
• 1:24:55
  environment. And then you get a skill from
• 1:24:57
  your environment. And then you decide how is how
• 1:24:59
  is my culture organized? And then you get a skill from
• 1:25:01
  that. And then you choose what kind of
• 1:25:03
  upbringing did I personally have?
• 1:25:05
  And then you get a skill from that.
• 1:25:06
  So effectively you're getting 3, three separate skills ish from
• 1:25:12
  your background and you mix and match your you design your
• 1:25:17
  character's culture background is the important thing here.
• 1:25:19
  And you mix and match those things.
• 1:25:21
  And then your GM, you know, you go, all right, GMI picked this,
• 1:25:25
  this and this. And then the GM goes, OK, cool.
• 1:25:26
  So you know, you came from this town and now you know, you,
• 1:25:31
  you're supposed to kind of work with your GM and whatever you
• 1:25:34
  choose for the culture then becomes an official like
• 1:25:38
  location or type of people in the world, so on and so forth,
• 1:25:46
  anything at that. No, I mean, I think it was
• 1:25:49
  really, it was fun and intuitive to put all that stuff together
• 1:25:52
  like I built, you know? Yeah, I think it's.
• 1:25:54
  I rebuilt Luca, right? Like my human talent, formerly
• 1:26:00
  Mystic. And it was cool to see how
• 1:26:04
  things interplayed with each other and how you could go, oh,
• 1:26:07
  well, I kind of wanted this thing.
• 1:26:08
  But you could almost immediately fill any gaps in the character
• 1:26:12
  that you want. Like, obviously you can't do the
• 1:26:13
  absurd, you can't do everything. But as someone who wanted to do
• 1:26:16
  the like, really focus in on the intelligent, studious, kind of
• 1:26:22
  be the bookworm. I pretty much went, oh, I want
• 1:26:24
  this thing. Oh, I can get that with this.
• 1:26:25
  Oh, I want this thing. Oh, I can get that with this,
• 1:26:27
  which is it's cool. It helps you feel like it.
• 1:26:31
  It really helps you. What's the word I'm looking for?
• 1:26:39
  Not a comp. Like it helps you fill a niche
• 1:26:45
  in a really complimentary way. Like it's fun and it feels
• 1:26:48
  almost rewarding. Rewarding to to plan it out.
• 1:26:55
  So plan it out, but so really go hard on doing your one thing
• 1:26:59
  like in so in D and DI. Guess what I'm trying to say is
• 1:27:02
  this and D&D, if you want to be a character who's really
• 1:27:05
  studious, it's like, ah, yeah, I could be good at Arcana and I
• 1:27:10
  could be good at like, you know, investigation.
• 1:27:13
  But you're always going to have these weird gaps where, you
• 1:27:16
  know, you'll have gaps in everything else in this game
• 1:27:18
  because of just the sheer amount of breadth of skills.
• 1:27:20
  But if you want to know everything there is to know
• 1:27:22
  about monsters and magic and psionics and and just general
• 1:27:26
  studiousness, you can very easily achieve that at a very
• 1:27:29
  low level. Well, it's funny you say that
• 1:27:32
  too, because one of the reasons that they, I forget where the
• 1:27:35
  book says it, but it specifically has a little pop
• 1:27:37
  out paragraph where it's like, wow, there's a lot of skills in
• 1:27:40
  this game. And basically the reason it says
• 1:27:42
  there's so many skills is so that you can really hammer home
• 1:27:46
  this is my character's identity. This is the vibe I want my
• 1:27:49
  character to have. And so you're you're, yeah,
• 1:27:52
  you're basically reinforcing that point where you're like, if
• 1:27:54
  I really want to hone in on this thing to like, I really have an
• 1:27:58
  identity for my character. It's letting your culture build
• 1:28:01
  is letting you do that. Yeah.
• 1:28:04
  Which, yeah, I mean, agreed. I I it's also good because you
• 1:28:07
  can do that thing where you're like, oh, my ancestry is I'm a
• 1:28:10
  dwarf. But like, what if I'm a dwarf
• 1:28:12
  raised by elves, right. And then so you go, OK, I'll
• 1:28:15
  pick ancestry, but I'm going to design my culture element to be
• 1:28:19
  like, I was raised in a Wode elf village out in the out in the
• 1:28:22
  forest or whatever. So I'm going to choose, you
• 1:28:24
  know, a lawless upbringing and like a communal organization and
• 1:28:31
  then in a wilderness environment.
• 1:28:35
  So it lets you do that, that that kind of vibe too, because
• 1:28:37
  that's the thing people have complained about in D and DA
• 1:28:39
  lot, right? Like, well, I want to play an
• 1:28:41
  elf, but like, what if I was an elf raised by the dwarves?
• 1:28:44
  Like I wouldn't do some of my abilities don't make sense then.
• 1:28:47
  And it's like, yeah, this fixes this problem.
• 1:28:50
  And I, I believe a lot of games have been doing a similar thing.
• 1:28:52
  Like I know Tales of the Valiant did a similar thing to this, and
• 1:28:57
  I believe, I think Pathfinder does too, actually.
• 1:29:04
  And then lastly, so after all the culture stuff, the last step
• 1:29:09
  is languages. I There's a lot of like
• 1:29:13
  information on the languages because languages are kind of
• 1:29:16
  treated as a big deal in this game.
• 1:29:19
  There's languages based on ancestry, so like who used to
• 1:29:22
  speak it and like little notes about it.
• 1:29:24
  So for example, there's the first language which was spoken
• 1:29:28
  by elder Dragons and is the language of magic.
• 1:29:33
  There is several human dialects, like Isaiah mentioned, of
• 1:29:40
  Vasiloria, which Vasiloria is the name of the planet, I think,
• 1:29:47
  or no, or it's the name of the no as Laurie's a country now.
• 1:29:51
  I don't remember. Actually, I don't know.
• 1:29:54
  Orden's the planet as Laurie is, I think, a country.
• 1:30:01
  And then it gives you a breakdown of like how the
• 1:30:03
  language is used. There's also a chart for dead
• 1:30:06
  languages, which is cool. You probably don't want to take
• 1:30:11
  them, but I like that they exist for like, lore building stuff on
• 1:30:14
  the GM side of things. Yeah, Yeah.
• 1:30:19
  And then your career. So your career is just what the
• 1:30:23
  fuck was your character up to before you were a hero, right?
• 1:30:28
  Because the idea is that, you know, you're a superhero now,
• 1:30:31
  but like, what was your vibe prior to this?
• 1:30:37
  So the careers are are kept intentionally broad in their
• 1:30:41
  like names. They're not hyper specific, but
• 1:30:46
  essentially you get some skills, you get some languages, some.
• 1:30:51
  Some careers will increase your renown score, which renown is
• 1:30:55
  kind of like a meta currency that's like represents how well
• 1:31:00
  known you are or how well known your character is.
• 1:31:03
  Some of the careers will give you starting wealth and then
• 1:31:07
  some careers will provide you with project points, which are
• 1:31:11
  points there's a whole crafting project system that you can do
• 1:31:16
  during downtime. Project points feed into that.
• 1:31:21
  And then a lot of most of the careers will give you a perk.
• 1:31:25
  Perks are basically feats in this game.
• 1:31:30
  You do also get perks from your class.
• 1:31:32
  So don't worry. It's not just it isn't just your
• 1:31:35
  career. And then it mentions deciding an
• 1:31:39
  inciting incident basically being like, why did you stop
• 1:31:43
  being a blacksmith and why did you become an adventurer?
• 1:31:45
  You know, that kind of vibe, like come up with a reason and
• 1:31:48
  and fill that out. And also there's a little
• 1:31:51
  paragraph that says what was taken from you, like what
• 1:31:56
  happened during that inciting incident that kind of took
• 1:31:59
  something away that changed you into who you are now.
• 1:32:03
  Worth mentioning, you do not need to take the inciting
• 1:32:08
  incidents for. Your culture stuff.
• 1:32:12
  Oh, you can make yourself. Yeah.
• 1:32:14
  So there's a table, what Eze is talking about.
• 1:32:16
  There's an inciting incident table that comes with every
• 1:32:18
  career. Yeah, you don't have to take it,
• 1:32:21
  But if you want to roll, if you want to, either A roll on the
• 1:32:23
  table or pick one from the table to give you ideas.
• 1:32:26
  You know, there's also questions to help you flesh out your
• 1:32:32
  career background. So, for example, if you look at
• 1:32:34
  the agent you worked as a spy for a government organization
• 1:32:38
  and defining your career, think about the following questions.
• 1:32:40
  Who'd you work for? Who'd you spy on who shouldn't
• 1:32:43
  know your true identity and allegiance, but does?
• 1:32:47
  Who did you burn or leave behind to get the job done?
• 1:32:49
  And again, you don't necessarily have to answer those or
• 1:32:51
  anything, but they're, you know, they fill in that background
• 1:32:53
  stuff. I.
• 1:32:55
  Do really like that they let you take the inciting incidents from
• 1:32:59
  other cultures? Yeah, if they basically like
• 1:33:03
  read the ones that you have, if these don't fit, take a look at
• 1:33:07
  the other ones. If those don't fit, work with
• 1:33:09
  your DM to make a new one. I, I don't know, I, I appreciate
• 1:33:12
  that because they're asking you to like, for the sake of, of
• 1:33:16
  the, the congruency of the character, they're asking you to
• 1:33:18
  stay within the lines. What they do acknowledge that
• 1:33:22
  those don't always fit whatever one's idea is.
• 1:33:24
  So they're giving you wiggle room and they're doing it in a
• 1:33:27
  tiered system, which I like. Like, look at these first.
• 1:33:29
  These don't fit. Try these things.
• 1:33:31
  If those don't work, then work with your GM.
• 1:33:33
  Right, right. Yeah.
• 1:33:35
  And that this feels like maybe I'm overstating it, but I'm
• 1:33:37
  really not giving GMN players alike, first time or otherwise,
• 1:33:43
  some pointers, you know, some ideas for what the the the game
• 1:33:48
  designer was thinking even in small circulus I really
• 1:33:51
  appreciate. Yeah, well, it's good when you
• 1:33:55
  describe. It's good when you suggest and
• 1:34:00
  give advice on something people are probably going to do anyway
• 1:34:03
  because it helps sometimes ease some of that like new game
• 1:34:08
  stress a little bit in a way you know and and also gives you
• 1:34:11
  insight on to the the designer's thoughts.
• 1:34:14
  It does and it does both. The hidden thing that people
• 1:34:17
  don't talk about is you always have that one first time player
• 1:34:22
  who goes, well, I just want to do all this myself.
• 1:34:24
  And then you have to play the game of like, well, you should
• 1:34:27
  really follow the books because that's how you're going to get
• 1:34:28
  the best idea. And then they'll, if they they
• 1:34:30
  don't do it, they'll start thinking of random wild shit
• 1:34:33
  like playing D&D for the first time being like, I want a
• 1:34:36
  character who can't die. And you're like that.
• 1:34:37
  That's not yes, don't do that. You know, this game is
• 1:34:41
  specifically giving you some like, start here.
• 1:34:45
  Move on from that. Work your way down.
• 1:34:47
  Yeah. So just to give a couple of
• 1:34:54
  examples of like the kind of careers, like I said, there's
• 1:34:56
  the Agent 1. So what do you get from it
• 1:34:59
  skills wise? You get the sneak skill from the
• 1:35:01
  intrigue skill group plus one skill from the interpersonal
• 1:35:04
  skill group and one other skill from the intrigue skill group.
• 1:35:08
  The suggestion is it give you gives you is disguise, lie and
• 1:35:11
  sneak. You learn 2 languages and you
• 1:35:14
  gain 1 intrigue perk. Perks are also broken up into
• 1:35:19
  groups the same way the skills are, and so like if you're
• 1:35:22
  looking for, for example, if you want an intrigue perk, it's
• 1:35:27
  going to be about intrigue substrifugee kind of vibe.
• 1:35:34
  Another example, the aristocrat, you get one skill from the
• 1:35:37
  interpersonal group and one skill from the lore group, and
• 1:35:40
  then you get one language and you get plus one renown and plus
• 1:35:43
  one wealth and then you get one lore perk.
• 1:35:47
  What's another? What's one that?
• 1:35:50
  Oh the artist talking about the project points.
• 1:35:52
  The artisan 1 you get 2 skills from the crafting skill group,
• 1:35:55
  you get one language. You get 240 project points and 1
• 1:36:00
  crafting perk. 240 if I remember correctly is like a decent
• 1:36:05
  amount to get a project done. I forget exactly how to mess up,
• 1:36:08
  but it's pretty good chunk if I remember correctly.
• 1:36:10
  It is, yeah. Yeah, you have stuff like Beggar
• 1:36:14
  and Criminal and Disciple Explorer, so on and so forth,
• 1:36:18
  all the kind of backgrounds you would expect to see in your D
• 1:36:21
  and DS vibe. But yeah, like we said, they
• 1:36:24
  each give you a feat called a perk in this game.
• 1:36:27
  They give you some more skills and then potential renown or
• 1:36:30
  wealth or languages. A small thing worth mentioning
• 1:36:35
  as well is you will find it like kind of like in D&D, right?
• 1:36:39
  Like some backgrounds, if you pick the the outworlder
• 1:36:44
  background, you're just broke, right?
• 1:36:46
  You have no money. Yeah, and in a game like DND,
• 1:36:48
  they don't offer you anything else to compensate for the fact
• 1:36:52
  that you're flat fucking broke. Yeah, yeah.
• 1:36:54
  To like offset it. In this game, they actually do.
• 1:36:57
  So when I built my character right, I built the sage.
• 1:37:01
  You don't have any money, but you have project points.
• 1:37:05
  If you don't have project points, you'll have something
• 1:37:06
  else. If you don't have that other
• 1:37:07
  thing, you'll have something else.
• 1:37:09
  The game does its best to cover your bases so that you don't
• 1:37:12
  feel like you're just up Schitt's Creek without a paddle.
• 1:37:15
  And some of them get more, more skills than other two others
• 1:37:19
  also. So yes, yeah, they do a pretty
• 1:37:22
  good job of trying to make sure that that they offset each
• 1:37:25
  other, not to go back to the art discussion.
• 1:37:31
  But once we get past the careers bit, the the piece of art with
• 1:37:35
  Sir John versus Ajax and everyone else fighting around in
• 1:37:38
  the background, this part, this this one I like a lot.
• 1:37:41
  Yes, that one is cool. I'll give this one goes.
• 1:37:43
  I love we we didn't talk about him but the fucking weird dwarf
• 1:37:48
  with the staff. No, the conduit guy.
• 1:37:52
  Yes, I love him. He's.
• 1:37:54
  Just a space Marine. He's just a fucking like he
• 1:37:57
  manified space marine. I love him so much.
• 1:38:00
  He literally looks like a librarian down to like the weird
• 1:38:04
  psychic the hood thing on his head.
• 1:38:06
  I love him. He looks like a Marvel
• 1:38:09
  character, but I'm kind of here for it.
• 1:38:11
  To explain what Isaiah is talking about, there's a there's
• 1:38:14
  a dwarf character for the conduit class art that is like
• 1:38:20
  hitting people with holy smitage and has like a big weird sci-fi
• 1:38:24
  looking staff and shit. He's yeah, there's a lot going
• 1:38:27
  on with him. He fucks.
• 1:38:28
  I'm not going to lie, I kind of. He's got a pretty.
• 1:38:30
  Crazy. You're not selling it.
• 1:38:31
  He's got like a metal crop. Top Crop.
• 1:38:35
  Top and fucking skivvies with a Garter belt.
• 1:38:40
  Like thigh high grieve stocking things, massive piccolo
• 1:38:46
  pauldrons and a Cape and this crazy metal apparatus around his
• 1:38:51
  head. Embracers.
• 1:38:52
  And in every shot he's there, he's screaming to the high
• 1:38:56
  heavens and shooting. Yeah.
• 1:38:58
  He's like smiting everyone. I fucking love him so much.
• 1:39:02
  I. I feel like it's also worth
• 1:39:04
  pointing out his weird like his staff is like an orb on top of
• 1:39:08
  like an hourglass shape that looks like it maybe has blood in
• 1:39:11
  it. Yeah.
• 1:39:13
  Also, is he wearing assless chaps?
• 1:39:16
  Yes, that's what I'm saying. He's he's got like, so yeah,
• 1:39:18
  they're not like Garter belts, but yeah, he's got the tighty
• 1:39:21
  whities, he's got the leather skivvies.
• 1:39:24
  But the inner thighs and back of the legs, there's nothing there.
• 1:39:29
  It's just the outer thighs that have a leather on them dude.
• 1:39:34
  Who is? This guy, apparently his name is
• 1:39:36
  Dazar, and I love him, Yeah. Dazar, the gods judge our
• 1:39:41
  actions and our inaction. Dazar you're like, Oh yeah, all
• 1:39:44
  the characters have quotes. All of that is to get us started
• 1:39:49
  on classes. Bro it's literally every fucking
• 1:39:53
  shot. He's just screaming.
• 1:39:55
  He's just screaming like a space marine.
• 1:39:57
  I love him so. All right, so the book did a
• 1:40:02
  really weird thing here where there's like a chunk of
• 1:40:06
  mechanical explanation stuff before the classes.
• 1:40:11
  I don't know why these why this section is here.
• 1:40:13
  Did this feel out of place to you too?
• 1:40:14
  Absolutely. OK, so here's what we're going
• 1:40:17
  to do here. We're going to come back to it.
• 1:40:21
  I think like I I just want to talk about the classes
• 1:40:25
  themselves right now because this feels slightly out of
• 1:40:29
  place. How are we going to do the
• 1:40:30
  classes? Because if we want to do every
• 1:40:32
  class, we're not. Doing every class.
• 1:40:34
  We're not doing every class. We can't do that all.
• 1:40:35
  Right, because we talked about this last episode.
• 1:40:38
  Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. This game goes ballistic with
• 1:40:41
  this class. Classes.
• 1:40:43
  You have a class and your class. You have a class.
• 1:40:46
  And unique abilities for every subclass.
• 1:40:49
  And you might be like I say, what the fuck are you talking
• 1:40:51
  about? It's like D&D.
• 1:40:52
  No, shut the fuck up. It's more everything you get to
• 1:40:55
  a certain point is based on your subclass.
• 1:40:59
  So yeah, so yeah, we can't go through every class because that
• 1:41:06
  would be 3 hours by itself. It's just not.
• 1:41:09
  So I'm just going to, I'm going to like explain them first and
• 1:41:14
  then we're just kind of go over them.
• 1:41:16
  The one I read in the most detail was the sensor, so I'm
• 1:41:18
  going to use that as kind of my sample one the so God, my brain
• 1:41:29
  just I just went in eight directions.
• 1:41:31
  OK, so the classes are sensor, conduit, elementalist, fury,
• 1:41:37
  null, shadow tactician, talent troubadour, roughly roughly
• 1:41:45
  those map onto, and I emphasis on roughly here.
• 1:41:48
  The sensor is your paladin guy, the conduit is your cleric guy.
• 1:41:55
  The elementalist is your wizard, but also your sorcerer and also
• 1:41:59
  your druid depending on which subclass you go with.
• 1:42:03
  The Fury is your barbarian. The Knoll is your monk, but like
• 1:42:10
  also has psionic powers and can turn off other people's powers.
• 1:42:16
  The Knoll I am almost positive is inspired by a character from
• 1:42:20
  the Black Company named Darling the White Rose because she is a
• 1:42:27
  Knoll and her whole thing, the reason, part of the reason she's
• 1:42:30
  so important is because she has to defeat the Oh God I just
• 1:42:36
  forgot his name, not the Baron. Wow I just forgot the main bad
• 1:42:40
  dude's name. What the fuck?
• 1:42:42
  I do not read. The series.
• 1:42:43
  I know, I know, I know, I know. Oh God.
• 1:42:47
  The point is the guy she has to beat is an evil wizard and she
• 1:42:52
  has the ability to turn off wizard shit.
• 1:42:57
  So I'm I'm almost positive that the the Knoll is inspired by
• 1:43:06
  that character from the Black Company, but also they're the
• 1:43:08
  monk. We kind of because kind of a
• 1:43:11
  weird combo. Yeah.
• 1:43:13
  Yeah. I mean, for me, I thought blanks
• 1:43:14
  from Warhammer, but I've no doubt that the fucking blanks
• 1:43:17
  from Warhammer were likely taken from the Black Company as well.
• 1:43:19
  So I would say that's also it. Yeah.
• 1:43:23
  You know, James Workshop stealing everything that isn't
• 1:43:26
  is not bolted down. The Dominator.
• 1:43:28
  Jesus Christ that's his fucking name that I was trying to think
• 1:43:30
  of. The Dominator completely
• 1:43:31
  different than the Baron. Yeah, I my brain was really
• 1:43:35
  fucking firing on no cylinders on that when the hamster died.
• 1:43:43
  The fury is your barbarian, the Knoll is your weird monk guide.
• 1:43:46
  The shadow is your rogue, but also very explicitly like shadow
• 1:43:51
  magic powers, not just stabby guy.
• 1:43:55
  The tactician is mostly your fighter, but has all sorts of
• 1:44:00
  different there like every every fighter is a battle master type
• 1:44:04
  scenario. The tactician has all these
• 1:44:06
  different like control the battlefield type moves.
• 1:44:10
  The talent has no DND equivalent.
• 1:44:13
  They are. They're like the psionic super
• 1:44:16
  powered person. But that doesn't necessarily
• 1:44:19
  mean they could be Jean Grey. But they can also be a time
• 1:44:22
  wizard or a metamorphosis wizard or a pyrokinetic or telepathic
• 1:44:27
  or a cryo kinetic. Like the talents have a lot of
• 1:44:30
  different shit they could be. And you can be all of them at
• 1:44:34
  the same time. Yeah.
• 1:44:36
  I don't know if you could be all of that.
• 1:44:37
  I don't know if that's true. You can basically like every
• 1:44:40
  level you get to pick any of the skill like So you have like you
• 1:44:43
  basically can get your 3 subclasses and then there are 4
• 1:44:48
  tertiary classes that you can pick from when you get level
• 1:44:52
  UPS. Wait, I thought the talent
• 1:44:53
  traditions were the subclass. They not.
• 1:44:56
  They are, but you only get three of them as base.
• 1:45:01
  Oh, OK, OK, I see. What?
• 1:45:02
  You're saying so like at the start you only get oh God, what
• 1:45:08
  is it called? You get protopathy, telekinesis,
• 1:45:14
  and telepathy. So animopathy, cryokinesis,
• 1:45:17
  metamorphosis, pyrokinesis, and resopathy are all things you get
• 1:45:21
  as you level up and you basically just pluck them when
• 1:45:24
  you want them. It's odd.
• 1:45:30
  I feel like that's not exactly how it works, but I didn't read
• 1:45:33
  close enough so now I'm not sure but.
• 1:45:35
  It works almost identically to the Mystic 'cause that's how
• 1:45:37
  that worked too. Oh, OK, so maybe that then.
• 1:45:40
  I guess maybe I was a misunderstanding.
• 1:45:42
  Point being the talent is your psychic person with with the
• 1:45:45
  crazy grab bag of tricks. And then lastly is the
• 1:45:49
  troubadour. It's the Bard.
• 1:45:51
  You do Bard things. The thing that's fun about the
• 1:45:54
  troubadour, of course, is you actually have performances that
• 1:45:57
  you can put on. They're referred to as routines.
• 1:46:02
  So yeah, those are your classes. So, OK, So what the fuck does a
• 1:46:07
  class give you in this game? So up until this point, right,
• 1:46:11
  you have your ancestry and then you do your culture and then you
• 1:46:14
  do your career. Your last option is your class.
• 1:46:18
  I'm glad they put side note, I'm glad organization.
• 1:46:21
  So on one hand, this game did the thing I don't like, which is
• 1:46:23
  they put character creation before the rules.
• 1:46:26
  Not a fan but they did put the background stuff before the
• 1:46:32
  classes so that's better because I feel like background before
• 1:46:35
  classes makes more sense. Side note I again I'm not to
• 1:46:41
  hammer on the art thing again, but if you look at the art for
• 1:46:43
  the sensor, an example of the action being a little unclear
• 1:46:47
  and confusing to me. I cannot tell if that dragon
• 1:46:51
  knight is swinging the Mace up or down.
• 1:46:54
  What direction is he swinging the Mace in?
• 1:46:57
  Because if he's swinging it up, that looks really weird and that
• 1:46:59
  would be a very weak swing. But if he's swinging it
• 1:47:01
  downward, it doesn't look like he'd be hitting that tentacle.
• 1:47:04
  Hold on, I'm trying to like figure.
• 1:47:06
  Out you see what you see what I mean?
• 1:47:08
  It doesn't. It seems it's not clear which
• 1:47:10
  direction his arm is supposed to be swinging in.
• 1:47:13
  It's like in too neutral of a spot that it makes the action
• 1:47:16
  confusing. I mean, he's swinging, he's got
• 1:47:18
  to be swinging up, right? That's the damage is starting at
• 1:47:20
  the top, which means and like the trail is ending at the
• 1:47:24
  bottom. I see the trail which is also
• 1:47:26
  why I thought up, but I feel like that would be such an
• 1:47:29
  awkward way to swing that Mace. Like swing it up above, back
• 1:47:32
  behind your head like that. Yes, well, it just doesn't make
• 1:47:36
  sense for the pose because if he was swinging diagonally upwards,
• 1:47:40
  he'd be in a handshake grip with his thumb pointing forward right
• 1:47:45
  in, like AEI jutsu kind of thing.
• 1:47:48
  But he's just pulling it up like he's doing.
• 1:47:51
  He's kind of holding it up. He's like an inverted row, Yeah.
• 1:47:55
  Yeah, well, he's holding it up like he's posing for a photo
• 1:47:57
  shoot. Almost.
• 1:47:57
  Yeah, yeah. Done.
• 1:47:58
  It's just done. It's just.
• 1:48:00
  It's just this confusing. It's a shame because you get
• 1:48:03
  some interesting stuff, like did you notice that the shield is
• 1:48:05
  buckling inward from the impact? Yes, and I mean, I like his, I
• 1:48:10
  like the the rest of the drawing.
• 1:48:12
  It's just that one bit confuses the shit out of me.
• 1:48:16
  And because it confuses me, it bothers me and pulls all my
• 1:48:18
  attention away. Yes.
• 1:48:21
  Anyway, right, So what does a, what does a class actually give
• 1:48:26
  you? So you have your starting, so
• 1:48:31
  your characteristics, which again are your stats in this
• 1:48:33
  game. So if you are a sensor, you
• 1:48:38
  start with mite to and presence to and then you choose from an
• 1:48:43
  array for your other stats. And if you'd math out, each of
• 1:48:49
  the array options add up to +1. This is very similar to how
• 1:48:55
  Apocalypse World did the math basically and dungeon almost
• 1:48:59
  identical. Right.
• 1:49:00
  Actually, it might be identical. Yeah, it might be completely
• 1:49:03
  identical. So effectively what you're
• 1:49:06
  looking at if you're playing a sensor, for example, is you
• 1:49:10
  know, might and presents are two and then either you can have two
• 1:49:13
  minus ones and another two, or you could have two ones and a -,
• 1:49:16
  1 or a one and two zeros. Keep in mind roles in this game
• 1:49:21
  are two D10 plus your modifiers. So if you have a -1 in a stat,
• 1:49:27
  you'd be rolling 2 D 10 -, 1. So 2 might not sound like a lot,
• 1:49:33
  but 2 is a lot in this game. Like 2 is 2 is roughly
• 1:49:37
  equivalent to like a + 3 ish in DND.
• 1:49:42
  It's it is a. Demonstrable increase I in fact.
• 1:49:46
  It's because of the way the dice.
• 1:49:48
  Because you're working with two die and you're adding a modifier
• 1:49:51
  to two die. The way the curve works out, +2
• 1:49:53
  has a lot bigger of an influence.
• 1:49:55
  Yes, something in fact I really like about this game is that
• 1:49:58
  flanking gives you a + 2, but unlike in +2 are like unlike in
• 1:50:03
  DND, that +2 feels good. It feels really good and it
• 1:50:07
  doesn't feel as busted as Advantage.
• 1:50:10
  Yeah, it's it's a very relevant bonus.
• 1:50:15
  So then then you have this the your class will also lay out
• 1:50:19
  your potencies. So this game does not have
• 1:50:22
  saving throws. So instead if you do an ability
• 1:50:27
  to an enemy or they do it to you, it checks against a stat.
• 1:50:33
  So for your sensor, for example, your weak potency is equal to
• 1:50:39
  your presence score -2 so at level 1 it would be 0.
• 1:50:43
  That's your weak potency. So if you have an ability that
• 1:50:46
  says if the opponent has weak potency or less in this stat,
• 1:50:53
  then they're knocked prone, then that in this case that would
• 1:50:55
  mean if they have a presence of 0 or less, they're knocked
• 1:50:59
  prone. If they have a presence of one
• 1:51:01
  or higher, they are not knocked prone.
• 1:51:04
  And then your average potency for the sensor is presence -1
• 1:51:08
  and then your strong potency is just equal to your presence.
• 1:51:11
  So anytime you do any kind of effect that would kind of that
• 1:51:14
  would roughly be equivalent to a saving throw effect in D&D, you
• 1:51:18
  just check against a stat instead.
• 1:51:21
  And the main reason for this is just speed of play.
• 1:51:26
  They just it's just kind of a pain in the ass to be like, can
• 1:51:29
  you roll me a save? And then what did you get?
• 1:51:31
  And then tell me the number. So as opposed to that, you just
• 1:51:34
  say if this guy has a if this guy's presence is less than two,
• 1:51:40
  he this thing happens to him and it's just a speed of play thing,
• 1:51:44
  which I do. I like I'm AI think that's
• 1:51:46
  probably a good decision because you know, it's it's a little bit
• 1:51:50
  of a shame you don't get to do like saving throws, because
• 1:51:52
  sometimes saving throws could be fun.
• 1:51:53
  But at the same time, I get why they got why they tossed them.
• 1:51:58
  You know, yeah, no, I get it. To give an example of what I
• 1:52:02
  mean, so the the sensor has an ability called Halt miscreant if
• 1:52:11
  you get an average role. We haven't talked about how
• 1:52:15
  roles work, but if you get the average success on the role, it
• 1:52:19
  does 5 plus your might in holy damage, and then it does
• 1:52:23
  presence greater than average. So in this case, the average at
• 1:52:29
  level 1 would be 1. So if the enemy you're hitting
• 1:52:34
  has a presence greater than one, they are not slowed.
• 1:52:39
  If their presence is less than one, they are slowed and then
• 1:52:45
  they what they do is there's it has what's called a save ends on
• 1:52:48
  the end of it. And a save ends is once you've
• 1:52:50
  been affected by an ability like that, at the end of your turn,
• 1:52:54
  you roll ADI think it's AD 10. And on a six or higher, the
• 1:52:58
  condition ends at the end of your turn.
• 1:53:00
  And if you roll less, it doesn't.
• 1:53:02
  So effectively once you're affected buy an ability like
• 1:53:06
  this, it's it. It is luck whether you can break
• 1:53:10
  it or not. Your stats don't dictate
• 1:53:11
  anymore. Your stats protect you from the
• 1:53:13
  initial hit, and then if you get hit by it, then you have to hope
• 1:53:16
  for a little bit of luck. After that is the basic flow,
• 1:53:23
  then it, then the other thing. Obviously your class gives you
• 1:53:26
  your starting stamina, which again stamina is health in this
• 1:53:29
  game. The sensor starts with 21 HP.
• 1:53:32
  There is no rolling for health or anything in this game.
• 1:53:35
  Every it'll tell you under your starting stamina it says stamina
• 1:53:39
  gained at second level and higher is 9.
• 1:53:41
  So every level you get 9 extra HP.
• 1:53:46
  Funny story about this my stupid ass.
• 1:53:48
  For some reason completely did not see the stamina gained at
• 1:53:51
  second level line and could not find it where it said that
• 1:53:56
  anywhere else in the book and so I was Googling furiously online
• 1:53:59
  being like how the fuck do characters get more stamina in
• 1:54:02
  this game? I was very confused because I
• 1:54:04
  missed one fucking line. Felt like a dumbass.
• 1:54:08
  Gotta love it. And then as the sensor you get
• 1:54:12
  12 recoveries, which is how many times you can use your catch
• 1:54:15
  breath maneuver, which is effectively your 4 E style
• 1:54:18
  healing surge thing. A maneuver is a bonus action in
• 1:54:23
  this game. So effectively on your turn
• 1:54:26
  you're like oh I need a little bit of help.
• 1:54:27
  You can use a bonus action to heal yourself.
• 1:54:29
  Everyone can do this, there's no restriction on it.
• 1:54:32
  You can only do it once per turn unless you have a special
• 1:54:35
  ability that sort of says otherwise, like the orcs who can
• 1:54:37
  spend more recoveries. And then you get 2 more skills
• 1:54:43
  from your class. In the case of the sensor, you
• 1:54:45
  either get the Interpersonal or Lore.
• 1:54:47
  You can either get 2 skills from the Interpersonal or Lore skill
• 1:54:50
  group. Then you pick your sensor order,
• 1:54:54
  which is your subclass. In the case of the Sensor, you
• 1:54:58
  have the Exorcist, the Oracle, or the Paragon.
• 1:55:02
  I'll just read these real quick. The Exorcist.
• 1:55:06
  You specialize in hunting your orders, hidden enemies, knowing
• 1:55:08
  that an open mind is an unguarded fortress.
• 1:55:10
  You have the read person skill. Oh yeah, you get a skill from
• 1:55:13
  your subclass too. I forgot about that.
• 1:55:15
  Oracle corruption has deep tendrils that can be missed,
• 1:55:19
  leading you to specialize in uncovering clandestine threats
• 1:55:22
  to your order. You have the magic skill and
• 1:55:24
  then paragon. Without a strong example and a
• 1:55:26
  firm hand, the weak will be corrupted.
• 1:55:28
  You specialize in setting an example for your order.
• 1:55:30
  You have the lead skill. Subclasses are a similar vibe to
• 1:55:35
  D&D. Essentially they lock you into
• 1:55:37
  certain abilities as you level up that are themed to your
• 1:55:40
  subclass. That's the main vibe.
• 1:55:43
  Although there will be points where you have to choose pretty
• 1:55:48
  much almost every level. In this game, you're choosing
• 1:55:52
  abilities. It's pretty rare that you just
• 1:55:55
  get a thing and that's the end of it.
• 1:55:57
  Yes, every level up in this game will feel significant and it
• 1:56:00
  will feel like oh I am just cooler than I was.
• 1:56:04
  Before, yeah, for the most part. There's also a deity and domain
• 1:56:10
  thing for the sensor. Obviously if you're playing like
• 1:56:12
  a tactician or whatever, you don't have to pick that.
• 1:56:15
  And then heroic resources. So every class has a heroic
• 1:56:19
  resource which grows throughout the fight.
• 1:56:26
  So for the case of the sensor, you have wrath at the start of a
• 1:56:30
  combat encounter or other stressful situation tract.
• 1:56:33
  In combat rounds, you gain wrath equal to your victories.
• 1:56:38
  At the start of each of your turns during combat, you also
• 1:56:40
  gain 2 wrath. That's how the sensor works.
• 1:56:42
  Everybody has slightly different ways that this works.
• 1:56:46
  Additionally, the first time each combat round that a
• 1:56:49
  creature judged by you, they have an ability called Judgement
• 1:56:52
  deals damage to you, you gain 1 wrath.
• 1:56:54
  The first time, each combat round that you deal damage to a
• 1:56:57
  creature judged by you, you also gain 1 wrath.
• 1:57:00
  You lose all of your wrath at the end of the encounter.
• 1:57:04
  And then it briefly mentions, and every class has this, which
• 1:57:07
  is wrath outside of combat. So every class has heroic
• 1:57:13
  abilities and heroic abilities cost your heroic resource to do
• 1:57:18
  them. So when you're outside of combat
• 1:57:22
  you cannot. You don't accrue your heroic
• 1:57:24
  resource unless you're in a fight or other like tense
• 1:57:28
  situation type related scenario. So you can use abilities that
• 1:57:35
  would cost your heroic resource outside of fights, but
• 1:57:39
  effectively what you can do is you can only use them once, like
• 1:57:47
  once between fights or once between long rest.
• 1:57:50
  So you do a fight after where the fight finishes.
• 1:57:54
  You want to use an ability for some.
• 1:57:57
  Most of the heroic abilities are going to be combat focused, so
• 1:58:00
  you're not going to want to use them out of combat that much.
• 1:58:03
  But if for some reason you want to you use the ability and then
• 1:58:08
  you your GM says OK, you can't use the bit, use that ability
• 1:58:12
  again until either you acquire a victory, which is to say, do
• 1:58:17
  another fight, or if you do a respite, which is to say a long
• 1:58:20
  rest, then you can do it again after that.
• 1:58:24
  And if you need to know how many points of your heroic resource
• 1:58:31
  you have roughly went outside of combat, it's equal to your
• 1:58:34
  number of victories. So if you have 3 victories and
• 1:58:37
  you have an ability that deals damage based on how many of your
• 1:58:40
  heroic resource you have, you would treat it as 3.
• 1:58:44
  The. This is an interesting rule.
• 1:58:52
  I'm glad that they gave the option to use a lot to use your
• 1:58:56
  heroic abilities outside of fights, because I'm kind of, I
• 1:59:02
  almost kind of expected them to just say you can't do that,
• 1:59:06
  period. I yeah, I mean, but this is an,
• 1:59:14
  this is an OK middle ground, I would say.
• 1:59:18
  Yes, I think it's an OK middle ground.
• 1:59:20
  I I agree with you that I don't 100% see a reason why you
• 1:59:25
  should. Most of the, yeah, I mean, most
• 1:59:29
  of your heroic abilities are not.
• 1:59:31
  You're not going to. But I don't know, there might be
• 1:59:33
  some fringe. The fact that the rules in there
• 1:59:35
  makes me believe that something came up in play testing.
• 1:59:39
  Right. That being said, once in between
• 1:59:42
  fights or in between days, I think is just an odd number.
• 1:59:45
  I don't know what else it would be, but I like I'm not I.
• 1:59:49
  Don't know how. It's just kind of weird.
• 1:59:51
  That's what I mean. It's kind of it's like a
• 1:59:52
  compromise kind of situation. You do get abilities from your
• 1:59:58
  class that are not necessarily like a fight abilities.
• 2:00:02
  You do get like traits that will do things outside of combat and
• 2:00:06
  stuff. So it's not like it's not like
• 2:00:08
  outside of combat, you just have nothing.
• 2:00:12
  It's just, yeah, the combat abilities have kind of specific
• 2:00:17
  uses. Speaking of your SO, the way
• 2:00:23
  your abilities work in this game.
• 2:00:27
  I mentioned this last time, but like, there are no spells, there
• 2:00:31
  are no features, there's no like, default actions.
• 2:00:36
  I said there was no attack action last time.
• 2:00:39
  I kind of was wrong. Sort of.
• 2:00:44
  Yeah, exit your free attack. You have your yeah.
• 2:00:47
  So you have your free strikes, which are just kind of a basic
• 2:00:51
  attack. The thing about that is there's
• 2:00:54
  basically no reason where you would ever use your free strike
• 2:00:57
  over your signature abilities. They're always going to be the
• 2:01:01
  better option. So it does say that specifically
• 2:01:04
  too. Like, yeah, the game says we
• 2:01:06
  don't know why you would do this.
• 2:01:07
  You. Wouldn't, yeah, you could, but
• 2:01:10
  you there's no reason to. So yeah, everyone gets a basic
• 2:01:13
  free strike that is a melee in a range, but you're not going to
• 2:01:16
  use them because the way that your class works is you have
• 2:01:19
  signature abilities and heroic abilities.
• 2:01:21
  Signature abilities you can use every time for free every single
• 2:01:26
  turn. And then heroic abilities you
• 2:01:28
  can use by spending your heroic resource.
• 2:01:30
  So, you know, they haven't, they have an ammo count effectively.
• 2:01:34
  And every class gets a couple of different heroic abilities that
• 2:01:38
  you choose from. And then those are essentially
• 2:01:41
  you're locked in abilities and some of them are kind of basic
• 2:01:45
  attacks, but some of them are kind of odd.
• 2:01:47
  So for example, one of the ones the sensor has is every step
• 2:01:51
  death, which is you do a magic like you do a magic range strike
• 2:01:57
  on a target and then it deals either 57 or 10 plus your
• 2:02:02
  presence in psychic damage. And then the effect of it is
• 2:02:08
  each time a target willingly moves before the end of your
• 2:02:10
  next turn, they take one psychic damage for each square they
• 2:02:13
  move. And that's like a basic attack
• 2:02:15
  ability that you can do every single turn, no questions asked.
• 2:02:20
  The other one is back. Another good one is back
• 2:02:23
  Blasphemer, where you deal holy damage and can push the opponent
• 2:02:26
  away 1-2 or three squares. The suggested one they give you
• 2:02:31
  is your allies. By the way, all the abilities
• 2:02:34
  have like the names are phrases, they're like statements.
• 2:02:40
  They're all named this way. So the suggested ability for the
• 2:02:44
  sensor that it gives you is your allies cannot save you.
• 2:02:47
  You do a melee weapon strike and then you roll with your might
• 2:02:52
  and then you either deal 35 or 8:00 plus might in holy damage.
• 2:02:57
  And then each enemy adjacent to the target is pushed away from
• 2:03:01
  the target a number of squares equal to your present score.
• 2:03:03
  So you smack the person and then all of their friends get pushed
• 2:03:07
  one or two squares away from them.
• 2:03:10
  You just dunk them so hard everyone gets like blasted away,
• 2:03:14
  which is cool. I want to don't get me wrong.
• 2:03:23
  The shit was the thing and oh, so, so yeah, essentially you
• 2:03:28
  pick you pick one of your signature abilities.
• 2:03:30
  Those are kind of like your default attacks.
• 2:03:32
  Those are your your fall back if you don't have anything else to
• 2:03:35
  do at the moment. And then your heroic abilities
• 2:03:38
  are the ones where you spend your points to do like bigger
• 2:03:41
  stuff. So for example, the Sensor, the
• 2:03:47
  Gods Punish, and the suggested one for the one of the suggested
• 2:03:51
  heroic abilities for the sensor is the Gods Punish and Defend.
• 2:03:54
  You do a magical melee weapon strike roll plus your might, and
• 2:03:59
  you deal either 5/8 or 11 plus might holy damage on one
• 2:04:03
  creature or an object. And then once you do that, you
• 2:04:06
  can spend a recovery to allow yourself or one ally within 10
• 2:04:10
  squares to regain stamina equal to your recovery value.
• 2:04:13
  So you smack the bad guy real hard and then you can heal
• 2:04:16
  yourself or a team. I'm not going to read through
• 2:04:21
  all the abilities because as I say, it can attest there's a
• 2:04:23
  fucking Dick load of abilities. Yeah, it's a lot.
• 2:04:27
  It's a lot and everybody has heroic abilities that cost 33
• 2:04:35
  points, five points, 7 points, 9 points, and then up at the last
• 2:04:40
  couple of levels, 11 points. So yeah, there's, there's a lot
• 2:04:48
  of fucking abilities. And then you also get subclass
• 2:04:50
  abilities on top of that. Those will often those will
• 2:05:02
  sometimes also cost heroic resources and whatnot to get
• 2:05:09
  like so for example. Well, that's not even this.
• 2:05:12
  I was about to say I was about to give an example and then I
• 2:05:14
  realized this isn't the the domain is not the subclass.
• 2:05:20
  I'm trying to find a where the fucking where OK, where the
• 2:05:24
  level 1 subclass thingies? Where's the subclass thingies?
• 2:05:34
  Blessing a fortunate what? No, those are the those are the
• 2:05:37
  domains. Oh yeah, sensors pick a domain
• 2:05:40
  kind of the same way a cleric would in this game.
• 2:05:45
  The conduit also does that. So both the paladin and the the
• 2:05:49
  cleric get that basically. Oh, oh, you don't get one at
• 2:05:54
  level 1. So to give another example like
• 2:05:56
  if you chose the paragon fucking censor at level 2 you would get
• 2:06:04
  the abilities lead by example and stalwart icon.
• 2:06:08
  So lead by example to give an to explain what the non fighty
• 2:06:14
  abilities kind of look like for your class.
• 2:06:16
  If you got lead by example, your devotion of your deity allows
• 2:06:19
  you to take command of the battlefield, letting you and
• 2:06:21
  your allies benefit your wisdom. While you are adjacent to a
• 2:06:23
  creature, your allies gain the benefit of flanking against the
• 2:06:25
  creature. Additionally, your allies gain
• 2:06:27
  an edge on tests made to aid other creatures with their
• 2:06:29
  tests. That's just always on.
• 2:06:32
  So like that doesn't have the the stipulation of like the once
• 2:06:36
  per between fights or anything like that.
• 2:06:39
  And then stalwart icon, you exhibit a small spark your
• 2:06:42
  deities power causing creatures to trust or fear you depending
• 2:06:44
  on what you need. You gain an edge on tests made
• 2:06:47
  to intimidate or persuade others.
• 2:06:48
  Again, always on. So you do get like passive
• 2:06:54
  traits that come from your classes.
• 2:06:58
  Also, it's not just the attacky smacky thingies.
• 2:07:02
  It is mostly attacky smacky thingies, don't get me wrong.
• 2:07:08
  And then so though, so you get those features and then also at
• 2:07:13
  level 2 you would get your order ability, which is more of an
• 2:07:18
  attacky smacky type thing that would that cost a heroic
• 2:07:21
  resource. Just a hammer hone the point
• 2:07:27
  about you get a lot of shit and then you also get perks at what
• 2:07:32
  is it, level 4? And like, hold on, I gotta hold
• 2:07:38
  on. I gotta scroll back up now hold
• 2:07:40
  on. I'm looking, I'm looking, I'm
• 2:07:41
  looking, I'm looking. OK, level 4 and level 6 and
• 2:07:46
  level 8 and level 10. So after level 4, every two
• 2:07:51
  levels you also get perks, which are feats.
• 2:07:56
  So you're getting, you're getting your abilities, your
• 2:08:02
  order, your subclass abilities, your regular abilities and
• 2:08:07
  perks, plus some other passive things, plus skills.
• 2:08:15
  You will also get additional skills as you level up in a
• 2:08:18
  class, and you can increase characteristics every couple of
• 2:08:23
  levels too. Just to give you an idea of
• 2:08:27
  stuff. I don't know if you have
• 2:08:30
  anything you want to add. I mean, no, we we weren't.
• 2:08:33
  There's a lot of classes, about 10 pages.
• 2:08:36
  It's you get so much stuff for. Every class stocks it's a
• 2:08:44
  little. Nuts.
• 2:08:45
  To be honest, I I was not expecting the girths that I got
• 2:08:49
  when I was like, Oh yeah, I want to look at.
• 2:08:51
  The Oh my God, if yeah. So if you just look at it
• 2:08:55
  without looking at the rest of the game or whatever, it
• 2:08:57
  definitely hits is a little overwhelming.
• 2:09:00
  If you just take the time to like read slowly, it's not
• 2:09:03
  actually that bad. It just, when you look at it
• 2:09:11
  real quick, at first, it looks like it's going to be really
• 2:09:14
  bad. Yeah.
• 2:09:16
  You know, like it has this like overwhelming.
• 2:09:19
  That's a lot of words. The other thing I do this is a
• 2:09:24
  little bit of a complaint the because the text is just a lot
• 2:09:31
  of like black on white. Sometimes it's a little hard to
• 2:09:35
  see like where where important delineations are, you know what
• 2:09:42
  I mean? So like for example, if I go
• 2:09:45
  where's the level 2 page? OK, so if you get to the level 2
• 2:09:53
  perks, right? And then it says you have the
• 2:09:56
  second level order features and then you get the table and
• 2:09:59
  you're like, OK, immediately after stalwart icon, it says
• 2:10:05
  second level order ability, right?
• 2:10:09
  But if you're scrolling really fast, that font is not that much
• 2:10:13
  bigger and doesn't isn't a different colour and isn't
• 2:10:17
  doesn't have a background to it or anything.
• 2:10:19
  So it's really easy to kind of scroll past that little one,
• 2:10:22
  that bit that says second level order ability and not realize
• 2:10:25
  you're supposed to be picking from that list.
• 2:10:28
  You know what I mean? Yes, I actually did have that
• 2:10:31
  same thing when on the first read through.
• 2:10:32
  It's like, oh, I get all of no, you don't.
• 2:10:34
  Get all you don't. Yeah, it's one delineation.
• 2:10:37
  There are delineations, but it's hard to see the and another
• 2:10:40
  great example, if you Scroll down a little further after the
• 2:10:43
  second level paragon abilities, the text then jumps up to the
• 2:10:47
  right half of the page where you get the third level features.
• 2:10:51
  If you're just scrolling fast and looking, the third level
• 2:10:55
  features bit almost looks like the text on the left side might
• 2:10:58
  be related to it, but it's not. But like it.
• 2:11:04
  If you're not realizing how it's ordered, you might.
• 2:11:07
  You might not realize that. You know what I mean?
• 2:11:08
  Yes, I know exactly what we're talking about.
• 2:11:10
  Yeah, so like the headers get mushed into the text a little
• 2:11:14
  too much, and so that can get it.
• 2:11:17
  And the abilities themselves are a little easier to see because
• 2:11:20
  they have that little tab art piece on the edge, but there's
• 2:11:24
  so many of them that they get mushed into each other
• 2:11:26
  sometimes. So yeah, there's a little bit of
• 2:11:31
  like a formatting weirdness. Yeah, it's a.
• 2:11:35
  It's not the end of the world, it just means you have to read a
• 2:11:37
  little slower. Yes, you don't have to pay a
• 2:11:39
  little more attention and it is daunting for sure.
• 2:11:42
  Like even even knowing what I know now, as I was reading the
• 2:11:49
  classes, I like I, my, my eyes started to subconsciously skip
• 2:11:53
  around because I'm like, there's so much to take in.
• 2:11:55
  I got to like. How do I get it all?
• 2:11:57
  If you're not actively making a character in the moment, yeah,
• 2:12:00
  you're you're you're going to have, you're going to, you're
• 2:12:03
  going to feel this urge to like jump past things, but you will
• 2:12:06
  actually you, you, you will lose your spot really easily.
• 2:12:09
  You will be like wait wait shit fuck where was I?
• 2:12:12
  I don't entirely know how they could remedy this, I mean.
• 2:12:15
  I don't either I. Think I think 5E did it
• 2:12:17
  perfectly right. You get all your basic class
• 2:12:20
  shit and then there's a subsection where you get your
• 2:12:23
  subclass shit. And I know you get a lot of shit
• 2:12:26
  with your subclass in this, yeah, but maybe worth a try with
• 2:12:30
  the book's already out but. Yeah, the book set, I mean, the
• 2:12:33
  the one other thing I would really like to see is just a
• 2:12:36
  little bit, a little extra like pizzazz on the headers bits to
• 2:12:43
  to make them stand out. Like if there was a little bit
• 2:12:45
  of like a if there was like a yellow background to the bit
• 2:12:47
  where it says like second level features, third level features,
• 2:12:50
  if there's like a background color to it or something to just
• 2:12:53
  make it pop forward a little bit more.
• 2:12:55
  I feel like that would help. They could also try just
• 2:12:57
  coloring the text and I know like that's more for.
• 2:12:59
  Coloring text if. You colored the text by each
• 2:13:02
  subclass, so it's like, Oh yeah, yeah, Judgement is a paracon
• 2:13:06
  feature. I know it's not actually, but
• 2:13:07
  let's say it is. That would be red or gold.
• 2:13:11
  And then like the Oracle is blue and then the then the Exorcist
• 2:13:15
  is like purple. Yeah.
• 2:13:18
  Yeah, I could see that for sure. All right, we're going to have
• 2:13:24
  to stop there. We only hit classes, this is
• 2:13:28
  not, and I purposely didn't talk that much to let you do your
• 2:13:31
  thing. And we're still only on classes.
• 2:13:33
  Yes, Sir. Well, I feel like we're also not
• 2:13:41
  done talking about classes necessarily.
• 2:13:43
  No, we're not. We got to come back around to
• 2:13:45
  it. Plus because I want other
• 2:13:46
  because I I'm sure you have some shit to say to throw in there
• 2:13:49
  too. So.
• 2:13:51
  Yeah, a bit. I mean classes are going to be
• 2:13:53
  the medias thing because once we get past the classes it is going
• 2:13:57
  to be a lot of like this works like DND.
• 2:14:00
  Yeah, yeah, yeah, like the the most of the general rules about
• 2:14:05
  combat are almost identical to 5V with some interesting
• 2:14:07
  minutia. Yes, and and the minutias we're
• 2:14:10
  talking about, but yeah, plus the little bit where you have to
• 2:14:15
  go before class, although a lot of that's just like explaining
• 2:14:18
  how AO ES and shit work. But I will go over them briefly
• 2:14:21
  and we, oh, the ability rolls. We just have to explain how the
• 2:14:24
  ability roll works. That is relevant.
• 2:14:26
  But anyway, anyway, we're done for now.
• 2:14:30
  Obviously we're going to be coming back to this game because
• 2:14:32
  we're still not done talking about it yet.
• 2:14:34
  Clearly I didn't, I wasn't expecting us to be, to be fair.
• 2:14:38
  So it's fine. How do you want to do this then?
• 2:14:41
  Do you want to you want to just take over until we're done?
• 2:14:43
  Or let's discuss, not on. Recording.
• 2:14:47
  OK, fair enough. Yes, this has been us.
• 2:14:52
  We're heading out of here. Brett's probably got a tactical
• 2:14:56
  nuke our houses for giving him another big chunker to deal
• 2:14:59
  with. To be fair, we're not at 2 hours
• 2:15:02
  and 30 minutes yet. Not quite, but we're real close
• 2:15:04
  so let's shut the fuck up. Give us a follow up.
• 2:15:07
  The social media's in the description.
• 2:15:09
  Yay.