Free One Pager + Dev Log
Shore leave hangout, Cryo Drakus behind the scenes, and collected awesome things.
Hello Guac!!
Here at the Spicy Tuna office we’ve had two recent giant leaps. Cryo Drakus launched on Kickstarter and Greenhorns was digitally released to backers on Saturday (plus physical fulfillment started over the weekend)!
Beyond those milestones, I’ve broken through a lot of the winter brain fog and have been writing and designing more efficiently than I have been over the past year. I’m feeling great about our work and am excited to be making great progress with it.
Today’s Guac returns with more umph! It’s a bit longer of a read because we have a Cryo Drakus Dev Log, a ton of Cool Links, and wrapping it up with some of our Zine Month/Zine Quest ST Favorites!
Docket
Cryo Drakus Dev Log 1: The Danger Meter + Crashing and Variety of Threats
Cinema: Derelict, a free shore leave location
Cool Links
Zine Month/Zine Quest ST Favorites
Current Spicy Tuna Links
Cryo Drakus Funding Now Live https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/marcoserrano/cryo-drakus-an-alien-reconnaissance-rpg
Blackthorn Prelaunch Sign Up
https://www.backerkit.com/call_to_action/353bf3a5-29e2-4ac2-ba9d-1ddf20894866/landing
The Hands That Feed Preorder https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/marcoserrano/the-hands-that-feed
Cryo Drakus Dev Log 1: The Danger Meter + Crashing and Variety of Threats
Cryo Drakus has gone through a slew of iterations both in terms of the game’s world and gameplay. I’m not designing this alone this time around though. Ryan from The Weekly Scroll provided valuable feedback last fall when Cryo Drakus was in it’s infant stages, and Josh Hittie is now on the team for both writing the accompanying mission “The Screaming Depths” and to provide development for the game’s mission structure. On top of that, feedback from Adam Vass, Adam Bell, Ryan again, Jean Verne, and Chris Airiau shared after playtesting has helped me streamline the game, focusing on the fun and allure of the setting while shaving off all of the unnecessary parts. So onto the three things I want to share about now, as titled above.
The Danger Meter + How it Works
The Danger Meter is our chosen clock. The meter is split into five different sections, known as Levels, and each level is split into ticks. The Danger Meter ticks forward based solely on player actions. Each time the meter advances into the next level two things happen: the hive’s defenses increase and a new alien sample becomes available.
*Important Information*. The core of Cryo Drakus is to collect alien samples while on mission. Then study, trade and/or sell the samples and the intrigue the extract from their samples (physical samples and recordings alike) when back on Earth. So we needed the focus to be on the “treasure”, the alien samples/intrigue/etc that the pilots find in the hives.
Our newest iteration eliminates the difference between intrigue and samples on mission, instead focusing on the physical samples alone. The intrigue (biological/historical information about the alien species, what their intent with Earth is, and what is preventing or supporting them in taking the actions they want to take, etc) still has a home on the danger meter on the right hand column. But instead of learning about this specific information while navigating the hive, the crew now discovers the intrigue back on Earth where they, or supporting scientist staff/colleagues/etc, have time to decipher the recordings, markings, and samples the crew collected.
So this changes how information is obtained. The crew gains default information from their experience exploring the hive and their interactions with the aliens. Next, the crew is able to decipher/gather bonus intrigue from the table if they collect three samples. This is considered incomplete intrigue. Complete intrigue, ie. all the information they can collect about the hive’s unique alien species, is obtained only when the crew collects all four samples.
Some benefits we expect from the change:
Maintains the levels of uncertainty among the crew throughout the mission, leaving their additional knowledge about the aliens for when they return home instead of advancing beyond what they witness in the hive.
Maintains the pace of the mission better. Leaving the intrigue for an epilogue during a one shot or for shore leave in a campaign, the tactical maneuvering throughout the hive remains the spotlight of gameplay in the hives, saving more roleplaying and discovery for shore leave.
Allows for more interesting storylines to develop during shore leave. It makes more sense for players to double their duty as researchers (which was always an interest point for player characters) and allows crews to invest more into the process of studying samples, and trading/selling the samples to other rogues/investors/scientiests/etc. Of course, if crews prefer to continually deploy on missions all of the intrigue could be narratively handled, or shared immediately post mission.
Offers players more of a reason to return to a hive. The default mechanic for extracting intrigue takes time, so the crew might deploy on an additional mission just to come back to find new intrigue extracted from samples they collected during a previous mission. The game intends for incomplete intrigue to be rewarding, but also provide reason for the crew to want to return and discover more. We think this adds to the open ended options we want for campaign play.
Crashing and Variety of Threats
One other major development was leaning into the resource management part of gameplay. So the major resources that players balance use of are Power, Shields, and Assimilation.
A quick rundown of the resources:
Power: A pool of d6 dice your ship starts with (5 or 6 depending on the ship). Power Dice can be used to take an additional action during combat, rolled in addition to your Risk Dice when taking a risk, and restore shield slots. It can also be drained by enemies or hive defenses, and when you have zero Power Dice left you crash.
Shields: Ships have three shields, each with varying shield slots (HP equivalent) and damage reduction (reduces incoming damage by 1). Each time a shield is broken, damage continues to the next shield and the pilot must sacrifice an upgrade (or a Power Dice if they have no upgrades to lose).
Assimilation: Some enemies assimilate pilots instead of dealing damage. Pilots can take a maximum of six assimilation before being fully assimilated and are forever changed whenever they take their fourth or fifth assimilation. Enemies generally deal 1d4 assimilation at a time so it becomes very important to deal with the assimilation threat when given choices to focus on.
Although these have always been part of the game, I was originally trying to make a fairly deadly game based on being shot down by enemies, ie losing your shields. When I actually got to playtesting though, the Damage Reduction mechanic, which is both applied to certain shields and picked up with specific upgrades, proved to make ships really tanky whenever they gained a +2 Damage Reduction.
I thought this was a problem, but playtesters really enjoyed being tanky and we added more actions for pilots to choose from while engaged in combat instead of eliminating or reducing damage reduction – one of which is to draw fire.
Now drawing fire can have big ups and big downs depending on dice rolls, so there isn’t any guarantee your tanky build is actually going to be able to absorb all the damage headed your way. And alongside that, we noticed that players were also nearly out of Power and/or almost completely Assimilated by the time our truncated ~2 hour sessions were finished.
So we decided to double down on the variety of “attacks” enemies and tower defenses have in each mission instead. Providing multiple threats to the crew, one or two of which emerging to become more dangerous than the others.
I’m excited for how this might impact players ability to push forward and try their luck in order to get a final sample.
That’s the dev log for today! I’m extremely excited for this game, both for its release and to continue to develop missions for it. If you haven’t checked it out yet, here’s the Kickstarter link:
Cinema: Derelict, A Free Shore Leave Location
I meant to participate in the Tiny World Jam, but it only went on for a couple of weeks, and I ended up focusing on our major projects instead. The goal remains the same though, which is to make shore leave locations for Cryo Drakus. I think you can easily use these hangouts in any scifi game, including shore leave in Mothership.
Cinema: Derelict is an abandoned theatre turned rogue hangout. It’s also an ice bar, an establishment that only serves ice snacks and exists for denizens of the future to ground away from technology and uncertainty. I’m thinking Cryo Drakus’ setting is going to mostly, or entirely, omit alcohol and drugs. They’re a big staple in scifi and I think it will be really interesting to shape the setting to focus more on the looming alien threats than corporate horror and drug dominance.
The goal for these shore leave locations are one pagers, but ones that I really enjoy, such as Cinema: Derelict, will probably get some expanded content in the future, more encounters, area details, patrons, less rushed design etc.
Download it here
https://drive.google.com/file/d/163Zvv62Fdui4Sz3o61VjR0n60dOJxh6H/view?usp=sharing
Cool Links
I Have No Mouth, and I Must Scream by Harlen Ellison (and narrated by the author)
This probably isn’t new to a lot of you, but I relistened to this recently and it’s just an incredibly horrific and emotional listen.
The Hinokodo Method
Hinokodo shared a fantastic tutorial for creating maps with Affinity Designer. There’s a lot of applications to this technique beyond this style, and I think it’s a fantastic resource for people who might not know where to start with map design. I would love to see more of these types of maps in published zines.
The Beautiful Horror of Deepspace by Curiosity Archive
I really enjoy the Curious Archive. They do a wonderful job compiling various sources that tackle a subject. I found this a really great listen, and discovered the game “Under a Star Called Sun” because of it.
Under a Star Called Sun
https://haraiva.itch.io/under-a-star-called-sun
“a sci-fi bitsy game about grieving, holding on to fading memories, and carrying the world on your shoulders, made for LIMINAL magazine's GLITCH series, released in June 2020 as part of the Emerging Writers' Festival.”
The game was really interesting, and a short guided playthrough. Plus, the music is extremely pleasant.
Valley 100
Alfred Valley, the anomalous design warlock, is running a 100 person funnel played entirely on Bluesky. The graphic design for this is just bonkers amazing and the story is fun, and made even more fun by the players!
I believe this is the first post (it was a little difficult to track on Bluesky)
Monster Plants and Humans That Invented Them
The Weekly Scroll Reviews Daisy Chainsaw by Charlotte Laskowski
The Weekly Scroll Reviews Fire Drop by Meatcastle Gameware (Christian Sorrell)
Deluge at the Drizzle Distillery
Munkao stuns again with a new adventure for Kala Mandala! This adventure was released a few months ago, but I needed to share it. Munkao’s world is incredible and inspires me tremendously.
Check it out here
https://heycentaur.itch.io/drizzle-distillery
And more of Munkao’s brilliant illustrations here
https://www.instagram.com/munkao/
The Brain Trust Crowdfunding Series
Zine Quest/Zine Month
Midnight Marathon by Adam Vass
https://www.backerkit.com/c/projects/world-champ-game-co/blood-lock?preview_token=thIpfYtbEL9
Five new horror tabletop zines from Adam Vass! Vampires, demonic spirits, cryptids, and much more.
Solar Crawl by Galen Pejeau
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/solarcrawl/solarcrawl-osr-exploration-in-a-fantastic-space-age
Galen’s also been making a number of cool dev-oriented bluesky threads about the game.
Prequel RPG by Ethan Yen
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/ethanyen/prequel-rpg
A tactical storytelling game of heroic sacrifice. Fight the Evil, recall your Quest, forge your Legacy.
Ethan and James sat down with the Weekly Scroll boys for an actual play too.
Monster Pamphlets Reprint: 1-7 by Arlin
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1093341618/monster-pamphlets-reprint-issues-1-7
Monsters! Art! Zines! A collection of original Risograph printed Monster Zines for fantasy tabletop roleplaying games.
Cryo-Siq by Waco Matrixo
Cryosleep is over, the deranged killer is awake. And you still don't know what's inside that box.
Avon by the Sea
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/johnhambonemcguire/avon-by-the-sea
A seaside horror adventure for 321RPG: Kids face vampires in a storm-ravaged town with streamlined, cinematic gameplay.
JP Coovert also shared some of his favorite projects on his youtube channel here.
Thank you for being here! Especially if you read all the way through. If you want more from Spicy Tuna RPG you can see posts more often by following us here:
One last thing for everyone still reading. I want to invite anyone to leave a review on our modules on the Tuesday Knight Games store, something TKG recommends that helps get our modules in front of more eyes and picked up by more people. Specifically, more reviews on our Outsourced listing would help us out a ton.
Here are the links:
Outsourced: The Luko Fin Corp Deception
https://www.tuesdayknightgames.com/products/outsourced?_pos=1&_sid=e194ee2fc&_ss=r
Constant Downpour Remastered
Knights of Lazarus
https://www.tuesdayknightgames.com/products/knights-of-lazarus?_pos=1&_sid=88639a7c8&_ss=r
Reviews.Books.Ads. and Spicy Tuna Stories No.34 are also available there if you are more into diagetic, in-world, and player-facing zines vs more gameable adventure ones.