RED AEGIS June Update
over 9 years ago
– Mon, Aug 03, 2015 at 08:54:14 PM
Hello again folks.
Apologies for the radio silence since April. Major family events have kept me busy over the last few weeks, including three birthdays, a high school graduation, and, because I’m a glutton for punishment… packing and moving my family from Seattle to Southern California. But enough about me. How is the project coming along?
Chapter 12
Chapter 12 has received a second layout pass from our graphics designer, adding additional artwork and text edits. The glossary on pages 318 & 319 has been completely revamped and the Clan Record Sheet updated to reflect changes in terminology. Both of these may be downloaded in the links to follow.
Chapter 12: http://bit.ly/1HabQjo
Clan Record Sheet: http://bit.ly/1dcX25G
Chapter 11
My current milestone goal is to redesign Chapter 11 (the Arbiter’s Guide). It’s still a work in progress, but I’m including a link for you to download a sample scenario titled We Wayward Children. This is a 6-page snapshot of the RED AEGIS adventure format, as it currently stands. Feedback is most welcome.
We Wayward Children (scenario): http://bit.ly/1TJnuoX
Digital Tools
Chapter 11 is the last major roadblock to completing the manuscript of the Core Rulebook. As such, I’ve frozen development of the Digital Tools until Chapter 11 is complete.
http://www.redaegis.com/record/2
http://www.redaegis.com/record/2/encounters
Until next time, gamers!
-Brian R. James
Lead Designer, Vorpal Games
RED AEGIS April Update
over 9 years ago
– Mon, Apr 27, 2015 at 12:51:12 PM
Hello again folks.
Digital Tools
Over the last few weeks I reviewed several sub-systems of the game, identifying areas that need polishing or improvement. To aid me in this endeavor, I started work on the RED AEGIS online tools, one of the bonus rewards promised during the Kickstarter campaign. When completed, this website will include a character builder, lineage designer, and so on… but the area I’m primarily focused on at the present is encounter balance across the continuum. In other words, I want to ensure that encounters in the game’s 1st age are just as fun and rewarding as the encounters in the 9th age. The website is still very much a work in progress, but if you’re interested in taking an early peak, you can test drive the encounter tool at http://www.redaegis.com/record/1/encounters
Contested Challenges
Let’s deep dive for a moment into the mechanics of contested challenges—an encounter in which the player is being actively opposed by a rival faction. In the following example, the player’s clan attempts to enter a territory controlled by the Moon Barbarians (not a real faction in the game world, btw), led by Ookla the Mok (bonus points if you recognize the name without Googling it).
The barbarian horde halts your clan at the frontier. They are agitated and armed for war, but for the time being their leader is amenable to parlay. Examining the stats and attributes for barbarians reveals that they would be potent adversaries in a domination challenge. Not only does Ookla have a d6 in the Mettle attribute, his faction has a Progress level of 60, which gives them a d10 craft die. But what the hell, let’s see what happens if we attack.
Victory! Through sheer luck your clan wins the encounter against the Moon Barbarians. Because your achieved victory in the domination encounter, Ookla the Mok suffers one wound to his Fortitude defense (reducing it from 2 to 1) and your clan earns an epic victory (because you rolled 3 successes). Though you were victorious, the Moon Barbarians still menace this territory (none of their defenses were reduced to zero). It’s up to another player to finish off or secure peace with the barbarian horde.
Encounter Difficulty and Critical Wounds
Okay, so the scenario I described above is not new. What *is* new, is how encounter difficulty is handled. Encounter escalation was a concept introduced in the last playtest packet. In brief, escalation is a game mechanic that ratchets up the tension as the session progresses. At the start of the age, encounters begin at Standard difficulty. Roughly half way through the session, the difficulty increases to Legendary, and finally reach Epic difficulty at the end.
To achieve a victory in an encounter, you must earn a number of successes equal to the difficulty (at least 1 success for a standard encounter, 2 for legendary, and 3 for epic). A success is earned whenever one the dice in your pool is greater than the matching die in your opponent’s pool. In the earlier example, the challenge resulted in three successes, earning your clan an epic victory. Now, consider the following example:
In the above example, your clan earned a legendary victory (2 successes). Not only did you trounce your opponent, your opponent also suffers a critical failure (represented by rolling a 1). Critical failures always inflict wound damage (even in victory). Since the barbarians lost this encounter, they suffer two wounds (one for the loss and another for the critical failure).
In this example, the barbarians earned two successes while your clan earned only one. This results in your defeat. And because you rolled 2 critical failtures, your scion suffers three total wounds. If this were a Domination encounter, the example scion, Ebran the Doomweaver, would have been slain, given he only has a 2 in his Fortitude defense.
Finally, consider this last example. Even though the player scored two successes the encounter is marked as a defeat. Why is this? For this last example, I upped the difficulty level of the challenge from standard to epic. In a late game encounter such as this, two successes is simply not enough to overcome the challenge. The player either earns an epic victory (with 3 successes) or fails in defeat.
Manuscript
I'm still reworking Chapter 11, which will include an example scenario and rule building your own encounters. It's my goal to release that missing chapter to you in next month's update.
Until then, thank you once more for your continued patience.
-Brian R. James
Lead Designer, Vorpal Games
RED AEGIS Status and Annotations
over 9 years ago
– Wed, Mar 11, 2015 at 04:09:50 PM
Hello again backers.
Project Status
Progress continues on Red Aegis but on a much slower pace. Work and family commitments have increased over the last few months, limiting the amount of time I’ve been able to dedicate to the game.
If you've had a chance to download and review the December draft (link in Update #34) you know that the bulk of the manuscript is already laid out. So, you may ask, what exactly remains to be completed?
Firstly, I’m reworking Chapter 11 to include an example scenario. In Red Aegis, a scenario is an example story arc tied to a particular age. Like a mini-campaign module, scenarios come with a collection of pre-generated story encounters, territories, and landmarks for use in a single session. Scenarios are great for one-shot game nights, but can be easily incorporated into an ongoing multi-age campaign.
Additionally, another balance and quality control pass needs to be made on the mechanical sub-systems of the game. This work includes incorporating feedback from the playtests at Winter Fantasy. As lead developer, Matt is tasked with this endeavor but I’ll aid him as I am able.
With those two tasks comes a final round of editing and layout work, including annotations…
Designer Annotations
Annotations are small explanatory comments or images that exist in the outer margins of the main manuscript text. It has been our intention since the start of design to use the annotation space for designer commentary—similar in feel to the deleted scenes or director’s cut extras found on a special edition DVD or Blu-Ray disc. Now, some of these annotations will be intentionally puerile or sarcastic (see Special Instructions for Commodore 64 Users on page 4 of the December draft). Expect to see, for example, annotations where Matt and I disagreed on one game mechanic or another.
Backer Annotations
As a small token of appreciation for the patience of our backers, I’d like to offer you the opportunity to “place your mark” on the core rulebook. Many of you likely have shelves or whole bookcases dedicated to roleplaying games, but how many of you can open up one of those books, point to a specific page and tell your friends “See that text right there? That’s mine. I added that.”
As with our designer annotations, backer annotations may be serious, mischievous, or something in between. Keep in mind that space considerations require these annotation be short (less than 50 characters or so in length) or even a small doodle if you’re artistically inclined. Submissions are subject to approval, of course. I’ll send out specific guidelines in a future update.
Thank You
Once again, thank you very much for your pledge of support and apologies for the continued delays.
-Brian R. James
Lead Designer, Vorpal Games
Red Aegis at Winter Fantasy
almost 10 years ago
– Fri, Feb 13, 2015 at 11:26:00 AM
Greeting backers!
We interrupt your regularly scheduled programming to announce that a special Red Aegis event will be taking place February 5-8 at the Winter Fantasy Gaming Convention in Fort Wayne, Indiana.
Our lead game developer, Matt James, will be running a convention special event that will allow groups of players to experience Red Aegis, and develop an entire campaign setting by the time the convention ends.
Matt will be running 9 slots of Red Aegis, whereby each slot covers one age of gameplay. Participants will be afforded the chance to learn how to play Red Aegis, and influence the events that transpire during their given slot of play. As explained, by the end of the convention, 9 unique ages will have been constructed, with unique twists and turns that participants will have created along the way.
This is a unique opportunity to see Red Aegis before final publication, and gain insight into exactly how the game runs.
Not able to attend? Do not fret. We intend to film portions of each session and post them at a later date.
