On Double Helix and Quill Quaz

 

You see the military is for G.I. Joe, and the wasteland is for He-Man. 

Not officially of course. 

Asset Pack II is out right now!







But fun, nonetheless.


Hack & Slash 

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On The Cyberpunk path

So how do we move forward?

You aren't qualified to answer that question. Neither am I. I'm a pretty good at the things I do. I have opinions about things. But they aren't informed, right? I don't work at the border or an abortion clinic. I am not a city planner or a member of government. 

I think the first thing we should do is only listen to people about what they are actually good at, without assuming they know shit about anything else. 

It's hard though. It's trivial to say terrible things pleasantly.

It is the certainness of ignorance that is so terrifying. And that's what is so wrong with corporations, is that the clearness of their mandate. It makes them wonderful opponents and bad guys. Profit is extracted from inequality, by definition. 

It just needs to be rethought.

I see some good examples, like software design. It also relies on money, but the modular seasonal implementation of code is heavily driven by users, with clear consequences (financially) for not meeting the needs of their userbase.

And if they are bad enough at it, someone else can come in and replace them. (Simcity, sitting in the corner, glaring at Cities:Skylines).

This is also the model I have for Sinless. I'm playing this game. People are playing this game, and the things that are made for it, and given to the people playing, and their feedback drives the gameplay changes.

It's a great model, and part of—well, when I say Path; Global media (not 'the media' but globalized media) is agendaized. AI slop is flooding everywhere, making data impossible to locate. Walled, private, moderated communities are the answer.

So, you know, I'm building one of those too—although you are almost certainly part of several already. It's just something I've always wanted and everyone is so focused on 'the current hot trend' that no one is doing it. Well, I'm doing it.

https://sinlessrpg.com


Hack & Slash 

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On the Ghost Incentive

 

I hate being told "I'm playing wrong."

My favorite part of tactical infinity is the idea that you can douse a fire elemental with a decanter of endless water. You're supposed to swing off the furniture and play the game. 

But what for the Murderhobo!?

Well, the OSR has had that problem for a long time and has great solutions. Consequences. That's it. Players can do anything they want, as long as they are willing to pay the consequences. I never have to say "You're not supposed to do that."

I can just say "Go ahead, enjoy camping and random monster checks."

So I didn't want to say "You can't do that" in Sinless. I want players to say, "I'm going to solve that problem by blowing up the building."

But that isn't sustainable for long-term campaigns (which Sinless is designed for). It rapidly leads to the structure of the game disintegrating (in a very similar way to rampant Murder-hoboism!) It's a good solution, but best not to overdo it.

Because an Agonarch has no desire for any one result or another, we look to an impartial metric. 

Blowing up a building brings attention. 

No one could deny this! Behold! The building is gone? 

Where is it?

People will want to know. 

Instead of some invisible wall you can just say, Ok, if that happens, everyone's ghost rating is going to drop by 1d6. 

A simple solution to a complex social problem that creates great emergent gameplay and player motivation! I play this game regularly, I'm not trying to do extra work over here. Emergent gameplay is key, cause I don't have time to plot anything.

https://sinlessrpg.com



Hack & Slash 

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On Flash Moresloth

There are uplifts in Sinless. You may have noticed there are a lot of population crashes world-wide. In Sinless, the prion plauge, the plunge, the quickening, and climate change have severely impacted the amount of labor that was available.

The solution? Synthetics, Ersatz clones, and uplifted animals.
 

Meet Flash Moresloth. I think it's clear this is a parody of Flash Slothmore from Zootopia, and just, look at him in his little suit!

We broke some rules here. Generally in Sinless there's not things you're required to track across rounds or phases. It's because Sinless is developed from play, and in actual play, those things get forgotten. But Sinless is has an exception-based design framework, and that's an awful lot of influence and it fits with-well, look at him. He's a sloth.

And, just like his counterpart, he has his fast animal ability (FST NML, his license plate) providing an escape vehicle for groups that don't have access to a rigger. 

After all, he's the fastest sloth they have working there!


Hack & Slash 

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On Dogs & Technomancers II

Origins of the Technomancer

The BCI (Brain-Computer Interfaces (precursor to DNI (direct neural interface) nerve-rig tech) first came online in early 2042, leading to the wirehead generation, reaching adulthood in ~2060. Their ideals centered around separation from the real world. To a true wirehead only information is real, many of them spending nearly their entire lives in biocaskets their brain digitally connected to the internet—Pre-Plunge.

Can you imagine? All of human history available? 10 billion people making art and worlds and stories and content? More primitive positronic AI numbering nearly 100 billion by 2045 constructing anything wireheads requested in virtual playworlds. Wireheads rejected the constant push towards corporatization, and they idealized old ways focused around freedom of speech, freedom of information, and elimination of societal restrictions and regulations.

Examples of the way this manifested were the Shéntech Greenlimb incident, and massive support from the living wireheads in 2084-5 for the Dignity International Rights Enjoined Act, each thinking that if they didn’t like their current corporate land, they could freely move to whichever one they preferred. This did not work out well for them, vast numbers of them becoming dependent on the very corporations they despised. 

Another, and more crucial development for our discussion was “the hackfiring”. In May of 2071  the most advanced wirehead biocasket deckers stole a huge amount of data from Orpheus, AE, Shen, and unsurprisingly braintech and information heavyweight, Neuronetics. A massive bay of the largest collection of linked Positronic cores christened “The Positronic Authority”  analyses all the data and autonomously and algorithmically distributed it based on an unknown metric, along with all of the data becoming public. Many many people lost their jobs and it was viewed as a great victory for wireheads. However, the rise of Vilkater, Michael Ivanov and Darkstone, and Wyn Fowler, filled the power vacuum and created the manufactured consent necessary for the DIRE Act. 

So the genetic triggers for creating the data mutation were spread worldwide. Ten years later, the first rumors of mutated people with powers over technology spread. They are spoken of in a whisper, these techno-mancers, biological mutant tanks with the ability to control machinery exist! It is not just a rumor and as a Sinless agent,  you must be prepared against this new threat.

Research has given us the first inklings into technomancers. They are raised almost exclusively by corporations or autocreche.  Most people who grew one of these mutants were sorely unprepared for what happened when they hit puberty. They have incredible control over technology, but their body itself is mutable,  highly subject to intense mutation. 

Another unforseen side effect were the sheer numbers of them who became nuncios of Archduke AI’s. By the time most of the children reached the age of twelve, their constant interaction and control of the internet made them very present to the archdukes, Metatron, Grendel, and “Tenshi” [CENSORED]

It is difficult to understand if they worship the AI, or perhaps have integrated with it but it is clear that every contact with a techno-mancer has involved the overwhelming presence and trace of an archduke AI.

Technomancer playtest available on the discord today!

https://discord.com/invite/UYzGqN8egQ


On Dogs and Technomancers: Part I

The first legitimate record of a Data dog was in February 12 of 2049 when Albert Mild filmed the now well known dog, Tracker, flagging down and using a Waymo. 
Mr. Mild, in shock, shared the video on-line and it was widely considered to be a Hoax. 

But coordinated investigation between Orpheus and AE (Alphabet Enterprises) showed that Tracker, along with most of his extended relatives, had been using Waymos and erasing the evidence of that use.

Now, we are just talking about street dogs here. No uplifts; the data dog is a natural (some say unnatural) rapid manonic expression. Initial evidence is uncertain.

Tracker’s genetic line has a specific brain mutation that emits focused electromagnetic radiation—like light or heat or dozen different ways organic species emit/interpert EM radiation (Bioluminescence, electrical fields created by bees and eels, pigeons and radical-pair navigation, the Frey effect.). But unlike those other ways, the dogs could in a short space of about two meters emit low energy bursts of radiowaves, mircowaves, and infrared waves. Since the entire grid runs on wireless, bluetooth, and infrared communication methods, the data dogs can communicate with machines.

How does this work? We don’t know. 

I know you’re likely saying, “Well, why don’t we just uplift a Data Dog and ask?”

First, there aren’t that many data dogs, and if you have one the breeding rights can make you rich. No one is eager to risk uplifting their data dogs.

Second, of course that’s the exact first thing they did.

Any uplifted dogs that survived the procedure, lost the ability. Something about the cybertechtronics screwing everything up. The information they can recall before the memory enhancement during the uplift is unclear at best. Our best understanding is that without it, it’s a blindness and muteness. Like most dog uplifts, they compared it to scent. 

Mr. Mild was able to film Tracker, because he was standing across the street, out of tracker’s range. Many of Trackers relatives were caught, and now there is a market for breeding data dogs; but tracker was a street dog and may not even be the original dog that developed the ability. 

Our understanding of the particular mechanism of action in the mutation is unclear. Soon after Mr. Mild’s video, many data dogs were caught and studied. The genetic triggers for its formation were located and mapped by the 2070’s. 

And because of Mr. Mild and Tracker’s surreptitious ability, today, in 2090 we have the villenage of the Technomancer. 


Hack & Slash 

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On Play Reviews

 Hi. I'm a game designer.

I get play reports.

Here's a play report from people I don't personally know and have never met (I've communicated with the GM in discord I guess).

Background

3 players

Session took place over 3 hours, covered getting an operation, recon, prep, sabotage, and running the op

Characters were a Green Face with maybe too broad of a focus (more on that later), a Synthetic Bruiser, and an Uplifted Octopus mage

What my players loved

  • Gameplay felt pretty easy and straightforward, one remarked that once you were into the flow it just made sense
  • One player described the game as definitely being easier than Shadowrun, but admitted that that is grading on a curve
  • Players really liked the structure of mission prep, compared it to games like Blades in the Dark
  • Really felt like they were in control of the story, high degree of agency
  • One player compared character creation to making a custom race in Master of Orion, felt like they had a ton of meaningful choices and it was fun to think through

What my players were less enthusiastic about

  • My face player went too broad and ended up with some pretty mediocre hacking and a bad innate spell as part of his Green heritage that was hard to use.  Felt certain things required a lot of investment and almost weren't worth taking as a result
  • Some felt the somewhat structured nature made it maybe harder to roleplay or get in character much

GM Thoughts

  • I used the in progress random mission generator and it mostly worked great! Shoutout to you and bacchist for making that possible
  • There were definitely some gaps in the mission generator content, or maybe they're just assumptions the system makes? - For example the alert track talked about drones coming out to patrol, but didn't say what kind of drones or give stats for them.  I could've also used more information on NANs and electronic defenses. It feels like the current mission generator is great at providing "what is unique" about an operation but more of the baseline stuff would be helpful to me.

Note that the operation generator on https://sinlessrpg.com has been updated since then several times. 

  • The core dice mechanic just works and makes it really easy to adjudicate what is happening and why.  I definitely felt like I had a long way to go w/ system understanding but it was easy to make reasonable rulings that everyone thought were fair in the moment
  • Every once in a while you run into a little gap here or there; our run in this session was the gun cyber-limbs; none of the guns listed have effective ranges, so I just improvised off of what stats regular firearms had. Not a big deal, but mildly annoying to turn to a page in the book only to figure out it doesn't quite have what you need in the moment

I dunno guys. That's a raw play report. I've read some of them in my time, and, uh, they aren't usually this positive.

You should read into it yourself. 

https://sinlessrpg.com


Hack & Slash 

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Asset Thursdays: Acrocolypse

 

Here we have Acrocolypse, and uplifted anarchist crocodile. This asset was the asset of a player in the playtest games, and I did my bestest to make the crocodile look like him. 

Because he's an anarchist, he takes cash (4 market capital, equivalent to approximately 40k.) but has no upkeep threshold. He'll work for people without infrastructural support. 

His sector action is best used in sectors that you don't control, the lockdown prevents any sort of profit from being made and increases enforcement on any operations in the sector. 

And, as a bonus, having him drive by on his chopper and launch grenades at your opponents is always helpful.


Hack & Slash 

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On the Ease of Play

 I don't buy TTRPG's to put on my shelf.

One of the things I've learned through decades of play, is that if someone has to stop the game to play a separate game that takes place in a short period of time, like early edition psionics and deckers.

There's literally a joke about everyone going to watch a movie while one player takes their turn.

I run too many games to have someone sit out for an hour. It's just—it's not acceptable.

The way I addressed this in Sinless is that it all takes place on the same board. Everyone is playing the same game in the same literal space, hence the rule of targeting. Now there's more handwaving and explanation and in fact it does affect the in world fiction in concrete ways. 

But the goal is to play a fun cyber-sorcery heist game with friends. There's this trend, where you might say "Oh, you're just making everything simple and dumbed down."

Well, yes, but actually no, but maybe yes.

It is simple. If you can see something you can target it. But it isn't dumbed down for two reasons. 

First, your pools are limited and you bid your resources in combat. If you're out of dice, you can't defend. Second, there's a Jan-Ken-Pon interaction in combat. You can shoot a spirit, but it's much less effective. Lots of things are powerful but weak to other things. 

So there are a lotof simple meaninful decisions to make in combat. But instead of spending time figuring out how to do what you want to do, you spend your time deciding what you want to do.

YMMV.

https://sinlessrpg.com


Hack & Slash 

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On the Functional Face


So a big challenge I had with Sinless was "How do you have a functional face character?".

And my answer was, give them unique powerful resources that can only be accessed by people with social skills that derive from Charisma.

There are around 160 illustrated assets for Sinless, each with a pair of unique abilities that are accessed by Etiquettes. Characters have six ranks in etiquettes (which equal the number of dice they roll to use the asset abilities). You get points to choose etiquettes via your charisma score.

Oh behold the ludo-narrative synergy!

You see, a face knows a lot of people (assets) and can walk in many different circles (etiquette) and the assets have unique options that give face characters options other characters don't have.

And then they can use those assets to try and make the world the way they want.

Neat! 





Hack & Slash 

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On Lore

Sinless is a fully independent intellectual property with it's own lore. The basics: magic came back, a lot of data and tech was lost, there's fewer people and corporations are in charge are all the "lore" anyone needs to know.

It is not required to read one sentence of background or lore to play the game. You're already familiar with the idea of mages, ronin, deckers, riggers—they are just different 'classes' of approaching situations.

Not needing to know a single piece of background is a strength. like in the Forgotten Realms or Dark Souls, the lore is there to provide depth to those who seek it, but it isn't in any way required: It's designed to be set up so you can play out your cyber-sorcery games, not mine.

It's explicitly a classic-style game. What do I mean by that? I mean, like in early games, it was about sandboxes, open tables, and an evolving world. All the Sinless games in the discord take place in the same city. It isn't set up for traditional play, like in second edition, or vampire: the masquerade where there's a plot and the players follow it.

But, due to the fact that it follows a B/X (Basic/eXpert, Moldvay/Cook) modular exception-based design it is trivial to use the system without engaging in the corporation/brand building mechanics. 

In fact, that was the original design. I always found it difficult to understand how much to pay, what the budgets were for these corporations, how to model the surrounding effects of operational fallout, how would it impact the economy in the area. How do you handle medical procedures, acquiring new weapons, hurting or defeating a corporation. 

I don't want the players to do what I want, I want to find out what happens when they play.

So in laying out a system to handle common player actions (finding someone, gathering information, buying things, upgrading their character), it was necessary to create a framework (like a literal guide) to Gamemasters, so they knew how much to pay for operations, and how these entities interacted for players to affect them.

And all that exists! You can use it just like that, and handle character actions during downtime without needing to engage in brand or company management at all!

That said, since there's this wonderful framework for creating and managing power structures in the city, it is pretty easy to add a few actions that allow players to interact with that.

And during playtesting, it turns out it's pretty fun to fight over sectors and resources in an area. It's like, clearing hexes, but instead of killing indigenous species, you're making rich people miserable. 


Hack & Slash 

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Asset Thursdays: Robert Science-Man

 

Many many of the assets are pastiches or parodies of memories of my youth. (Hold on to your hats guys, this stuff is going to make you feel old)

This is a mad scientist for the Aristocrats. Gorilla GroddTM (Property of DC comics) was influenced by an alien meteorite, so this would be the geneticist who reverse engineers a hypothetical (certainly not copyright infringing) gorilla influenced by alien radiation. And since Sinless takes place in our future earth they have a DC comics with a trademarked Gorilla. The study of Gorillas influenced by alien radiation obviously would be named Groddgenics. 

No Cap.


Hack & Slash 

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On the Action Economy


This is always a sticky wicket for games. 

My highest priority in designing Sinless was making a robust frame that was easily understandable. I wanted the thing you would guess the rules would be based on your TTRPG experience to be the rule. 

So, and stop me if you've heard this before, Sinless has Simple and Complex actions, and a Reflex action. A complex action is two simple actions. You get them at the start of the round.

Holy shit, you could probably just sit down and play a cyber-sorcery game without needing to take a college course and reference reddit!

Now this isn't novel or particularly special. But we have a "Summoner" situation. Speakers summon spirits, riggers command drones—there are a lot of situations that create this 'action economy' problem, where certain people act a lot. Examples include wired reflexes in Shadowrun 3e, Summoners in Pathfinder 1e, and utilizing the bonus action in 5e.

There are many solutions to this, but Sinless uses the cohort system.

You can get exploit actions (from VCR's, Wired Reflexes, Henchmen et. al.) that can only be used for a specific purpose. Adding more drones doesn't get you more actions, you have to divide your actions among your cohorts.

This 'restricted extra action' system is flexible and descriptive rather than prescriptive. Did you take fascination and train a tiger or dragonelle? Get an exploit action to command it in combat. 

This also fits the tropes of action movies, much like the way dice pools work, your focus is limited and you choose where to apply it. 

https://sinlessrpg.com


Hack & Slash 

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On the Cyberpunk now.

It is a universally acknowledged truth that science fiction always examines current issues, fears, and anxieties in a foreign setting: The Terminator and automation, Robocop and the fascist corporatization of democratic societies, Star Trek and interracial representation, early cyberpunk works like Blade Runner and Shadowrun examining anxiety over Asian/Japanese dominance in a pretty classic example of exoticism. 

So, you know, Sinless is pretty cyberpunk, but, uh, have we looked outside lately?

We live in that future. My future setting is a future setting, but it reflects the now

It requires you to walk the dance of an outsider. You have to appeal to the same system you wish to destroy and replace, otherwise it will destroy and replace you. It also puts you in the position of having the same immoral options your opponents. Whether you've been instructed by your programming overlords to consider it "the deep state" or "the patriarchy" it is the force of human nature for one man to raise himself above others and resist change to that order that keeps the system stable. 

Only it's a game, so you can win.

Check it out.


Hack & Slash 

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On the Success of Sinless

So, Sinless is pretty good.

You never quite know with a game, how it's going to turn out. Sinless has a lot of moving parts. 

But people are playing this (a lot), and it is a simple, modern, modular design that allows for trad and classic playstyles with a concrete mathematical foundation for handling money, prices, owning and taking over territory. It isn't necessary, you can simply use the three actions during 'downtime' (or the sector turn) to handle character level things and never engage in the downtime system.

But it's pretty well integrated. The operations on the operation generator come with factions and backgrounds that integrate with the downtime phase, resulting in a robust system for managing emergent sandbox gameplay.

That's. . . a lot of buzzwords. It's accurate, but poorly communicated. Here, let me explain in pictures.

 

This is the job information for the players. They use their skills to find out what etiquette, brand, and individual is hiring.

Here is the operational background.


Of course, "Shen" and "Zenith" are corporate factions. They have locations in the sectors. 

It grounds the mission in personal drama. 

Also: the operational generator makes it super easy to manage runs. This is a sinless statblock:

The number is how many 1d6 you roll.

Compare this to a Statblock from other cyberpunk/cybersorcery games:



You may wonder "Why is the Sinless statblock so simple?"

It's simple because it's what you need to run the game and nothing more. It  has what I need to run the game. This may not be appealing to everyone, but I run two games a week, and find this helpful.


Hack & Slash 

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On the Success of the VOTE

 You voted for it, and it's here!

All the prices on the books I sell on DTRPG will be rising in price, 40-50% so I can maintain the same margin as now!

We are no longer reliant on cheap paper! Now we get to use the same paper, and that cost gets passed on to you!

If you'd like to get something in print, either do it before April 1st (no fooling) or purchase from other retailers, like Amazon at its current price!

If you can't afford my books, and you'd like them, I will, as always provide them free of charge in digital or print to you. 

The power of people at work.

Once the price changes go into effect, I will list the increased prices here. Note that some of my books will increase in print price beyond their current retail cost. 

I won't make any more money than I do now, but how excited are we for 59.99$ books rising to 94.99$ books? I guess the people selling us the paper.


Hack & Slash 

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On 1984

 “The Party told you to reject the evidence of your eyes and ears. It was their final, most essential command.” -1984


On Singularities and Licenses

 You guys remember way back when we thought Turing tests would be helpful?

The Sinless Third Party License is available here:

https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/azyj27zs3ujrshc4ytrsr/Sinless-License.pdf?rlkey=yks2nq56y49m7c9pqdhxrk83f&st=8ocnhq45&dl=0

It's free. Low stress and low overhead. 

If you have ideas, the Sinless third party license is free!


Hack & Slash 

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