Sticky: Where to buy and where to find me.
You can buy Postmortem Studios products at:
RPGNOW/Drivethrurpg/Paizo/Yourgamesnow/E23
Lulu (hardcopy)
You can find me at the following locations:
Personal LJ / Twitter/Myspace/Facebook/Tribe /RPGBomb/ Yahoogroup/LinkedIn
We have a hosted forum at UKRoleplayers:
Postmortem Studios Forum
1. Savagely Edit the Rules Descriptions.
Spirit of the Century and Starblazer Adventures are both weighty, weighty tomes in their respective sizes and while FATE is - ostensibly - a simple, narrative oriented system but sprawls like a demented monster over a huge number of pages. I'm a guy that likes to concentrate on background and feel and rules bogging down a book too much just isn't on. I'm going to assume that my readers have a passing familiarity with RPGs and so won't be quite so explicit and long-winded in explanations. I'll also try to avoid repetition.
2. Less Illustration, More Typography
I want Agents of SWING to be a stylish product, but also quite minimalist, a wipe-clean, plastic-fantastic, white formica, 60s future-vision. So I'm going to cut back on the illustration and use a lot of silhouette/flag/pop art imagery and work harder on the presentation and layout of the text, using that to greater effect. There will be illustrations for the example character dossiers though.
3. Streamline Character Creation
I think there'll be less emphasis on character advancement and characters need to be reasonable powerful at the start, roughly equivalent to the Standard Campaign level in Starblazer Adventures. I'll also drag some of the character generation options back towards a more traditional RPG role, less group creation, we already have our group-hook in the game setting and other than a few teams and partnerships, many of the heroes in the source material were skilled loners. If people want to play the IM Force or The Champions or whatever, players can do that anyway. It doesn't need to be worked into character generation here.
Important elements of a character would be:
- Career - Prior to joining SWING
- Cover - Their cover identity
- Section - The section of SWING they're attached to.
4. Decouple Stunts from Skills
At least as much as possible. The cross referencing in SOTC and SB can be a bit of a son of a bitch, a few stunts - obviously - need to be related to a skill, but others don't necessarily and getting rid of the need would free things up and make referencing easier.
5. More Stress?
You've got physical stress and composure, but perhaps add something in for social standing? 60s Britain (the default) is still a class concious society, more so than today, and scandals had more power then to harm than they do now. An ill regarded agent could be in trouble in many situations and this is distinct enough from composure to warrant its own treatment I think.
6. Gadgets
These need a big treatment, both for Bondian style gadgets and for the potential widgetry of villains.
7. Rationalise Skill Descriptions
Slim them down, they're very long right now and could be covered in much less space IMO.
8. Separate Out Special Rules
Special rules for car chases etc need to be in their own sections, not intermingled, muddling things up a bit.
9. Allow the Attacker to Choose Consequences?
Might be a little harsh, but allowing the victim to choose the type of consequence and the attacker to choose the actual consequence pushes narrative control more interestingly I think.
10. Skills Pyramid?
I don't particularly see the need to stick to the Pyramid arrangement for skills, it kind of got in the way of making Doc Savage-alikes and I don't particularly see why it should be kept.
11. Psi/Super Abilities
Essential to replicate some of the material from the time but I don't want to overemphasise it. Perhaps a few examples and expand on the material later in another book? Same could be done with gadgets.
12. Organisations?
Villainous organisations need to be detailed as do the various sections of SWING and the rest of the conventional intelligence community, a few examples perhaps and then expand on the rules in a separate book.
13. Clue Based Plot Structure?
I'd like to mix in some of the plot stress ideas in SB with some of the ideas from Gumshoe, perhaps plot stress advancement from section to section, splitting up adventures into investigative sections, interrogations etc which yield points of 'plot stress' that advance the game towards its conclusion.
14. Profit.
The third - and probably final - edition of the Neverwhere RPG, produced with permission and available for PDF only. This is the final, comprehensive edition of the game with an improved system, more detail an expanded A-Z and advice for running the game in tabletop, online or as a LARP.
Make sure to buy something that actually gives me money while you're there too, don't forget Schlocktoberfest is still going!
| Congratulations! We've reached the target and stand at 105 adds for the month with a week still to go! This means that my next project, barring freelancing, will be Neverwhere 3rd Edition, before anything else. I'll commission a little more art for it in the next week or two but if you can get me to 150 followers before the end of the month I'll pump some more money in and get even more art. So, what you're campaigning for now is an even shinier, even better Neverwhere 3rd edition than before! Here's the various social networks that count for this exercise: MYSPACE |  |
Working for Socialgears is a bit of a break for me, the pay's reasonable but it's a lot of hard work. It could lead into greater things though. They seem impressed by my ideas and it could be an in for me into working more on the world building, lore and quests of more CRPGs. Browser games are huge and, from there, I may get other opportunities. To make sure I get a proper grasp of what they're doing and their game as it stands - which is why I'll be working on improving - I'd appreciate it if people could help me out with it. Their app currently runs on Facebook and you can join it HERE, which will make you part of my adventuring party. If you also want to join clan 'Postmortem' you'll get a nice joining bonus and it'll help me explore their current iteration of the game from a user standpoint and design and write more intelligently for it.
Cheers!
I'm just here to give you a heads up on what the plans are for Postmortem Studios in this forthcoming 2009.
- Redesign: Expect this blog/site to get a facelift and redesign in the early part of this year, something a bit more slick and professional and I think I'll be retiring the old Postmortem Studios logo for something a bit more 'chic'.
- Cthentacle: This is my first priority this year, to get Cthentacle out of the door. I have, somewhat controversially, decided to go with the simplified, faster, Vs rules for this iteration of the game.
- All These Worlds: Mongoose's Traveller is going a storm and there's really no point me reinventing the wheel, so this is being revised for a second time and will become a series of expansions and materials for Traveller, most likely released - somewhat - via Mongoose's Flaming Cobra line.
- 100 Series: 100 Conspiracies and 100 Conspirators, 100 Supervillain Plots and 100 Supervillain Lairs will be the next few 100 Series books. I'm also cooking up a similar concept for players, something akin to the old Central Casting 'lifepath' books.
- Neverwhere: When I get time the third edition of this free RPG will be made available. This will also have more 'proper' rules for those who like such things.
- D&D4: I hope to be writing for Axe Initiative and I also hope to be releasing a complete adventure line, piecemeal, for D&D 4th Edition, a 'super campaign' that takes character from starting out to maximum level while also spinning out a complete game world. I also hope to begin work on my world-city setting.
- Gumshoe: Expect a Gumshoe version of @ctiv8 at some point during the year.
- Blood!: If there's time I hope to get Hell on Earth out of the door this year. That's the Renaissance/Enlightenment/Witch Burning era version of Blood!
- Fiction: I WILL complete a book of short-mid length stories this year and self publish, this is my promise to myself.
- Fanbooks: I hope to complete a Fallout fanbook for the Xpress system, again, depending on time.
- Getting Paid: Fingers crossed I get paid for work I've done over the last 2-3 years that I haven't yet been paid for :P
- Other: Agents of Swing (Xpress) and Unnamed Barbarian Fantasy Game (Xpress), The Pretentious Game.
- Someone with knowledge of d20 Modern, RuneQuest and my game, Blood!, willing to do some system conversions/creations for all three systems at about ten dollars a shot.
- A map-maker, preferably using the newer versions of campaign cartographer, willing to do play-mat style grid-work (nothing too fancy required) at about the same payment as above, per map.
- A map maker/illustrator willing to do larger, more freehand maps at about 25-100 per shot, depending on the size and intricacy required. CC maps also acceptable here.
- If anyone wants to release clipart through my established channel, they're welcome to, the profit split is about 50/50.
- I'm also willing to take on, produce and publish games that you'd like to and have no time to put out yourself at a similar profit split (after my costs are recouped.
Bloodsucker: The Juice is the player's guide and companion for Bloodsucker: The Angst, written by newcomer Ian Warner. It contains new cliques, new professions, new powers and an assortment of other goodies to enhance your Bloodsucker: The Angst games and take them away from the original intentions of the game, just as happened with A Certain Other RPG.
Gaming nostalgia AND satire! Two for the price of one!
Buy Bloodsucker: The Juice HERE
Buy a bundle of both the main rulebook and Juice HERE
You can (or will soon) also get your copies at your other, preferred RPG PDF outlets.
You can also get hardcopy via Lulu HERE
Share and enjoy!
Shapeless is a game of paranoia and metamorphic horror intended as a tight 'New Style' thematic horror game. We need play testers to be sure the game hits the right note and you can contact me HERE to apply. Groups that successfully playtest the game AND file a playtest report to me will be rewarded with a copy of one PDF product from the Postmortem Studios line up of their choice (one per group, ostensibly for the GM).
Something from our old campaign, useful for knocking over Thresher Suits so you can smack them with melee weapons :)
S.L.A.P. rounds replace the standard bullet with an advanced polymer gel. When the gel globe strikes the target it instantly expands into a flat pancake, transferring its energy over a wide surface onto the target, throwing them off their feet and enabling the operative to catch up with and subdue the target.
Soft Load Anti-Personnel rounds cost 1.5x the normal cost for a standard load and use similar technology as in the shiver BB guns. A target struck by a S.L.A.P. round must make a Physique roll against a difficulty equal to the gun's normal Damage + Armour damage in order to remain standing. The S.L.A.P. rounds otherwise are considered to only do one damage with a penetration of -4 and no armour damage. If struck by a multiple fire burst from a single attacker, each additional round striking adds +1 to the difficulty, additional damage that would normally be applied, from whatever source, is also considered to add to the difficulty.
Pistol Examples:
CAF - Difficulty 3
8mm Long - Difficulty 6
10mm Auto - Difficulty 7
12mm - Difficulty 8
12.7mm - Difficulty 11
10 gauge slug - 11
Rifle Examples:
CAF - Difficulty 4
8mm Long - Difficulty 9
10mm Auto - Difficulty 10
12mm - Difficulty 11
12.7mm - Difficulty 16
17mm - Difficulty 36
10 gauge slug - Difficulty 14
What would YOU want to see in a running/climbing race across a fantasy city?
(Besides boxes full of chickens and panes of glass, clearly).
"Stimpy, it hurts! Why?"
- Ren Hoek
Welcome to A Life of Angst, a world not dissimilar to our own but no less frightening for it. Perhaps the nights are a little darker, the jeans a little baggier and the top twenty a little sparser when it comes to good tunes, but the world is as ours is.
With a few little additions, like vampires stalking the land by night, nothing to be too concerned about.
Some mysterious force has allowed those who most wished they were immortal creatures of the night to become them. Goths, punks, nu-metallers, spooky kids and the simply outcast of teenage society have found themselves transformed by one means or another into the very creature they would most desire to be.
The Bloodsucker roleplaying game allows players to take the part of one of these transformed subculture denizens and to explore the darkest nights in the world of the Bloodsuckers, discovering fell secrets*, attending dark and dingy nightclubs, pubs and warehouse parties, drinking far more absinthe than is strictly healthy for you and, perhaps most importantly, smoking cloves.
While most will play the part of alter-egos that they create, the Games Master will determine the world for you, describing the scenes to you and helping you explore the lives of your characters while placing obstacles in your path as you attempt to better the lot of your counterparts and advance them in the society of the Bloodsuckers until all fall before your might.
*Fell secrets may neither be as fell, nor secret, as advertised.
YOURGAMESNOW
RPGNOW
DRIVETHRURPG
E23
PAIZO
Urban Faerie
There are certain kinds of people, ale-drinking people, people who did a little too much acid in the sixties, people who wear large, warm jumpers and take long brisk walks in the country. These people maintain that faeries not only exist but that they are very common. They also tend to believe that faeries are, were and always will be a countryside phenomenon much like casual cruelty to animals, sexual intercourse with sheep and having an impenetrable and parochial accent.
This is, of course, rather wide of the mark.
Faeries have always had a strong relationship with man, darning his socks, cobbling his shoes, cleaning his houses, drowning him, marrying him and swapping his children for malformed hydrocephalics as a bit of a jape and otherwise aiding or demeaning the efforts of man. Faeries do not need our belief to exist; they need us and the things we leave around.
Like an urban fox or that aerial rat known as the pigeon, if they survive they will have adapted to city life and found their niches not in tending to flowers and trees but in crashing computers, letting down the tyres on peoples cars and eating the leftover pizza.
What then, would their world be like as they transitioned, with man, to an urban environment? How would the traditional faeries of yesteryear alter, shift, change and cope to deal with this new world? What powers would they have and what would they get up to?
So, armed with my imagination, a few research books and a hefty draught of the Postmortem Studios Patented Farie Sight Potion I set out to discover imagine and set down what sort of world might exist for faeries today. The fruits of that labour are now yours to play with.
Reviews & Comments
'Given that the player characters are human-hating faeries with wacky powers, natural invisibility and a code of ethics that, even when followed, is minimalist, it's almost impossible for a group of players with a twisted sense of humour not to have a riotous time with this game.'
'Urban Faerie is "Changeling" with balls, what a Charles de Lint on speed or a drunk Neil Gaiman could have written. The writing is hilarious (the short stories put you in the mood instantly), the various types of fairies range from the classical to the very, very wrong.'
YOURGAMESNOW
RPGNOW
DRIVETHRURPG
E23
PAIZO
The Live System is designed to be a more free-flowing, fast playing & looser interpretation of the Open Gaming system. It contains systems & rules that present a more flowing, less structured & modern updating of the system, stripping out unnecessary complication & updating with standard innovations, such as the removal of levels.
The Live System is faster & deadlier but is more suited to both cinematic style games & to ?harder? settings such as hard science fiction or gritty modern-day adventures.
The Live System may also be used to play standard 3rd & 3.5 edition games with a little conversion work & this SRD should contain enough information for you to be able to do so with little problem.
Reviews & Comments
'An interesting idea. It is essentially a way to make d20 become more of a points-based system. It is like playing GURPS with all of the d20 dice and characteristics.'
YOURGAMESNOW
RPGNOW
DRIVETHRURPG
E23
PAIZO
Gigantic metal warriors clash in the world of Tierplana.
Ideology and faith are the points of conflict, not 'good' and 'evil' or the bidding of gods.
Powered by Postmortem's Live System OGL implementation Cloak of Steel has...
- Streamlined, deadly and more cinematic OGL combat.
- Classless & levelless character creation.
- Feat based magick implementation, using 'mana points'.
- Rules for Cloaks (mechs), Squires (powersuits) and Airships.
- Extensive and well thought out gameworld.
- Art by Raven Morrison & Icymasamune of 'Shadowlark Symphony'.
Don your Cloak and enter battle for your future.
Reviews & Comments"A valiant way to mesh mech/character style interactions, and great world building."
"I'm a sucker for mecha in fantasy settings.. and this book does an excellent job of making a D20 game of it."
YOURGAMESNOW
RPGNOW
DRIVETHRURPG
E23
PAIZO
BloodQuest is a 'rules sketch' for Mongoose Publishing's RuneQuest, allowing you to use the RuneQuest rules for a modern, horror setting designed to be semi-compatible with Blood! and allowing you to more easily incorporate Blood!'s upcoming monster products (which will include statistics for Blood! and both leading OGL systems).
This is NOT a complete rules set and you will need RuneQuest in order to use these rules changes. You may also be interested in Blood! for a complete, self-contained horror rules set.
Includes...
- 'Mind Points' for tracking mental stress and loss of sanity.
- 'Fatigue Points' for a less abstract way of tracking exhaustion.
- 'Courage' for resisting horrifying situations.
- Modern 'Basic' and 'Advanced' skills.
- Modern cultural and professional templates.
- Firearms combat, armour and weapons rules.
- Vehicle rules.
"BloodQuest is a great rules supplement for horror-themed campaigns using the RuneQuest rules. New attributes such as Mind Points and Fatigue are easy to insert into existing RQ rules and will be familiar to anyone who has played older incarnations of RuneQuest or Call of Cthulhu. Indeed, I would heartily recommend this product to anyone who wants to use Mongoose's RQ rules for a CoC kind of game. The new professions and modern weapon rules are of particular interest. It's also the only rules supplement I've seen where a character can eliminate Fatigue by eating junkfood! Perfect for us snack-happy gamers who also love thier gore!"
YOURGAMESNOW
RPGNOW
DRIVETHRURPG
E23
PAIZO
Back from the grave comes a new edition of Underground Games classic horror RPG, Blood! Appropriately enough rewritten and reconfigured by Postmortem Studios.
The new edition holds over '150' pages of blood, gore, violence, psychopaths, insanity, zombies, vampires, chainsaws, belt sanders, gratuitous injuries and other material to help you create a suitably nasty atmosphere for any type of horror game.
- Gritty and deadly percentile system to evoke the harsh brutality and fetished violence of the genre..
- Over 25 maim-worthy critical hit tables.
- Statistics for household items, tools and many other unconventional items to be used as weapons - almost '400' of them.
- Almost '30' different profession templates, and rules for your own.
- Rules for insanity, exhaustion and bleeding.
- Over '90' skills.
- Fantastic art by Gavin Hargest, Darkzel, Bradley K McDevitt and Paul Campion.
Reviews & Comments
"A very classy rpg, which includes some of the nastiest crits available which can be used in your d20 rpgs. Well worth the price."
"Wow....this is pretty much the first horro-themed RPG I have purchased since Unknown Armies to deserve a spot on my "must play" shelf (next to Kult, CoC, and AFMBE). It's rare that I purchase a game....especially something small press that leaves me thinking, "damn I wish I'd written that." This is one of those books."
YOURGAMESNOW
RPGNOW
DRIVETHRURPG
E23
PAIZO
A global anarchistic conspiracy.
A self-forming collective of individuals willing to do anything that is required to make the world a better place.
A source of consternation to intelligence and law enforcement communities.
A secret computer program, hidden in the net.
You can join them.
You can make a difference.
You can make the world a better place.
All you have to do is try.
A complete game in one book.
The first game to be powered by Postmortem Studio's Xpress System.
Concept easily transferable to other modern systems and settings.
@ctiv8 contains challenging political themes.
CHARACTER SHEET DOWNLOADABLE HERE
YOURGAMESNOW
RPGNOW
DRIVETHRURPG
E23
PAIZO
- Mood:
productive
HE was a mutant with a gift for the guitar and an eye for the ladies...
SHE was a hotrod-racing bombshell on the lookout for love...
IT crawled from the wastes of Nashville crater, seeking human victims...
THEY were trapped in a world they never made!
'45 is a world where WWII was fought with atomic bombs on all sides
'45 is a world where the B-movies are real
'45 is a world where Rock N' Roll mutants do battle with giant ants
'45 is a Psychobilly Retropocalypse
All the cool cats dig '45 daddy-o, are you hip to the scene?
'45 is so cool, it's radioactive, man!
'45 is powered by Postmortem Studio's Xpress system and features customisations specially tailored for pulp/B-movie play.
Filmed on location in
IMAGINATOVISION®
"This game kicks ass. It's very different from most other games. The style is unique. It is it's own Genre of game. I can't think of anything else that's just like it. The setting is very inventive. It's a glorious amalgamation of 50's B-movies, Hammer style horror, and high adventure. I wonder what kind of drugs they were taking when they came up with this. And where can I get some? Also the art, which emphasises 50's style pin-up glamor is really good!"
"The author nails the B movie genre of the 1950's squarely in a fun evocative style. Freely mixing and matching icons, tropes and fads its rock and roll meets attack of the fifty foot woman, its James Dean with three arms blazing nickel plated .45's featuring in Plan 9 From Outer Space, its voluptuous cavewomen named Lalula riding Harley's being pursued by giant radioactive ants. Its a pulp game of over the top B movie madness combined with a Rockabilly flair where the atom bomb and science are king. The world encapsulates everything, Femme Fatals, crazy scientists, mysterious swamp creatures, vampires, gumshoe PI's and sinister Nazi mooks ('45 supposes everyone nuked each other so the war isn't exactly over). The rules are succinct and to the point and there are plenty of interesting character examples and plot hooks to get you started. Indeed the book is a perfect length giving you just what you need in a comprehensive well laid out format. Art is thematic and sexy and overall its a good looking book."
- Mood: productive
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