3 RPG Kickstarters You Should Back – Changeling, Capharnaum, and Warsong

This week, I’m looking at Kickstarters for the second editions of RPGs including one set in the World of Darkness, one using the FATE Core system, and one crossing over from French to English. Let’s check’em out.

 

Changeling: The Lost 2nd Edition by Onyx Path Publishing
Ends on .

“Contribute to help create, publish, and distribute the 2nd Edition of the CHANGELING: THE LOST tabletop roleplaying game.

There will be dragons and there will be sirens and there will be all the armies of the otherworld sent to bring you back. But you will slay them and you will shun them and you will stand on the battlements of your fortress as they break against your walls of thorn and iron.

You will be free.

You know the stories. The hero leaves his village on a terrifying journey, or the waif finds her way through the cold, dark woods. In the end, they kill the giant or shove the witch in an oven.

But what happens next?

In Changeling: The Lost, you take on the role of an ordinary person who has seen the extraordinary. Lured or abducted by the alien Gentry, you have passed the gates and Hedges between our world and the vast fantastic.

In Arcadia, the Gentry changed you. They forged your flesh and sewed your bones, and they gave you a role to play. You were a lover or a servant or a monster. But it was never your story.

Having run from your Keeper and climbed your way back through the Hedge (and didn’t the thorns bite more than they did going in?), you’re back in the world of pizza and Facebook and nuclear anxiety.

Your eyes are open now. You can see that magic is not the sole province of Faerie. The world is alive with wonders most people never see…and rife with horrors that count on that unwariness. It’s all part of your life now. You take the good with the bad, the magic with the monstrosity, the beauty with the madness.

It’s not always an easy story, not always a happy story. But now it’s your story.

Changeling: The Lost began in 2007, and amassed some of the most passionate fans the Chronicles of Darkness has ever known. Now, it’s reborn in its second edition, which tells new tales and builds on lessons learned in the past ten years. We’re jumping back into the brambles, and letting the scar tissue from last time protect us.”

 

Egg’s Thoughts: 

This campaign is for the second edition of the Changeling, a part of Onyx Path’s World of Darkness. A decade into its lifecycle, everyone can gauge their interest in the setting. For my part, I’m interested in it for it’s basis in historic folklore that some feel was the superstitious explanation for autism and other challenges. I’m curious to see how this influences the project.

 

You can find their work on DriveThruRPG here.

To support their Kickstarter campaign, click here.

 

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Warsong Second Edition for Fate Core by Higher Grounds Publishing
Ends on .

“Every choice has a consequence in this game-changing tabletop RPG where destiny is literally in your hands.

Warsong Second Edition is a game about cataclysmic war. A game that looks into the face of destiny, and decides for itself. It is a game about mythic deeds, and choosing free will over fate.

Destiny is a choice. 

The Viziers guide the flow of our world toward its inexorable doom. The armies of the world amass and gather, intent on destruction and death. Only you can choose the path of your own fate. By your actions, you choose the course of history.

The burden of free will is yours alone. The chains of destiny cannot hold you.

You are free.

Draw your sword.

Make your choice.

Guide your destiny.

In Warsong Second Edition, you play as one of the Viziers, ancient shape-shiftingQuicksilvers, dread undead Neverborn or one of the other primordial inheritors of the world. It is your free will that will shape the course of history and decide whether the world will fall by its own hand, or rise up from its ashes. The ancient powers are but memories, and the people fight for the right to rule.

The skeins of destiny have begun to fray and the Ancient Viziers have disappeared along with the old gods, leaving destiny in the hands of their heirs. You are one of the children of the primordial powers, born the promise of destiny, and bound to its power.

Armed with the power of magic and the ability to shape destiny itself, the Viziers, divine offspring of both god and man, stand as the world’s last defense against the forces of entropy and their own self-destruction. The gods, ancient viziers and primordial powers have disappeared, the nations refuse to stand united for a promised future and bitter rivalries burn as brightly as ever while the world’s life force dwindles down to ember. It won’t be an easy choice, but it will be yours to make.

What will you do with Free Will?

Warsong Second Edition began in 2013 as a play-test sample world built along with Pathfinder guidelines. Over time, it became a game of its own and Kickstarted on June 25 2016. Since then, it’s become a dynamic world that has gathered some of the most passionate fans Higher Grounds has ever seen. Now, a bit over a year after the game’s release, a revised and expanded second edition is nearing completion. Renewed in its second edition, Warsong Second Edition takes a year of reviews, feedback and criticism and puts those lessons to work.

Today, Warsong Second Edition is ready to jump back into the fray as a distilled and refined game using the Fate Core System rules, ready to ride the skeins of fate once more.”

 

Egg’s Thoughts: 

This is Warsong 2e’s second campaign (I looked at the first one here). As I said with the first one, “Need a FATE game? Does the premise sound interesting and you’d like to try the first edition of the game for free? Click here.”

 

You can find their work on DriveThruRPG here.

To support their Kickstarter campaign, click here.

 

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Capharnaum – The Roleplaying Game by Modiphius: Mindjammer Press
Ends on .

“Fantastic Arabian Nights adventure in a world of deserts, dragons, and crusaders!

Welcome to the Capharnaum kickstarter! Help us fund the release of the English version of this fantastic roleplaying game in a beautiful 400-page hardback, and also expand into a complete line of adventures, supplements, and support material into 2018 and beyond!

With your help, our initial goal is to fund the release of the 400-page hardback core book of CAPHARNAUM – TALES OF THE DRAGON-MARKED, a complete standalone fantasy roleplaying game. Our initial release is in beautiful two-colour print, with sixteen gorgeous full colour plates; but rapidly we hope to reach the stretch goal of releasing the entire book with full-colour artwork. We already have the text ready for editing and layout, and anticipate releasing the core book in PDF format in March 2018 and in print in April 2018.

Capharnaum also has a range of supplements and adventures which we would like to produce, including a player’s guide, screen, bestiary, atlas, and epic campaign, plus many standalone adventures. We hope that we’ll exceed our initial funding total and be able to release these additional books to you as Kickstarter stretch goals.

Why not check out Capharnaum today, in THE TEARS OF AMPHAROOL, our free Quickstart Rules and Introductory Adventure!

CAPHARNAUM – THE TALES OF THE DRAGON-MARKED is a fantasy roleplaying game set in an imaginary Arabia-like world. It borrows from the tales of the One Thousand and One Nights, as well as semitic legends and the ancient and mediaeval epics. Capharnaum doesn’t aim to be a historical game, but a heroic one, a flamboyant refraction of historical, cultural, and mythical themes, filled with light and thrilling adventure!

In Capharnaum, you play the Dragon-Marked, heroic individuals with a special destiny, born with a birthmark on their backs in the shape of a dragon’s claw. The Dragon-Mark announces to the world that you are capable of astonishing feats, for good or evil. Chosen by mystical dragons in accordance with an unknown divine will, you are offered a place in the great game of the gods. You’ll be cast into colourful adventures, political, military, and magical intrigues, and much more…

Capharnaum is a simple yet profound game. We all know the tales of Sinbad, of Ali Baba, of Aladdin and Scheherezade – we grew up with them, they form part of our personal culture. The world of Capharnaum is familiar, easy to pick up and play.

And yet – scratch the surface, and a whole world opens up. Meticulously researched,Capharnaum aims to provide fantastic takes on real-world Mediterranean cultures, from ancient Greece and Rome, Egypt and Sumeria, right through to the crusader kingdoms, dark age and mediaeval Europe, the kingdoms of Africa, India, and the distant East. Uniquely,Capharnaum is centred upon a fantastic version of the Middle-East, where all these cultures meet, clash, come into conflict with the profound cultures of the peninsula of Jazirat, and where something new is being born.

As the Dragon-Marked, you transcend cultural differences. You’re united by an unknown, mystical, yet common destiny. Side by side with people who would otherwise be your foes, you adventure in this vibrant, chaotic land, where the fate of the future is at play, and where you are destined to change the world…

The Capharnaum Game System

Capharnaum uses a tried and tested custom game system which is celebrating its tenth anniversary this year, with a second edition of the original French roleplaying game. Our Kickstarter includes all of the updates and rules modifications of the second edition game. It’s a d6-based system, a modified dice pool with a semi-roll-and-keep mechanic. Simple yet flexible, it combines skills and attributes in rolls against difficulties, resolving into levels of success or failure in a highly cinematic style. It’s grounded in traditional concepts of hit points, armour values, wounds, and healing, but also expands into genre-specific rules tweaks such as Dragon Dice and Constellations which let you really feel the power of the Dragon-Marked course through your character.

One of the key components of the Capharnaum system is the concept of paths: mystical associations which you belong to, which represent your view of your role in the world (your “character class”, to some extent), but which also provide you with cool and increasingly awesome abilities as you play.

Advancement is built into the Capharnaum system. As one of the Dragon-Marked, you’re already an individual with great potential – but this is an age which calls for Heroes, and the rules let you rise to the occasion and change the world!

Who is “Al-Rawi”?

In Capharnaum, in the fine tradition of Middle-Eastern story-telling, we call the game master “Al-Rawi”, an Arabic word meaning “the Story Teller”. When you play Capharnaum, you’re not only playing a roleplaying game, but participating in an ancient tradition millennia old!”

 

Egg’s Thoughts:

This translation is based on the 2nd edition of the game.

“The Tears of Ampharool are actually the 2nd edition mechanics. […] The English version of Capharnaum will use the 2nd edition mechanics, which features several streamlinings on 1st Ed, particularly with regard to initiative, the calculation of magnitude, and Babouche-Draggers.” – From the comments on the Capharnaum quickstart

[Editor’s Note: Egg’s reaching for this week’s second edition theme.]

In terms of a setting, it brings something under explored (compared to Europe) in RPG, Arabia. That’s what sets this apart, it isn’t another pseudo-Western European setting. If you want to try out how different it is, they have a free quickstart here.

 

You can find their work on DriveThruRPG here.

To support their Kickstarter campaign, click here.

 

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Want your RPG Kickstarter reviewed? Have some RPG wanna-lancer thoughts to share? Contact me here or on Facebook (Egg Embry) or on Google Plus (+Egg Embry).

Disclosure: This article contains affiliate links to DriveThruRPG.com and Amazon.com.

Savage Worlds: Fast, Furious, and Fun! - Available Now @ DriveThruRPG.com

 

* * * * * *

 

Egg Embry, Wanna-lancer™

Wanna-lancer™ Checklist T-shirt available at Cafepress

Interested in being a wanna-lancer? Start with the official Wanna-lancer Checklist t-shirt or wall clock or ice tea glass!

* * * * * *

Egg Embry wrote comic book short stories, edited comic book series, wrote and drew a webcomic, and contributed to comic book journalism across the 2000s. Now, he buys the opportunity to write for a variety of tabletop role-playing games in the tradition of vanity press. His purchases have been published by:

Want your RPG Kickstarter reviewed? Have some RPG wanna-lancer thoughts to share? Contact me here or on Facebook (Egg Embry) or on Google Plus (+Egg Embry).

4 RPG Kickstarters You Should Back – Xenomorphs, Epic Legacy, Operators, and Warsong

It’s Thanksgiving/Black Friday week in the US and that means we’re headed into the season where RPG Kickstarters will *not* get the attention that they deserve. With this article, I’m hoping to buck that trend and showcase some of the deserving RPGs that are waiting for you to back them.

 

Warsong 2nd Edition for Fate Core by Higher Grounds Publishing
Ends on Fri, November 24 2017 10:53 PM EST.

“A game of warring nations spiraling toward oblivion. Will you pull the world free from self-destruction, or guide it to its doom?

Draw your sword.

Make your choice.

Choose your destiny.

Warsong is a game about cataclysmic war. A game that looks into the face of destiny, and decides for itself. It is a game about mythic deeds, and choosing free will over fate.
Destiny is a choice. The Viziers guide the flow of our world toward its inexorable doom. The armies of the world amass and gather, intent on destruction and death. Only you can choose the path of your own fate. By your actions, you choose the course of history. The burden of free will is yours alone. The chains of destiny cannot hold you.

You are free.”

 

Egg’s Thoughts:

 

This KS ends on Black Friday because, if nothing else, Ray Machuga knows no fear! Need a FATE game? Does the premise sound interesting and you’d like to try the first edition of the game for free? Click here. Want to get the full 1e rules for $.97? Click here.

 

You can find their work on DriveThruRPG here.

To support their Kickstarter campaign, click here.

 

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Operators RPG by Samjoko Publishing 
Ends on Thu, November 30 2017 2:00 AM EST.

“Mission Impossible heists and Tom Clancy technothriller meets Bourne-style kinetic fight sequences in this all-new action RPG.

Operators is an RPG designed to tell cinematic action movies at the table. Whether you like challenge-based play in a Tom Clancian technothriller or the futuristic hijinks of Mission Impossible, Operators has you covered.

The core mechanic revolves around rolling four Fate Dice. Players look for pluses in order to succeed and the Game Master looks for minuses that mean the task becomes unexpectedly complicated.

Operators also uses a deck of cards to help narrate fight scenes and chase scenes. The Fight Cards all have unique illustrations and moves taken from various martial arts, but mostly those seen in the Bourne movies. These cards, along with rolling the dice to see which moves land, are turned away, or are countered, make it easy to narrate a kinetic fight scene. Chase cards work similarly, except instead of having fighting moves on them, they have the ways the person in the lead tries to get away.

You can find a free quickstart of the game and all the mechanics in depth right here. along with some additional player aides for the Game Master (called Director in Operators) and some mock-up character sheets with a loose scenario to play through if you and you group want to get it to the table to see how she runs.

Click to download the free Quickstart - still a work in progress
Click to download the free Quickstart – still a work in progress

Click here to download the free Quickstart – still a work in progress. 

The book is going to be graphic novel size, softcover, full colour, and around 200 pages.

The Cards will be a deck of 52 cards in total and will be regular playing card size (2.5 x 3.5″). 19 of them are used for Chase Scenes, 33 are used for Fight Scenes. One of the main goals of the kickstarter is going to be increasing the size of that deck. I’m hoping to add quite a bit more. In the quickstart above you can check out what the cards I already have look like.

Cards Mock-Up (Not Final)
Cards Mock-Up (Not Final)

In addition, these cards can be used with all kinds of other games, like Night’s Black Agents, Delta Green, or any other game where you want to narrate out a brutal martial arts sequence between opponents.

I also want to be able to hire a professional to do photo manipulation and photo realistic art throughout the book. It’s a big challenge since it’s not a style that is commonly seen in RPGs and I’d really like to do it right.”

 

Egg’s Thoughts:

 

From the same company that brought the cyberpunk RPG, The Veil, to the world, Operators isn’t quite a FATE RPG as best I can tell, but it uses some elements of it. I am interested in seeing how the photo manipulation artwork works out.

 

You can find their work on DriveThruRPG here.

To support their Kickstarter campaign, click here.

 

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Xenomorphs: The Fall of Somerset Landing Tabletop RPG by EN Publishing
Ends on Fri, December 1 2017 3:00 PM EST.

Disclosure: I freelance for EN World.

“A gritty universe of sci-fi survival horror, including the full core rules and a setting/adventure.

Dare to enter a gritty universe of sci-fi survival horror! A full standalone set containing the core rules for WOIN-powered science-fiction roleplaying games and the Xenomorphs: The Fall of Somerset Landing setting/adventure sourcebook. The books are completed and ready to ship, so you’ll get them right away!

Terror and monsters await in the depths of space…

You get two books shipped as soon as the Kickstarter ends:

  • The 300-page full-colour hardcover N.E.W. The Science Fiction Roleplaying Game core rulebook, fully updated and errataed, with a special, exclusive Xeno Edition cover.
  • The 60-page full-colour softcover Xenomorphs: The Fall of Somerset Landing setting/adventure sourcebook which describes the setting – including known space, the United Marine Corps, equipment, careers, a pair of iconic starships, information about the different varieties of xenomorph, plus a detailed terraforming colony called Somerset Landing, along with a survival horror adventure set in that colony. Both books are detailed below.

Xenomorphs: The Fall of Somerset Landing was written by Darren Pearce (Doctor Who; Lone Wolf), Angus Abranson (Hillfolk; Cubicle 7), and Russ Morrissey (What’s OLD is NEW; To Slay A Dragon).

If you already own the N.E.W. The Science Fiction Roleplaying Game core rulebook, you have the option to simply purchase the Xenomorphs: The Fall of Somerset Landing setting/adventure sourcebook on its own.

Want to see a whole load of previews? Before the Kickstarter launched, we were posting them regularly here on this thread on EN World! Feel free to check them out!

This is the Full Xeno Print Set
This is the Full Xeno Print Set

 

A full-colour 60-page softback setting book which introduces the universe of Xenomorphs, including a 15-page adventure called The Fall of Somerset Landing.”

 

Egg’s Thoughts:

Disclosure: I freelance for EN World.

 

Want to try out the N.E.W. RPG system? This is your chance to get in on the game via a Kickstarter where the product is in the can, no stretch goals are planned, and delivery starts within a week or two of the close. I participated in their Touch of Class Kickstarter and I think the first PDFs went out the same day that the campaign closed. In this case, it could be a Christmas gift Kickstarter!

 

You can find their work on DriveThruRPG here.

To support their Kickstarter campaign, click here.

 

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Epic Legacy Core Rulebook – 5th Edition Beyond 20th Level by 2CGaming
Ends on Sun, December 3 2017 12:00 AM EST.

“The ultimate guide to Epic Level 5th Edition. Bring your characters and DM arsenal to new heights of power beyond 20th level!

The Epic Legacy Core Rulebook is a 5th Edition supplement which adds a powerful and tested Epic tier to the established levels of play, advancing the Character progression from levels 21 to 30. The Epic Legacy system provides all the tools Players and Dungeon Masters will need to bring your most epic games to life.

At the core of the project’s design is the smooth playability that is the hallmark of 5th Edition. Building upon our work in the Epic Legacy Player’s Guide, this book is a masterwork quality product from veteran designers at 2CGaming. More than that, it is a labor of love consisting of over two years of development, extensive testing and balancing, and a fantastic community that has helped us every step of the way. From cover to cover, this book is packed with epic features that help you take every element of your game to the next level.”

 

Egg’s Thoughts:

 

Are you taking your 5e characters beyond level 20? Want to play a god? This is the solution. My sweet spot in D&D tends to be levels 5 to 8 so this may be beyond what I’d look at, but that does not mean it’s not going to look amazing and offer some innovative ideas. On the KS page, they have samples of what the epic levels will be like and those are worth checking out to see if this is for you.

 

You can find their work on DriveThruRPG here.

To support their Kickstarter campaign, click here.

 

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Signal Boost:

 

Era: The Consortium – A Universe of Expansions 2 by Shades of Vengeance 
The critically acclaimed Sci-Fi RPG returns to Kickstarter: get expansions to the universe, as well as the Definitive Edition Rulebook!
Ends on .

Read my interview with Ed Jowett of Shades of Vengeance here.

Want to know more about the game? You can get the (free) Quickstart pack right here and try it out!

Why signal boost this? Because I’ll be writing one of the stretch goals – Sirona Specials Part 1 (Sessions 1-10)!

 

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Want your RPG Kickstarter reviewed? Have some RPG wanna-lancer thoughts to share? Contact me here or on Facebook (Egg Embry) or on Google Plus (+Egg Embry).

Disclosure: This article contains affiliate links to DriveThruRPG.com and Amazon.com.

Savage Worlds: Fast, Furious, and Fun! - Available Now @ DriveThruRPG.com

 

* * * * * *

 

Egg Embry, Wanna-lancer™

Wanna-lancer™ Checklist T-shirt available at Cafepress

Interested in being a wanna-lancer? Start with the official Wanna-lancer Checklist t-shirt or wall clock or ice tea glass!

* * * * * *

Egg Embry wrote comic book short stories, edited comic book series, wrote and drew a webcomic, and contributed to comic book journalism across the 2000s. Now, he buys the opportunity to write for a variety of tabletop role-playing games in the tradition of vanity press. His purchases have been published by:

Want your RPG Kickstarter reviewed? Have some RPG wanna-lancer thoughts to share? Contact me here or on Facebook (Egg Embry) or on Google Plus (+Egg Embry).