A Year of Killshot

I am the Warden!!

Yesterday, I posted the sales results for Killshot after a year on the shelf. Today, I'm looking at those results from a game designer POV.

As a publisher, it's my decision that Killshot is financially successful, but only by a small margin. While it's currently in the hole by $121, that's easy enough to make back over a few more months if things continue on a predicted course (meaning the attention from last month slows down exponentially until it dries up again by the end of the year). While it's not a profit, it's not a loss either and in independent publishing, that's pretty good for a first time at bat.

Regular readers and Killshot fans will know I've been knee deep in putting together a sequel to the game, Killshot Reloaded. With this kind of information in tow, especially when combined with the ENnie award (which is a HUGE factor compared to the same time last month), I need to make adjustments and decisions about Reloaded, how it will be designed, and how it will be released. Plus it's handy for other project down the road as well, especially with Optional Core.

The thing about Killshot as a whole is that it was one big experiment. Everything, every single step in the process, including design, was an experiment to analyze for future projects. How it was released was another step in the experimentation and these numbers provide some crucial facts on the success and failures of that experiment. Here's what I've gathered.

The Reloaded Black Box

I am the Warden!!

Before we get started today, what do you think of the new presentation? Maybe it's the graphic designer in me rising out of the ashes, but I wanted to revise this blog's visual appeal a couple of notches and make it easier to read. There are still a few tweaks to make here and there (I'm not overly satisfied with how this layout adjust to the mobile format), but it's a vast improvement from before in my book.

Now to the actual topic of the day: analyzing the wreckage that was the Killshot Reloaded Kickstarter. Trust me, I've been pondering on this a lot and there are two major issues developed from this project so far.

A Question of Impact?

I'm quite satisfied with the Kickstarter's reach and the numbers collected (other than the lack-of-hitting-a-goal thing). Here's what the stats say.

The Good, The Bad, and the Surgery

I am the Warden!!!

OK, let's cut straight to the chase, shall we? I have no idea where to start, so I'm going to list the three things going on right now in the order implied by this post's title.

The Good: There's a new column that launched on the Troll in the Corner blog yesterday written by yours truly. "The Games of Wrath" is not about games that piss you off so much as it's about remaining a part of this passionate hobby without draining your wallet (or even taking anything out in the first place). It's a great opportunity to help get my work and my name out there (because that's what it's all about), particularly in combination with the Under the Hood column that runs every Sunday on Roleplayers Chronicle.

The Bad: With less than three days remaining, there's still a sliver shy of $1400 to raise for the Killshot Reloaded Kickstarter. Or the last 47%, if you look at it from another angle. While many of the backers, assassins, and good friends across the Interwebs have been incredibly supportive, I will be very surprised if this sucker makes it past the finish line. Does that mean I've given up? Nope, not yet. Come tomorrow, I'm planning on pimping the shit out of this project and give it up last good fight. Why not right now? Then let's cut to the last snippet.

The Surgery: I've spent the majority of the day today meeting with my orthopaedic specialist, going through the X-ray routine, and having professional pull on my busted foot like it was a gag at a bar, but it's not for naught. After nearly a year of tests (mostly waiting for the tests), the specialist's made a decision and has decided surgery is the only possible option to lessen the pain by restricting the amount of motion in my foot/ankle.

So here's the thing. The Good and the Surgery are all great news (with bigger emphasis on the latter, to be honest), and the Bad is very unfortunate but not tragic. It was always a possibility and, as I wrote in last week's post, not the end of Killshot Reloaded by a long shot. For the first time in a while, my personal life has started picking up steam while my freelance career has taken a backseat.

Life. Go figure.

A Thought on Scale

I am the Warden!!

For those of you paying attention to my struggling Kickstarter, you can imagine I'm feeling disappointed. That's not to explain my lack of Video Updates over the past few days, the majority of those were due to prepping and planning for the LUG Con games run over the weekend. (If you haven't had a chance to check them out yet, you can find them on the BRG YouTube page.) As for this morning, I have to admit that I was sitting at my desk ready to fire off another recording session, but didn't have the want or will to do it. It is a bit frustrating to see something you've planned on for close to two years come to a halt.

And then I remind myself that this is not the only way to publish. Killshot came to be its current inception because of Kickstarter, yes, but that is not the only way it would be possible. The same goes for Reloaded - it does not need a Kickstarter to become a reality, but the current version did depend on it to make the process simpler and less risky. With signs and indications this is not going to happen, barring an incredibly generous benefactor, I've begun to think about a Plan B approach. Then a Plan C.

When I first started to get last year's project ready and posted, I was given an ominous warning. "Not all project make their goal, but that doesn't mean they fail." I've been keeping that sagedom to heart over the past few days as I've begun to stand back and study the black box. What I've been coming up with has grown beyond the mere reach of this particular project, but to the very heart of how I've been conducting business.

Is it possible I'm trying to hard to reach for something that's beyond my grasp at the moment?

By that, I mean the concept of publishing a 250-page volume designed to create a campaign and indulge the gaming pleasures of countless others the world over. Am I asking too much of myself and the few regulars aware of my work? It's a question that goes beyond Killshot and it's something I'm quite seriously considering. Is it possible that I need to try something a bit "smaller?"

In this context, smaller does not mean less. It means slighter in scale. Rather than publish an entire core rulebook for a new system, should I be focussing on single adventures and supplements? Right away, the knee-jerk reaction is to work on open licensed material from other publishers and designers, but that's not why I created BRG, no sir. The Ruler is for completely original material, particularly in game mechanics, so that's forbidden. Now the question becomes "How do I publish 'smaller' products without playing in someone else's puddle?"

That, ladies and gentlemen, is the true question. 

The Waiting Game

I am the Warden!!

Running a Kickstarter is exactly as my friend and fellow game designer, Jason Pitre, once said (and I'm paraphrasing here). "It's like going to a month long convention. You meet lots of great people, talk about games, but when it's all over, you just want to crash." Yep.

The Killshot Reloaded Kickstarter currently teeters precariously on a thin ledge. With the thirteenth day coming to a close, it's currently $58 behind schedule (we need to bring in at least $100 a day to make our minimum goal of $3000) and my nerves are twitching like there's an electrical current running through my body. What started off as a rewarding and encouraging launch (over $600 on the first day), the running total's only climbed by roughly $800 in the twelve days since and that math does not bode well for this project.

Add to that a couple of problems/ego crushers to add more current to the voltage that is my nerves and it's a wonder I haven't started chain smoking again. (In my defence, I have been smoking irregularly, so maybe it's safe to say the pressure's taken a slight toll on my willpower.) On Sunday, during an update to the Kickstarter, I found out that the domain name for BRG was no longer valid and when I started looking into it, my password was no longer working. That lead to a panic and after an hour of scrambling to figure out what was going on, I learned there's a cost to having web problems on a Sunday. No one's around to solve the problem. At this moment, I still have no clue why the renewal didn't go through because I set it up with Google directly. There are no people working at Google, only codes and lines of programming and they don't speak human. With all my advertising spouting the website "brokenrulergames.com" and that very domain name connecting potential backers to a lovely picture of a young, blond student next to a list of alternate possibilities, the timing is the very definition of poor.

And not but an hour ago, I found out my work on another unrelated project has been replaced by someone else's efforts after reading about it on a public announcement on Facebook. Ouch. I haven't heard a peep out of the project lead, even going so far as to check my spam message looking for anything. There was also a link to the new edit and after watching it, my ego has taken quite a kick in the groin.

But you know what? That's the game, kids. If you can't take the heat, get out of the kitchen. If you can't handle third degree burns, stop putting your hand in the BBQ. For every major defeat, there is a minor victory to improve the odds and make it appear that you're on the right path. For me, it was this link.

You hear me, Kickstarter? There's still 17 days remaining to meet my goal and this project's not dead yet.

The Eh-Team: How One Playtester Played Killshot With His Kids

I am the Warden and this is the Eh-Team!

The who? You know, the Canadian edition of that popular and cheesy action TV series from the 1980s.

I received this email from Brandon Neff, my longtime friend and playtester, who was looking for a way to play Killshot Reloaded... with his kids. What resulted became an homage to the kids' favourite show on Netflix and I couldn't help but share them with everyone. With stats provided by Brandon, I've taken the liberty of transplanting them onto official Killshot Reloaded character records for your group to try out in their next playtest. You can read Brandon's account of how they played the newly provided Dealing Justice job (available to all backers of Killshot Reloaded) with a twist.

The Next Step Begins! The Reloaded Kickstarter Is Live!!

I am the Warden and this is my Kickstarter!!

That's right, Killshot Reloaded is up and running and already sits at 20% of its goal ($3000). The past eighteen hours have been a whirlwind of relief and reward and there's still 29 days remaining on this bad boy. According to Kicktraq, the project is due to hit 318% of its goal (just over $9500), which would allow me to not only publish Killshot Reloaded, but include a special appendix for ninja magic in the Way of the Killshot theme, support Killshot Files for another year, publish a 64-page supplement for one of the themes, provide a job for each of the five themes, yet fall just short of the Savage Worlds edition of Killshot.

Add to that this absolutely glowing review of Killshot: The Director's Cut from Megan Robertson at DriveThruRPG and it may be safe to say this project is going to meet, exceed, and obliterate expectations.

Wow.

Wow.

So the pressure is on, folks. Check out the Kickstarter video below and feel free to start clicking away. Make your vote for the Stand Alone Theme stretch goal (see Bonus Objectives for details) and let's reloaded this game.

Talkin' Kickstartin'

I am the Warden!!

An impromptu Hangout with fellow Ottawa designers Fraser Ronald (Centurion) and Jason Pitre (Spark RPG) turned into the latest episode of Collateral in the Accident Survivors network. It was a great opportunity for me to get an impression, answers, and suggestions for the Killshot Reloaded Kickstarter currently set to launch next month.

Listen and enjoy. And share.

Cleaner, Simpler, Smaller!!

I am the Warden!!

Yesterday was the start of revisions for Killshot Reloaded's options chapter. You know those days when you get started on a large chapter/project and it starts with complete unawareness of just how much of a difference your work will bring? That was yesterday.

One of the primary goals for Reloaded is to create a cleaner version of the game while simultaneously allowing assassins and Directors more flexibility to take the game and run with it. While making a post on G+ about the process, it occurred that I've probably run close to 50 jobs for Killshot and various recent offshoots of the Optional System since it's creation and publication. In that time, I've noticed how players have translated and interpreted their options, listened to their opinions, and have now set a goal to use those opinions and concepts in mind for the new edition.

What I did not expect was just how improved these options have become. I hate putting it that way, because it instantly comes across as if the game was broken. And I hate saying THAT because the original edition of Killshot is by no means perfect (need I point out the major faux pas of having an option and skill both named "Survival").

Using My Big Boy Words

I am the Warden!!

You'd think by my blog alone that there's very little action going on right now, but that's so far from the truth. Aside from the official announcement of Killshot Reloaded (see the BRG site for details) and the progression of development in the new edition, I've also been plugging away on a new Kickstarter video for the upcoming Shaintar campaign by Sean Patrick Fannon, finishing up the final piece for Killshot Files #2, putting the next instalment of High Plains Samurai together, and working on a silent project on the side. If I haven't been posting enough, it's because I'm writing too much.

And that's the irony of today's post. It came to me last month that perhaps I haven't been writing enough, particularly when it comes to adventure design. When I'm running a game, I'm a massive fan of improvising. I'll detail a basic plot, flesh and stat out characters, establish locations, and run with everything as it plays out to provide players with a rich and reactive setting.

The problem is the contradiction with what I really need for adventure design and publication. It's something discovered during the past couple of Killshot or Optional Core sessions that must be seriously and correctly addressed in the new edition. When you don't write down the entire adventure and plan out your fight scenes in advance, you tend to take liberties with your text. For example, it never occurred to me during any of the various drafts for the three jobs published in Killshot: Direction to include a sidebar or any relevant information on how to set up a Tracker for a given scene. There were rules for determining all the chips needed on the board and that seemed good enough. What I've noticed is that without having a solid foundation to set up a scene through the game's mechanics, there's no telling how good or poor the scene will play out. So much information is missing from the text that Directors will have to embellish as they see fit and that can cause serious problems in game satisfaction.

Perhaps no other evidence is required than the outcome of the first session for High Plains Samurai. While the YouTube broadcast was cut out early and remains unavailable to those outside of the Development Team sitting at the table, the last fight scene went horribly awry. Everything went wrong and the fact that I never bothered to write down a set-up for the fight scene contributed to that problem. And it didn't help that my qi points mechanic was totally screwed up.

For tomorrow's game, I've made adjustments and wrote out every fight scene (all five of them) in complete detail, from how many Teams are provided in what order to a list of pre-existing triggers and outcomes for the fight using the new fight management system undergoing construction for Reloaded. How will it turn out? You can find out tomorrow as we stream a live broadcast of the game through the Optional Core community on G+. 

A Big Day For Reloaded

I am the Warden and today is the day that Killshot: Reloaded truly begins!!

Oh, I know I've been talking about it for months and work has begun on the four individual themes originally intended as the sole purpose for Reloaded, but things have taken a turn for the better. During the month I shall now refer to as Dark February - a time when I had to put various projects and other game design related activities aside to deal with the harshness of Reality - a realization occurred. Something deep and profound that has breathed new life into this project.

Killshot: Reloaded will not simply exist as a supplement supporting Killshot. It will be the second edition of Killshot, complete with additional themes and settings to create a fully-detailed, fleshed-out campaign setting. 

In the past year since Killshot's Kickstarter brought this game to life, I have run a lot of games. In that time, I have tried a lot of new options and material, particularly for the recent Optional Core playtests and we've devised a few new tricks and shortcuts previously unconsidered or unavailable. That's not to say it's broken as is, but it's dawned on me how this game could be even better.

At this point, I wouldn't go so far as to call this an official announcement or anything. Just a little secret between you and me. The plans for Reloaded have just exploded and it's going to take me the rest of the month to truly understand what's swirling around in my head and run with it. All of these ideas will be incorporated into a complete Kickstarter campaign bigger and better than what was offered last year and if everything goes amazingly to plan, you could be looking at a 300+ page guidebook for the next edition of the world's deadliest tabletop roleplaying game. 

The Editing Booth [Twilight Continuum]

I am the Warden!!

Look to your right and check out the Twilight Continuum Kickstarter launched by Mystical Throne. If you've checked it out before, take a look at the new video and look at this project with new eyes. There's also a pound of new info and previews of what's to come.

In between two days of meetings and commuting, I whipped up the intro for what will become the Video Continuum promoting Twilight Continuum. After some feedback regarding the original video, I offered to put something together as a teaser trailer for the project and an open for regular video/audio updates by everyone involved in the project.

With my own upcoming Kickstarter plans (currently on temporary hold while I sort out a few other issues and clear my slate), having an opportunity to test out this laptop's editing capabilities is exactly the kind of practise I need to prep the half-dozen videos I plan to release, including a how-to-play Killshot video. (Unfortunately, I can't make a simple video. The old film school student in me simply has to try and push that tiny envelope.) As the month continues, keep your eyes peeled for updates on the Continuum and there'll be some posts discussing my plans and dreams for Books 2 and 5 right here on this blog.

2013: The Year of Reality

I am the Warden!!

That's right, kids. It's time for yet another blog to recognize the end of 2012 and talk about everything he wants to accomplish in 2013, AKA New Year's resolutions. My mind is flooded with them at the moment and, as I always do in times of uncertainty, I turn to my blog for guidance like a purse snatching victim turns to Batman as the scumbag runs away with her bag.

As much as I could spend time going over the good and bad of 2012 (with much of it awesome, despite the numerous difficulties still going on in my personal life), my focus remains on the coming year. There's great doom ahead; I can feel it. Based on how certain events have closed out this year, I can tell the early months of 2013 will be incredibly challenging and what kicks me in the balls hardest is that I can't talk about them in any detail online or in any public forum. Hell, even being vague is probably not a smart move, but a writer expresses himself through his craft because he knows no other way. The ongoing lawsuit for my accident makes it incredibly difficult and unwise to freely share my views and comments on such matters because it's incredibly easy for such posts to be taken out of context. Don't believe me? There's a giant stack of papers bound in volumes as thick as Senate committee reports for my online posts alone, including my Kickstarter project for Killshot, my Twitter account, Facebook, and everything else. So while I would love nothing more than to include these details as part of my own healing process, it's not a smart thing to do right now. As always, you'll just have to trust me on a few matters and allow the topic to move on without explanation.

Overshooting the Market?

I am the Warden!!

A thought occurred to me earlier today while walking the dogs (as it always does) and I mentally broke down my objectives for the week. Am I expecting too much of Killshot?

Let me explain a little further. My editor, Chris, sent in the edits for Killshot Files #1 and this is what got the ball rolling. I've made a point to stay one issue ahead with article production so that as soon as an issue is released for sale, there are already articles ready to edit for the next. After quickly scrolling through Chris' corrections and suggestions, I started my final consideration on which articles should go into the second issue. All this while adjusting in the work required on the Adventurer gamebook, the BRG website, Killshot: Reloaded and its Kickstarter project, getting the house ready for winter (and a Canadian winter at that), putting up a door to my office, and many other upcoming events.

Now I want to make something perfectly clear at this point. I am not wondering if I've bitten off more than I can chew and thinking about cutting ties with Killshot or the ongoing issues of Killshot Files. Aside from the obvious benefits of putting these products together (and I should finally start making a profit on it by the year's end), the entire endeavour is a huge experiment and effort to gauge some future ideas. One of those ideas is the feasibility of releasing RPGs with only one or two core releases or as part of a large brand comprised of at least 6-12 products. Hence, Killshot Files.

Reloading Killshot: Let's Get Mystical, Part 2

The Nine Cuts of the kuji-kiri. Used for reference only.

I am the Warden!!

Seems I broke a small promise to you and went a bit off course from my Reloading Killshot series. With so many things on the go, I guess it's bound to happen, but let's not think of it that way. Let's think of it as appropriate to the topic - ninjas. One minute, your mind is thinking about them and how they might come in through the window to kill you in your sleep until eventually you begin to wonder about other problems... and then BAM!! they slip out of the shadows and dig a knife into your back.

Last time, I wrote about ninja magic in the upcoming theme, Way of the Killshot. As historical accuracy has already been tossed out the driver's seat, playing up on the mystique and terror of these ancient assassins is now par for the course. The trick is devising a magic add-on that not only plays along with the ninja's other assets without overpowering them (i.e. other focuses), but also extends the mechanics without breaking them and enhances the aura of these characters without snapping players out of their expectations.

As the idea of "magical ninja" is intended as a variant for players and Directors to play around with rather than a regular feature, I've created a first draft ninja focus called the Shinobi. These ninja specialize in the mystical art of kuji-kiri, itself based on the actual practise of hand symbols as part of meditation in various Japanese martial arts (including ninjitsu). Each symbol (or cut) represents an aspect of human consciousness and was taught to real world students as part of their path to enlightenment and training. All nine cuts are featured on the diagram to the right.

Reloading Killshot: Let's Get Mystical

I am the Warden!!

With tentative plans to run a little Way of the Killshot playtest, I spent some time last week working on ninjas. It's what I love about this line of work. I get to sit around and play with ninjas all day. Then break for lunch.

While the playtest never worked out, it gave me the excuse to crack down on how I wanted my Killshot ninja to look and feel. During my initial research, I found out there are two versions of these historical assassins: actual and made-up. What we consider to be the quintessential ninja is a modern, mythological version dressed head to toe in black save for eye slits is pretty far from the truth. Real ninja disguised themselves as yamabushi, or pilgrims, and ambush their marks out in the open. They were more like suicide bombers of today than the masters of darkness rumors may them out to be. Luckily, Killshot is not about historical accuracy and I wanted to present the mythological ninja for this theme.

What I didn't expect was dabbling in the most obscure and unrealistic aspect of the ninja: magic. During my initial research into the ninja, plenty of references were made to the belief in their supernatural powers granted or taught to them by the tengu, half-man and half-crow mystics dwelling in the mountains. Even many modern films and stories portray them as magical beings able to disappear into thin air (even without the iconic smoke bomb) or heal massive amounts of damage with nothing more than meditation (as seen in the recent film, Ninja Assassin). Even in my first impression of the ninja as a child, the classic B-film American Ninja with Michael Dudikoff, he was able to vanish in plain sight by the end.

Threat Levels

All this week, I've been talking about my objectives for Killshot: Reloaded and the goal of creating a more advanced version of the rules. Today, I reveal my plan to deal with advanced jobs and difficulty rolls: threat levels.

As characters in Killshot gain more experience, they take on more complex and dangerous jobs. While opponents surely get better, difficulty rolls and challenges generally do not. Characters improve and master such tasks to increase their chances of success, but in a game, this creates a situation where the only way to keep a challenge  on par with the opponents is to increase the number of dice. If we simply add on more dice for the sake of adding on more dice, we're simply stating the original version of the game is broken.

So we have to increase the threat characters face; the repercussions for failure as their work brings them uncomfortably closer to dangerous or high-profile figures.

Ramping Up The Difficulty

Increasing the difficulty in a game is much like
motorcycle jumping. Too much throttle and you overshoot your mark;
not enough and you land flat on your face. 

I am the Warden!!

In my last post, I talked about the major challenge for Killshot: Reloaded, the upcoming supplement for tabletop's deadliest game. I want to use it as an extension for more experienced characters, particularly with Operation: Killshot, the international espionage theme.

As we all know (and if you've never read or played Killshot yet, you can fix that problem with this link), active rolls attempted against non-opponents are challenged by difficulty levels, each one increasing the number of circumstance dice applied to the Director's opposed roll. By taking on experienced characters - such as those with over 50 training points - the difficulty has to keep up or else the game starts to collapse in on itself.

So here's the issue I'm addressing. Using the rules for difficulty levels as is, I could simply add more difficulty levels with more d10s. In all honesty, that's what I'm trying to avoid. As much as this system is built on dice pools, it can get really out of hand as the experience goes up.

And that's what we're here to brainstorm today. How do we address difficulty levels for experienced characters? Let's begin with some ideas I'm cranially tossing about at the moment.

Killshot... Advanced?

I am the Warden!!

On Thursday, I finally sat down and used a series of words to form sentences, which collected into paragraphs to create an introduction for Killshot: Reloaded. The next supplement has begun.

What was nice about nailing down the intro's first draft was settling on the key aspects for each theme. I had been tossing around a few ideas, collecting notes, yet never truly agreeing on anything save for the general idea and it's name. Having forced myself to make a decision, I can honestly say I'm really looking forward to the challenge this supplement will offer.

Having a basis to work from, I can now sit back and assess what this book is truly about. It's not just about new themes; it's about stepping this game up a notch. An advanced version of Killshot, if you will. I'm going with the assumption many characters (now that "assassin" will not always apply) will be close to 50 training points in total or simply looking to mix it up a little from their previous exploits. I realize now this book has to meet and exceed that challenge in many ways, including handling "higher level" characters.

Let's go through each one by one, shall we?

Phase 2: Planning for Reloaded

I am the Warden!!

The Killshot core release is complete. By that, I mean there's no more game design, editing, or layout remaining. All that's left is press production, sales, and the ongoing marketing that remains eternal for all core rulebooks. It's time to start a new project and, in typical fashion, I'm looking at more than one.

Those of you familiar with this blog, BRG, and Killshot in general know the next supplement will be Killshot: Reloaded (and the ongoing Killshot Files, of course). Four alternate themes/setting applying the Killshot RPG: Hong Kong gun-fu, Wild West bounty hunters, CIA operatives, and ninjas. It's a project conceived during Killshot's early days (there's even mention of it in the original Kickstarter project) and has been on the back burner for months waiting for the opportunity to start investing time and energy. Before I can type the first word, I need to know what I want from this book and how to make it all happen through Kickstarter.