Mutant Bikers of the Atomic Wastelands – A Detour

A recent mention on RPGNet inspired me to take a little time off from writing about Bounty Hunters of the Atomic Wastelands to talk instead about Mutant Bikers of the Atomic Wastelands, after all this is really where it all started..

Marquis of Ferrara proof copy GET!

ZOMG! It’s a book!

So I have the proof copy of the Marquis of Ferrara! Here it is!

We’re using Print-and-Publish.co.uk (the same company we used to print Witch). The book seems solidly bound and everything’s crisp and clear. Great!

The Cover

But what is this?! Some white space down one side?! Uh oh! I forgot to send them a PDF of the cover with Bleed on it. While the book is A5, the cover is not the size of two A5 sheets! We need some extra space around the page to cover the size of the spine, and a little extra wiggle room for when it’s trimmed. This is about 10mm of white space, so a 6mm Bleed on the sides and 3mm on the top and bottom should cover it.

BHAW – Preston York

The character I wish to talk about today is Preston York. His Origin is Waster which is effectively the non-Origin. The Waster Origin makes no assumptions about the character type. In the case of Mr York the Waster Origin was used as basis to created charismatic leader style character but you can build anything using the Waster Origin as a starting point.

According to his back story, Preston York once was the crooked mayor of Rubens, the Atomic Wastelands’ equivalent of Vegas. He was overthrown and replaced by an even more crooked mayor, hence the Aspect ‘Baggage in Rubens’. The exact details of mayor York’s fall from grace were never fully explained in game but nonetheless provided a lot of background colour and a fertile ground for Aspect invokes and compels .

Intrepid: The Rebellion Playtest

The new name for Quest – ‘Intrepid! A Storytelling Adventure’ – is now decided upon so I can get on with writing about it.

Intrepid took shape over 2 years of playtesting and iterating on the original idea. But once the rules were done and I’d stopped fiddling the real work on writing began. Along with Indie Pete as editor, I wrote down and developed a version of the rules that we were pretty happy with and at this time I ran one last playtest, not of the game mechanics but of the book itself…

BHAW – Ginger Shots

The lady in the picture is Ginger Shots. You met her briefly in my previous post, let’s get to know here a little better now.

Ginger Shots is a Gunslinger. As you might expect she’s absolutely deadly in a gunfight (SUPERB being the highest rank available to player characters). That is probably a good thing because Aspects like “Sees the good in everyone” and “Hates bullies” are an open invitation for trouble in the Atomic Wastelands. They are also, in Fate, terms eminently Compellable.

Her Aspects also meant that Ginger acted as the moral compass of the group. Her companions, Preston York and Domino, happened to be a lot more challenged in the general telling right from wrong department.

There are a couple of other quick points worth making with regards to Ginger’s character sheet.

The Marquis of Ferrara has gone to print!

My name is Lorenzo d’Este. You killed my father. Prepare to die!

Pompey Crew Design‘s game of passion, politics and murder in early Renaissance Italy has been sent off to the printers!

Clicky here for more details about the game itself.

Development History

This is one of those games which has been in development for far too long. It originally started back in 2008 as a tactical duelling simulator for swashbuckling action, and then as I learned more about the era, I fell in love with the backstabbing and the drama. That whole duelling system has gone (even though it was amazing, and based on principles described in Fiore de’ Liberi’s medieval martial arts treatise ‘The Flower of Battle’, with attributes like… Actually, write me a comment or read here if you want all this), but hopefully that swashbuckling spirit is still there.

After some big shifts thanks to Indie Pete (Richard D. Evans) and Kevin Barthaud, I approached the idea from a more story game angle with ideas from Love in the Time of Seið and Mist Robed Gate. A couple of playtests and a whole lot of procrastinating later (during which time Witch was developed and released) and here we are.

Bounty Hunters of the Atomic Wastelands Characters

Let me introduce you to the guys and gals from my last campaign. After all, what better way to learn about a game than by looking at some characters?

In the picture, from left to right, are the straight-laced gunslinger Ginger Shots, the disgraced ex-mayor of Rubens Preston York and mad scientist in training Domino. Just thinking about them makes me all misty-eyed. Good times.

Ashley Griffiths (Games Designer plus a bit of Layout)

Who am I : Ashley Griffiths, I go by the handle NimbyDagda most places on the internet including on the UKRP forums.

How I get money to pay the bills : Dev-Op (which is kind of like a computer programmer and systems administrator all smashed into one).

How I lose the money again : I design and publish roleplaying games, ones that tend to be especially far towards the crazy hippie end of the market.

Stuff I’ve made : My first game was published a year ago and is called What You Wish For its a structured free-form game about people taking stock of their lives and striving to make them better. I am also responsible for one of the more controversial games to come out of the UK indie scene which is my game poem about a grief support group for people how have lost young children called Though Our Arms Are Empty.

Intermission: Waiting on a name

I’m waiting to settle on a new name for Quest, and until then it seems odd to post about something without a name.

So for now, I’ve decided to repost something from my personal blog which I think is interesting. It relates to ‘Rule 0’ and ties in nicely with the discussion going on here.

The full repost is after the break…

Richard “oreso” Lacy (Game and Layout Designer)

Day Job: Travelling English teacher.

Play Pretend Job: Pompey Crew Design is myself and my bro-in-crime Kevin Barthaud, and we made Witch: The Road to Lindisfarne, a game about burning a young woman. And we’re currently working on The Marquis of Ferrara, a game about murder and courtly intrigue.