Phase 2 -- Stat Blocks

I now have a pretty comprehensive spreadsheet compiling the names, places, factions, etc., from non-5e D&D campaigns of today and yesteryear. These campaigns include:

• Alien 
• Cyberwars (with all of its prequels, sequels, and spinoffs)
• Dark Enigma
• Doctor Who
• Earth Commanders
• The Ladder
• The Other World
• Project Descartes
• Tales of the Ternion
• Torchlight
• The Vanguard Saga

Putting the spreadsheet together was the main objective of this phase of my project. However, in order to create a true multiverse where characters from various campaigns can cross over and interact with each other, the characters all need compatible game stats. The list above reflects a wide range of rules systems, from the Alien RPG (Alien) to TinyD6 (Dark Enigma) to 4e D&D (Torchlight). As I noted in a previous post, I've opted for the Cypher System as the common platform for the Front Porch multiverse. As such, my last step for Phase 2 is to assign a Cypher System level and stat block to all the characters in the spreadsheet. The core rulebook is a huge help, but I also picked up a copy of the Cypher System Bestiary, which looks like it will give me enough examples to balance characters from such wildly different genres.

Phase 1 Underway!

I mentioned last month that I've elected to use the Cypher System for my upcoming Vanguard sci-fi campaign and, ideally, all new campaigns in the Front Porch Multiverse going forward. (Side note: Big thank-you to my good friend Matt for really diving into the Cypher System rules!) One of the advantages of this system is that it's genre-agnostic, so it can be used for fantasy, modern, cyberpunk, or whatever. With a single ruleset, it will be super-duper easy for PCs and NPCs alike to cross over from one campaign to another. 

That got me thinking that I should pull together my notes from various campaigns -- names, places, storylines, adventure summaries, and the like -- and put them all into a single spreadsheet like the enormous one I created for the Druid Cycle campaign world. I have really great documentation from campaigns of the last few years -- Dark Enigma, Doctor Who, Tales of the Ternion -- so Phase 1 of my project is just to grab all that stuff and put it into one file. That's the easy part. 

Phase 2 is to go back to the not-so-well-documented campaigns of yesteryear, such as the Cyberwars series, and comb through my remaining notes for all the relevant info I can find. (Tim W, prepare to have your brain wracked!) The goal isn't to track down every last NPC name or obscure location, but essentially to mine those disparate records for anything that might help enrich future Front Porch Multiverse campaigns. 

Phase 3? I don't even want to think about it yet, but the final step is surely to merge the sheet created in the first two phases with the existing Druid Cycle spreadsheet to create one definitive repository of campaign data.

Cypher System

Recently the boys got me thinking about running a campaign set in my Vanguard universe, a sci-fi setting that has its origins in my very early childhood and has remained with me to this day. Most of my modern-setting campaigns -- from the cyberpunk Cyberwars (early 1990s) through the superheroes of Tales of the Ternion (2022) -- are essentially prequels of the Vanguard story. 

I've been looking around for an appropriate game system for this campaign, and gave the Alien RPG serious consideration, along with some d20-based systems. The boys, Nathaniel in particular, have broken the TinyD6 system (damn their incredible math skills!), so I needed something a bit more robust. I landed on Monte Cook's Cypher System, and now I'm kicking myself that I didn't find it sooner. This would have been the perfect system for all non-fantasy campaigns in my Front Porch multiverse. We could have used it for Tales of the Ternion, Doctor Who, Dark Enigma, and so many others. Well, better late than never! The Cypher System is now the official game engine of the multiverse.

Welcome to Wenro

We're inching closer to starting our zombie apocalypse game! I set up the buildings that form the core of Wenro Center, a small community off of Interstate 86 in western New York. All the buildings (as well as the smaller terrain elements and townspeople) were printed on our 3D printer and -- for better or for worse -- painted by yours truly. 

Nary a zombie to be found! Well, at least, not yet...

This story is set in the same world and time period as our Tales of the Ternion campaign, but it's a horror/survival theme rather than comic book superheroes, and the title will be Dark Enigma -- named after a spooky campaign of yesteryear. Can't wait to get started!

TWD DOA

Sometime this week, we'll be receiving a package that contains various materials for The Walking Dead RPG, which I was glad to back on Kickstarter. It will make for some fun reading material over the Thanksgiving holiday, but unfortunately it won't serve as the rules system for our upcoming zombie campaign. 

Nathaniel and I have spent many hours combing through the PDF version of the core rulebook, and we both came to the conclusion that the system really needs to be used for "theater of the mind" gaming, and is altogether impractical for a fully 3D campaign like the one I've been cooking up. The rules are fast and fun, and -- like its sister game, the Alien RPG -- shockingly lethal to player characters. They are also abstract. Like, really abstract. This is not a game for maps and miniatures, let alone an entirely 3D environment. Nathaniel and I went down some house-ruling rabbit holes but ultimately were rewriting the game. We even explored the possibility of re-skinning Alien for a modern setting, but that don't work out very well either. 

As such, I've landed on the TinyD6 system, which we used for the Tales of the Ternion superhero campaign and then again more recently for our Doctor Who game. I really wanted to make TWD work, but I guess it just wasn't meant to be.

Butts and Zombies

With Matthew and Amy at a swim meet this weekend, Nathaniel and I have been keeping ourselves busy with some gaming fun. I completed Delphine's renowned Another World on my Evercade, albeit with some assistance from the internet to get past some of the more opaque puzzles. I gave Future Wars a go, but the port to Evercade makes a certain early section of the game unplayable due to the Evercade's controls, so I'm wondering if users of this recently released cart will complain loudly enough for some sort of patch to be released. Undaunted, I moved on to a third Delphine title, Operation Stealth, a James Bond-style adventure that's been loads of fun so far -- even though I haven't yet managed to get my secret agent through customs and out of the airport!

When Nathaniel finished his homework, we got down to business with a few hilarious games of Butts in Space, and then turned to more serious business: adapting the brand-new The Walking Dead RPG rules for use in our upcoming family campaign (a loose sequel to the recent Tales of the Ternion) that will utilize all the 3D buildings I've printed (and laboriously painted) and hordes of zombies from Zombicide (also laboriously painted). The TWG rules don't quite meet our needs; the main sticking point is that combat with walkers is abstracted and not played out round-by-round, whereas our fully 3D campaign will require much more precise rules for how many walkers there are, how far away from the heroes they are, etc. Nathaniel is always up for discussing game rules, however, so I think we'll land on some solid house rules before our packed calendar affords us time to get the campaign started.

TWD Inbound!

I received an email indicating that The Walking Dead RPG that I backed on Kickstarter is going to be shipping soon! We'll be using this system (which features the same core game mechanics as the Alien RPG) for a Front Porch Multiverse campaign that is, in some ways, a loose sequel to our recent Tales of the Ternion superhero story. The intrepid heroes of this new game will be trapped by a devastating winter storm in a remote corner of upstate New York just as a zombie outbreak is occurring all around them.

This campaign will also be the first we've ever done that uses entirely 3D terrain. As I've mentioned over the past year or so, I've printed out and painted numerous buildings and countless smaller objects (tables,  beds, garbage cans, etc.). The campaign will feature three distinct settings -- the "downtown" of a small community, a top-secret military base, and a survivalist compound in the wilderness -- that the players will explore. The final task in my long list of preparations is to round up the zombies because, well, you know, you kinda need zombies for a zombie campaign! The minis from the excellent cooperative board game Zombicide are the same scale as the minis we use for our RPG campaigns, so I've pressed them into service. And, yes, I'm painting them. I was able to repurpose fifty-six miniatures from Zombicide, so I'm now in the midst of slapping some color on them. They won't be great, but no two will be the same, and at least they'll look better than flat gray plastic.

Done!

For better or for worse, I finished painting all the 3D buildings that I printed out last year. It's a big milestone that gets us closer to the massive zombie apocalypse campaign that I've planned for Amy and the boys. It will be our first-ever all-3D campaign, with three fully-fleshed-out locations (a sleepy town in upstate New York, a military base, and a survivalist compound) and enough random odds and ends to create ad hoc wilderness settings as well. I'll share photos here on the blog as the players encounter each of the major locations. 

And now that Matthew and I have repaired our 3D printer, we can actually print more buildings. But that would be crazy, right...?

A Year Already?

I used to keep detailed game session notes back in high school -- probably still accessible on the hard drive of our old Tandy 1000SX in my father's basement! -- but I got away from the practice as an adult and always regretted it. I resolved to start drafting session notes again when the boys and I started Tales of the Ternion, a superhero campaign that was, essentially, a sequel to my first-ever campaign, Earth Commanders. I was just looking through some records and noticed that Tales began exactly one year ago today. Wow, a whole year! I'm surprised it's been that long. 

I'm really proud of Tales, and would rank it among my top ten or even top five campaigns of all time. It was character-driven, dealt with a lot of weighty and topical issues, and featured some really nifty plot twists -- all while stitching together the most important threads from our modern-setting campaigns of the '80s and '90s, bringing them fully into the Front Porch multiverse. We'll be returning to the setting of Tales in a few months with a follow-up campaign, for which I'll be using all that 3D-printed terrain I've been painting...

What's Next?

The boys are inching closer to the end of our Tales of the Ternion superhero campaign. Well, not the end, but the climax of the current story arc. This campaign has really exceeded my wildest expectations, and it's been an absolute joy to weave together all those old modern-setting Front Porch campaigns from the '90s into something like a single narrative that fits neatly within this multiverse. I have a follow-up campaign planned out that will take place during the same timeframe and involve some of the same characters, but that game requires our 3D terrain, and, well, we all know that I haven't made too much progress in painting it!

So, what's next? Matthew asked me yesterday what's on tap for after we finish this phase of Tales. For the first time in a long time, I don't have the next thing lined up. I anticipate we'll wrap this storyline around Christmastime, so I'll get a bit of a breather as the boys and I devote our time toward some of their awesome gaming-related gifts. But what is the next campaign? I have to admit that I'm not terribly motivated to cook up another long-term adventure in either the fantasy or sci-fi settings of the Shattered Realm universe and would much rather get the boys into the Druid Cycle, but they know little about that setting and don't seem especially eager to dive in at this point. I get it -- the Shattered Realm stuff is what they know and love. 

Meanwhile, I've been buying and painting Doctor Who Exterminate! miniatures as that wargame line nears the end of its lifespan. I'm looking forward to playing out some cool "what if?" battles, like Cybermen vs. Ice Warriors, or a Time War conflict of Gallifreyans vs. Daleks. But hey, since I've got all these great minis, why not use them for a roleplaying campaign too? Dare I try my hand at a Doctor Who storyline? It feels almost like sacrilege for me to approach that setting, but I would dearly love to get the boys interested in the Whoniverse. So, I'll put on my thinking cap (a fez, of course) and see what ideas start to grow...

Monday TARDIS Blues

Grandfather Nurgle was the guest of honor at our Thanksgiving this year (henceforth it will be known as "That Pancake Thanksgiving"), and he continued to share his blessings on my birthday. Since we weren't in any shape to continue our Tales of the Ternion superhero campaign, I tried to get some painting done. As I'm still trying to avoid tackling the growing pile (it's now a full shelf) of 3D-printed buildings, I made some progress on my Doctor Who Exterminate! miniatures, finishing up my unit of UNIT infantry. I got to work on the TARDIS and thought I could knock it out quickly. Hey, it's only two colors, right? Well, even with careful drybrushing to get the tiny raised lettering of "Police Box" and "Public Call", I managed to screw up the "Public Call" on one side really badly. I could strip off all the paint and start the whole model over from scratch, but I also have to acknowledge that my my kids and I are the only ones who will ever see this stuff and it doesn't have to be perfect. Heck, the boys have been playing a multi-battle campaign with the Necrons against all of our other factions and half the models they're using are half-finished, just undercoated, or not even painted at all! They're having fun, and that's what matters at the end of the day. I need to learn that lesson, because I was still grumbling about the janky TARDIS lettering on my way to work this morning. Going through all the emails I missed over the long weekend, I saw that my team had chipped in to get me a Games Workshop gift certificate for my birthday. I'm going to spend it on something fun that the boys and I can all enjoy together, and not worry so much if it's painted to a "parade ready" (or even "battle ready") standard. 

(That sounded convincing, right?)

So...many...buildings...

We've made a lot of 28mm-scale buildings with our 3D printer. A lot. The intent is to use all this 3D terrain for modern-setting campaigns in the Front Porch multiverse. For example, our Tales of the Ternion superhero campaign currently uses flat maps, but it's just crying out for a more dynamic environment to host all the larger-than-life action of characters who can scale walls, leap over buildings, hurl vehicles down the street, etc. I'm also knee-deep in narrative for a spinoff campaign that involves a zombie outbreak in a sleepy little town. With scores of zombie minis from Zombicide, the vast array of 3D buildings we've printed, and custom hero minis from Hero Forge, it's going to have absolutely blockbuster visuals! 

There's only one problem: I have to paint all this stuff!

Looking at the gargantuan pile of gray plastic in the corner of our game room actually fills me with anxiety. First-world problems, I know, but I'm kind of freaking out about how long it's going to take to paint these buildings. I'm also looking for any excuse to put it off, so various other paint projects keep moving to the head of the line. Just yesterday, in fact, I received the latest free mini that comes with my Warhammer+ subscription; it's a chaos sorcerer (with a bevy of cute-yet-evil little familiars!) for Warhammer Age of Sigmar, but I'll repurpose it for our Shattered Realm D&D campaign. After that? Well, do I have any other unpainted models besides the buildings...?

Super Cars

The National Automobile Museum in Reno is one of my very favorite museums. The last time we took the boys there, they probably weren't old enough to appreciate it. 

As we toured the exhibits today, I treated my family to an impromptu retrospective on my beloved Elmira's many connections to automotive history, from the Philion quadricycle to American LaFrance fire engines to the Brothers Bodine. Here's a shot of their American LaFrance engine, manufacturing in good old Elmira, New York!

They also had one of the old Adam West-era Batmobiles on display, which Matthew was excited to see after getting into a lot of Batman video games lately. 

The reason for this post, however, is a connection to our Tales of the Ternion campaign. I nearly walked right past this beautiful Lincoln-Zephyr...

It then dawned on me that it was the favored vehicle of Ian "I'm missing a finger!" Silverstone, the British used-car salesman who has factored in numerous Front Porch campaigns set during the middle part of the twentieth century. The boys learned about Silverstone recently in our Tales superhero campaign as they've been working to unravel a decades-long conspiracy that links together all of my modern-setting campaigns.

First 3D Building!

Behold, our first 3D-printed building! This warehouse features double doors that actually slide open and a removable roof to allow access to the interior. 

Matthew has already claimed it as his hero's lair in our Tales of the Ternion campaign! Next up, we'll be printing a pizza shop. It's not Picnic Pizza, but it will have to suffice!

Hot Off the Presses!

The image isn't great, but Matthew has made a successful test run of our first custom-designed Hero Forge mini that we've printed on our own 3D printer. 

We took what we learned from the Hero Forge sample mini and created a more streamlined figure that requires fewer supports and has fewer skinny appendages that would easily break. I can quickly shave off the stringy filament residue and have this mini ready for painting in no time, in stark contrast to the hour it took me to carve the previous mini out of her plastic scaffolding and then re-assemble her broken parts. 

This generic helmeted trooper will work great for our futuristic Shattered Realm campaigns as well as our current Tales of the Ternion superhero game!

The Printer Prints!

And now the 3D printer prints! We were on the phone tonight troubleshooting with my software engineer brother-in-law, and he suggested loading the sample printable files onto a different micro SD card to rule out a faulty card. Nathaniel had another such micro SD, so we tried using that one in the 3D printer -- and it worked! We ended up with a cute little dog that Nathaniel has already claimed. Next up: Matthew is going to design a simple but usable miniature -- something we can bring right into our Tales of the Ternion superhero campaign -- and purchase the STL file so that we can try printing it at home!

Tales of the Ternion

The 3D printer has been something of a bust. Although all the mechanical components are fine -- the motors work as expected and the extruder heats the filament properly -- the printer essentially freezes whenever we initiate a print job. I'm thinking it must be a firmware issue, so I hope the manufacturer's tech support folks can walk us through a potential fix. Otherwise, back to Amazon it goes! 

The boys are pretty disappointed, but the blow was softened a bit by the start of our long-anticipated superhero campaign, Tales of the Ternion. Drawing upon characters and themes from all of my past modern-setting campaigns (superhero and otherwise), I've concocted a fiendishly complex web of mysteries and conspiracies for the boys to unravel. After just a few sessions (rather, "issues"), they're knee-deep in cryptic clues and feeling proud that they've been able to answer a few questions. I think we need to finish up Cursed City before we get too deep in this campaign, but it's been a fun treat over this long weekend!

Multiverse Mayhem

Don't ask me when we're going to find the time to run it, but I've been cooking up a new campaign for the boys that will link together many of the modern-setting storylines from across the Front Porch multiverse. Starting out as a direct sequel to Earth Commanders -- the first-ever Front Porch campaign from way back in 1988 -- and pulling in key characters and/or themes from The Other World, Cyberwars, and many more, this yet-to-be-titled story will give Matthew and Nathaniel a good foundation in our extensive catalog of non-fantasy campaigns. It's also an opportunity for me to untangle needless complexities and create a clearer narrative throughline from our earliest modern-setting campaign (The Ladder, set in 1895) through the various Cyberwars games of the late twenty-first century. More details to follow as this campaign takes shape, but I'm excited to get into some design work again!

Heroes Are on Their Way!

"We've been waiting for, like, a year!" Matthew tells me. It's actually been a lot longer than that, but the Amazing Heroes action figures from two successful Kickstarter campaigns are now on their way to our house. The boys -- myself included, of course! -- are excited for the action figures, but I'm also eager to introduce them to a related RPG mini-campaign (recycling the title Tales of the Ternion) that I've cooked up using these and other public domain Golden Age superheroes. The idea is to give the boys some more experience with roleplaying and cooperative storytelling outside the usual venue of D&D. I'm not sure how it will go, but it should be an interesting experiment.

Quintessence War

In 2015, the multiverse goes to war.