June Update #2 (new stuff for you!)
about 2 years ago – Fri, Jun 24, 2022 at 10:11:24 PM

That's right folks, it's June and I've got new Stealing the Throne stuff for you!

(Ahh, Stryker Eureka. The pride of my homeland.)

Current Status

• Galaxy map stretch goal complete! Lone Archivist has finished mapping the Throne-touched Milky Way galaxy of the distant future, and it is glorious. More details below, but you can find it in your BackerKit downloads now.
• New playsets! Thanks to the kind generosity of the Ancient Hero backers, you now have two new Thrones to steal: the horror-themed Solemn Antic, and Alpha Regalis, the First Throne. Again, more details below, but you can download these bonus playsets from itch.io or BackerKit now.
• Solo rules drafting underway. I've been thinking hard about the rhythm of solo Throne heists, and I reckon I've got most of the details mapped out. Now to test and refine them!

How do I get my stuff?

I hear you. You don't have much time. Who does, when the world is falling apart and there are epic heists to plan and execute? If you just want to know where to get your stuff, I've got you:

• Galaxy map: Lone Archivist's stunning galaxy map is in your BackerKit downloads. You should receive an email notification (entitled New Digital Content for Stealing the Throne) with a link. If you've lost your BackerKit survey you can find it again by following this link: https://stealing-the-throne.backerkit.com/.
• Bonus playsets: The new Ancient Hero playsets for the Solemn Antic and Alpha Regalis are available on the Stealing the Throne itch page: https://ickbat.itch.io/stealing-the-throne. You can also pick them up from your BackerKit downloads, as described above. If you do head over to itch.io, why not give the game a quick 5-star rating? I'd be very grateful!

(If your first thought on reading "how do I get my stuff?" was "heist!", then you get me.)

Galaxy map stretch goal complete!

If this little teaser image isn't enough to get you excited about the galaxy map, then I don't know what will! Lone Archivist has absolutely knocked it out of the park (the gravity well?). He has designed something that is at once a perfect match for Stealing the Throne's tone, and an exemplar of his distinctive style. I've had such fun looking it over, pondering what it might mean all. Why is Belly Laugh so far from House Tarkov space? What is South Wind doing there instead? What has drawn the Burning Soldier to the Galactic Centre? So many questions...  

There are plenty of little easter eggs in there, too. Like, oh, this one:

I'm super intrigued to see how this map gets used in play. There are no specific rules for it (yet?), which just means the field is wide open. Next time I play Stealing the Throne, I'm going to put it on the table and see what happens. How do you think you'll use it?

Two new playsets!

As part of their backer rewards, I worked with the two generous Ancient Hero backers to create custom Throne playsets. Those playsets were finalised last month, and both backers kindly offered to share them with the world. You, and everyone who buys Stealing the Throne, can now download these bonus playsets from https://ickbat.itch.io/stealing-the-throne!

ALPHA REGALIS

Alpha Regalis is the First Throne, the template on which all subsequent Thrones were based. It towers over its younger siblings, faster and more powerful than any of them, a true symbol of greatness. But it also has another name, whispered only in hidden places: the Flawed Throne.

THE SOLEMN ANTIC

In the darkest hour of the great war, desperate for a new weapon, we hacked together a Throne from four failed prototypes. It saved us then, but as the years wore on we learned that the thing we had created was not entirely right. The Solemn Antic was broken, in strange and terrible ways.

Both playsets are broadly structured like the ones in the rulebook, but we took the opportunity to add a couple of special rules to make each a little unique: a little something to emphasise the horrifying nature of the Solemn Antic, and a mighty dilemma for any would-be Alpha Regalis thieves.

Designing both of these playsets was an absolute blast. Both backers brought absolutely fabulous ideas to the table, from the pitch-perfect names to the brilliant themes, and many of the details that make up the backstories of these two ancient machines. They pushed the designs off in directions I wouldn't have dreamed up on my own. I think the Solemn Antic and Alpha Regalis are perfect complements to the existing Thrones, bringing two very different play experiences to the table. 

It was a real joy working with the Ancient Heroes, and I'm glad that you all get a chance to see (and then steal) what they helped create!

Next Steps

• Get the solo rules done. I think the basics are in place, so next up is some playtesting, getting a few extra eyes on it, and drafting up the final rulebook. If you'd like a sneak preview, I'll probably be asking folks on the ickbat games discord for their feedback soon!

Elaborate heist?

- Nick

May Update #2 (with thoughts on heist scene framing)
about 2 years ago – Wed, May 25, 2022 at 02:07:18 AM

Welcome to May. These Thrones won't steal themselves, so let's get to it!

(Pictured: me, making my getaway.)

Current Status

• Ancient Hero playsets complete! The Alpha Regalis and Solemn Antic playsets have now been delivered to their respective Ancient Hero backers. That means the core Stealing the Throne Kickstarter is fully delivered, which is pretty exciting news. All that's left is the stretch goals, and speaking of which...  
• Galaxy map nearing completion! I have a near-final version of the Milky Way map from Lone Archivist, and it's looking glorious. I can't wait to share it with you all!
• Solo heist planning begins. With the Ancient Hero playsets out of the way, I've started working on the final stretch goal: rules for playing Stealing the Throne solo. We've done a bit of brainstorming over on discord, so pop in if you have thoughts!

Heist scene framing

In games of Stealing the Throne, it's the Throne's job to describe a seemingly-impossible obstacle for the Thief to overcome. I've noticed that Throne players tend to do this one of two ways, which I've come to think of as soft framing and hard framing:

• Soft framing: The Throne describes an obstacle in the abstract, and then asks the Thief how they plan to overcome it. Using this information, the Throne and the Thief then work together to frame a specific scene. "There is an impenetrable force shield blocking entry to the Throne's command deck. To unlock it, you need to turn two quantum-entangled keys simultaneously: one on the Throne itself, and another on a secret facility hidden in the eye of a planet-sized storm on a gas giant twenty light years away. What's your plan?"  
• Hard framing: The Throne frames a specific scene, with the thief already in the action, and then asks Thief what they do. "You're standing before a crackling forcefield blocking entry to the Throne's command deck. You can see the lock where you'll need to turn a key, which sounds easy, but you'll need to do it at the exact same instant as another quantum-entangled key is turned in a matching lock on a secret facility twenty light years away. Oh, and there's a patrol of Storm Knights due in about thirty seconds. What do you do?" 

Both of these methods work -- I've certainly used them both, depending on the players and the needs of the session. Soft framing tends to lead to more elaborate plans, whereas hard framing generally gets to the action quicker.

It was during an excellent game of Rise and Fall this week (which you can listen to on Black Armada Tales) that the brilliant Becky Annison proposed a third type of framing. Let's call it Leverage framing:

• Leverage framing: The Throne frames a scene where it appears that everything has already gone wrong. The Thief then explains (possibly in flashback) how this was part of the plan all along. "The Storm Captain pulls the forged key from your hand as two of his Knights pin your arms behind your back. 'Did you really think this would work?' he sneers. 'To open this forcefield you need to turn this key at the same time as its quantum pair, twenty light years away. You've missed your window, and that means your accomplice on Squall Station - whoever they were - is already dead. You'll join them soon.' How are you going to get out of this one?"

So next time you're playing, why not try mixing up how you frame your scenes? And if you've got any other techniques you like to use, I'd love to hear them!

The Indie RPG Newsletter 

This month I also want to shout out The Indie RPG Newsletter, which is a weekly newsletter on the indie TTRPG universe written by Thomas Manuel (who also happens to be an excellent game designer). Thomas recently played Stealing the Throne, and was kind enough to feature it in last week's newsletter (thank you, Thomas!). I feel like he perfectly captured what I was going for in his writeup: "What is extra fun about these tight storygames is that the action and drama very seamlessly takes on an epic scale as players realise that there's nothing stopping them from going over the top." Exactly!

I heartily recommend subscribing to the newsletter -- not only are Thomas' musings on game design insightful and thought-provoking, he also curates a really excellent list of interesting bits and pieces from around the indie TTRPG sphere every week. It's great stuff!

Next Steps

• Finish mapping the galaxy. The ball is in my court now on the galaxy map stretch goal -- as soon as I can get my comments to Lone Archivist, he can work on those finishing touches. It's going to be ace!
• Sketch out a solo alpha draft, and playtest it. I was very excited when we hit this stretch goal, and now I get to work on it. Truly, I am grateful to you for all of your support! 

Steady... Almost there...

- Nick

April Update #2 (oof!)
about 2 years ago – Sun, Apr 24, 2022 at 04:07:34 PM

April, hey? What a month.

(Pictured: my encounter with April.)

Current Status

• So, April happened. To be honest, I should've seen it coming. April is always a ridiculously busy month at my day job, which makes it incredibly difficult to find the energy and brain space for creative work. As a result, this update is going to be short and sweet!
• Star chart brief with Lone Archivist. I did manage to prep a detailed brief for the star chart stretch goal, which is now with Lone Archivist - lots of juicy details for him to sprinkle across the Milky Way of a thousand years (and more) hence. This was super fun, drawing a little on my background as an astrophysicist, and with some top-flight inspiration from the ickbat games discord (thanks, team!).
• Played Stealing the Crone! I’m writing this from a gaming getaway with some very dear friends, and yesterday we played Logan Timmins’ Stealing the Crone. Our loveable scamps managed to create enough mayhem for Titus the Indomitable (aka Gramps) to sneak out of The Hero’s Rest, a home for retired adventurers. It was just the most ridiculous, charming fun - highly, highly recommended!

An idle design challenge for you

Last week, tabletop hobby journalist Chase Carter published an interesting article on Polygon about the preview of the Marvel Multiverse Role-Playing Game. The article began with the following:

"Why do we enjoy superhero stories? This question kept nagging me while I read through an early preview of the Marvel Multiverse Role-Playing Game.”

This immediately felt to me like a game design challenge: figure out why I enjoy superhero stories, and design a game to match. Of course, a bunch of indie game designers have already done this: Chris Longhurst's See Issue X, W. H. Arthur's Superhero Cinematic Universe TTRPG, and Jeff Stormer's Anyone Can Wear The Mask to name just three excellent examples. What’s most interesting to me about a challenge like this is that each designer’s answer is going to be different, unique to them. I don't know what my answer is yet (it probably has something to do with cosmic supers), but I'm going to be thinking about it in my idle moments.

In many ways, Stealing the Throne is my response to a similar question about heist stories. In that spirit, let me throw this design challenge to you:

• Why do you enjoy heist stories?
• How would you add to or tweak Stealing the Throne to reflect that?

Answers in a Kickstarter comment, tweet, or discord post!

Next Steps

• Finalise Ancient Hero playsets. With luck, I'll be able to finalise the Ancient Hero playsets in May, and then it's onwards to developing the rules for solo heists!
• Continue work on the star chart. Lone Archivist is hard at work mapping the distant future, and I'm very much looking forward to seeing what he comes up with over the next month!   

(Pictured: me, getting ready to face the rest of April.)

- Nick

March Update (a new thief joins the crew!)
over 2 years ago – Wed, Mar 23, 2022 at 03:57:58 PM

Is it really March already? The month of my birth? 

(Pictured: my encounter with the first quarter of 2022.)

Current Status

• Progress on the Ancient Hero playsets. I've had some great feedback from the Ancient Hero backers already, so my next step is to incorporate it into the drafts. I'm really pleased with how the mighty Alpha Regalis and the sinister Solemn Antic are coming together...
• Stellar cartographer secured. There's an exciting new addition to the Stealing the Throne crew! Read on to find out who will be handling the campaign's final stretch goal. ('Stellar cartography' is a pretty great area of expertise for a thief, come to think of it.) 
• Check out this amazing review of Stealing the Throne on The Alexandrian! A big thank you to Justin for playing the game and taking the time to write it up!

Lone Archivist joins the crew

Do you remember the last stretch goal we hit, to produce an illustrated star chart filled with story seeds from a thousand years of history? I'm excited to say that Lone Archivist will be tackling that project!

A designer from Southern California, Lone Archivist is inspired by the beauty of the cosmos, the horror of the dark, and the quiet between notes. He has published several micro games and adventures including two full-length third party modules for Mothership - Primeval and What We Give To Alien Gods. He has also designed and contributed to several other published and upcoming projects including Hull Breach (Anodyne Printware) and Orbital Blues (Soul Muppet Publishing).

I've been a big fan of Lone Archivist's visual style ever since I picked up Epsilon Outpost, which is a super interesting experiment in using PDF layers for RPG map design. And of course there's the forthcoming In Other Waters: Tidebreak, about which I am very excited. I can't wait to see what happens when his rad wireframe-y sci-fi stylings meet the brief for this project!

Why not welcome Lone Archivist to the crew by checking out some of his work?

#StealingTheJam: one week to go!

That's right, it's crunch time. The March 31st deadline for submissions to Stealing the Jam is now officially a week away (eep!).

Will any more hacks, playsets, or mods sneak in under the wire? Will my entry be done in time? Keep an eye on the jam page to find out!

The Black Armada heist

Have you listened to the Black Armada Tales actual play of Stealing the Throne yet? If not, now is the perfect time! The final episode of the heist went live on March 9th, ending with Tensword's explosive getaway from the harbour capital of House Tetsudo. Who made it out with the Throne? Who went out in a blaze of glory? And what exactly does the mysterious Primaris Device do? Only one way to find out!

(If you have listened, let us know what you thought -- you can find most of the crew on twitter, and the ickbat games discord is always open for chats.)

Next Steps

• Finalise Ancient Hero playsets. I'm hoping to wrap up the Ancient Hero playsets in April, at which point I can move on to the final stretch goal: lone thieves on epic solo heists!
• Work with Lone Archivist on developing the star chart. This will undoubtedly be the most fun part of my month...

Spaaaaace!

- Nick

February Update (one year on!)
over 2 years ago – Tue, Feb 22, 2022 at 11:26:17 PM

Well, here we are. One year since you all helped make Stealing the Throne a reality. Hopefully you've all received your zines by now, and maybe even executed a giant robot heist or two! 

There's a lot happening now that the game is in the world, so let's get into the update... 

Current Status

• Ancient Hero playsets drafted. I've wrapped up writing on draft playsets for Alpha Regalis and The Solemn Antic, and sent them on to the Ancient Hero backers. I'm very much looking forward to hearing what they think!
• Reaching out to potential map artists. I'm currently in contact with an exciting prospect for the interstellar map stretch goal. We'll have to see if schedules (and budgets!) align, but fingers crossed!
• First print copies for sale online! If you missed out on a print copy of the zine (especially if you're in the US), I have good news: you can now buy the zine from the Floating Chair Club! Tell you friends, head on over to the site, and tell Sam I said hi.
• A small favour? If you like Stealing the Throne, I'd be grateful if you popped over to the game's itch page and gave it a rating! A comment on the page is also a great help - maybe a mini-review, or a brief recount of one of your own heists?

Actual people actually playing  

Since we last spoke, two Stealing the Throne actual plays have appeared:

• Friends at the Table. The incredibly talented folks at Friends at the Table have played Stealing the Throne as part of the Road to PALISADE, the build-up to their next mecha season. They literally try to steal a Divine! This is hugely exciting for me - I love Friends at the Table, and their mecha seasons have been a huge inspiration. It's honestly hard to explain what it means to me as a game designer that they played my game. The episode is currently Patreon only, but you can bet I'll let you know when it's in the wild!
• Black Armada Tales. You all know I'm on an actual play podcast, right? With four excellent humans, some of whom also design excellent games? We've just wrapped up a long-running Apocalypse Keys campaign, so we figured it was time to steal Tensword! This is a great place to hear how I facilitate the game, with a top-notch crew of talented Throne thieves. If you do give it a listen, I'd love to hear what you think!
• Also, big thank you to Adam Bell on the Have You Played This? YouTube channel for including Stealing the Throne in the inaugural episode of Games Ive Read And Want to Play. It's a great list of games (including some other #ZineQuest3 alumni) and I'm very grateful to be on it! (Hey Adam, if you do play it, let me know how it goes!)

If you're on a roleplaying podcast, channel, blog, or stream and you'd like to play or talk about Stealing the Throne, please reach out to me! I'd love to chat, or help out any way I can.

#StealingTheJam: five weeks to go!

The deadline for #StealingTheJam submissions is March 31st - that's five weeks away! Entries have slowed since we last spoke, but I'm hoping a few more will arrive before we hit that deadline. Maybe something you're working on?

In the meantime, there are three excellent hacks already available that I haven't spoken about yet:

SAVE OUR SOULS, by The Dice

You sold your soul to The Damned One and now you regret it. It's time to break into their domain and take it back! I really like what Save Our Souls does with the thieves' motivation - though each thief followed a different path to get where they are, they're united by a shared experience and a shared goal. I'd wager that makes for a really interesting dynamic in play. Plus, who wouldn't want to break into "an ever collapsing timewarped spire" to steal back their soul?!

(I played Stealing the Throne with The Dice at Dragonmeet - they were responsible for possibly the finest blaze of glory that I've ever seen in a getaway. Top notch stuff.)

SEALING THE FATE, by Nick Wedig

For generations, your order of witches has watched for the arrival of a Chosen One who is prophesied to seize divine power, and you're tired of waiting. You're going to secretly shepherd a hopeful towards their fate and, at the last moment, steal their power. Sealing the Fate is a really interesting hack which makes extensive use of a Tarot deck both in gameplay and as an oracle: to decide who the Chosen One is, to name your coven of witches, to guide the creation of prophesied events, and so on. In a way, Nick has managed to incorporate playset-style aides directly into the game using the Tarot. It's really clever, and a perfect match for the game's theme.

STEALING THE CRONE, by Logan Timmins

It's time for the most epic heist of all: busting your grandparent out of their retirement home! (Not that you need to bust them out - they love where they live, and they could leave anytime. But they also love a bit of mischief!) Stealing the Crone is the sweetest, wildest, most charming thing. The concept is genius, and Logan's execution matches the theme beautifully, right up to a lovely optional debrief where you reflect on your own relationship with your grandparents. 

Folks, I love Stealing the Crone so much. It's the most joyful thing. I can't wait to play it!

Zine Month 2022

You may be aware that Kickstarter have pushed Zine Quest back to August this year. In its place, we have a community-led effort called Zine Month 2022 (#ZiMo2022). There are a ton of cool indie rpg zines funding right now, across a range of crowdfunding platforms. Here are just five that have caught my eye:

• LAST SENTINELS: a mecha RPG zine by Jason Price. A GMless storytelling game about a doomed mecha pilot defending the last survivors of massive invasion as they flee aboard a titanic starship? With art by Turbo Torbo and layout by Lone Archivist?! A hundred times yes.
• Signal to Noise by Craig Duffy. An epistolary game for 2 players, who write to each other as one journeys to the stars on a generation ship and the other stays behind on Earth. This is extremely my kind of thing, and it's part of Craig's Dyson Eclipse series of games, for which I know he has big, exciting plans.
• For Small Creatures Such As We by Anna Blackwell. Based on Becky Chambers' Wayfarers series (which blew me away the first time I read it), this is a solo or co-op journalling game about small spaceship filled with an alien crew exploring the galaxy. Astrobiology, curiosity, and adorable space otters!
• Lone Eons/Lost Eons by David Blandy. David is raising art funds for Lone Eons, a solo entry in his Lost Eons series of solarpunk science-fantasy games and supplements. A mashup of 24XX and Blades in the Dark - if David didn't have me at 'solarpunk' that would've sold me!
• In Other Waters: Tidebreak by Lone Archivist. An underwater exploration adventure which can be played solo, or using the sci-fi horror game Mothership. It's based on a video game of the same name, and folks, it looks gorgeous. Another Lone Archivist project - it's going to be a long wait to November to get my hands on this one!

Most of these are ending real soon, so go support them out while you can!

Next Steps

• Finalise the Ancient Hero playsets. Once I've heard back from the Ancient Heroes, I'll finalise their playsets and get them into layout. That'll be the last of the pre-stretch goal rewards signed off!
• #StealingTheJam entries. I've got one I'm hoping to work on in March. Maybe (hopefully!) I'll be reading yours too?
• Onward to the stretch goals. Once the Ancient Hero playsets are finalised, we've got two stretch goals waiting in the wings: the aforementioned interstellar map, and solo rules for Stealing the Throne. 

That's all for this time, folks. Gotta fly! 

- Nick