Classic City Vibes
Classic City Vibes Podcast - Conversations with people in the Athens, Oconee and surrounding communities who help make this such an amazing place to live. Learn what is going on in one of the nation’s most famous music, film and art scenes, learn about some of the amazing opportunities around us where you can be active and interact with others who have similar interests. This podcast is put out by the Athens Regional Library System where we are committed to helping build strong communities and celebrating our diversity. Engaging Communities, Exceeding Expectations.
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Classic City Vibes
Kismet Games
What happens when you take an alternate history Earth, sprinkle it with alien curses, and wrap it all in the creative chaos of the Old School Renaissance? Wayne and Dee from Kismet Games join us on Classic City Vibes to answer just that.
Kismet Games is the brainchild of Wayne Peacock. Together with writing partner Dee McKinney, they crafted the world of Rustwater, Kismet’s signature product. You can learn more about us and our writing process on our blog page. New releases twice a month.
You're listening to Classic City Vibes. I'm your host, zach Wilder, and in the studio today I have with me good friends who make up Kismet Games Wayne and Dee. Please say hi to our listeners. Hello listeners, this is Wayne.
Speaker 3:Hi everybody, this is Dee.
Speaker 1:Hi everybody. This is Zach and now that we've gotten the formal stuff out of the way, rustwater Quick start guide out now Live today. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. 40 pages of weird fantasy, old school role playing. Goodness, it's got pre-generated characters in it. It's got an adventure that's got dark magic and a submarine. The setting is dope, alternate history, earth with curse, curses abound, enigmatic aliens, overlords and, most importantly, it's pay what you want. That number should not be zero. If you're listening to this, don't make it zero, but don't take it from me. Let's hear it from Kismet Games themselves. Can you give our listeners just a proper elevator pitch for Rustwater?
Speaker 3:100 years ago. No, I'm kidding.
Speaker 1:No, do it.
Speaker 3:Okay, go for it 100 years ago there was a horrible alien apocalypse. Actually, what Rustwater is about is a bit of hope. When we conceived this game, we were in the middle of the COVID pandemic and I sometimes call it our COVID baby.
Speaker 3:I imagine there are a lot of people out there who can sympathize what it's about is a seafaring culture that fell under, and when we say alien, we mean otherworldly, not necessarily green men from space that invoked these four terrible curses on humanity red thorn, monstrous nativity, word, worms and the elemental riot. This set back the civilization a thousand years. It reduced, say, what would have been analogous to 18th century European culture, probably back at least 500 years. When we say it's about hope, what I want to say is that when play starts, it's not the happiest world in the world Wait a minute, that's dumb. It's not the happiest world, but the players can make it that way. And one reason that is so important to me is, as a person who's been gaming since 1980, I don't like games where my actions as a player can't have some sort of change and impact on the world. That's quite important to me.
Speaker 2:Rustwater. What intrigues me about it is that we really started with a story about these four curses that would fall on humanity, that would dismantle their culture. Some of them are very personal, like the monstrous nativity, which means that not only humans, but every all living things gave birth to more alien versions of themselves. So they're not only, you know, humans that are giving birth to monstrous and I'm yeah, you can't see my air quotes. I will, I will, I will edit that in post.
Speaker 1:See my air quotes. I will edit that in post and add air quotes into the. Thank you monstrous yeah.
Speaker 2:So I mean, not only are they giving birth to monstrous creatures, but, like you know, nature is changing as well and becoming more alien and and more otherworldly. And we just had a lot of fun like, ok, if we take these four curses as real, what would really have happened and then tried to write the magic system to, you know that you know there's, you know sanity, um and and and hopelessness to a certain degree, you know also would have been, also would have occurred because of these four curses and um, and more than other games that I've written. I think this is really a setting with a system built to support that. But the setting is really the key.
Speaker 1:What I was going to respond with what I was going to say before you added your last sentence. There was what I'm getting is the setting came first and the system came second. Right sentence there was. What I'm getting is the setting came first and the system came second, which is interesting because I think that, from what I have read online, most people when they set out to make a tabletop role-playing game, they start with the system and then build the setting out. But I think that there is a lot of advantages. There are a lot of advantages to starting setting first, because you have the context of what your players will do and you can design your mechanics around that assumption that you have as an author knowing how the world works Exactly, author knowing how the world works Exactly and I would say everything flows from that setting and everything is extrapolated from those four curses.
Speaker 3:They touch everything in the world and the system as well.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, we spent a lot of time. In fact, I think we went through three major game systems.
Speaker 3:Yep, that sounds right.
Speaker 2:Before we landed on the one that has stuck. It's very simple it is it's definitely in the OSR.
Speaker 1:That's old school renaissance.
Speaker 2:for those who don't know, yeah right, it means minimalist mechanical games. There's not. You know, this is not a game where you're going to sit down and agonize over your feet, choices or whatever. That's not what the game is trying to do.
Speaker 1:Good, there's plenty of that. There's too much of that, in my opinion, in the current zeitgeist, especially with the most recent addition of I don't know your mom's favorite role-playing game, or whatever they call it these days.
Speaker 2:I'm not there to ruin anybody's fun. No, not at all, but that's not what we wanted this game to be about. We really wanted it to keep the focus on the setting and what's happening, not too much the mechanics.
Speaker 1:Okay. Well, I was going to ask what the system was based on, but if that's not what's important, let's move on.
Speaker 3:I think it is important to say real quickly it's based on Black Sword Hack.
Speaker 1:Okay, gotcha.
Speaker 3:And it's a brisk frisky system. That's what I call it.
Speaker 1:Brisk and frisky. Brisk and frisky. Huh, okay, brisket, yeah, brisky, okay right.
Speaker 2:No, it's a I mean for those people who are system folks. It's a roll under system. You have some stats, you know you want to do something. You know again, we caution people that if it's something that's not, you know, interesting to the game and this person, the character, should be able to do it, then they do it and let's just move on. But otherwise it's just you roll dice and if you roll under, whatever the number is, you did the thing.
Speaker 1:It's fiction, first right. We're trying to explore a world and in that process of exploration and play, we're trying to grasp onto that ephemeral story that can only come from a role-playing game. That's it. That's exactly how I like to play, which is great, because I was hoping one of you is going to run Rustwater again at Rook and Pond. I think we will. I don't think I'm running this time. I think I would much rather Well, they're not doing it on Black Friday this year.
Speaker 3:Because it Georgia-Georgia Tech game is that night.
Speaker 2:So they would have no parking. But they're going to do the game event, but they're going to probably push it into January or February. Oh word, Different day.
Speaker 1:Okay, okay, I don't think I'm going to run anything. I would much rather just play in whatever one of you is going to run, hopefully a rest water, because I have been dying to play this game. And speaking of, I guess, the next thing I want to know about Rustwater is what is your favorite thing that has happened in, I guess, the fiction of the game or an instance at the table, or you know? I guess if it's roll under, I guess a 20 is the worst thing you can roll.
Speaker 2:Yeah, pretty much All those books you've been cursed with rolling ones. You've got some to look forward to.
Speaker 1:I have. There is a guy who plays in my games and D&D is his favorite, and he rolls low every time. And I'm like buddy, we should play Into the Odd or Troika or something, as you roll low instead.
Speaker 3:So my favorite is it was one of the games we ran with playtesters. I'm not going to spoil it because we'll probably publish it eventually, but it involves rescuing a bunch of orphans. Oh, I know where you're going Against their will, to save them. It's for a good reason, okay, okay, okay. And every group I playtested with came up with a different way to rescue those orphans. Some of them set the orphanage on fire. Some of them.
Speaker 1:It's a role-playing game, so therefore arson.
Speaker 3:My favorite were the drugged lollipops that the players created and gave to the orphans so they could get them out of the orphanage quietly, without the evil orphanage owners knowing about it, turning the children into boneless snakes so they could slide them outside. That was a good one.
Speaker 2:Oh, I thought this is not exactly where I thought you were. Well, it actually is the same adventure, but our good friend John was playing a character who had a spell that Dee just alluded to. That makes you boneless, and at one point.
Speaker 2:They had the child they were trying to rescue, like you know, two-year-old little, cute little baby girl, and they got trapped in a hallway and John was like looking over, like frantically trying to decide what to do, and he just had spell on the little girl and chucks her out the window because he figures a two-story fall. If you don't have any bones, you can't break any bones. And we were all like shocked.
Speaker 1:Your rib cage is there to protect your organs bud.
Speaker 2:If you're rubber, then maybe it won't hurt. So we were. It was like everybody was shocked and then we were all like, oh, now we understand what he's actually doing, and so, yeah, that was.
Speaker 1:Okay, yeah, but you explained the boneless part. Yeah yeah, where did the snake come in?
Speaker 3:I was just referring to, like when you turn something to boneless you know it's just floppy like a big boneless snake. That's all I was.
Speaker 1:I was like. I was like that feels like a wild like it's like snakes do have bones.
Speaker 3:Sorry, I was going for a metaphor there.
Speaker 1:Oh, no, no, no, I don't know metaphors.
Speaker 3:That was one of my favorite moments, but let me just quickly assure everybody, everybody, all the orphans were saved, yeah, yeah okay, yes it may or may not have been reptiles, correct, right, right, yeah, uh, that's, that's your.
Speaker 1:Yeah, no judgment, but this is a safe space. We don't judge anyone based on the uh, the form of their uh skeletal skeletal structure under their skin or whether or not they have scales.
Speaker 2:Not at all, absolutely.
Speaker 1:So, Wayne, is that also your choice?
Speaker 2:You know, that was definitely like a standout moment where somebody, when one of the players just did something.
Speaker 1:I did not Peak role-playing hijinks.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that was peak role-playing hijinks, I think, though in general. So in the setting, one of the curses is called word worms, and this curse resides within the eyes of people that are. Basically everybody is infected with it when they read it sets. Basically, the infection is magically passed to the page and words burst into flame. So in our setting there's no written language, there is a it's an oral communication, pictograms, things like that. So the only people who handle books are the blind, and so there are librarians that are blind in our game, that are incredibly important and, in fact, are kind of like the Bene? Gesserit of our setting.
Speaker 3:Okay, that's exactly what they're like.
Speaker 2:Okay, a Jesuit of our setting Okay, that's exactly what they're like, Okay. And so a lot of this did not come out until we were playing the game at the table and we kept getting the players being like wait a minute, what if? And then you know, insert their solution to this problem, Because it became. It was really interesting watching people deal with the fact that they could not leave a note for somebody, they could not give written directions like where are you going to meet in the city, and it forced or it created these environments where Dee and I were suddenly going. Oh yeah, we need a solution for that, and that's super fun. I mean, that's part of the creative process of role-playing games. That makes it art, and it's something that doesn't exist until you sit down with your friends at the table and this thing occurs.
Speaker 1:And it practically doesn't exist in any other context either. I think about the philosophy of tabletop role-playing games a lot, and I am hard-pressed to think of another scenario in which you get a bunch of people in a room and you invent something purely fictional of the mind.
Speaker 3:Yes.
Speaker 1:And there is something to me kind of innate to human soul about that, and I think technology has just naturally kind of stratified everybody, especially with COVID, into their houses where your interaction is with someone on a screen, kind of stratified everybody, especially with COVID, into their houses where you know your interaction is with someone on a screen. And I think there really is something like transcendental about getting everyone around a something, a table or a fire, campfire, whatever and telling stories, and I see this as a way to get back in touch with that. I see this as a way to get back in touch with that. And the word worms seems to me as just a latent manifestation of that in your game, Just that it like filtered all the way down to the actual game world and that seems that's really cool to me.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and it was just, I mean, for Wayne and I both. The first couple times we ran it the players were like, okay, I'm going to write a letter to you. I'm like, no, no, you're not. Oh right, worms burst out of my eyes. It was really fun to see people tussling with that problem of how do we communicate without written words.
Speaker 1:I would be interested to play that kind of character, uh, when I eventually do get to play um, because it seems very interesting to me to take something that is so, uh, fundamental about human experience that people take, like they don't even know they're taking for granted, and just like deleting that out of just their agency and watching the loading on their face, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:In fact we, you know earlier versions of this game. We had, like the archetypal fantasy character classes. You know, there was the priest and there was a wizard and there, and as we iterated through this game, we we started deleting them and we just had stuff that reinforced the, the setting, um. So you know, now there's, you know we're, we're, we took a lot of inspiration from the netherlands and so there is a just like the country. Yes, okay and the history and copenhagen.
Speaker 1:Oh okay, the history right. Yeah, I thought you were just like the netherlands and in concept, right right there's a lot of cafes.
Speaker 2:I'm kidding.
Speaker 1:I hear everything's really expensive. Right, but before we move on, I want to say that if anyone is listening to this and you're interested in the behind the curtain on how these kinds of games are made Wayne accidentally or not accidentally, but like incidentally hit on, I think, the most important word to that process, which is iteration oh gosh, games have to be made through iteration and no matter how set in stone a thing is in your mind when you set down to create it, if it's a role-playing game or a game of any kind, really you're gonna have to play it. You have to play it to understand whether or not it's finished.
Speaker 2:And I think brother preach it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I just wanted, like you said, that you're, like you said, iterate and I wanted to jump in on that, but then then you were like I'm going to drop all this knowledge on you about Netherlands.
Speaker 2:No I know, so, like one of the, so let me I'm just going to read, kind of read a couple of things.
Speaker 1:Absolutely. You need to read a couple of things.
Speaker 2:One of the classes is called a Harbinger, and this is the description. You are a living chronicle of your age.
Speaker 1:You are a member of the Harbinger Guild, serving as the herald and keeper. Now it's my turn to say amen, brother. So what you're saying is this archetype, this character option for the players themselves the person is meant to be the receptacle of information.
Speaker 3:Yes.
Speaker 1:Living archives.
Speaker 2:That's right.
Speaker 1:Flesh bound archives.
Speaker 2:Correct. Yeah, and so at first we're like man. Are people gonna want to play this as a like character?
Speaker 3:are you kidding?
Speaker 2:they did they did but we were still, you know, you know it's there. There are the. You know that doesn't say anything about, like you know, um, you know, setting an orphanage on fire. Okay, look, that's, that's a given it's implied.
Speaker 1:true, if you sit down at the table. Look, that's a given, it's implied. If you sit down at the table, you know that that's a possibility and likely an inevitability.
Speaker 2:So yeah, but we were kind of and. But when we started handing that class out on the table, that was one of the ones that got picked almost all the time.
Speaker 3:Almost every time it kind of shocked us.
Speaker 2:You know it didn't shock us. I mean, it surprised us in a good way.
Speaker 1:I guess it's better than shy that's one of the most no, go for it I thought people would grab the fuselier.
Speaker 3:and let me explain just really quickly when we were making up the fuselier. I'm like zach, is this pg or g rated? Uh, you can say whatever you want, it's's fine. I'm like damn it, I want somebody who's actually Wait a minute.
Speaker 2:I was expecting yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, my favorite is when people are like are we allowed to curse? And I was like, well, you know, the director's about to retire, so it doesn't really matter, jeepers.
Speaker 2:Jeepers, I'm kidding.
Speaker 3:I'm kidding, I'm sorry. I love the Three Musketeers. I've probably watched every single version ever made, including the. The French one is awesome, the French one is fantastic, plus Eva Green. Yeah, and Let me just say I really wanted a quote, unquote, musketeer type that could actually fire a weapon and I figured oh, everybody's going to want to play the fusilier, you can sword, fight, you can shoot. Nope, it's the Harbinger.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, really surprised.
Speaker 1:If I had to guess, I would just say it's because you were able to really nail down the fantasy of what you're trying to achieve in that character. Right, sounds good. Trying to achieve in that character, right, that sounds good. Yeah, and at least in my experience, there's always some latent instinct in me to go okay, but there does need to be like if the dude who shows up and he only knows Conan, he needs to have a character that he can play and he's not going to play the weird worm-eyed flesh-bound archive character he's going to want buff, meat flex and a big old axe.
Speaker 2:There's that too.
Speaker 1:Well, I'm glad that the Fusiler Fusilier.
Speaker 2:Fusilier.
Speaker 1:Fusilier.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so the buff. What did you call it? Buff meat axe, Buff meat flex. Meat flex, all right, so that's our red cap, oh geez yeah, which is basically a militant unionist.
Speaker 3:Oh, okay.
Speaker 1:He's a Conan plus socialism there you go Okay, so unionists, is there secession happening.
Speaker 2:There you go. Okay, so unionists, is there secession happening? No, no, I meant like unionists and like workers union.
Speaker 1:Oh I immediately thought like well I guess that's politics too.
Speaker 2:That's just a different kind of politics. That's true. No, no, right, so yeah. So the red caps are kind of semi-mystical warriors fighting for the working man and their communities.
Speaker 1:Oh, I mean, that is as at least as enticing to me as the Harbinger is.
Speaker 3:And I know this is a real stretch and listeners are going to have a really hard time believing this, but they do in fact wear red caps.
Speaker 2:Yes, oh nice, like the.
Speaker 3:Phrygian red caps worn in the French.
Speaker 2:Revolution Yep yep, yep. And they can dip them in blood and regenerate.
Speaker 1:Oh, I was like technically, anyone wearing a red cap could dip their cap in blood.
Speaker 3:But not everyone would regenerate.
Speaker 1:So that's three archetypes. How many are there total?
Speaker 2:So I think we put six into the game Gosh. This is where the six were. So the other really cool one is the Tinker Witch. So in our setting, when the elemental riot, which is one of the four curses, occurred, inanimate objects woke up. Okay, yeah, so the numina, the spirit within things, woke up, and that included machines which rebelled.
Speaker 1:They didn't necessarily want to work anymore, which was part of the others' plan, with their four curses to bring them and the others being the enigmatic presence Correct, sorry.
Speaker 2:So the Tinker Witch was the first group of people that learned to turn the magic of the others against them. They actually learned how to speak to machines.
Speaker 1:Oh yes, and they could conjole them into Machine spricker. Is that what it's called? Sprock machine?
Speaker 2:Sprock machine, sprock machine, that's right, so I'll just read you their little blurb.
Speaker 1:Please do, please do.
Speaker 2:So you communicate with machines and tools, overturning one of the worst outcomes of the elemental riot. You know Sprock machine, the language of awakened machines. This allows you to speak and bargain with them. You adore machines and tools and they love you too.
Speaker 3:Is that consensual, well? Well, that's a great question, and one of the things that I envisioned when we were writing the tinker witch is yeah, there's almost like this romantic relationship between machines and tinker witches, and it can go badly sometimes yeah, yeah, a bad breakup.
Speaker 1:Yes, yes, exactly, there can be a bad breakup all right, sweet, sweet.
Speaker 2:so we also just love the idea of, like the you know you, you might have a, you know a small boat that all of you that you're the characters participate in. And the tinker witch, you know, has, like you know, enameled the steam engine and let out and, like, left little votive sacrifices for it and, you know, polishes it and cleans it, not just because mechanically it needs to work but because, but then curves, baby yeah.
Speaker 1:Yes, wow, yeah.
Speaker 2:And you know, and it has a relationship with it. And once again, you know they don't have like this overwhelming magical ability, but you know we do lean upon the narrative elements a lot. And so once we told people, oh yeah, you can talk to machines, and you can, and they can still talk to, you know, rocks and trees. It's just they have a special relationship with with machines and know how to interact with them. So once we said that it was just like letting the players off of the chain.
Speaker 1:I mean, they just start doing it. Yes, that was cool. Yes, unlearning the bad habits from the other game, the one that everybody plays I love it and I'm going to just throw this in as well.
Speaker 3:I want to give a shout out to Wayne, one of the things that kind of was late in our development process was a ship combat system.
Speaker 1:Okay.
Speaker 3:And it works really well. And I'm just going to say we went down rabbit hole after rabbit hole after rabbit hole about seafaring vessels.
Speaker 1:They are not boats they are not ships.
Speaker 3:They are seafaring vessels schooner yeah, exactly jackknife, and so one of the things again we it was a sort of a late edition was the the ship combat, but it was really quite fun and if you're a fan of Patrick O'Brien or other things like that, that was a big inspiration.
Speaker 2:Which, by the way, is not in the quick start rules, but it is in the coming rules.
Speaker 3:Oh, I'm sorry. Okay, you can cut that Zach.
Speaker 2:No, no, leave it in. It's a teaser, I'm kidding.
Speaker 1:That's why people listen to podcasts right, correct, correct, and hopefully that's what this will do for Kismet and for Rustwater, because the quick start guide is only just a little sneaky peeky, because I have seen an earlier manuscript of the full game of Rustwater and there's plenty more to be had. What's the plan with it? So we got the quick start guide out. It's out right now. By the way, if you're listening to this right now, drive-thru RPG, kismet Games, rustwater quick start guide. That pay-what-you-want number better be a number different from zero. What's the plan? What's next?
Speaker 3:Full product launch winter of 25. Okay, we're leaning towards print-on-demand.
Speaker 1:Okay.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Easy to accomplish with drive-thru? Yeah.
Speaker 2:Right, yeah, yes, we're looking into all of that and that's where we're kind of headed right now. And that's where we're kind of headed right now. We do really want to see what comes from the quick start, so a lot of our final final plans will be are people liking this? So it would be a big help if you actually rated the game Five stars. $2 know five stars $2 minimum.
Speaker 1:Five stars minimum.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we get caught in that dynamic where, like I don't know why, like these people doing the one-to-five-star things are like haven't you gotten the thumbs-up, thumb-down thing? That is all we need world, we don't need anything else.
Speaker 1:Yeah, because then you get like weird stratifications where someone will give you they'll write the most glowing review and then give you three.
Speaker 2:Yeah, but the Quick Start didn't have a full character generation system, so I'm only going to give it two stars.
Speaker 1:Now, I'm normally a man who plays Dungeons and Dragons, and this game doesn't have any dragons, so three and five stars Okay.
Speaker 3:Gosh, I lost my train of thought. We do have a pretty active discord, and that's true. I love to talk on discord. I also did, for the very first time, my first live stream last night when we did the video product trailer, and so, yeah, we're more than happy to talk your ear when we did the video product trailer, and so, yeah, we're more than happy to talk your ear off about the game.
Speaker 1:Love Wayne's voiceover, by the way.
Speaker 2:Very dramatic Dramatis. Thanks. Dee did all the video work. She did a great job.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you did, thank you. I'm loving especially that shot of the door with the hands sliding on it.
Speaker 3:I love that one too.
Speaker 1:That, and then the one where the storm front thunderheads coming up against the coast. Yeah, that's super cool, reminded me of a game called Signalis. I don't know if I remember that sounds cool. It's a video game, so I know that immediately makes Wayne not want to hear about it. I'm old.
Speaker 2:That doesn't mean you can't play video game.
Speaker 1:I know, okay. So you said next up, what you're trying to do is have it out next year and you want to pay what you want, and you're doing that through drive-thru. We're going to print on demand.
Speaker 2:Print on demand, it will have a set price.
Speaker 3:What did I say?
Speaker 1:You said pay what you want, oh, print what you want.
Speaker 3:The quick start is pay what you want. Oh, print what you want.
Speaker 1:The quick start is pay what you want, print what you want, right, just do it, just print a little bit, just print a little bit. Print pages 31 through 37.
Speaker 3:Yeah, we have a stunning cover done by Pavel Shiplin. We have beautiful interior art some by. Pavel, some by Perplexing Ruins.
Speaker 1:It is all original art we're pretty proud of that, yeah, art, uh, we're pretty proud of that yeah, you should be because it feels I know, uh, from talking to wayne and seeing the project uh kind of evolve over the past year um, I know how much, how many different places you've pulled these assets and and it really does feel super cohesive. I want I want to make sure that I say that because the whole very gritty particle effect-y you've got black work, illustration it all really pulls together well, even though it's coming from multiple artists and multiple asset sources, like Only GFX. I am stunned how well you get that stuff to melt, because I feel like when I'm sitting at my desk and I'm like trying to, I was like I just need a gear logo.
Speaker 3:Just give me a gear logo.
Speaker 1:I feel like I have a hard time, but you make it seem so easy. I just wanted to say like it looks great. Thanks, thank you?
Speaker 2:Yeah, it takes it's multiple, multiple iterations at this point.
Speaker 1:Next, I want to ask what are the inspirations behind the product Like what did you have in your mind that was feeding into it?
Speaker 3:So we were sitting in Wayne's living room.
Speaker 1:Beautiful living room. By the way, it is Super high ceilings Bar Bar yes, bar.
Speaker 3:And, to the best of my recollection, wayne was like hey, what if the world was taken over by evil red plants with long barbed thorns on them? I'm like sounds good.
Speaker 1:Okay, now was this were you jamming on a product or were you just? Did you just walk in?
Speaker 3:with a cup of coffee and you were like, yeah, he just walked in with a cup of coffee.
Speaker 1:Okay, and it wasn't the context of a game.
Speaker 3:No, it was just this wild idea Wayne had.
Speaker 2:I don't even remember that, but I totally believe her.
Speaker 1:I think you were wearing your slippers even Now. Is this something that y'all have done in the past, like for fiction, so we've been gaming together since 80.
Speaker 2:I met.
Speaker 3:Wayne in 1985 at college, nice, and we've been gaming together ever since.
Speaker 1:That's like almost what? 40 years, oh geez.
Speaker 3:Yeah, okay.
Speaker 2:I'm 60. Thanks, Zach.
Speaker 1:Look no, I am just saying that I am impressed at the commitment, because I can't get the same people to show up every time. Oh yeah, we understand this is pre-podcast.
Speaker 2:We were talking about, like we've been in. The gaming group that we're in right now has existed since like 1989.
Speaker 3:Yeah, In some form or another. That means yeah.
Speaker 2:For sure longer than I've been around. Yeah, you can do this if you put things on a calendar.
Speaker 3:A what?
Speaker 1:What did we come up with? We came up with a short list. It was can you do math? Yes, Can you read? Can you speak English? Do you have a calendar? Do you have a calendar that you actively update?
Speaker 2:Yeah, we'll do it.
Speaker 1:Those are the minimum specs we need for you to join the table. So you're in this living room.
Speaker 3:Wayne walks in and he informs With his slippers and coffee.
Speaker 1:Slippers and coffee Robe Pipe and he goes to inform you. He takes a little puff, blows it to the high vaulted ceilings and says what if? What if this planet were utterly taken over by red plants? Like, did you immediately go, nailed it. Next game, let's go.
Speaker 3:Yeah, kind of. So let me just give a little bit of context. I had moved here from South Georgia, where I'd lived and worked for 20 years, and Wayne and his lovely wife Kim were kind enough to let me stay with them for oh, I don't know four or five months while I was looking for a house and everything like that, which was incredibly kind of them. And the side effect, which I guess is a good thing, is that Wayne would wander in with his coffee and slippers and and inform you that the planet had been taken over by the red plants.
Speaker 3:And I'm just like I'm probably sitting on the floor playing with the dog going okay, sounds good. You whip out the journal, you start feverishly scribbling.
Speaker 2:That's kind of how it goes. That's awesome and I think that was Dungeon World the first time.
Speaker 3:Good grief, I've lost track. Dungeon World yes, it was Dungeon World. That's right, because we had moves. That's right, right, yeah. And playbooks.
Speaker 2:Actually, a lot of it was just questions to ask the players Yep, and then, man, I can't remember, after that did we do OSC? I think we did OSC.
Speaker 3:We may have done OSC Old school.
Speaker 2:Essentials yeah, old school essentials.
Speaker 1:But yeah, anyways, yeah, they got plenty. They got seafaring combat for spades. Yeah, yeah, true, okay, so that was the genesis right Happens in this living room. What other works of fiction, other games? Obviously Black Hack influenced Rustwater. Can you name any?
Speaker 2:Fleo, can you name any Flay-O? Yeah, so Flay-O and Black Sword Hack are both written by you know, the guy's moniker is Kobayashi, but I believe he's French and living
Speaker 1:in England.
Speaker 2:Sounds great to me.
Speaker 1:Yeah, no, kidding, yeah it sounds really great yeah, especially considering recent world events.
Speaker 2:Yes, recent apocalypse that will not be named Apocalypses. So yeah, Now I forgot your question. I'm sorry.
Speaker 1:I just want to know what you like. What do you like? What do you read, what do you watch, what do you play? Stuff that has influenced Restwater.
Speaker 2:That definitely influenced it. Some of the spells. I mean we credit Black Sword Hat because we used some chunks of that which is again Creative Commons 4.0 license, which we use as well. You should If you release stuff, you just should.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And I think also Annihilation definitely okay.
Speaker 1:Okay, now see, I am a massive vandermeer fan. Oh yeah, I absolution that's about to come out like I am foaming at the mouth to get that book, yeah now I, I, when you, when you said alien entities, that is actually what the kind of alien that imagine, which is just like this being that is from a different reality or perspective from us, and then it comes into our world and just warps it beyond belief.
Speaker 2:That's what's going on in the background, the setting, if you well, you'll see this more in the second book, but also in the adventure. There are places in the Rustwater setting called Elseworlds which are in the other reality.
Speaker 1:Okay.
Speaker 2:And just by venturing there, which, again, that's also where magic comes from. So, essentially, if you want magic in this setting, you are going to deal with the others and their reality, rewriting nature. So the wizards of our setting are called the Tovanar and they there was air quotes there.
Speaker 1:You didn't see it. I'm going to have to put it in post.
Speaker 3:Let's just say we went down a rabbit hole of different languages to try to get the names and make them stick and you went with Esperanto.
Speaker 2:So the Tovanar are the wizards In the game. If you're affected by the others, you gain what's called stigma, and we're using that word purposefully, meaning it is a physical change. That others can see upon you and yes, to a certain extent they will judge you for it.
Speaker 2:The prejudice is part of the setting, but at the same point in time, the people of this world know that they need people to wield that magic, otherwise they're toast. So there is a push and pull there. So, whereas most players, when we're playing, they look upon gaining stigma, which is going to occur as this terrible thing that's going to happen to their characters. And it can be terrible and it is, it can be terrible, but the tovin are if you cured them, they can't do magic anymore.
Speaker 2:Okay, yeah, okay, right, sure. So there is this push pull there where they're trying to walk this line, where they want to expose themselves to the of the others because they need it. They actually cast their magic through their stigma. So it's been really fun, you know, because people want to play them, because you get really cool nifty powers, but at the same point in time, you're afraid it's going to run away from you.
Speaker 1:Oh, it's so fun when you get a player who is able to lean in and wants to lean into the negative aspects and just watching them just want to gut themselves on the table. Love it, it's incredible. Yeah, what was the? So you said that if they didn't use powers they would be toast. Does that mean that the world itself is dangerous beyond the curses? Are there monsters? Are there evil factions?
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Yes to all.
Speaker 3:There are definitely monsters, many of whom emerged after the four curses. I like making up normal people who are clever and evil as adversaries. So I think there's a fair number of those Politicians. Yeah, well, yes.
Speaker 1:Indeed. They invariably become politicians at some point.
Speaker 3:Scholars gone bad. That's always a fun one. You were asking about inspirations. I think I alluded to Three Musketeers and I have watched every single version out there and some are good, some are bad, but they all gave me some inspiration. And Master and Commander also Master and Commander.
Speaker 1:The movie was very inspiring.
Speaker 3:Just seeing how people interacted with each other in that confined environment of that ship. For the record I would have gone bonkers being that close to people all the time, but that was very inspirational for me.
Speaker 1:That's awesome. I don't think I ever hear I don't know if I've ever heard anyone say they like that movie. So that's awesome. I love it too. It was one of my mom's favorites, my mom's favorites, so it's, that's, that's dope, that it's. It also makes sense for the the vibe, considering all how important the level of technology is to, uh, the society being what did you say? 18th century?
Speaker 3:I'm gonna call it around 1700, yeah, okay, yeah, 1650 to 1700, my guess on here was 17th century, so I was you were right there, I, I was close, yeah, and it's not, we're not. No.
Speaker 2:We use history and the real world as touchdowns but, this is not a historical setting. We I'm a strong believer of grounding your fantasy setting as much in the real world as possible, but we don't want you to be like. You need to go read these four books.
Speaker 3:Oh goodness no.
Speaker 1:No, you want the language of your game and the language you speak as a game master to just easily translate to experience that the players have had, and maybe not everybody at your table is a massive Tolkien encyclopedia or has read every L Ron Hubbard book.
Speaker 2:Don't read any of those books.
Speaker 1:Please don't read those books. So we've talked a good bit about Rustwater. Is there anything else about that work you want to say besides the fact that it's out right now and drive through?
Speaker 2:RPG for pay what you want, I don't. I think we've touched on a whole lot. I think that's good for now. I just hope people pick it up and enjoy it and give us some feedback.
Speaker 1:We're going to make a scene around it locally for sure. Thank, you yeah, for sure, for sure, we're gonna. I have some ideas about doing bigger level, um event organizing specifically for tabletop, because we have like a weirdly high density of tabletop designers in Athens and like the surrounding area Shout out J Domingo and Mystic Punks.
Speaker 3:That's about to come out.
Speaker 1:Yeah, had him on. That was. He was hilarious to talk to. But we have all this talent and we have a library as a resource, so I think something's going to come down the pipeline. When you're ready to finally like, for real, put that product out, we will have something, we'll have a scaffolding for you to be able to like launch it from for sure, for sure. Thank you, absolutely, absolutely. An art scene is only as good as much as the people work together in the community to create the experiences. Because you don't? I guess solo games are a thing now, but typically it is a communal activity to play a role playing game, and the more that we organize the community, the better that'll be.
Speaker 2:The ultimate irony of solo games is they're really dependent upon a community to get the word out too.
Speaker 1:I have the solo rules for dependent upon a community to get the word out too. So I I haven't I have. I have, like the, the solo rules for um cloud empress that, oh, whenever I, when it's a great setting, whenever I get a like a weekend that I want to sit down and have the ability to, I'm going to try to see what that's like. Um, I don't think I've ever even tried a solo game, but I'm interested in it. We'll try that out. Let's talk about some other stuff from Kismet. There have been a bunch of releases all in a row, right, you've got Old Scroll.
Speaker 2:Yeah, old Scroll is the zine that comes out periodically that supports old school essentials, comes up periodically that supports old school essentials. There's two. There's the first. The first zine is a a real old school dungeon that is called Red Wolf's Tomb and it's kind of a fun house dungeon which, because I love that, I love that kind of gonzo, you know high, high weirdness, um setting. But it's also about this, this wronged um woman and the revenge taken by her and against her. It's really neat. Because I think it's neat because you go through the dungeon and it's all about learning about her life and what happened to her and by doing that you can get a much better chance of survival, because it's old school essentials. Survival is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1:I have total trust that there's enough context in that dungeon, because one of the things that I have seen in Kismet Games' catalog that has always impressed me is the local history you provide in like every single product, where it's like you get this many years ago, this thing happened. X many days ago, this thing happened. And that's something that's not, I think, popular enough in adventure design to be able to give like the broad strokes we were talking about this a little before, the podcast too where most people just focus on the what, the when, the where, the how of the situation, but everything beyond the situation is just blank Right, even just broad brush strokes. Just a little bit of context really does help the GM to be able to catch those edge cases, in which case someone tries to turn a two-year-old kid into a little mushy pile and throw him out the window.
Speaker 3:And throw him out a window, yeah it happens Just stuff that you're not as you do.
Speaker 1:Yeah, stuff you're not expecting, but you would be able to handle that easier, right, if you had context for well, maybe there's people down the block that see the kid get thrown out the window.
Speaker 2:Who are those?
Speaker 1:people, are they worried?
Speaker 2:Do they care? Are they betting on how far it bounces?
Speaker 1:So I have no doubt although I have seen it because I have downloaded it too that there's enough context there for the dungeon crawl to make this character really feel three-dimensional and fleshed out.
Speaker 2:So yeah, there's three issues of that. Two other issues of Old Scroll are about a, a fairy road that kidnaps desperate people and imprisons them on itself On the road.
Speaker 1:On the road.
Speaker 2:So it is a road. That is a world, but it is just a road.
Speaker 1:I'm going to have to go and pull that back off my shelf and reread it, because that is not sounding familiar, so it's meant to be something you can insert into your game whenever the characters are. I don't know running out of a burning orphanage. They're carrying seven boneless snakes on them, right right, seven boneless snakes on them.
Speaker 2:Right, right, so yeah, and so that any time someone passes through a portal, it could be a door or a porthole or a crystal gate. A crystal gate, yeah, then the Green Golden Raid, which is the name of this very road, can pluck them as they pass through that and bring them to itself and then torment them. Now, it's not all it. There's a lot of downbeats, but it's also about discovering what the story is of the road and then learning how to use it. So it could be, it's we've, I've played it in other people's games, and so that's kind of that. That's the other two issues of Old Scroll about that.
Speaker 1:That's awesome that you've made it to a third issue. How many or I guess how long would be a better way to put that how long have you been doing Old Scrolls, specifically Like when did the first one come?
Speaker 2:out Two years, something like that. Two years, something like that.
Speaker 1:Literally any commitment to like a series of releases is like to be commended. You know, right Like actually getting volume two out there. Yeah, congrats.
Speaker 3:And I'd also like to just mention Space Reavers.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, I had a great artist.
Speaker 3:You did, your artist was amazing and the art fit the writing so beautifully.
Speaker 1:I'll have to go check that out.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I don't know if you know him.
Speaker 2:I truly do not know this man, although I think he was I think Zach was was having lapses of consciousness.
Speaker 1:By the time you finished that, dude, I was in a fugue state. Let me tell you, poor guy, we were literally building the room in which we are sitting while I was drawing, I was sitting out there in the bigger creative space while dudes with buzz saws were in this room constructing the vocal booth that we're recording in while I'm hurriedly trying to draw the flies buzzing around the detritus knight. It really did add to the frenetic energy of Space Reapers.
Speaker 2:Well, this was like Pocket Quest is a contest that happens every year through DriveThruRPG, and it had already started. Yeah, and Zach and I were talking, I came walking in with some slippers and a cup of coffee.
Speaker 1:Two Rookin' Ponds. You came in with a coffee to the coffee shop.
Speaker 2:And my amazing ascot dazzled his eyes.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I spilled coffee all over myself. I had first-degree burns.
Speaker 2:It was terrible. So, yeah, we started talking and riffing and I was like, oh, you know, I thought about this but I really don't have enough time, you know, and Zach, and you know I don't know what was in the coffee or whatever. It was like we can do it, we can do it and yeah, so in 19 days we that's wild.
Speaker 1:Is that how you remember that? Is that how you remember that that's not how I remember it at all.
Speaker 1:I remember us being at Rook and Pawn, but I remember you coming in and being like I think I want to do Pocket Quest and I was like, oh yeah, when is that this year? And you were like, now it's already started and I'm sitting there working on my, my zine quest, managing the kickstarter, and I just wanted to like I might even be like toxically supportive of other people's ventures because I will, I will do that. I will say you can do it, man, you can, you can do it. Just no sleep, stay up all night, work, grind, like I, I will, I will convince people to do that. I have been known to. But I'm glad you did that with space reavers man, because, uh, it is a really fun little game. Uh, it sells like at my tables when I, when I go to festivals. It's one of the number one sellers every time.
Speaker 2:Um yeah, I sold out at fluke.
Speaker 1:Yeah, oh, that's right yeah, congrats man.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you brought and you you walked a couple copies down to um uh, wookstreet. Yeah, yeah, yeah, oh, that's right. Yeah, wookstreet, oh okay.
Speaker 1:I put it up.
Speaker 2:I gave you a handful and I think you took them down.
Speaker 1:Oh, I took half and put them in the zine. They have a revolving zine rack in their first side room. I put some there and then I kept some and I just had them on my tables that I don't think I have anymore, kept some and I just had them on my tables that I don't think I have anymore, because I think I sold through them all, which is awesome. People really seem to be grabbed by the concept because they see the cover. I think that's striking enough. Thank you, I think that's striking enough for people to pick it up. But the second I start talking about it to people, they're immediately like wait, so it's just like space yachts and you just like fucking up rich people and I'm like yeah, actually.
Speaker 1:Yeah Right, that's the goal.
Speaker 2:It's your dream honestly.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so sweet, and we have been talking and working. Maybe you'll see Space Reavers again in the future. Yeah, and Wayne will get the name right this time. Oh my God. What did you call it Space Wieners or something? No, he's called it Space Raiders to me so many times and literally every time I've caught it and I haven't corrected him because I don't feel like it's my place. He's like Space Raiders and I'm like, yeah, man.
Speaker 2:Space Raiders.
Speaker 1:Sometimes like I haven't done it with you, but like with other people, especially working with patrons if they say something wrong, I will repeat the right thing back to them to get them to realize. But I don't even do that with you, I just let you flounder.
Speaker 3:Oh, you can do it with him, it's okay.
Speaker 1:No, no, I want him to suffer. Anything else on the Kismet backlog you want to talk about? I've got a bunch of different names here. Camp Hollow Hills is another one that would be cool to talk about Pocket Quest last year. That's right. Two years ago sorry, that's right I specifically didn't do that one because I hated the prompt yeah Camp, I was like Pocket.
Speaker 2:Quest.
Speaker 1:Nah.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:I find it kind of hard to work under those constraints because I find it hard to work on things that I don't think are cool Sure.
Speaker 2:You know, yeah, I, I think I. The thing that helps me is I love like uncovering these weird subcultures, you know and they're like what? Subculture under like camp, like camp people. They're like, they're camp people that, like they lived, they live for going to camp, you know, and and I and d's married to one, so I, uh, yeah, so I I called up buck and I was like, okay, you need to tell me what with a name like buck?
Speaker 3:yeah, yeah, yeah yeah, buck lived for rainy mountain. Yeah, that was his thing I mean I, I.
Speaker 1:The older I get, the more I'm into it. Honestly I wasn't like I went camping a little bit as a kid, but the more I grow older, the more I'm like man. It would just be tight to get a little cabin in Alaska. And then just never talk to anybody and then just work constantly making games and pooping them out on the internet. No, we're not going to do that. My number four here on the itinerary is how did Kismet start? Is there a story behind that?
Speaker 2:I guess I mean Dee and I just kind of clicked and we actually. Our very first Kismet product was way back in the 40 days of D20.
Speaker 3:Is that Patrons of Adventure?
Speaker 2:Yeah, we wrote this we wrote a D&D 3.5, d20 thing and we put that out there. And this is like we both had young kids, we both had, like you know, jobs and that part was not yes.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 2:But yeah.
Speaker 3:I think it's fair to say and Wayne correct me please if I'm wrong we bring different strengths to Kismet. Thank God, Okay, Wow, that went to an interesting place.
Speaker 2:That's me. There's no self-deprecation.
Speaker 1:That was me, that was absolutely self-deprecation.
Speaker 3:Yeah, we bring different things to the company. I don't know what else to say. I'm going to leave it right there.
Speaker 2:Okay, so D superpower is the list that shall be completed.
Speaker 1:Oh nice, which is also like her tragic flaw sometimes too, but that's going to be said for everybody. Do you get a little burst of serotonin every time you?
Speaker 2:Hell yes.
Speaker 3:Nice.
Speaker 2:Yeah. That itself is a superpower, yeah, and I mean, I swear to God if this woman makes a list you know, woe to you. There's a lot of political strife.
Speaker 1:There's a lot of political strife If you want to make a list of how to fix some stuff. Have you, have either of you, done anything tabletop wise outside of Kismet? Oh, yeah.
Speaker 3:So Wayne and I sort of got our writing feet working as freelancers for White Wolf.
Speaker 1:That's crazy.
Speaker 3:My first paid gig was for Mage back in 1994 at three cents a word.
Speaker 2:Yeah right.
Speaker 1:If it makes you feel any better, I still haven't been paid, oh no, not for writing, at least.
Speaker 3:If it makes you feel any better. I still haven't been paid, oh no, not for writing at least, but yeah, and I was able to put myself through grad school on part of that money, which was nice. That's awesome. I wrote for a little bit for Mage A lot of Werewolf, a lot of Werewolf, a lot of Werewolf, Some Changeling as well, a couple things for Changeling, but Werewolf was sort of my sweet spot I haven't played uh, either mage or changeling, but I have a player in my games who swears by that setting uh and he's like near evangelistic about the magic system.
Speaker 1:It's amazing. Next time I talk to him I gotta be like I'm not gonna kiss my.
Speaker 3:But it taught me you know, I'm going to get all serious here for just a second it taught me how to be disciplined about writing. I became a better writer, yeah. And then let's be honest, who hasn't? I parlayed this into a couple of novels that did not sell, but that's okay. I think I'm in a happy spot in writing games because I really love it.
Speaker 1:You know I have a similar experience in which, like I came to writing at first with the intention of writing a novel, and then I did, and then I tried pitching it to 82 different it's hell, Zach it's hell. Literally like it was over 80 different agents and not a single one was even a little bit interested. I went in with the idea that nothing was going to come of it, but it still hurt.
Speaker 3:I got to the point of having a meeting with an agent. Oh nice, and that's where it came to a grinding, painful, agonizing halt.
Speaker 1:You didn't vibe with them.
Speaker 3:Yeah, pretty much.
Speaker 1:I mean, agents are money, people right yeah.
Speaker 3:And it was hurtful, and it was painful, and then about six months later, I picked myself up and dusted off my butt and said screw it, I will write what I want and how I want. That's awesome.
Speaker 1:That's awesome, and I'm glad that it is finding its way through Kismet Games because, without having read any of your dedicated prose, I can say with pretty certain that Rustwater would be more interesting to me.
Speaker 1:Yeah, fair Because you are able to express beyond simply constructing a narrative. You know words and sentences all in a line, but you can do. There's so many different vectors and like. I wouldn't have seen all this dope, art and like. Have it combined to create this like cohesive vision. Right, that to me is like gestalt, uh concept, like even greater than what a novel can do yeah, to me at least, it's a lot more fun to write.
Speaker 3:It is so much more fun to write.
Speaker 1:So much more fun. Sweet, did you want to say anything about yours? I?
Speaker 2:wrote for White Wolf as well, nowhere near as much as Dee did, but yeah, it was Changeling. And Mage and Sorcerer's Crusade, hunter, hunter and, oh and Werewolf the Forsaken the second version. I did quite a few things for that.
Speaker 3:That's right.
Speaker 2:But yeah, so and that was good and I learned that you know having a deadline and completing your work and being you know, you know adulting is the thing you need to learn how to do and it's, you know, it's what actually gets things finished, finished. That was the key difference between a lot of the folks who weren't writing in the business for long and those who were, because if you were somebody that a developer was like, yeah, I can call this person and I will actually get my first draft on the day that I tell them to give it to me. That was enormous for them, because when you're working like six months to a year out and you have somebody who drops the ball for a month, it's bad.
Speaker 1:It really screws things up. Yeah, I can imagine I have a hard enough time wrangling in my band members to get anything done, so I can totally imagine what it would be like working with a freelancer Roof. So we have this other little item on the itinerary, but I don't know what to call it, and I don't think you know what to call it either. Wait a minute.
Speaker 2:I'm thinking really hard at you.
Speaker 1:Can you read my mind? Can you read my mind? Can you read my mind? I recently saw someone just master cut splice all of the scenes from X-Men 92 of Xavier screaming, where he's just like oh, it's just like every other scene, yeah.
Speaker 2:Dee is heading up this project, which has had many names, and that's okay, dee. I've had many names for a while.
Speaker 3:Yeah, okay.
Speaker 2:The name was on her list and, wow, she had that like a dog with a favorite chew toy. I was like it's okay, Dee.
Speaker 1:You don't need the name to keep working on the game. How do you come to name your products? Do you have, like, a processor?
Speaker 3:Yeah, it's called. We stick a giant sticky note on the wall in my house. And we write down every conceivable crazy idea we have and then cross some of them off because they're wrong or terrible. Or are you comfortable?
Speaker 1:with sharing any we have, okay. So one of the ones that we came up with so um.
Speaker 2:This game is a is a game about psionic people and it has definite overtones, or undertones of espionage.
Speaker 3:We're going to call it undertones.
Speaker 2:Right. So anyways, we were writing all the words down there and I realized espionage starts off with ESP and I was like, oh wait, a minute, we could do something with that. And then two weeks ago, somebody released their quick start for their espionage and I was like he released their quick start for their espionage and I was like, oh, he's going to hate this Okay.
Speaker 1:So you had the name sniped from you. I'm so sorry. That's all right, it happens.
Speaker 3:I will say, to be fair, it's a very different game, so it's not at all the same. All right, so here's the premise. There are psionics, right, but where do their powers come from? They come from the miasma, or, as we call it, plasm, of people who die. When you die, your body releases well, it's psychoplasm, and that energy becomes ambient. And this is not only how size became size, but also how they use their powers and they have to have the dead to survive. Because if you're a psi, you don't want to not use your powers. They're part of you, they are who you are. But then people have to Psy. You don't want to not use your powers. They're part of you, they are who you are. But then people have to die for you to be able to use those powers. But people die every day.
Speaker 1:That's right, they do.
Speaker 3:So the game is to me. It's sort of a nice blend of I called it a three-legged stool. It's more like a two and a half legged stool of psionics, supernatural and a little bit of espionage, because the setting for the game is modern day. It's approximately 20 years after this huge psychic Cold War. That sort of coincides with the actual Cold War. But people are still vying for power. There are lots of factions, government and not government. Scythes live in small groups called cells. They try to work together to accomplish, we hope, good deeds. But then there is that supernatural element where there are also ghosts who are concerned about what's going on, and other supernatural creatures. I'll just leave it at that, and I'm really excited about this game. We look to release a quick start middle to late of next year. It's actually already written. We just need to polish it up and lay it out, which takes a lot of time.
Speaker 1:Yes, it does.
Speaker 3:I'm doing the first play testing, starting in a couple of weeks, and not sure what else I can tell folks. Then it's awesome.
Speaker 2:We're just getting the rubbers about to hit the road as far as playtesting, which will change the game.
Speaker 1:Of course.
Speaker 2:And we'll just see where we go from there.
Speaker 3:It uses Year Zero Engine, which we both love as a system. Okay, it has currently, in its current iteration, 12 archetypes and four domains of psi powers. So that's where we're going. But again, wayne's right, he talks about iterations. Things will change in playtesting and we know that, and I'm sure the name will probably change as well. But that's okay.
Speaker 1:Year Zero is like a dice pool right.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 1:The alien role-playing game.
Speaker 3:Yes, Okay, cool, I've played that.
Speaker 1:Walking Dead. I want to play Basin, but I haven't had a chance to.
Speaker 3:Yet Basin is the best game I have played in the last decade Nice, that's high praise yeah.
Speaker 2:So you've played the Alien game? Yeah, I have. So, we use that stress mechanic is tied into the whole side power thing.
Speaker 1:Nice, yeah, that's great. That's great. It's been a minute, but yeah, I played an Android.
Speaker 3:So, did.
Speaker 2:I.
Speaker 1:It's just because it's what you want to do. Bishop's like the best character. Yeah, it was good. It was anything Mothership can do, really, which is also another good game. How do you go about fielding players for your playtests? Are these just players that are in your groups?
Speaker 2:We have a regular gaming group We've talked about. We get them to play, we get them to play, we ask them to play and they're very nice we get them to play. They're very nice to say, yes, capital P play.
Speaker 1:Don't pull up if you ain't willing to play True.
Speaker 2:And then I run Rustwater here at the library, for example.
Speaker 1:That was the, the grand opening, right right, yeah, that seemed like you were having a good time, even if you were having to yell over everything else that was happening. That was horse where I left, but yeah, you know what that and the way that we did yeah, she said it was awesome.
Speaker 1:She said she wanted to play it again. So she said she wanted to play it again. We're going to do future events differently, I think, because we had a very similar problem at the last FanFest. The times we've done it before that it wasn't as bad, but for some reason it was just like way worse this year. So you do essentially like behind closed doors, private playtests yeah, although, yeah, I do. What was it? No, no, no, no, no. What was that face?
Speaker 3:Oh, I am absolutely willing to send out a playtest.
Speaker 1:if somebody wants to playtest, I'm fine with that I mean, we could probably make it happen here is what I'm doing.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, yeah, I'm sorry I didn't catch where it was.
Speaker 1:You weren't smelling when I was stepping in. It's okay, yeah yeah. We're picking up what I was putting down.
Speaker 2:We've also playtested at Dyson Diversions, which is a January Con, role-playing, heavily role-playing thing in Atlanta, and I have a friend who organizes an online convention called BSerCon yeah, bsercon, and that is an awesome event. There's a ton of games there. Yes, landia, yeah From BS Landia podcast live from BS Landia.
Speaker 1:It's BS or con.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah. So yeah, we we play test a lot of different places.
Speaker 3:Oh yeah, we're happy to we're love.
Speaker 2:I mean love having playtesters, and that's one thing we're hoping with this quick starter for Russwater is that we really would love to hear you know how things went for people who ran it.
Speaker 3:Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 2:That's the key, you know.
Speaker 3:That's the secret sauce.
Speaker 2:D&I running stuff. We know the background and everything. Of course, the background getting somebody else to run it, that's really golden so Classic City Vibes studio.
Speaker 1:First, I'm just going to pitch an idea to you that I had earlier. I don't know if I've told you that Jay and I are cooking up a Mystic Punks actual play. Oh no, that's good, we've kept it under wraps. The studio that we're working with, we've already done a live. You've seen the one that I've already been on right, the Joker Joker, one Joker Joker.
Speaker 2:yeah, we're going to do a whole Mystic Punks campaign.
Speaker 1:Sorry, you have to laugh.
Speaker 2:It's.
Speaker 1:Joker, joker.
Speaker 2:You either have seen it and understand why everybody's laughing, or it's just joyous and crazed.
Speaker 1:They have told me already that they want me to do stuff beyond that. Oh cool. So it would be dope to do Rustwater. I would love to do an actual play of Rustwater.
Speaker 1:Cool, we'd love that, so I think that might be something that we start cooking on. We're going to get into the studio here in December, so we're going to try to have the whole season filmed, I think before like February, so we could like genuinely start talking about that in the next few months. That's cool. Yeah, I can't believe I haven't told you about that. That's okay. Oh, so busy.
Speaker 2:So busy. Are you going to have it end on 420, like his Kickstarter?
Speaker 1:Was that what the day? That's what it was. I knew it was like 420 was important somehow. I don't remember if we recorded on 420.
Speaker 2:It was the day his Kickstarter ended and he was like oh, it was totally just kind of a random thing. And you were like no way.
Speaker 1:You smoke joints to regain health. Bro, You're not fooling anybody. That corpse paint you're wearing is not fooling anybody I know who you are, Jake. Okay, so we Do. We have anything we want to promote? I know on here I have Black Friday games, but I guess it's not going to be on Black Friday.
Speaker 3:I'm sad, yeah.
Speaker 1:So just be looking out for that big full game day at Rook and Pond. I'm sure they'll announce it soon, but they do like a little 24-hour games thing, and Wayne and ID as well. We've all run games as a part of this and we probably will at the next one too, so just be on the lookout for that. The other thing I have down written here is I remember us talking about you doing something for ZineQuest. Is that still happening, possibly?
Speaker 3:It's on the calendar and on the list.
Speaker 2:Oh, it's on the list. I guess it's happening, dope.
Speaker 1:It's on the list, all right. Well, secrets, keeping under wraps but your boy is also going to have a zine quest. So if you're listening to this and you're into tabletop, please look out for something from Kismet and something from WilderWim during zine quest February of next year. And I think that wraps up most of the interview portion, except for the most important questions. We are a library. We like talking about books, oh, yeah, yeah. So I will include this question and James does too in every interview, and it really does terrify people. It's so funny to me. I'm looking at my list here. Good, good, it seems like there are only two responses to this question. It's bewilderment. Or I'm looking at my list here. Good, go ahead. It seems like there are only two responses to this question. It's like bewilderment, or I'm pulling up my list, right, which is? What have you been reading? What have you been reading? What is currently fueling your fiction engine in your brain?
Speaker 3:Go ahead, dee, you go ahead. I'm collecting my thoughts.
Speaker 2:So a couple things Go ahead, dee, go ahead. I'm collecting my thoughts. A man named Silver John the balladeer, who is based in Western North Carolina and, if you can think of, like Cthulhu plus bluegrass.
Speaker 1:I can think of that. Yeah, I'm thinking of it right now and it's a fun thought.
Speaker 2:And he wrote these in the like 40s and he was not really native to that area but he loved West North Carolina. He actually went out and participated in gathering real folktales and then he wrote these stories and one of his collected volumes is called Owl's Hoot in the Daytime Okay, called.
Speaker 1:Owl's Hoot in the.
Speaker 2:Daytime and it's all these little stories about, you know, silver John the balladeer stumbling into some you know cove and meeting a witchy woman or something like that, and you know and hijinks ensue, and he was called Silver John because his magic was him playing his guitar, which was strung with silver strings. Okay, super cool, anyway. So, after all the disaster in Western North Carolina, I just which is where we're from, by the way.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, oh, both of you. Okay, yeah, yeah, that's where we're at. That makes sense.
Speaker 2:That was one of the bigger ones I've read recently.
Speaker 1:I have friends who live up that way too, and they have been in our thoughts and my money has been in their wallets because they desperately need it. Donate to your local charity.
Speaker 3:So one of those powerful books I've read in the past couple of years and I just reread it because it's so wonderful. It's called Scythe. It's by Neil Shusterman.
Speaker 1:Oh, I'm very familiar with Scythe. It's a very popular book here.
Speaker 3:It is amazing writing. I am tickled to say I have a signed copy from him, nice, and it sits on my special shelf.
Speaker 1:On the special shelf, on the special shelf You've got to tell me what else is on that special shelf.
Speaker 3:That's where I keep signed editions and things like that. I've got a chunk of speaking of Silver John. I've got a chunk of Tom Dietz's books. Those are all signed. But the other thing and I don't know if you want to cut this or not, but it's been a stressful couple of months, and so when I'm stressed- I go to comfort food and my comfort food, heaven help me is a quarter thorn in roses. Oh, ok.
Speaker 1:Don't know that's. That's also incredibly popular.
Speaker 3:Yeah, the whole series, which has led to a lot of really bad jokes about fairy porn. But that's OK.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so it's just comforting. We have like four runs of that entire collection because they are so popular.
Speaker 3:I mean, yeah, she's a good writer. I really like Sarah Moss. So those are the two things I've either been reading is it Moss?
Speaker 1:I've said Mass the entire time. Oh, I have no idea.
Speaker 3:Oh, okay but it's two A's. It's A Moss. Yeah, it's two A's, like I've always said Tovenar, okay, I don't know, I'm just making that up anyway.
Speaker 2:So it's two A's Like Tov and R.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah, okay, okay, I don't know, I'm just making that up Anyway. So it's been very comforting to kind of go back and read those books.
Speaker 1:Excellent. Now a little spin on that question what tabletop books have you been reading, if anything?
Speaker 2:I just got Electric State. Oh right, right right.
Speaker 1:The newest free league game that's getting turned into a TV show.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's already been made into a movie. They're like it's in editing now and it's yeah wild. Yeah, it's another, simon Stellenhog. I think it's the name of the artist Stellenhog. Yeah, that's a name and he, yeah, he. So Free League has adopted several of his art books into games like Yep.
Speaker 3:Tales from the Loop.
Speaker 2:Tales from the Loop. Oh, that guy is kind of a dystopian 1990s where people have been addicted to this kind of VR video game thing. I just dabble into it, but I've been reading that and I actually just got Notice how the second he said video game, that entire thought just died.
Speaker 1:No, sorry, notice how the second he said video game, that entire thought just died.
Speaker 2:No, sorry, I get no end of shit from Mr Wilder. So what was the Sky Princess?
Speaker 1:Cloud Princess or no?
Speaker 2:Cloud Empress, Cloud Empress right.
Speaker 1:Sky Princess. She's more than a princess man. It's because of Nausicaa I'm stuck in my head, so anyways, but yeah, yeah, nausicaa than a princess.
Speaker 2:It's because of Nausicaa I'm stuck in my head, anyways, but yeah.
Speaker 1:Nausicaa was a princess, yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's what I meant.
Speaker 1:That's where it kind of gets stuck in my head.
Speaker 2:But yeah, and Princess Mononoke, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:All of them are princesses the best princess Actually, ash, and I watched Princess Mononoke recently. It was her first time seeing it.
Speaker 2:How did she like it?
Speaker 1:It was the first time I had seen it since being a kid, and I think that I just did not get it when I was a kid.
Speaker 1:How scary it is, yeah, how terrifying. The thing that was most affecting to me on this watch was when the Boris spirit is about, is like about to fall over dead, or the Keith, keith David and all of the love, keith, david, keith David, silverthroat himself, oh yeah, amazing, incredible, incredible, and that's one of his best roles when, when he's like about to fall over his wobbling and son is walking with him, and then all, all of the human assassins come out wearing the pig skins. They managed to make that so creepy, despite the fact you know it's just a bunch of assholes under a tarp, the way they move.
Speaker 2:I just love that movie because it doesn't dehumanize the quote bad guys. In fact, as the movie goes along, you're like are there bad guys?
Speaker 1:Yeah, right, isn't that awesome? Yes, isn't that awesome? Yeah, it belies a genuine understanding of how the world works like all of these different interests and political powers.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and for that's to do a uh, oftentimes you get the. You know, nature is good, nature is wonderful nature's a bitch. Yeah right, is she a bitch in that movie, for sure and that and to go there with that is so sorry and you're right.
Speaker 1:It's cool because it doesn't paint irontown as a villainous force. Right, it humanizes them and it almost does that as its number one mission in the first half of the film Right Incredible film and Cloud Empress. I haven't played it, but I can tell just from reading it. Incredible game. The art on the inside is incredible, the way that it establishes and accomplishes so much with so little. It's like a 20-page zine, yeah it's unreal. Have you read any tabletop games recently?
Speaker 3:I just backed Mythic Carpathia for Basin I'm chomping at the bit to read that It'll be a while before it comes out. The most recent thing I've read is Symborium, symborium, symborum.
Speaker 2:Symborum yeah, yeah, yeah, that is some really cool.
Speaker 3:Really really good stuff, Really enjoyable, Both free league games yes, they are Just incidentally both free league games.
Speaker 1:Pretty much the industry leader at this point. Yeah, and I'm cool with that, the Swedes and the Italians are taking names Go ahead.
Speaker 3:And just because of nostalgia, I'm actually running a Vampire 20th Anniversary Edition game. Nice, we got it print on demand because we did call around to all of our local shops to see if they had it. They did not, which I understand. It's been a little while since it came out. We almost gave ourselves a hernia picking up the book because it's like what? 600 pages.
Speaker 2:Yeah, at least.
Speaker 3:It's like everything.
Speaker 2:You just crammed everything into that. It's the opposite of Cloud Empress. It's the opposite of Cloud Empress.
Speaker 1:There was some poor sod at one bookshelf.
Speaker 3:It was like 600 pages, and that's not even as big as the Mage 20th edition.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that was 800 pages. I've got the PDF of that, yeah it's beautiful, so anyway.
Speaker 3:so those are the three things I've sort of either looking forward to or have been reading. Yeah, I'm really excited for Carpathia, though. That's going to be really fun.
Speaker 1:It's awesome just talking to folks who are well-read, because I do get interviews where I ask that question and people start sweating bullets and I was like, have you never read a book? This is the library.
Speaker 2:What did?
Speaker 1:you think I was going to ask you what? Did you think You've got to pay the bills? That's right, that's right. Well, is there anything you want to plug? I know we've already gone back over, like your future plans with kismet, but uh, anything other than a little game called rust water out now, drive through rpg well, I mean, uh, kismetgames is our website, so that's a great place to go, and and I write a saucy blog there I've read a little bit of the saucy blog. It is saucy not quite.
Speaker 1:Fairy porn not quite it's, it is saucy, which is like that is its own flavor, and there there are. There are a lot of people who want that, that like that middle ground, where it's like not too graphic but actually does have a little bit of spice.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's so funny. I'm sorry we have in have in several of our games. Dee has added like there is a spell that can be cast that essentially gives people. Is it Minarsh? Is that what it's called, minarsh? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, that gives people, like you know.
Speaker 1:Period cramps Period cramps.
Speaker 3:That's a rest water thing yeah.
Speaker 2:And I'm like and it fits in the, it fits perfectly in our setting and went like that. But it's like, yeah, I would. As a dude, I would just never go there, but Dee is like I've been there, oh man.
Speaker 1:Well, it's like if you're going to battle misogyny, that's the quickest and easiest way to do it. It's like, oh, you think being a woman's easy you respect, yeah, and I feel really strongly.
Speaker 3:I'm going to throw this in. You can cut it if you want. You know, kismet Games is half woman-owned and I'm really really proud of that, and right now I'm super proud of that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah yeah you should be. Thanks you should be. I think Kismet Games rocks. I think what you two are doing is incredible, especially to have peers genuine peers in the industry, like local nearby. It's super fun for me and I know that the two of you are bringing an awesome little vibe to the community. So thanks for that, thanks for releasing excellent games and thanks for coming to talk to me today.
Speaker 3:Thank you, Zach. We really, really appreciate all you've done for us.
Speaker 2:Hey, absolutely Support your local library.
Speaker 1:Yes, please support the local library. I'm here every day. I have to be, or else.
Speaker 3:I don't get paid.
Speaker 1:Oh man, Thanks for coming in and talking to me.
Speaker 3:Yeah, this was very cool, that was super fun Anytime I get to talk.
Speaker 1:tabletop at work is incredible.
Speaker 3:I bet yeah, it's an excellent use of time.