Prompt #22 for #RPGaDay2026

Grit

I guess one could say I have some grit about my game.  It took me a long time to convince myself that it's okay to talk about my game along its journey.  I figured most people wouldn't find my experience interesting or engaging enough to read, let alone interact.  But none of that matters in the end.  I'm chronicling this journey for myself, and for whoever does want to read about it.  

Making a game isn't easy.  I remember my professors driving home the fact that good games take a lot of time and effort, especially if you're doing it alone.  There's a lot to do, and I'm willing to put in the work.  Right now, I'm building the core foundation of mechanics.  Seriously, without my playtesters I would still be in the very beginning stages of this project.  

That grit got tested a couple sessions back.  I had built the market vendor module, and it worked fine for me as the GM —made sense in my head, it ran smooth when I interacted with it myself, everything.  But once the players got their hands on it, it fell apart.  It turned into a chaotic mess, and I started losing track of everything happening at the table.  I walked away with pages of notes and a lot of feedback.  Most of it I've already fixed.  There's still a handful of things left, but nothing game-breaking, at least not yet.

I probably won't be done with the core foundation until the end of the year, maybe in the first quarter of next year, and I am perfectly okay with this.  I want this game to be exactly as I see it in my head.  My bestiary is kind of a supplement that keeps me going, and hopefully resonates with others who aren't running as playtesters.  I've temporarily closed my Ko-fi shop for the weekend while I revamp my PDFs.  They were originally a temporary look anyway, but now I have a much better concept of how I want those to look.  I aim to reopen the shop on Monday.

I'm willing to put in the time and effort for my game.  I have a pretty strong resolve, and maybe a little courage, to keep talking about it to the world — even if it is to a small few. 

Links: 

• Patreon
• Ko-fi
• Mastodon
• Twitch 

 

Prompt #21 for #RPGaDay2026

Charity

This word is a hard one to discuss.  According to the Merriam-Webster dictionary: generosity and helpfulness especially toward the needy or suffering; benevolent goodwill toward or love of humanity; a gift for public benevolent purposes; lenient judgment of others.  I'm going to be honest right here and now that this post is probably going to be more like word-vomit because I have absolutely no idea how to even tackle this, haha.

Yesterday's post was about "promise", in which I mentioned that I don't rely on Patreon and Ko-fi solely for the monetary exploitation of others.  Those platforms are more for providing a gateway for people to become involved with my game, joining my community, and even partake in feedback for creatures.  I never wanted to be viewed as a "charity case" for my passion project, and I refuse to have that happen now.  

I am genuinely a person who likes to help others, regardless of any return.  It hurts at times, but it is what it is.  I've been in the dark recesses of humanity, and I rarely judge others because I've had to make decisions I wasn't proud of.  Some aren't as bad as what others have experienced, but for me it was pretty awful.  I won't go into the details, since that could be a plethora of situations listed, but I've made it out of those dark places and am doing much better now.  There are people in my community who are battling their own monsters, and sometimes they just want someone to listen to them.  Thankfully, having ADHD can be a bonus.  Sometimes I don't retain a damn word they say past that conversation, but then there are times I remember a lot and just kind of dismiss it, shoving it back down into the filing cabinet of theirs.  

My game kind of reflects this part of me.  Depending on what kind of interaction an NPC or even a creature has with a player, it could change a lot of future situations.  I believe I touched on this in another post earlier in this month, but if a player chooses to be nice to an NPC, that NPC could influence interactions with other NPCs.  If a player chooses to be nasty, then obvious repercussions are on their way.  Another example is the Calamivox Ingratus interaction that both parties were involved with.  Both befriended one, and I can't wait to see what they say once they realize that being charitable to it was a great decision.

In the end, charity goes both ways in my game.  Players can be good or bad, and they'll have to deal with their choices later on.

Links: 

• Patreon
• Ko-fi
• Mastodon
• Twitch 

 

Prompt #20 for #RPGaDay2026

Promise

Okay this is a good word for today's post.  As many gamers have come to know, promises made by big game companies can be a hit or miss.  I can think of two video games right now that fell short on their promises: No Man's Sky and Cyberpunk 2077.  For No Man's Sky, that game was epic in falling short of everything they had shown the audience.   We were shown true multiplayer, cool fleet battles, various wildlife ai, and the various planetary physics in showcases that led up to the release date.  Once that day came, all we had was a really minimal deliverable.  What we got was nowhere near the expectation.  For me, personally, I was really interested in the procedurally generated planets but my experience was mid at best.  Yeah, they were cool but it became very repetitive very quickly and I noticed how assets were reused in some of the most uncreative ways possible.  I never played Cyberpunk 2077 but a lot of my friends were upset about the initial release of it.  Every week, more complaints about what they were expecting versus what they were sold.  Thankfully, both No Man's Sky and Cyberpunk 2077 earned their brownie points back through years of fixing their games.  

As for TTRPGs, I haven't personally had any interaction with any that fell short on broken promises.  I'm not saying there haven't been any, because I'm pretty sure there have been a decent amount.  Let me explain.  A lot of TTRPGs in the past decade have been crowdfunded.  One of my many reasons why I will never put REDACTED up on a crowdfunding site such as Kickstarter is because of the reputation games have there.  I've seen so many video games and RPGs and TTRPGs gain a lot of support and traction, just to see it all come crashing down on the supporters.  I like mech kind of things and two of the ones that caught my interest were Mekton Zero and Robotech RPG Tactics.  Thankfully, I was broke at those times and couldn't support them but I did follow their progress.  Needless to say, promises were broken and it hurt the supporters.  I don't want to be like that.

Which is where I'm at now.  This is going to make me sound like an absolute lunatic but here I go.  This game of mine is a passion.  It's been with me since 2010 and I'm now working on making it a reality.  I'm not going to stop working on it, even when times get tough.  Right now, I've got milestones and goals to reach.  Real life is a thing and I am only one person.  I've got my fantastic playtesters, running my expeditions and giving me solid feedback.  I've also got support sites like Patreon and Ko-fi, which I know usually get side-eyed as money grabbing platforms.  That isn't how I use them.  On Patreon, anyone who pledges is actually part of making something for my world.  It isn't an empty promise, because I give back in the form of the game itself.  This is either a creature they designed/inspired or an NPC.  Ko-fi is more about giving supporters a usable creature for their own games.  There isn't a lot of math involved yet, since I'm still working that part out, but they get a lot of info on the creature, like attacks and stuff, so I guess it's more like a template right now.  And there's a milestone on Ko-fi too, for anyone who's just nice enough to donate and support without needing anything back.  Every week is a new creature for my world.  This week has been falling a bit short because I'm redesigning my deliverables and I might have to bite the bullet and post the older formats.  This game is being tested as a TTRPG first, working out all the issues and the kinks.  Eventually, it will be a video game.  If I haven't quit on this since 2010, I'm not going to quit now.  I want to share my world with others.  This is my promise.

Links: 

• Patreon
• Ko-fi
• Mastodon
• Twitch 

 

Prompt #19 for #RPGaDay2026

Desire

Okay this post is going to hit some spots for me.  I believe every game developer ever has wanted their game to "make it big".  That desire to get your name out there and recognizable is a big dream.  I'm no different from this, but I also know that I have a long way to go before I really gain any sort of traction.  There's goals and milestones I've set for myself and I'm slowly checking those boxes.

I think the next goal of mine is to start creating more "presence" in what I've been doing.  I created a BRB screen on my Twitch which provides snippets of lore for my game.  If anyone actually pays attention to that is a whole other thing.  Every week, I change the creature part to reflect the weekly creature.  There's also the call-to-action (CTA) that is running on my main overlay.  It's just a simple Ko-fi and Patreon rotation image, so nothing super fancy.  Once I get further down the dev pipeline, I'll be sharing more information about the expeditions my playtesters are experiencing.  

I'm not a pushy person in any sort of way, which hurts me in the long run.  There's people out there who constantly talk about their projects, their social media, etc. and I just can't get myself to do it.  Blaugust, this year, has been the most active I've been on blogging, talking about my game, posting over on Mastodon, and copy/pasting the Links section below.  I guess it's just a part of me that doesn't want to be seen as "annoying" or "begging" for attention.  Mentally, it works yet it doesn't.  I know that I need to put myself out there more but at the same time, I'm fighting myself from becoming "one of those people".  

This brings up one of the reasons why I'm participating in Blaugust and #RPGaDay2026: get my content out there.  I'm hoping that by the end of this month, I'm a bit more active in participating in the blogging community, showing signs of life on Mastodon, and just working on my game in general.  Well, the game part is always going to happen, but maybe a bit more motivation to get it done.  Hell, I even enabled RSS feed on this website two weeks ago.  I didn't know it was off.  Might be too late to get it picked up for Blaugust but the fact I have one now means a lot to me.

Desire is great to have, but you have to put forth the effort in order to achieve the goal. 

Links: 

• Patreon
• Ko-fi
• Mastodon
• Twitch 

 

 

Prompt #18 for #RPGaDay2026

Directness

There are times, as a GM, I wish my players followed the directness of the route literally in front of them.  But then again, it wouldn't create such memorable moments.  I spoke of a scenario a few days back about creating a map with MS Paint.  That was a great session.  I've been trying to up my game a bit since then because at times, it feels like I'm trying to herd cats.  This is all in good fun, mind you.  I use to command zergs in World vs World in Guild Wars 2 back in the day. That was definitely herding cats!

My playtesters are very diverse in their thought processes.  Some are trying to think outside the box, others are definitely inside it.  There are times where I've had to place an enemy token on the board just to prevent them from going down a wrong path.  Even then, they killed it or some how skirted around its presence.  Truly amazing at how things just...happen...even with high threat ratings.  I'm wondering if they'll do similar things for the next expedition, knowing that the enemies there are bit more vicious.  Well, some of the more menacing ones are.

As I develop my game further, I'm probably going to start reducing my directness as the developer/GM.  Most if not all sessions thus far have been me telling my players what I did, what I need them to test, get feedback, and then play a bit.  The more refined I get things done, the less information and feedback it'll probably require.  I can say one thing though: I have a path for my game and I'm doing everything that I can to get the results I want. 

Links: 

• Patreon
• Ko-fi
• Mastodon
• Twitch