VI·VIII·X KUP RPG

This is the second topic I wanted to cover in my deep dives: really, I love to transmit the message to the reader about how it is structured the magic system in the VI·VIII·X game. Firstly the way I call magic in the game: SS or Secret Sorcery and CC or Clerical Canons. These are 2 ways rather different to have a magic effect. Hopefully I had been enough skilled to use the same mechanics despite the difference in concepts. SS is the eldritch magic, the arcane powers, what is used by high wizards. It is secret for a precise reason, this is not disclosed in the rule book (it will be part of the setting and it has origin from the cosmogony to be more precise). SS casters know words of power, every word is one of the two parts which a spell is composed. The caster needs to use 2 different words of power: an element and a principle. These two are then enough to create the effect wanted by the caster. This means the SS is completely open! There are no constraints in the spell definition. The...

I stick to the notes I have on the desk and as promised I will try to provide you with some insight of the "new" game mechanics that I introduced in my  VI·VIII·X game. Let us start with Morality: it is a concept similar to alignment and to my eyes this is one of the weakest features in rules of "traditional" RPGs... I am well aware the topic is extremely "slippery" as you may find yourself with accusations of Satanism and media campaigns ruining your reputation if you push too much into a strong direction. However this reason is not enough to give up and make up a solution to preserve the detail of the character's alignment however completely empty of contents. If you think for a while what is the meaning of a chaotic-good alignment, for instance, you will soon realize that you can do whatever you want in the game and nothing will be affected by the fact that you have an alignment and you can follow this or not without any consequence. IMPORTANT: plea...

After some days spent on DriveThru in order to understand how tricky is the preparation of a title over there, I am back to the real matter, the game. Let me only say: yes, I will likely put on DriveThru my stuff and as soon as the Core Rules will be ready, I will start a communication campaign. Now, what is in the rulebook: this book has 9 chapters, I will provide you with a summary of each of them here below. Ch.I - Introduction to the VI·VIII·X KUP RPG game; here you will read what is the KUP concept, what is the underlying rationale and how the rulebook is built. Let me add a detail: for this book I decided to write the rules in a (hopefully) easy to read way; short explanations, some examples and many many links to other related or recalled rules; in order to help the reader I outlined keyword or concepts in bold (now, with the formatting, I lost this feature but I will insert it in the printed version).  Ch.II - Character's definition: in this chapter all the main stats ...

It took me more than planned but I finalized the first two supplements for the VI·VIII·X game. These are called "Notebook". The first one is for PCs, it is a 20-page booklet where the player can record any info he likes about the campaign; in terms of contents there are some pages which replaces the traditional PC sheet, some other pages dedicated to any info about the campaign and lastly some useful ref charts which can be used "on the fly" by the player. Hereby the cover of the PC Notebook. The artwork is by G.Doré, it is entitled "Enigma" and it is, to my eyes, very charming. For the playtest version I purposely decided to swap the artwork to a scale of teal in order to make a clear distinction between this "beta" version and the final one.  The concept for this product is that I find a small booklet more useful instead of a single-page sheet which is always added to other loose sheets (one for magic, another for notes and so forth). In this c...

Once it is clear the background, my vision and the main idea, let us try to figure out some more details of the KUP model. The first main feature is that the rules are for GMs only. They need to learn and use them: I wrote "use" and not "apply"; despite the fact that in the majority of the traditional RPGs the "rule 0" is invoked (i.e. the rules in the book are subject to changes upon decision of the GM), I have tried to leave the rules open to the application of the GM (whenever it is possible of course). Therefore the GM has to learn the rules and then define how he wants to use them. The players do not need (or better have not to) read the rules, in particular those referred to the game mechanics. The second main feature is that some rules work on pieces of information that are known to the GM only; among these you can find that even some PC stats are not known to the players, they do not need to know these info (I called these unknown stats US, the acr...

As promised, let us focus on an oustanding detail of my project: the KUP RPG.  Several years ago I started thinking of a game model where only the GM uses the dice and makes any action required to determine the events of the game. I talked about this idea with a friend who convinced me that this would have been a failure for sure in terms of interest and playability. I must admit that the discussion didn't last so much: the explanation he gave was solid... Gamers want to toss dice and ideally make 20! That's one of the keys for the success of the RPGs! I then set aside this idea and tried to elaborate something different which brings to the same result and found a solution that now I call KUP: Keep Uneducated Players. Before any further detail I need to explain the reasons that led me to rethink the current game model: one (and it is not the only!) aspect I dislike is the complete disclosure of any detail of the game mechanics to the players. First of all if you look at a moder...

Talking about the great picture, let us focus on what is planned and what is currently on work... This is a summary of the books/subprojects as of today: Core rule book, it is complete, the title is "VI·VIII·X"; it is about 220 pages in A5 format; it has 9 chapters (and in a dedicated post i will detail them) Optional rule book, the title for the time being is "VIII·XII·XX"; it is in a raw status: partially on a word document (say about 20%) and the remaining part on my handwritten notes (about 20 pages); I would say that I am at approx 10% of that work: the core rules were on approx 20 handwritten pages as well at the beginning and now that book is more than 200 pages; the real missing part which is on a very embrional status is a chapter I want to add at the end, "Running a VI·VIII·X game" where I look forward to explain my point on how this game should be managed by the GM PC Notebook: done and ready for the print; this is a matter of fact a booklet of ...

Well, I had a couple of busy days: I had to manage my first proofreading process... It's likely that I didn't do the perfect job but it seems that I worked it out. 3 friends will look after my text... I could still extend it to a fourth one, I am not sure... For the time being I am really happy of what I have in my hands! It's something completely mine and this is a great achievement for me. I even took a pic like if it was a baby: That said, let's move to serious topics: I am still trying to figure out what could be the best steps once I have completed the proofreading revision. I will have a book and my idea is to launch a voluntary playtest. At the same time I need to do some fund raising in order to cover the expenses of such a print run. So the overall idea is to print a very limited number of books and then distribute them for a playtest. The first question is: how to carry out this wishful thinking?!? In the meanwhile, while I am working on other products for thi...

Today I have not so much time, therefore a very short post! I'm happy as I finished my last review of the full text of the Core Rules! It's done! Next step is to have a third party proofread... no clue how long this will take... but as soon as it has done, I will be ready to launch a limited print run of the VI·VIII·X KUP RPG Core Rules for a playtest! Next step is starting to work out how I will manage this step, both in terms of time, of people and of money... Let's see... for the time being, I am happy!

Let's see what is under the hood... So far here is what I have in mind: A core rule book; this is not the traditional "player's handbook", it is rather a DM guide; from all the rules I have drawn, I took the ones for a "basic" game. The idea is that this book is for GMs only since they are the cornerstone figure in the game (I will eventually develop this concept, for the time being it is sufficient to say that GM are more important than in traditional RPGs). An optional rules handbook; in here I have all the rules that I removed from the core rulebook and make them available to be used once the GM and the players are acquainted with the game. In a nutshell, in here there are some additional features that could be selectively used in the game to improve the game experience at the cost of a more sophisticated game mechanics. A character sheet, it seems silly but even for this item I have in mind something different than the usual 1-page sheet. A GM log where ...

It all started in 2003, I used to attend an Italian forum of RPG players and got the idea to start to draw a setting done with my features: a strong religious framework, a new magic system and a new world where myths and lore brought to these features. Then it came to my mind that there was something more to add, something that in traditional fantasy RPGs is often latent (this doesn't mean it is absent!): it was necessary to start from the baseline and build a culture which brings also values and principles. At those time, we were living the boom of the D&D 3rd Edition... a great game but based on game mechanics and nothing more. So I started thinking to many ideas which should factor in a "new approach": as I said, religion was a milestone, therefore it was necessary to build a sound hagiography. Along with that I felt the need to have a deeper concept of magic, it was not enough to have a good number of spells; paradoxically I didn't care (and still I don't!...

Well, it's a boring Sunday (I am jammed at home). I really have no clue how I should start here. Never posted anything... My first thought goes to Max and Nikola, 2 wonderful fellows: these guys are known for the RPG "Against the Darkmaster"  ( https://www.vsdarkmaster.com/ ). I got in touch with them and they filled me with many wise advices... the first one was: "Open a web page to start telling the world your game". Here I am, thank you Max and Nikola!