The Crisis Center

How will you decide the Fate of Waking?

Waking’s fall represents a huge humanitarian crisis, plus the chaos of the Rook’s rabble rousing… So how do you get involved?

THE CRISIS CENTER!

It’s Heather here with our weekly blog post for the upcoming event, VOX POPULI!

This is the leadup for our May DR:TX event written by me, Heather Halstead, Overarc ST for our Season Closer, and Operational Storyteller for Season 5. Today we will talk about how The Crisis Center Works, some CVC Best Practices, and more!

TICKETS FOR VOX POPULI are on sale now! don’t miss OUT!!!

THIS POST WILL DISCUSS A FEW LIGHT STORY SPOILERS FOR OUR NEXT EVENT, SO WE HOPE YOU ENJOY WHAT WE HAVE IN STORE!

Our photos for this post were taken from previous DR:TX events by our talented Photo Team.

“And how did you plan on paying your delinquent Grave Tax? Would you like to take advantage of our low-cost extended financing and payment deferral at a low APR of 320%?”

The Crisis Center

The Crisis Center will be set up for the majority of the game in the DEPOT (Cafeteria). Organized by Felicity Redfield, CEO of the Railroad Conglomerate, this is the place you will plan to rescue refugees, turn in needed supplies, or maybe sabotage efforts to keep Waking afloat. The Crisis Center is the primary place you will take ACTION to make one of Waking’s THREE OUTCOMES come to life. 

There is going to be A TON of things to do from this board. We are working hard to really represent how IMMENSE the efforts are to affect Waking’s Fate. 

This in character space will consist of:

• A Map of Waking

• Bulletin Boards full of ACTIONS any player can complete

• A radio to facilitate occasional communication with Waking

• A dropbox to drop your completed ACTION slips. 

Here’s the mockup of what we are planning, courtesy of Heather

The goal of the Crisis Center is to have a very low threshold of entry.

Anyone can complete an Action from the Center and interact with the plot and have things to do that MATTER. But the Center will also provide large benefits to digging deeper into the mechanics to be strategic with your choices. 

There will be over EIGHTY Total Actions available. NOT ALL OF THEM NEED TO BE COMPLETED. But I’d rather you guys have too many, rather than not enough. Hell, if you are like me and get overwhelmed by too many options.. Just pick one of the right color and go from there. Don’t worry about reading every Action on the board. 

Every Outcome will have a color. So for example, all the Actions that advance the Emergency Landing Outcome will be on the same color of paper (probably green, but subject to change when we go to print.)

Some actions may not be added to the board until later in the event due to other mods that occur, so you may not see all 80+ up at game on. 

There will be an equal number of actions for each outcome. And we are monitoring the total resource cost of each Outcome as well across all actions. 

The Outcome that has the most Actions completed by 7:00pm on Saturday will decide THE FATE OF WAKING. 

Just to highlight that again: Actions need to be completed by 7pm Saturday. 

We will be tallying the actions throughout the event and will work to provide a running score for players to reference. 

So, how do I use it?

The Basics

• Walk up to the Bulletin Board

• Choose an Action posted there that you want to complete

• Use the provided slip to mark that Action “Pending”

• Go complete the action!

• Return to the Crisis Center, take down the Action from the board, sign it with your player number, get any guide to sign off on it and STAMP it COMPLETE!

• Drop the action (and any relevant other materials) into the ACTION BOX.

BOOM.

You’ve just moved the needle on The Fate of Waking. 

Action claimed by a pending slip!

Completed Action! This goes in the Action Box.

Actions will vary. Some of these actions are mods that you can request from Ops! Most of these actions are roleplay, resource gathering, or ZOM behaviors that you can complete without NPCs or a staff presence. If you need to be given a prop to complete it, the slip will tell you where to get that prop.

Each Action will be COLOR CODED and labeled as to which OUTCOME it is associated with. So, if your character’s goal is to Emergency Land Waking, take a look at all the GREEN slips of paper on the board! Those will be the actions you’ll want to complete to advance your OUTCOME. 

Before we get into the more complex aspects of the Crisis Center, there are a few important rules I want to outline:

• Each ACTION on the board can be completed ONCE. If there are actions that can be multiple times, there will be multiple copies of them on the board. But as a rule, one action slip = one instance of that action. 

• If you find a duplicate Action, please leave it for someone else if you’ve already completed one of the same action. For example, there might be three Action Slips that read “Send 10 Recovered Electronics to Waking”. Complete one, and leave the other two for other players. Or get a group together of at least 3 LCs and do all three. But no one LC should turn in duplicate actions.

• Once an Action is marked “Pending” no one else can claim it until the “Pending” tag is removed. Pending tags may be removed if any action stays in this status for too long without being completed.

• If you mark an Action as PENDING, you should work to complete it as soon as possible. This is a huge one! If an action is left pending for too long, the staff will remove your pending tag, and the Action will be able to be claimed by others and you will either lose out on that Action, or have to go reclaim it. We want to avoid situations where someone claims an Action, then gets stuck going to 3 meetings and 2 gravemind scenes and forgets, leaving that Action, and that VOTE, in limbo. There is no set time an action can be pending, because actions vary in difficulty level. We’re all going to work to use our best judgment and we ask you do the same. 

• You cannot mark Actions as pending that you do not intend to complete. The Bulletin Board itself should not factor into your strategy to beat out the competition at this event. The board is our way of helping players know what they can do to affect the setting, not a place where anything should be obscured, obfuscated, or tampered with. 

• Please do not Remove Actions from the board unless you have completed them. You may need take attached ZOMs or other documents if you’re working on that Action. But please do not remove action slips themselves until you’ve completed them. Actions that are removed and aren’t accounted for in the Action Box will just be reposted. And it will make me cry to have to do that paperwork. Please don’t make me cry. My cry time is strictly scheduled for post-event only. 

• Please do your best to avoid reading actions for the OUTCOMES you are NOT working towards. This will help everyone avoid unintentional meta-gaming. This isn’t a hard and fast rule, but it will help us keep competition and CVC more organic. If you SEE someone tampering with Waking circuit boards, by all means, call them out! Fight about it! But don’t camp the circuit boards because you read on the Bulletin Board that there was an option to sabotage them. 

We are quite literally putting all our cards on the table to help everyone get as involved as possible, but in order for it to work, we need you guys to help us, by being diligent with this mechanic so everyone can have a chance to enjoy it. 

Now, let’s look DEEPER.

This is for the folks who want more STRATEGY.

Districts and Threat Scores

Waking is going to be divided into 5 DISTRICTS. Actions will be evenly distributed between districts. Each District has a THREAT SCORE. This score represents how likely that District is to become inaccessible during the event. This is a crashing ship, after all. A district might fall off, or collapse, or be intentionally cut away by a group of n’er-do-wells in a desperate attempt to maintain altitude…. You know, the usual. 

So if District A has a THREAT SCORE of 5… you should probably focus on getting those Actions done first because that District has the highest CHANCE of being destroyed.. And if its destroyed, all Uncompleted Actions for it will be removed. 

So what might cause a District Collapse?

• The primary way a District will be in danger is during one of our STEERING EVENTS. We covered these events in last week’s blog post.

• These STEERING EVENTS are how you decide where on the San Saba Map that the city of Waking ends up. But moving such a massive ship causes heavy strain. So if at 12:30AM Friday night everyone wants to MOVE THE SHIP RIGHT, all the engines on the LEFT side of the ship will have to fire… and the Districts on that side of the city have a chance of being destroyed. So hold your breath when you radio Waking on where to steer.… and wait to hear what, if any, the damage is.

• Out of game, this will be determined by rolling some dice by the ST. The higher the threat score, the higher the chance the dice say it collapses.

• There are some Actions that might affect Districts if completed. Either by removing them from play, or by raising their THREAT SCORES.

Actions for each outcome will also be evenly spread across districts. We don’t want one Outcome to get fucked over just because of a couple unlucky dice rolls. 

Some Actions are marked “Duster Only”

This should be self-explanatory. If you aren’t a Duster, don’t claim these actions.

If a Duster asks you for help on an action they’ve already claimed, go ham. Hell, maybe enlist a few Dusters to join you on your quest to achieve an outcome, and get them involved proactively! If a Duster Only action is completed by someone who is not within their first three games, it will be excluded from the tally.

There will still be the normal, scheduled mods we all know and love, and some of these mods will have choice points that affect the Outcome as well. These choice points will be telegraphed so that you know what your choices in the mod are affecting. We will also keep these opportunities equal across the span of the event. 

WHEW! That’s a lot.

Thanks for sticking with me so far. We’re very excited to give you guys different avenues to affect this wide sweeping plot, and we hope you really dig into this mechanic. 

If there is a slow moment for you (which is…. doubtful, given how packed this schedule is that I’m eyeballin’ right now, but I guess could happen!), go to the Crisis Center, claim and action, and get to WORK. 

CVC Best Practices

We covered this previously, but its such an important topic, I want to cover it again. 

Jonathan has written excellent posts about CVC, how to keep it fun, and how to get the most out of the experience. Check them out!

• Introduction to CVC

• Steering & the 10 Foot Rule

In this event, there is more likelihood of CVC, especially Social CVC than in some of our previous events, because we have LCs vying for DIFFERENT OUTCOMES. And that’s awesome! Responsible CVC can lead to some truly amazing and impactful moments for everyone involved.

So what does ‘Responsible CVC’ mean, then? If you came out to the Live Q&A last week, you heard my request to everyone, and about My Best Practices for Successful CVC. 

Responsible CVC is largely about your GOAL and MINDSET.

As a PLAYER, your goal in a CVC encounter, whether it be social (maybe it’s a yelling match!) or physical (the conflict comes to blows!) should NOT be “to win”. If your PLAYER goal is to win, then if you don’t, you are just left feeling disappointed and frustrated. 

However, if you shift your GOAL from winning the encounter to “having a badass scene with another player” then the actual outcome of the CVC scene is way less important. Because regardless of if you convinced them to vote your way, or you didn’t, you had a cool, memorable, impactful scene… and that’s what it should be about. 

Some of my most memorable and fun CVC moments were ones where I got the shit beaten out of me (physically or emotionally/socially), because while my character’s goal was to win, my goal as a player was just to have a cool moment. 

That being said, it’s okay to calibrate a scene that is too intense.

This best practice takes.. Well.. practice.

We always have the OK Check in System to calibrate an intense scene in the moment to either ramp it down, or up, if that’s your jam. Also, you -are allowed to break character- to tell someone to scale it back. We like to preach about the OK Check In System because it keeps everyone immersed, but if you feel like you are getting overwhelmed, we would much rather you break a little immersion than suffer a scene that you aren’t into. 

If you are averse to this type of in game conflict, we recommend instead sticking to the Crisis Center Actions, and avoiding the big Steering Events. There are plenty of Actions that you can complete that don’t have CVC baked into them. 

Wrap Up

That’s it for this week! If you have any additional questions, please let us know! There will be instructions posted at game as well for everyone to reference. 

Waking’s fate is in your hands. And the San Saba will never look the same. Remember that tickets are on sale now.

Pre-register and get your choice of NPC shift to maximize your experience!

“See you soon Vados!”

The Fall of Waking Prime

It’s Jonathan here with our next weekly blog post for the upcoming event, VOX POPULI! This is the leadup for our May DR:TX event written by Heather Halstead, Overarc ST for our Season Closer, and Operational Storyteller for Season 5. Today we will talk a bit about the BIG CHOICES you will be able to make during our season closer as your characters can decide the final fate of the sky-city of Waking Prime. Your choices will matter and will determine the future of the San Saba!

We have a lot in store for the finale of Season 4!

• We have a special LIVE Q&A planned on our DR:TX Discord server on Thursday, April 20th at 7:00 PM CST. Join us in this voice chat on Thursday to hear from Heather and Jonathan about the next episode; Vox Populi, and answer your questions about SURVIVING THE WAKE, our big siege-style fight at the end of the event.

• Our next event will feature options to use the ZIPLINE and the POOL at Camp Kachina! Make sure to pack those swimsuits! Tickets will go on sale soon for the Zipline Passes!

• Our Feedback Form is still up for our last event!  Did something really amazing, exciting, or tragic happen at game? Was there a person who helped make your time better and welcomed you to the community? Perhaps nominate them for a Community Achievement! Tell us what you loved about game so we can make more of the content that you love and enjoy.  Conversely, if there is something you did not enjoy, or something which needs to be addressed, we would really like to hear about that too. 

• We’ve added some new ways to spend your hard-earned CAPS from the last event. Check out the new items you can purchase with your Community Action Points!

TICKETS FOR VOX POPULI are on sale now! don’t miss OUT ON YOUR CHANCE TO MAKE A BIG DECISION!!!

THIS POST WILL DISCUSS A FEW LIGHT STORY SPOILERS FOR OUR NEXT EVENT, SO WE HOPE YOU ENJOY WHAT WE HAVE IN STORE!

Our photos for this post were taken from previous DR:TX events by our talented Photo Team.

I’m sure all those Resonant Raiders showing up in Bravado had nothing to do with what’s happening to Waking…

The Best of Bad options

This is a bit of a repeat from Heather’s post last week, but it bears repeating:

A central theme in any zombie post-apocalypse, to Dystopia Rising, and to our setting in Texas is “the best of bad options.”

You will rarely find a solution to a problem that is perfect. Complication drives story. Our world is deeply flawed, and that is what makes these stories exciting and impactful. At Dystopia Rising: Texas we want to encourage you to explore roleplay about making difficult choices and then living with the consequences of those actions. What does that look like for your character? How do you grow from that? Or how does your sense of personal ethics slowly degrade in a world that constantly asks the worst of you? Can you feel like a hero while knowing saving those people meant dooming others?

Like we mentioned last week, we’ve spent the last two months gathering all your ideas for the Fate of Waking. Both in research, letters, form submissions, and interactions with NPCs, we are creating a story to let you enact some of these plans.

But there is no “perfect” solution. 

While there’s a bit more granularity in the decisions and events that will occur during the game, each of the decisions you make during VOX POPULI will lead to one of three possible “endings” to the crisis facing Waking Prime.

• Emergency Land Waking near an established settlement

• With the right choices, you may be able to “land” Waking in a (mostly) controlled fashion somewhere in the San Saba.

• This choice will still cause immense chaos, ecological damage, and will greatly impact the power and numbers of the people or faction that location represents.  The proximity to Waking will tie that area or faction deeply to the politics of the Board and will reshape them in significant ways for Season 5.

• The Board will be unhappy, but not actively antagonistic to the town’s choice. 

• Keep Waking in the air, no matter the cost

• Great sacrifices may have to be made to achieve this, but it will be possible to keep the floating skyship-city in the air, despite the failure of the Capacity Engine.

• Waking will continue to leak pollution and runoff on the area it sits over, causing ecological damage wherever it passes, but the Board’s Seat of Power will be maintained. No faction or location will be specifically removed or heavily reduced.

• This Choice represents the Status Quo, and allows the San Saba Board to continue business as usual.

• Shoot Waking from the Sky

• The Rook has a plan to end the threat of Waking once and for all and intends to remove the Board’s seat of power with extreme violence.

• A skyship of this magnitude will crash land with the force of a high yield bomb and will annihilate the faction and the area for miles in every direction, resulting in untold lives lost and ecological devastation that the area has not experienced since the Hiway War. The area the destroyed skyship-city crashes into will be decimated, and the faction and Waking will be largely wiped out.

• The LCs will have to choose where the husk of the destroyed city falls, and which faction is impacted by the destruction.

• This is an open act of aggression against the Board and will have long-term consequences for the story and Bravado heading into Season 5.

The time for new ideas is over.

There will be no Option D.

choice points and you!

The choice on where Waking will land (or crashes), will be decided by your actions at a new mechanic location inside the Depot called THE CRISIS CENTER. We will dig into this aspect of the event in a later blog post, but we want to practice Radical Transparency with some of the BIG CHOICES you will be able to make during our season closer.

The FALL of Waking is a CHOICE of physics and gravity, and hard choices.

During this event, your LCs will have a chance to decide what exactly happens to the flying skyship-city of Waking Prime, the current capital of the San Saba Territories. The doomed city is falling from the sky slowly, but inevitability. Through your actions like sacrificing parts of the city to gain elevation, shifting ballast to change the direction it is falling, or creating a burst of engine speed to hasten its demise, you will be able to impact the trajectory, destination, and the elevation of the city throughout the event.

While most of the choices you make at the Crisis Center will apply to one of the three resolutions above (Controlled Landing, Stay in the Sky, or Crash Landing) there will be a few planned Choice Point Events that will determine major decisions in the eventual destination of Waking. With the help of your allies and certain away mods, you will be able to take charge of how the fall of Waking resolves.

We are sharing WHEN these choice points will be made in advance, so that LCs who want to be a part of that choice can be present.  This will help you plan around player events and NPC shifts to make sure you can participate in the “voice of the people”.

Here are the three times to plan for:

• Friday @ 12:30 AM

• Saturday @ 11:30 AM

• Saturday @ 6:30 PM

During these times, Waking will be in an area or situation where a choice on a new trajectory can be made. Moving a flying city as large as Waking is largely a matter of momentum and speed. A slight change in the course can dramatically alter it’s final destination, but the mass of the ship is not easy to move. It’s not some Road Royal race car that can turn on a dime, it’s a monstrous behemoth that is on a collision course with Widow’s Peak.

Let’s talk a bit how this will work…

STEERING THE FALL OF WAKING

During these three Choice Point Events, you will have some agency in deciding where the city of Waking goes next. During each choice, you will get to make some limited choices by “steering” the skyship-city through your actions.

Waking can be moved by firing all the engines in the appropriate district, or performing a similar action that changes the trajectory of the city. Wherever this occurs, there will be a chance that some portions of the city will collapse, and will no longer be accessible. In addition to a tremendous loss of life, you will not be able to evacuate valuable technology, refugees, and resources from that portion of the falling skyship.

During a Choice Point, you will have a few choices to make:

• The LCs will choose to move Waking either to the Left (West), Center, or Right (East) or to have it hold position. 

• The choice point will be made based on the majority vote of those PRESENT AT THE TIME, and this challenge will be TIMED.

• If a consensus or a majority is not reached by the end of the timed event, Waking will automatically move forward one step on its current trajectory.

Momentum means that a gargantuan airship is descending forward whether you make a decision or not. If you don’t take action to change the fate of the city, it will reach it’s eventual destination of Widow’s Peak. With a massive sandstorm rolling in from the Dune Sea, wind currents mean that some of the obvious easy choices for safely landing Waking Prime are no longer an option.

Heather has prepared a slightly [REDACTED] map of the remaining choice points below:

The options above represent a pyramid of choice, loosely based off our map of the San Saba Territories.

• To illustrate, let’s assume Waking is the Red Dot, approximately where it will be at the start of the event as the fall begins.

• At each choice point, it can move ONE SPACE to any circle that is connected to with lines. 

• Waking can only move forward on the pyramid map and cannot go backwards. Sorry!

• So for Choice 1, Waking can either move to the Left, towards Widow’s Peak, or to the Center, to line up with Bravado and Essex. 

It is important to note that if the City isn’t moved in a certain way, it will eliminate some options as Landing (or Crash) sites. 

As you make decisions (or fail to make one), the momentum and mass of the city will limit your future options for a choice. For example:

• In order to land (or crash) the city on top of Killhouse:

  • Choice 1 would need to move it Right towards the center line.

  • Choice 2 could either Hold Position, or move it Right.

  • Choice 3 would need to be either move to Right, or Hold Position. 

A couple of different choices here will drastically limit your options.

• If you moved the city to the Left on your first decision at Choice 1, there is no possible set of choices that will allow you to land on top of Killhouse.

• Even if you managed to get the skyship to take a hard right at each remaining choice, you won’t be able to steer the ship sharply enough to reach Killhouse. There is no multi-track drifting on this trolley problem, sorry!

• Your early decisions will be the MOST impactful on the eventual destination of Killhouse, so these will be the crucial events to attend if you want to have a say in the fall of Waking.

Your LCs will need to be strategic in where they move Waking and at what point.

Don’t worry if this is a bit confusing!

We will have an NPC there to guide this and help further explain the mechanic during each choice point, and we have a neat Discord Q&A planned with Heather and Jonathan on Thursday, April 20th at 7:00 pm if you have any other questions that might come up.

Wrap Up

That’s it for today Vados! The time to start politicking starts now! What decision will you make in the fate of the San Saba? Can your vote at the Choice Point be swayed by Brass or favors? Will you vote to shoot down the city, or help maintain the status quo? Will you be able to steer the finale towards an enemy or a friend?

Waking’s fate is in your hands. And the San Saba will never look the same. TICKETS ARE ON SALE NOW!

Pre-register and get your choice of NPC shift to maximize your experience!  

See you soon Vados!

Collection Day & the Grave Tax

It’s Jonathan here with our next weekly blog post for the upcoming event, HELLS OF THE SAN SABA! This is leadup for our April DR:TX event written by our Overarc STs, Ash Sexton, Ren Lewis and Andrew Harper. Today we will talk a bit about one of the major world events that happens during April, Collection Day, and the role this “holiday” plays for the Grave Council. We will also cover the details on the GRAVE TAX, and what you can expect from this event if you owe a debt to the Grave Council.

• Did you hear? We are running a Returning Player Campaign through the end of the season. If you have friends that have been away from DR for a bit, not only can you earn some CAPs for inviting them back, but they can also get a head start with some free items and benefits for coming back home to Bravado.

• Blueprints were updated a few weeks ago, and another round of updates hit shortly after. I’ve catalogued most of these changes on my Blueprint Checklist, but I have written a blog post on the topic as well.

Our photos for this post were taken from previous DR:TX events by our talented Photo Team.

Let’s talk a little bit about the “holiday” that occurs during our next event…

In life there are only two things assured to us, Death and Taxes. The Grave Tax is inevitable, it is necessary, and paying it yearly is as regular as a bowel movement. There is nothing glamorous or terrifying about the Grave Tax, so long as yours is paid on time and in full. Otherwise, the Reckoners; blackclad taxmen who specialize in wetwork, will provide the only alternative known to Taxes; that being Death.

Collection Day

A Grave Council “holiday” of sorts, Collection Day is when the Grave Taxes come due, once a year, normally in the oldcestor month of April.  The forces of accountants and taxmen take to the towns and cities of the Lonestar to upkeep the ledgers of life and death, collect interest on the debts they are owed, and keep tabs on those who would irritate the balance of power in the Wastes. During this time, the fees for Groundskeepers can skyrocket in price, and people across the land strive to avoid an untimely death that could increase their debt, or else the Reckoners could attempt to “close your account” for good.

During the Collection Day “festivities”, the fee for deaths normally doubles in price.  As the bulk of the Grave Council is concerned with upkeep on the ledgers and collection of debts, distractions to manage the morgues have an additional opportunity cost assessed.  

If the debt is deferred, the Grave Council normally applies interest to the debt until it is paid.  This is at a negligible rate but accounts for the cost of maintaining the morgues of the Lone Star.  At Collection Day, a debtor must pay at least a portion of their interest to the Grave Council or risk being held in breach of contract.

• During Collection Day (which normally occurs in April), Tax Collectors & Reckoners will be available to provide a balance of a person’s account and to offer alternative methods of paying the interest.

• This debt can be accessed by interacting with Grave Council characters or through mechanics at the Post Office

Why do we have a Collection day?

Collection Day was a local tradition we introduced to DR:TX back at the start of 3.0. Shan & Aesa introduced the various factions of the San Saba, one of them being the GRAVE COUNCIL. This faction was envisioned to handle two major things in the Dystopia Rising game — how we handle Death scenes from an “in-character” perspective, and how we could create a threat of punishment for breaking the contracts and laws of the region.

One phrase that kept coming up in our design docs and brainstorm sessions was the familiar quote about death and taxes. We loved the idea of creepy taxmen coming to collect what is owed around the same time the rest of us are forced to pay our tax debts to the government. From there, Collection Day was kind of… inevitable.

We missed our first attempt at running Collection Day due to the pandemic closing down live events, but we revisited this “holiday” last year amid some turbulent times for the Grave Council faction. During that event, COLLECTION DAY, the leader of the Grave Council, Takheeta Firstborn, gave her life to cure a sickness that plagued the morgues of the San Saba.

We have three major themes of this holiday, from a Storyteller perspective:

• Death has Consequences - In a world where survivors can return from death again and again, crimes like murder can run rampant unless some threat of punishment is enforced.  The Grave Tax is a method to prevent the needless deaths of shareholders, merchants, and Vados, and is assessed as a financial burden upon death.  Unnecessary death is frowned upon and punished more heavily.

• Death Comes for All, Pauper or Prince - The Grave Council does not care for the status placed upon a person in the times within the Mortis Amaranthine. They pursue their due from every being that walks the San Saba wastes, no matter their station. The Groundskeepers treat the death of a Pureblood from an ivory tower the same as they treat the death of a wandering Rover.

• Story, not Punishment - The purpose of the Grave Tax is not to punish players for dying or to create an undue financial burden.  The Grave Tax provides a concrete way to involve yourself in the greater story of the Lone Star, interact with several powerful factions, and seek out assistance and roleplay with other characters in the game.  It is tied with the enforcement of law in the game and can be opted out if the player wishes to avoid a negative play experience.

Collection Day is still an “opt in” holiday, as we have many options to bypass our system of Grave Taxes if this is not a story you want to tell. I’ll cover the details of the Grave Tax in a moment, but let’s talk about how Collection Day has changed for this year…

The latin in this Grave Council faction symbol translates to “Death and Taxes”. Aesa even included our symbol for Brass Notes into the forehead of the skull.

the story of collection day DURING A DROUGHT

This year, our story takes us back to familiar territory, with a bit of a twist. You see, for years, the Grave Tax and Collection Day were just an assumed burden. Ever since the Hiway War, the morgues of the San Saba have been sick, and the very act of retrieving a person from the Grave Mind intact was fraught with risk and peril. Very few questioned the Grave Tax or the role the Grave Council played in maintaining the Morgues of the region.

Until last year.

Last year, Takheeta Firstborn, the High Mystagogue of the Grave Council and leader of the faction, gave her life in service of the Great Work — to cure the ailing morgues once and for all. Using a Barogian artifact called the CANTANKEROUS MATRIX, she was able to conduct a ritual to cleanse the morgues of the Plague of the Unfinished and finally restoring the damage done by years of war and misuse of the Grave Mind.

In her zeal, the process to heal the morgues worked a little TOO well, and for a time, every morgue in the region was sealed with a scabrous tissue that prevented those that died from returning. The Grave Council worked diligently to correct the mistake, but it took another sacrifice, of a young man named Eight to stabilize the morgues and finish the work that Takheeta Firstborn had started. Their imprint joined with Takheeta’s to form a new balance to the cycle of death and rebirth, a Gravemind Shard called the Eightfold Mother.

Since the formation of the EIGHTFOLD MOTHER and the curing of the Plague of the Unfinished, the region has experienced a stability not seen since before the Hiway War. This has dramatically eased the burden on the Groundskeepers and the Grave Council but has created unrest at the same time. With the threat of the Plague gone, the job has become somewhat mundane.

There are those that suggest that Grave Council has not earned their due this year, that perhaps the tradition of Collection Day and the Grave Tax are a misuse of funds and maybe a relic of the past. The beleaguered new leader of the Grave Council, Reckoner-General Rampart has argued that the Council still performs needed tasks, but this seems more and more like a political response as the days pass. A sickness spreading through the Groundskeepers has yet to find a cure, despite the supposed expertise of the Grave Council on matters relating to the Mortis Amarathine.

With the added stress of clean water being in short supply, increased raider activity targeting psions in the area, including those psions that make up the various Graverobbers and Groundskeepers of the faction, it seems as though a tipping point is being reached. How will the Grave Council weather this new storm during their “holiday” of Collection Day? Can the faction survive if they cannot collect the Grave Tax that funds their very operation?

So, with that context in mind, let’s look at some of the mechanics of the Grave Tax itself…

The Grave Tax

The Grave Tax is one of the enforced laws of San Saba Territories and a tradition of the Grave Council that helps cover the maintenance of the Morgues of the Lone Star.  This is a fee, normally paid in Brass notes, that a Groundskeeper is paid to retrieve someone from the Mortis Amaranthine and is tracked and collected by the agents of the Grave Council.  As part of an agreement with the newly formed Railroad Conglomerate, the Board has delegated authority over every Morgue within the San Saba Territories and the Lone Star to the Grave Council and enshrined the Grave Tax into law of the San Saba Board:

“None shall interfere with the Delivery of the Post, Nor the Collection of the Grave Tax.”

Implementing the Grave Tax

When a character dies in Bravado, this fee is assessed by the Groundskeepers (or STs) that run your death scene.  Depending on the nature of the death, the fee can be classified into one of several categories or brackets:

Class 1: Accidental or Unpreventable Death (25 Brass)

• Death by Zed, Raider, or a Creature of the Wastes

• Death from the Environment, or Natural Disasters

• This is the standard and most common fee assessed for passage through the Mortis Amaranthine or a Sunless Garden.

• If the death cannot be clearly identified as a Class 2 or 3 death, this is the minimum fee for the Grave Tax.

Class 2: Preventable Death (50 Brass)

• Death that could have been avoided in some way.  Foolhardy, silly mistakes are normally classified in this manner.  Needlessly feeding the Gravemind is a threat to the delicate balance of the Mortis Amaranthine.

• Duels, Crimes of Passion, Violations of the Laws.  If an action of the deceased could have been avoided by upholding the laws and contracts of the San Saba, this level of fine is normally assessed.

• If a Law Dog is responsible for killing a target during apprehension, this is the normal fee assessed to the Law Dog instead of the deceased.

Class 3: Intentional Death, or Murder (100+ Brass)

• Purposefully feeding the Gravemind is the most grievous crime. This can include collateral damage and actions that lead to the death of others in addition to themselves, particularly in ways that can be proven by the recently deceased or other witnesses. This is the starting amount of a fee for this type of death but can escalate accordingly to the severity.  

• If a Law Dog can investigate and identify that the deceased was murdered by another, this fee is instead assessed to the Killer of the person that died.  Depending on the egregiousness of the murder, this fee will often be increased substantially.

• A member of the Law Dogs known as a Hell Hound is almost never assessed a fee for Murder, provided the death occurs in the course of their duties.  Abuse of this privilege can cost the Hell Hound their title and protection of the Board.

• Sanctioned targets of the Red Ledger do not incur a Grave Tax on the striker. 

As you can see, the key person in charge of deciding this amount is the Groundskeeper. Let’s talk about the role they play…

The Role of the Groundskeepers and Graverobbers

The Groundskeepers of the Grave Council are responsible for the common task of helping guide an unfortunate soul through the Mortis Amaranthine and provide the support necessary to complete the transition in one piece.  The Groundskeepers interview the dead and assess the correct level of tax based on the manner of death and provide a friendly face for those that have undergone the trauma of the Mortis Amaranthine. Originally, the Council earned the right to charge a Grave Tax by promising a rebirth free of the Curse of the Unfinished, a wasting plague that infects those that return to the living without help, but this mandate has grown murky in recent months.  There are rumors that since the Curse of the Unfinished is no longer be the threat it once was that there is no need for Groundskeepers any longer.

The Sanctioned Graverobbers of the Council operate in a contrasting role to the Groundskeepers as fixers and specialists that deal with outbreaks of disease and issues with the Morgues of the Lone Star.  While they are also equally capable of the more rote tasks of the Groundskeeper if needed, their abilities are kept in reserve for the rite of Pallor Mortis and assessing outside threats to the Gravemind.

The recently deceased has several choices, after a Grave Tax is assessed by the Groundskeeper: 

• Pay the debt, in full, immediately or by the end of the weekend event.  

• If not paid to the Groundskeeper at the Morgue, the fee can be submitted to the Depot, through an Ops Guide.

• Defer the payment until Collection Day

• If the Tax is not paid by the end of the event, it is automatically deferred to Collection Day and is added to the Grave Ledger.

• Using this method will offer the players a chance to have a scene later in the season during the Collection Day event.

• Ask for Forbearance, or assistance, from the Pauper’s Fund

• If the player wants to opt out of the Grave Tax, the fee is said to have been simply paid by the Fund so that a negative play experience does not happen.

• If the player cannot afford the debt or does not want to defer until Collection Day, they can seek an alternate method of payment by taking a debt to the Widows instead.

• Forbearance is not granted for deaths that occur on No Quarter mods, during CvC, or deaths that occur in the Wasteland.

• Use a Grave Council Voucher to pay the debt

• This offers a way that another player can pay the debt or earn an advantage for their influence in the faction for themselves.

• Certain San Saba Socials can mark a period of time where the Grave Tax is not charged, provided a Stakeholder spent the money to post it at the Post Office.

The Pauper’s Fund

The Widows of the Lone Star maintain an account called the Pauper’s Fund with the Grave Council that helps alleviate the debt of the unfortunate or those that cannot afford to pay.  This fund pays the Grave Taxes of those that ask for assistance and is collected by the various charitable works of the Widows.

• The Grave Tax is meant as a way to create a cool story behind each death, not a burden or punishment.  The Pauper’s Fund can be used in the cases where a player wishes to opt out of this mechanic, within reason.  

• Class 3 deaths cannot normally be paid from the Pauper’s Fund (as the player chose to be flagged for CvC).  There are rumors of powerful favors or vouchers from the Widows or other factions that might be an exception to this rule.

• Using the Pauper’s Fund will normally require a “Widow’s Favor” completed on behalf of the Widows in exchange for their assistance, instead of a Brass payment.  Widow Clauthia normally hears requests to clear a debt to the Widows during her afternoon tea. 

• Requests to pay off the debt should be submitted as Action Requests in between events.

You can find a list of our current Groundskeepers on our Staff Listing on our website.

wrap up

That’s it for today folks! I’ll be back next week with our traditional Rules You Should Know on the Wednesday before our event, THE HELLS OF THE SAN SABA. We hope you will join us for this event, where we hope to test the limits of your character’s endurance and skill with water shortages, crazed psionic raiders, and the most threatening foe of all — taxes and bureacracy!

See you soon Vados!

The Resonant

It’s Jonathan here with our next weekly blog post for the upcoming event, HELLS OF THE SAN SABA! This is leadup for our April DR:TX event written by our Overarc STs, Ash Sexton, Ren Lewis and Andrew Harper. Today we will talk a bit about one of the key threats of this event, the mysterious Resonant Raiders, a unique tribe of Raiders from the Dune Sea. We first released these local DR:TX threats during our online event exploring the Lost City of Barogue, but you might have already encountered one during a late night mod this season. The recent drought has resulted in aggravated raider activity near Bravado, and you will surely encounter these new crystalline foes during our April event.

• Did you hear? We are running a Returning Player Campaign through the end of the season. If you have friends that have been away from DR for a bit, not only can you earn some CAPs for inviting them back, they can get a headstart with some free items and benefits for coming back home to Bravado.

• There was a large March Blueprint Update that occurred last week, and 35 different prints saw some changes and 6 prints were removed from play. You can find more details at the Blueprint Changelog on the National website, but I’ll have a post on how we will handle this for DR:TX soon. Stay tuned!

TICKETS FOR HELLS OF THE SAN SABA are on sale now! don’t miss OUT!!!

THIS POST WILL DISCUSS A FEW LIGHT STORY SPOILERS FOR OUR NEXT EVENT, SO WE HOPE YOU ENJOY WHAT WE HAVE IN STORE!

Our art for this post is taken from our gallery of events from our online game series, Lonestar Skies. Resonant artwork and the Barogue map is by Jonathan Loyd, and our epic picture of Barogue below is by our friend James Pardee.

Let’s talk a little bit about the threats of the next event…

The approach to Barogue

Barogue, the Lost City

In order to understand the threat of the Resonant Raiders you will face during the HELLS OF THE SAN SABA, we have to dig a bit into some juicy LORE of our setting.

During our online pandemic season, we explored several locations across the San Saba, from the humble homesteads of Widow’s Peak to the oily shores of the Clutch, into the depths of Killhouse Prison, to the floating skyship-city of Waking Prime and back through the streets and packed taverns of mighty Essex, the City of Light and Sound. But to wrap up the events of Dead Man’s Hand, the largest online National event so far, we released a mysterious treasure map supposedly leading to the long-lost city of Barogue.

Barogue was once thought to be an archeological legend and tall tale, a titanic moving city that was lost somewhere in the depths of the Dune Sea. A massive moving vehicle, the entire city was built on a series of tracks and wheels that propelled it across the landscape long ago, generations after the Fall of Man. Some told of finding massive formations resembling tread marks in the stone of the deserts to the west of Essex, “proof” they said of Barogue’s existence. Others spoke of songs of the dead city, or even crazed religious ramblings of the Final Knights. And there is a strange series of cryptograms and prophecies thought to be the words of the last leader of the fallen city, found in the strangest of places throughout the San Saba.

Weeks would pass before word emerged about a breakthrough in the search. A group of adventurers managed to unite all six pieces of the map auctioned away at the Dead Man’s Hand Tournament and formed their own expedition. They were joined by Felicity Redfield who has made her interest in the legendary city very well known. Supposedly she held a piece of the puzzle that the explorers would need to find the final resting place of the Lost City.   The wasteland waited with bated breath to see if this group would fare better than those who journeyed before them.

A few lucky individuals got to lead the charge into the unknown, and helped uncover a city thought lost to time and legend. After many days of wandering, Gillie Schwinehund, Gentlemen Commander, Vaan, Niche, Hargrave Moss-Iverspit, and Kell Hyacinth returned victorious. They brought with them tales of shifting sands, gargantuan leviathans, and murderous bands of raiders, but eventually they made it to their destination and all (but mostly Felicity) staked their claim on The Roving City.

Since Barogue’s recent discovery by this team of scouts and Felicity Redfield, it has become a phenomenal source of metal, scrap, and materials for the Railroad Conglomerate. This scrap has been turned into new rail ties to expand the Oxlines, plating to reinforce defenses in Essex and the Clutch, and even attempts to help the city of Waking Prime with new power sources and engines. Many of the new technologies used by the Emerald Arsenal first started as scavenged pieces of oldcestor tech taken from the Lost City. Barogue has become an important resource for the San Saba Board and the various factions of the region, and has served as a safe place to rest and refuel on the path to Oasis and the Broken Coast. The path of progress moves ever forward!

Further secrets of the Lost City are still being uncovered, but one particular myth of old Barogue is worth exploring further… the tale of the strange inhabitants of the Roving City.

The map fragments awarded during the Dead Man’s Hand Tournament.

The Tragedy of the Resonance Choir

During the lead up to our Barogue event, we talked about a few myths and legends that had persisted about the city. While there were several tales shared about ancient Barogue, they all had a few common themes. Some facts remained the same throughout the telling, lending credibility to the legends of the Roving City. The city was somewhere to the west, perhaps lost in the Dune Sea, they said. It was a moving city, a technological marvel made before the Fall. The city was doomed by its hubris, relying on advanced technologies to evade the undead, but eventually succumbed to treachery from Mammon, a Final Knight demogogue in some stories, a traitor within, or even a nation of psions in others. From the fall of Barogue began an exodus, their people scattered to the ends of the San Saba, abandoning the carcass of their once mighty roving city, leaving the Prince Undying, their former leader, behind in a lifeless city to ponder its failure.

We released three tales of old Barogue, but the one to focus on today is the Tragedy of the Resonance Choir. This story speaks of one potential truth of the stories of Barogue, and the lessons we should take from its fall.

While many legends of ancient Barogue have been told, few focus on a single uncontested fact: Barogue was a menace and a threat to its enemies.  At least 200 years ago but perhaps more, before the blastlands became the Dune Sea, the city of Barogue moved with impunity around the wastes. While it is known that the Roving City was mounted on giant wheels or treads that moved it around, the fleets of scavenger vehicles that roved out from the city were a true threat to settlements in the Lone Star in ways that raider or zed could never hope to achieve.  You see, the Roving City was powered by the Resonance Choir - a combination of psions working in concert, pouring their effort and will into the singular task of charging the psi-tech that empowered Barogue.  And the largest source of those psions to power the engines? Captured psions, turned into living batteries against their will.  Their fleets captured any that showed the spark of psionics, and brought them to serve Barogue.

Chief of its enemies was the great state of Mammon, led by the Witch Queen.  The Witch Queen was a powerful psion and worshipper of the Damned 33, and realized the nascent threat the Roving City represented to the wastes.  She realized that the only way to threaten the powerful moving fortress that was Barogue was to corrupt it from the inside.  It started innocently enough - she introduced an addictive new serum, capable of “super-charging” any psion into a mighty mental juggernaut… for a time.  A wealthy city like Barogue didn’t care about the duration, as it was cheap enough to rotate out psions from their stable of “batteries”.  For a time, life was good as newly powerful psions weaved the song of energy that moved the Roving City.  But, the poison pill that was the Witch Queen’s creation was insidious - each time the psion took the drug, it sapped a bit of their life away and hastened their demise as they lost the ability to channel psionic force at all.  Soon enough the plague of the drug addiction melted away the Choir bit by bit, until Barogue could no longer rely on their choir of psions to power the city.  

Faced with dwindling reserves of survivors to scream their wordless energies into the hungry void of Barogue’s engines, they did the unthinkable.  Instead of trying to find a new or different source of power, they simply began taking the undesirables and the unlucky from their own population and giving them the drug to power their unholy crystal tech.  Before too long, it was any that opposed the collection - even the scions of the elite, or any that opposed the Prince Undying, the leader of Barogue. Like short-wicked candles, their own people were cast as new victims into the meatgrinder of Barogue’s unceasing demands for power.  While the drug did not work as strong on non-psions, the feeble spark it lit was enough - provided they poured enough bodies into the Choir.  Few can say if it was this cannibalism of their own people that caused the Exodus, or it was simply their people fleeing certain death at the hands of the elite of Barogue.  But the population dwindled, scattered to the wastes, leaving only one man - the Prince Undying, to solve the eternal riddle of Barogue.  How can a city form a choir without the harmonies and melodies of the psions within?  The Prince sat with the decaying corpse of Barogue for generations, seeking an answer that could not be found.  

As the wastelands turned to dust, and the hills and valleys of the scorched land to dunes, the city of Barogue sat as a reminder of the terrible cost of the psionic technology they sought to master. Psi-tech always has a cost and even if you think the price is easy at first, it is never sustainable.  When you view people as property or things to be consumed like living batteries, you can never outrun that corruption.   Eventually, even the Prince Undying abandoned the dead city, proving the truth that the Witch Queen of Mammon knew all along - when you rely on the power of others to survive, you don’t recognize your own powerlessness until it is too late.  Seize power from those not worthy of it, but most of all realize that the true strength is in a community that does not feed on itself or a community that relies on cheap tricks to stay off the decay.  Barogue was dying long before it fell, and once the wound grew septic it was their end.  Barogue was doomed to fail for its sins, and many are glad that it suffered the ignoble fate of a quiet and soundless death, alone and unmoving in the sands.

How does this tie to the Resonant, then?

In the first nights of exploration into the depths of Barogue, the first scouts encountered terrifying enemies, dessicated corpses with psion crystals for eyes, capable of feeding on the emotions and fear of the living. These strange creatures appeared dead at first, but were only dormant, left behind in the lifeless city in a strange torpor, waiting for prey to return.

The Resonant

As the lost city of Barogue began to collapse in on itself during THE LOST CITY, a new type of enemy appeared from the wreckage, and from the morgue - The Resonant.  First discovered in strange tubes and storage cylinders, these corpses first appeared dead but seemed to awake as survivors lingered in the catacombs and naves of the ancient city. There were countless banks of these preserved bodies in the bowels of old Barogue, suggesting that the Tragedy of the Resonance Choir was not so much myth as fact.

These crystalline raiders were a powerful threat, easily recognized by their eyes and foreheads encrusted entirely with a bismuth-like crystal.  They were eerily silent, lurking in the darkness of the ancient city but drawn to the survivors like moths to a flame. Despite their silence, they were aware of the intrusion into Barogue and reacted violently. They could paralyze their prey with fear and use wicked claws to take down a survivor for later feeding, seeming to devour energy itself from the corpses of their victims.

The Resonant Raiders we know today are thought to be an unexpected consequence of Baroque’s desperate and cruel use of aberrants as living psionic batteries in a final attempt to keep the city moving.  With the discovery of the final resting place of Barogue, the presence of aberrants among the explorers perhaps reawakened the Resonant raiders who have now begun to disperse across the Lone Star in search of energy to feed their eternal hunger after escaping being buried under the dune sea. Others have suggested that they were simply trapped in the defunct morgues of Barogue, released once the Mortis Amaranthine had enough Imprint nearby to begin again on the cycle of Infection. After the Lost City was later excavated by the Railroad Conglomerate, they reported that the bodies of the Raiders killed and buried in the evacuation of the city were gone and the majority of the Resonant were nowhere to be found.

Very little is accurately known of this strange raider clan, but since their escape from Barogue they have been spotted in small groups through out the San Saba. They seem to be more clever than the common Raider, and there are rumors that they have been getting stronger in the years since. Some even suggest that their numbers are growing somehow, perhaps by spreading some strain of Bad Brain to their victims, or even spreading the strange crystalline growths that fester on their bodies to other Raiders. Some early encounters suggested some organization to the raiders as they attacked defenses and probed ways to get through barricades and walls, as if they were seeking something or someone or searching for something ancient and forgotten.

Infested with crystalline growths, the most dangerous of Resonants have psionic crystals emerging and encrusting most of their torso and arms in addition to the growths from eyes and forehead.  While all of the Resonant seem to be blind, with crystals growing from their eyes, they are more than capable of sensing their surroundings and even seeing through the stealthy camouflage of their foes. Their profiles are alien and difficult to make out as humanoid, with the most recognizable parts being crystalline claws and a vaguely humanoid head emerging from a mass of crystals.

The Resonant were first thought to feel your emotions and primitively track their prey this way, but later encounters suggest that they might simply sense psionic potential of aberrants. Some speak of them hovering near trembling foes in ecstatic glee before killing them. Other early encounters spoke of survivors trying to blank their thoughts and think of nothing when the Resonant are near as a tool to evade their preternatural senses, but just as many tales speak of this protection faltering at the last moment when they smell their fear. Regardless of the accuracy of such tactics, the Resonant all seem mildly telepathic and can react to strong emotions and fear in their prey. Whether or not they draw sustenance from this, they still exhibit cannabilistic tendencies like more common Raider clans.

Some of the more powerful Resonant seen recently seem to be voids of psionic energy, both drawing energy from anything nearby and exhibiting complete resistance to psionic attacks. These powerful Resonant are psychic vampires that find sustenance in the last laugh of a foe, or the psionic potential of those aberrants they track down to “harvest” in a bloody display of feeding on the despair and anguish of their victims. Fortunately, the presence of these types of advanced Resonant Raiders seems like to be limited to only a handful of reported sightings.

Successfully “psychically feeding” on downed foes seems to energize the Resonant like it would an undead cannibalizing a corpse, but the bodies they leave behind are desiccated and shriveled remains that seem to resemble the first sightings in the Lost City. There are multiple confirmed reports of them leeching energy from psionic use nearby, healing their wounds and reacting with an anomaly response. Regardless of how many they kill, feeding on aberrant energies seems to do nothing to truly sate the hunger of Resonant Raiders.

They always hunger for more.

What will happen or what will emerge when that hunger advances to be all consuming, leaving room for nothing else? Let’s find out together!

Artwork by Anastasia Mars

Wrap Up

That’s it for today Vados! I hope you enjoyed this bit of lore, and we hope you will join us for our next event, THE HELLS OF THE SAN SABA. It seems like the drought won’t be the only thing that’s a danger during the next event!

I’ll leave you with a bit of poetry by Shan, first released for our Barogue event. See you soon, Vados!

Old Barogue thy Humble Art 

Driving through those Shining Seas 

A Kingdom come from Lands Apart 

To bring us what we sorely Need.

To Parth she brings the fuel and food,

To Chime she brings the bright young men, 

From there she ferries them to Sand, 

And ferries them back home again. 

Ol Barogue thy Brave Art 

To connect the Islands of the Sea, 

To range afield and journey far,

To bring us sorely what we Need. 

The White Death looms before us

And the White Death looms behind. 

The White Death is a chorus, 

That sings inside my mind. 

The White Death could be joyous,

The White Death could be kind, 

But the White Death is afore us. 

And it takes us all in time. 

How do you find that Old Barogue? 

How do you go to the City that Roves? 

Well young traveler just follow the Road,

Made by the passing of that Old Barogue! 

If you are lost and the city is missing, 

Look for the light of that Old Vossa Psi.

Cast a keen look upon each horizon 

And follow wherever she colors the sky. 

I cast these poems into the pit, 

As a kind of time capsule. 

I hope that when they are exhumed one day,

By smarter people than I ever was,

That they will remember Barogue, 

And what we were capable of, once. 

And could be again.

Rage That Fills Her Sails: Rules You Should Know

It’s Jonathan here with our next weekly blog post for the upcoming event, THE RAGE THAT FILLS HER SAILS! This is last leadup post for our March DR:TX event written by our Overarc STs, Ed Sampson and Joel Vold. Today we will talk about some Characters of Note, a brand-new National Blueprint that will be very useful for the upcoming National Event in SoCal, and some Rules You Should Know before this weekend!

TICKETS ARE STILL ON SALE AT THE DOOR! SEE YOU THIS WEEKEND!

Character art is by the talented Avery Clarke, and our blueprint graphic was done by Aesa Garcia.

Grand Admiral Sinker Swim, Leader of the Junkerpunks

Characters of Note

Let’s talk about some characters that will be important to recognize this weekend:

Grand Admiral Sinker Swim

You might have seen a recent Signal for Aid from the Junkerpunks, but let’s talk a bit about another character that will be important this weekend - SINKER SWIM.

Thrust into a position of power, Sinker Swim is not only the ultimate leader of the expansive merchant fleet that makes up the Junkerpunk’s handshake-agreement network but now, a permanent voting member of the San Saba Board. The Saltwise pirate has been the heart and soul behind the recent successes of the wayward faction, and the foundation of the nearby settlement of Drywater.

Bouncing back from the precipice of destitution after a riotous party in the Clutch, the Junkerpunks have recently focused on becoming a bonafide rival to the San Saba Board. Thanks to their own gumption, and some unexpected support from the RRC and the Tribes Disparate, Sinker Swim has recently managed to push through the Drywater Settlement Package, which funded the founding of a new inland settlement to the west of New Bravado. 

Generally understood to be a sort of roughshod, grating personality; Sinker has regardless been responsible for the safe arrival of hundreds of New Bravado citizens via the port at Lake Bravo. All of the exports that leave the New Bravado territory that don’t take the Oxline out, end up in the cargo holds of Sinker Swim’s merchant fleet. 

Joanna Waves, the Strainscourge of the Seas

“Strainscourge of the Seas, Head of the Amaranthine Armada.  Terror of the Waves. The Doom upon the Horizon.  The Dark of the Deep.  The Scourge of All That Sail.”

Joanna Waves is a force of nature and psionics, bringing death and destruction to whoever is in her path.  She is thought to have been formerly a Saltwise Pirate Captain, a ferocious duelist, and a powerful Psion.  She has many weapons in her employ, such as the Tentacles of the Anchor, an ancient Barogian relic, the choking Dark Water, her deadly Sirens of the Dread Captain, the countless Thralls that serve her with one life at the mast, and of course the insidious disease of the Black Spot.

But all of these are tied to her and her will.  Through strange relics and determination, Joanna has made herself the focal point of the Amaranthine Armada, even beyond death itself.

An old song shared by sea dogs called “Joanna, Now We Mourn” may speak some truth to her origins, but wherever she truly came from has been lost to rumors and superstition. Common themes include her being an orphan of some kind that had to fight to survive. They speak of a great injustice done to her or perhaps her family, and the rage she felt against all that she considered foes. All the legends speak of the same thing, though — her rage was capable of propelling her beyond death, in her pursuit of vengeance.

Joanna leads the Amaranthine Armada at the helm of the Juggernaut, a massive oldcestor ship with heavy steel plating, serious firepower, and a relic-borne anchor capable of reaching into the very Mortis Amaranthine to call new sailors to her banner. She has no equal and as she comes to Bravado, she demands fealty and service on the Juggernaut to all those marked by the Black Spot.

There once was an orphan, who didn’t know her name.

And there once was a town that would never be the same.

The orphan lived there, always scraping by for life,

Her food and roof and self-kept safe by her knife.

The town didn’t care for the orphan, they didn’t want to know.

And this orphan couldn’t leave, for where could she go?

The orphan met a family, who took her in from the cold.

The family loved the orphan and welcomed her to the fold.

The orphan loved the family and had a place to belong.

And if nothing had happened, this would be a very different song.

But the town fell to ruin, crime and despair.

And they began to hate the family, and everything seemed unfair.

The town butchered the family, to take their food and cash.

But the orphan was stronger now, and with her mind did lash.

The town is left abandoned now, its people long since gone.

And the orphan sails the seas now, singing her lonely song.

The orphan swore that day, in blood and bone and tears.

That if she couldn’t live in peace, she would live in everyone’s fears.

All the fear and pain she’d felt, she would bring upon the Wastes.

And she’d never be scared again or trust herself to fate.

For the orphan had power now, and a terrifying name.

And now it was the Wasteland, that would never be the same.

An artist’s depiction of Joanna Waves.

New Blueprint!

During our EMERALD GALA event in December, we were given an option to make a new National Blueprint to represent the efforts of the town in creating the Emerald Arsenal. During that event, our players choose three of the possible seven choices, and here are the results of those choices — the SKYLINE DARKENED VEIL. This is a concept design by the peerless Maenad Wilder, our overarc ST for that event, and was one of the three player-chosen projects for the Arsenal.

Named after the Skyline family of Waking Prime, this device was thought to have been used to hide the floating sky-city over the years through clever use of mirrors and reflective compounds. This blueprint presents a new tool to use against the imminent Archon Incursions, and provides a way to stop the Archons from healing as easily if they can be lured into the room augment.

This blueprint will be seeded to the folks that signed up via a Zone of Mechanics during our December game and paid money for an investment into the Emerald Arsenal. Those players will be the first few to receive a copy of this print, and it will enter the public database after this event. For those travelers to our December game that invested, we will add this blueprint to their LIT inventory once it becomes available on the Characters Database.

Check it out:

rules you should know

Lastly, let’s talk about a few major rules you should know about going into this weekend:

DROWNING (DARK WATER)

Effect. The Drowning effect immediately drops you to 0 Body, regardless of what you had left, and you immediately enter Bleed Out. This condition is normally inflicted by Aquatic enemies, included in DARK WATER zone of mechanic effects, or the threat skill Dark Water Strike. The Saltwise strain and Full Dead strain are immune to this effect. If delivered with a Dark Water Strike, this can only be prevented by the Avoid skill.

How do you avoid Dark Water & Drowning?

Some Strains have evolved to either be able to breathe underwater with gills, or simply no longer need oxygen for their dead lungs. The Full Dead and Saltwise Strains are completely immune to DARK WATER and DROWNING and can call “No Effect!” if targeted by an ability.

Certain equipment, such as the Stormies Chaplain Rigging can provide some protection on specific Zones of Mechanics that involve DARK WATER, but only protect versus environmental effects and ways to remove folks from the offending area, not threat skills. These protections will be outlined on that specific Zone of Mechanics.

Some threats might call “Inflict Drowning, Full Dead & Saltwise Immune!” on a strike. If this call is delivered with an Attack or an Area of Effect ability, you must Avoid or prevent the effect to avoid entering Bleed Out. If not prevented, you immediately start Drowning. If you aren’t a particular protected Strain, this can be a one-hit kill!

In the environment, you will also encounter areas of DARK WATER will be clearly marked with blue glow sticks and yellow Zone of Mechanic sheets. Entering into these areas can be VERY deadly, so be warned! Skills like Enhanced Movement can be useful for quickly moving across patches of Dark Water, and some Sailing items can help you avoid being knocked off of a boat. But be careful of enemies purposefully using the inky black water as a weapon, especially if the Siren Song draws you into to the choking darkness of Dark Water.

NOTE: if you are in a Zone of Mechanics of DARK WATER, and received healing for some reason, DROWNING immediately affects you again and you immediately re-enter Bleed Out.

An injectable brew won’t save you from Dark Water if you are alone. You need to be pulled to safety first, THEN you can be healed. Make sure to take a friend with Enhanced Movement with you into that Sailing Mod!

BLOCKADE (PLOT EFFECT)

• Characters may not use the Trade Connections, Sailing, or Criminal Influence purchase lists until the Amaranthine Armada’s blockade of Lake Bravado is resolved.

This weekend, the blockade of the Amaranthine Armada in Lake Bravado has completely shut off trade to the town. While the port is obviously closed, even the Ox cannot stop for long before needing to get out of the range of the cannons, so shipments of goods and materials have been shut down entirely. As such, you may not use the Buy List Skills you may have until the Armada is dealt with. Once this plot has been resolved, you will be able to make purchases as normal, but at the start of the game you will need to find other ways to get Grog, Crystal Candy, Rover Tea, and more.

Threat Abilities of note

Let’s talk about a few Threat Skills you will see on certain enemies during this next event. I’ve included the text of the ability that will be on our Threat Guides this weekend, and I’ll talk a bit about how it will be used to try to kill and murder your characters this weekend by certain zombie pirates.

Common Attacks:

• Dark Water Strike: This is a powerful strike that fills the victim’s lungs with inky black Dark Water and drowns the target.  Drowning reduces the target to Bleed Out immediately, as detailed above.  Call “Inflict Drowning, Full Dead & Saltwise Immune!” on strike. Countered by Avoid, being a certain Strain, or certain equipment.

• Dread Strike: Thralls and Sirens can purposefully recruit victims to the crew of the Juggernaut by spreading the disease of the Black Spot. The creature will call “Inflict Black Spot, no Mutant Resist!” Because the Black Spot is a unique disease, the normal resistances to diseases cannot be used by the Mutant Lineage. The NPC will give the LC an illustrated item card for Black Spot, printed with the rules for this mechanic.  This ability is commonly used on a helpless target in Bleed Out but can be Avoided if delivered with a Strike.

Other Unique Abilities:

• Dark Water Pulse: This is a powerful AOE ability possessed by some of Joanna’s crew that inflicts Drowning in a wide area.  The creature will call “Dark Water Pulse!  Area of Effect, Inflict Drowning, Full Dead & Saltwise Immune!”.  Countered by some equipment that lets you avoid AOEs, and generally being out of range.

• Whisper Walk: Some creatures like Sirens of the Dread Captain can use the Basic Stealth ability even under the effects of bright light or daylight. This psionic effect is countered as normal with Awareness, for 5 minutes, and certain equipment and augments.

• Agonizing Scream: This ability is used by Joanna’s crew to identify Black Spot victims.  The threat will call “By My Voice: Compulsion, All Black Spot AGONY 10 Seconds!”.  Because this is a psionic ability, it can be countered by Basic Mental Endurance and certain equipment, like the Grave-Bell Shard. It uses a Keyword to deliver the ability, so if you are not marked by the Black Spot, this ability has no effect on you.

• Siren’s Call: This dangerous ability is used by the Sirens of the Dread Captain to draw Black Spot victims closer using the Attract ability, particularly to draw victims into Dark Water areas.  Call “By My Voice: Compulsion, Attract All Black Spot!”. This is a psionic effect and can be countered by Basic Mental Endurance for a five-minute period, or items like the Grave-Bell Shard. If you are not marked, this ability has no effect.

  • Attract is a threat ability that lures those creatures or people with a certain Keyword towards the user. Those affected by it must move when possible, in the direction of the call, although if attacked they can stop to defend themselves - if an assailant withdraws, the effect reasserts itself. While they are not required to attack the source of the effect, most zed and raiders will, and critters will if their natural instinct is to do so. Player characters affected can make their own decisions as to what to do once they have arrived at the call, but MUST move towards the call regardless of the danger.

Unique Abilities of the Dread Captain:

• Crew of the Damned: Joanna Waves will demand service of her Thralls, pushing them beyond their limits to enact her vengeance on a town. She will call “Crew of the Damned: By My Voice, All Thralls, Rise Again”.  This will restore every Thrall of the Dread Captain who is nearby and in bleed out but have not been double tapped, instantly healing them to full Body. Even death won’t stop service to the Dread Captain.

• Murderous Strike: Certain deadly enemies may make a melee strike and call “10 Body, Murder!”. If this damage would reduce you to 0 Body, you instantly DIE, as if you took a Killing Blow. This dangerous skill is countered by Avoid and some equipment and skills that prevents Killing Blows, like the Striker’s Coat.

• Down With the Ship: Upon death or entering Bleed Out, Joanna can declare “Down With The Ship”, then she “sinks” back to the Juggernaut as a Fair Escape.  This is NOT a Never Here effect OR entering the Grave Mind, so it cannot be stopped or followed by mechanics that call “No Escape” or follow someone into the Grave Mind. You’ll need to deal with the Amaranthine Armada AND Joanna Waves to succeed this weekend!

There will be a few more surprises for sure, but most of the enemies this weekend will have some variations of the Dark Water Strike and the Dread Strike. Remember, when you hear the INFLICT call, something bad just happened to you!

Wrap Up

That’s it for today Vados! We will see you soon at Camp Kachina for our next event, THE RAGE THAT FILLS HER SAILS! We are excited to tell you a story of zombie pirates and nautical terrors, and we hope you will survive the dreaded Amaranthine Armada. Stay sharp, keep your friends close, and above else make a decision — when the time comes to answer the Call of the Dread Captain, will ye RESIST or SERVE?

See you soon, Vados!