Let’s Holler about Heroes! (Also, some book info!)
almost 6 years ago – Mon, Feb 04, 2019 at 11:53:07 PM

Hey there, everybody!

How was your weekend? Mine was great, at least in part because I’ve been looking forward to writing this update ALL WEEKEND! Let’s get down to business.

Hero Creation

As mentioned in last Wednesday’s update, Chapter 3 of the SCRPG Core Rulebook is all about Hero Creation. The process of making your own Sentinel Comics hero is fairly organic, bringing your hero through their origin story to make them into the crime fighter they are now. There are two methods you can use: the Guided Method or the Constructed Method. Here’s an excerpt from the start of that chapter:

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The Guided Method

The guided method is the primary method of hero creation described in this chapter. It’s useful for players who don’t have a clear vision of what they want their hero to ultimately be when starting the process. It’s not a completely randomized process, as you are still making decisions, but it’s not strictly determined by the player either.

For example, if Adam knows that he wants to play some sort of frontline brawler hero, but isn’t really sure on the specifics, the guided method is perfect for him. He can go through the process, using the basic ideas he already has about the character to inform his choices in each category, while still allowing the system itself to flesh out and inform what sort of hero he’s making.

The Constructed Method

The other method of hero creation is the constructed method, used when you already have a vision in mind of the hero you’re creating (whether it’s your own concept or an existing hero). The constructed method is very similar to the guided method. The only difference is that when you come to a chart that requires you to roll to determine your options, simply choose whichever option fits best with the concept you have in mind. You still need to note what die sizes are used to move from one table’s entry to the next and assign those dice to powers and qualities, but you don’t roll the dice to pick from the charts. Otherwise, follow the same directions as the guided method.

For example, if Maggie knows that she wants to make a specific hero that she’s already written a backstory for and even has a costume design, the constructed method lets her pick the necessary mechanical bits to make that hero playable. With this system, she’ll spend a bit more time reading everything in order to end up with the best elements for her hero.

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With either method, you’ll be going through a list of Backgrounds - who your hero was before they were a hero - which gives you some Qualities and one of your two Principles. Then, you select a Power Source - what made you into the hero you are today - giving you some Powers and a few Yellow zone Abilities. Next, you choose your Archetype - the sort of hero that you are - which adds to your Powers and Qualities, and also gives you several abilities and your second Principle. Last, you determine your Personality, which sets your Status dice and unique roleplaying quality, as well as your Out ability. You then fill in your Red Abilities based on what Powers and Qualities you’ve selected during the process, and determine your Health ranges, based on various choices you’ve made along the way. Finally, you complete your character with a few finishing touches, like your name, alias, and your physical attributes.

This process results in a vast array of types of heroes - every hero is going to have their own unique feel and approach to danger. It’s been a delight building this hero creation process, and then getting to use it to create heroes from the pages of Sentinel Comics and see them really work! I’m excited to get it into your hands.

Our talented videographer (seriously, he made the video for this Kickstarter campaign - he’s really good at making videos) is in the process of making a Very Cool Video about the hero creation process, so look forward to that sometime next week!

Heroes of Sentinel Comics

Also mentioned in last Wednesday’s update was Chapter 7 of the SCRPG Core Rulebook - The Archives. In the Heroes section of The Archives, each hero will have their own 4-page spread: the first two pages are their hero sheet, and the second two pages is their bio, complete with their Attributes, Biography, Powers & Abilities, and info on their Personal Life. These write-ups will delve deep into the stories of each of these heroes, giving you information on who they are, where they come from, and what’s going on with them now. 

Now, if we were to include 4-page spreads on every hero from the world of Sentinel Comics, well, that book would be WAY too big. An unmanageably massive tome. Not very useful or easy to carry, let alone read. Thus, the Core Rulebook was originally going to feature just two hero teams worth of heroes: the Sentinels of Freedom (formerly known as the Freedom Five), and the new teen team known as Daybreak. However, due to us passing the $75k stretch goal so quickly, we’re also adding two more heroes: Heritage (the former Legacy, who has stepped into a new role to allow his daughter Felicia to take on the role of Legacy full time), and Time-Slinger (formerly Chrono-Ranger, no longer time-hopping but still maintaining law and order in this new, strange world). Thus, the twelve heroes in The Archives will be:

• Heritage

The Sentinels of Freedom, including:

• Legacy
• Bunker
• Wraith
• Tachyon
• Absolute Zero

Daybreak, including:

• Headlong
• Rockstar
• Muse
• Aeon Girl
• Muerto

And the lone hero:

• Time-Slinger

What a cast!

A Brief Look at Stretch Goals

Let’s see here...

We haven’t reached the $200k stretch goal, but we’re less than $13k away! I’ve gotten some questions as to just what “Diamond Book of Monsters and xxtz’Hulissh Adventures” means. A very fair question, indeed!

Besides the Core Rulebook, there are three types of books we want to make for the SCRPG line: Supplemental Books, Adventure Books, and Settings Books. 

Supplemental Books are themed around a particular type of comic book setting/storytelling, but are similar to the Core Rulebook in content. They include more mechanical options, advice, and direction for players and for GMs, they add a bunch more characters and locations to the Archives, and they include a one-shot adventure, highlighting some of the material from that supplemental book.

Adventure Books are similar to the six issues of Sentinel Comics adventures that came with the SCRPG Starter Kit, but so much more. Those adventures were intentionally more introductory, given when they came out and what their purpose is as part of a starter product. SCRPG Adventure Books will include 12 issues of adventure in total, sometimes split across two major six issue adventures, sometimes one giant adventure that takes a total of 12 issues to complete. 

Settings Books dig into to locations of Sentinel Comics in a way we’ve never done before. They collect a series of notable places and go in-depth on what goes on there, what those places look like, who are the movers and shakers there, and so much more. For those of you who are listeners of our podcast The Letters Page, these books cover similar content to the settings episodes we did last year, but with much more material relevant to what’s going on in the world of the RPG. 

So, with all that info, you have probably deduced that the $200k stretch goal unlocks an Adventure Book with two six-issue adventures, one about the Diamond Book of Monsters (the book passed down to the hero known as NightMist from her grandfather - where is it now?) and one about xxtz’Hulissh (wait, who/what is that?). The Diamond Book of Monsters adventures are written by Tracy Barnett and the xxtz’Hulissh adventures are written by Cory O’Brien. More on those fine folks soon! 

Whew! Thanks for sticking with me through this lengthy update! Looking forward to Wednesday, where we get downright villainous!

-Christopher

Ama-ZINE!
almost 6 years ago – Sun, Feb 03, 2019 at 07:25:54 AM

Good morning, heroes stalwart and true!

It’s another great day here on the SCRPG Kickstarter Campaign, and I’m excited to be here talking to you about so many things! At the end of this update, we’ll go over the stretch goal we just unlocked, but first: ZINE QUEST!

ZINE QUEST?

ZINE QUEST! It’s an initiative by Kickstarter to get people to make some gaming zines, like the olden days! Learn more from the Kickstarter blog post here.

So, we’re definitely not going to run another Kickstarter starting today for a Sentinels-related zine - this one is already taking up all of our bandwidth. However, since we happen to be running an RPG Kickstarter at the same time as Kickstarter’s Zine Quest is happening, we figured we’d make a zine of our own!

Written and designed by Patrick Clapp (with a bit of guidance and editorial oversight by Christopher Badell and featuring sketches from Adam Rebottaro), Sentinel Choices is a one-issue adventure that is playable by one or multiple players all out of the same zine! It’s not the SCRPG system - it’s its own thing entirely - but it’s inspired by many systems that bring Sentinel Comics games to life.

Patrick is a professional librarian with an impressive writing pedigree, having worked on the Wizard’s Apprentice book in the Kobolds Ate My Baby line of 9th Level Games, as well as authoring their K-1-2-3 Mega Module. Most recently, his “After School Special” contribution to the Tragedies of Middle School anthology of games really wowed many GTG folks when he showed it off to us at Gen Con last year. We’re thrilled to get to work with him on this project, and the work he’s already put into it is both impressive and inspiring.

Rather than do a separate campaign for this or make it an add-on, we’re sending it for free to all backers of this Kickstarter! The SCRPG Kickstarter has been doing so well that we want to say thank you to all of our backers and also support Kickstarter’s Zine Quest, all at the same time.

Anyone who is backing this campaign for a physical reward will get both a physical copy of this Sentinel Choices adventure zine and a PDF of it as well! If you’re backing the campaign for just PDFs, not to worry, you’ll still get a PDF of this zine.

Thank you to Luke Crane - head of games at Kickstarter - for making this initiative happen, to Patrick Clapp for writing and designing such a fun and compact system, and to all of you for supporting us in a way that lets us do fun stuff like this!

A new stretch goal unlocked, and another revealed!

Since we just passed $175k, we’ll be sending all the backers of this campaign EIGHT hero character sheets: the heroes played by GTG employees in the livestream games that Paul and I ran on the GTG Twitch account last year!

PDFs of Hero sheets for The Visitors and The Escalators will be sent out to all of you after the end of this campaign. But what if you don’t know who those characters are and you don’t care about those sheets? Well, good news - you can always go back and watch both Season 1 and Season 2 of the SCRPG livestreams! And even if that’s not interesting to you, hey - it’s 8 more heroes for you to read through and possibly even use for your own games!

Updated Stretch Goal Chart

Where are we now? Where are we headed?

Some interesting things on the horizon!

Catch you next week, where I’ll be doing updates about heroes, villains, and environments in Sentinel Comics: the Roleplaying Game! Have a great weekend, everyone!

-Christopher

A successful start! What’s yet to come?
almost 6 years ago – Fri, Feb 01, 2019 at 09:55:46 AM

Good morning, Sentinels!

The launch of this campaign has been a resounding success, surpassing our hopes and dreams! Thank you all for making this possible.

I want to start today off by covering a few things, including a roadmap of the next few weeks of updates, talking a bit about the content of the SCRPG core rulebook, and then catching up on the stretch goals - both what we’ve unlocked and what’s yet to come!

Kickstarter Updates

We’ve got just over 3 full weeks left in this campaign, and I’m going to be posting updates every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday over the course of the campaign. But what could I possibly be talking about in all those updates? Well, I’ll tell you:

• Friday, February 1st: A little something for what Kickstarter is calling “Zine Quest”
• Monday, February 4th: Hollering about Heroes!
• Wednesday, February 6th: Validating the Villains!
• Friday, February 8th: Elaborating on Environments!
• Monday, February 11th: The Other Stuff: Special Edition, GM Kit, Dice set
• Wednesday, February 13th: Sentinel Comics Stories!
• Friday, February 15th: Digging into The History of Sentinel Comics
• Monday, February 18th: Last week! Let’s take and answer some questions!
• Wednesday, February 20th: Only Two Days Left! Lingering topics...
• Friday, February 22nd: It’s the Last Day! (Plus afternoon livestream during final hour.)
• Tuesday, February 26th: A look back at the campaign and a look forward to fulfillment

Whew! That’s a lot of stuff! 

In each update, we’ll also cover any relevant information on stretch goals, like we’ll do at the end of today’s update!

Chapters of the Core Rulebook

A question many of you have expressed: just what is in the SCRPG Core Rulebook? Well, to answer that question completely and exhaustively would take somewhere in the neighborhood of 400+ pages. But! I’m happy to break down the chapters of the book for you!

I enjoyed making that last bulleted list so much, I wanted to make another!

• Chapter 1: Welcome to the SCRPG and to Sentinel Comics
• Chapter 2: How to play the game
• Chapter 3: Hero creation
• Chapter 4: How to GM the game
• Chapter 5: Tools for GMs to build their own minions, lieutenants, villains, challenges, environments, scenes, and more!
• Chapter 6: Two one-shot adventures: one for the hero team Daybreak, and one built for any heroes, including those of your own creation!
• Chapter 7: The Archives - Heroes, Minions, Villains, and Environments of Sentinel Comics
• Chapter 8: Glossary/Index

So, that at least gives you an idea of what sorts of thing this book will cover! We’re very much looking forward to getting it into all of your hands.

Stretch Goals So Far

We already passed $150k? Impressive! OK, some things to talk about here.

First off, we’re adding a couple more villains to The Archives of the SCRPG Core Rulebook. 

On the left, Fright Train has a new outfit, complete with a railway cannon and specially engineered leg pistons that convert the energy of his running charges into charges for that cannon! With his new helmet, he gets tunnel vision in a fight, and he’s always had a bit of a one-track mind, so he’s more than happy to let Ermine conduct their operations. But if a hero signals that they’re on the express line for a bruisin’, Fright Train might derail all their plans for a chance to let off some steam! All aboard! The Fright Train’s a comin’!

On the right, we have the ever elusive Ermine! She’s got some fancy new tech that significantly upgrades her tricks of the trade. Each of those gems on her “jewelry” holds a specific set of programming, allowing her to deploy smoke pellets, flashbangs, and energy barriers on the fly. She can also tune that stealth suit to make herself undetectable by the naked eye. Good luck getting your hands on Ermine!

Next, we have a Sentinel Comics coloring book!

There are so many great arts being made for the SCRPG Core Rulebook, and we wanted a way to show off those arts and let you interact with them in a fun way. Thus, a coloring book! Using some of our favorite inked arts from the game - before they are expertly shaded and colored - we’re putting together a beautiful book that you can fill in, bringing the heroes and villains to life!

This is a 24 page, soft-cover book, printed on matte paper made for coloring with pencils, crayons, or markers. Plus, each page is perforated, so you can tear out and display your art after you’ve perfected it!

Due to the shorter length of this book (only 24 pages, as compared to the add-on books which are all over 150 pages at the very least), and the fact that this book does not require any additional writing or art over what we're already creating for the core rulebook, we’re able to send this stretch goal to all backers that have pledged for a physical product. Everyone who backs this campaign at any pledge level will also get a PDF of the coloring book, but if you’re only getting PDFs as part of this campaign, you won’t get a physical copy of the coloring book - just the PDF - as you haven’t paid shipping on anything else. However, if you get any other physical product, you’ll also get a physical copy of the coloring book for free!

But seriously, look at this art.

Fantastic.

Stretch Goals Going Forward

What’s coming next?

Looks like there are some cool things on the horizon! How far will this go? That’s up to you!

See you Friday, for an announcement about an exciting thing we’ve been working on!

-Christopher

First Day and Already Funded! Amazing!
almost 6 years ago – Fri, Feb 01, 2019 at 08:57:54 AM

Greetings, heroes! And many thanks to all of you! 

Thanks to your heroic efforts, this campaign funded just before the one hour mark, and that’s spectacular! More than that, we already passed our first two stretch goals in under 5 hours! Bot-tastic!

There’s a lot to talk about in this day one update, so bear with me. We’re gonna go over the currently unlocked stretch goals, reveal a few new stretch goals, and then last but certainly not least, finish up with a bit of news about getting your name into The History of Sentinel Comics.

Unlocked Stretch Goals!

Wow! So, we’re funded, so we’re really making all this stuff. That alone is delightful. This game has been a dream of ours for a long time, so seeing it truly happen is so good - we’re all blown away by your support. Thank you.

As thanks, besides sending you the stuff you’ve pledged for, we’re also going to send a big ol’ PDF of the Timeline of Sentinel Comics that we’re making as part of the book The History of Sentinel Comics. This timeline will be used in the book in a few different ways, but this PDF is really the best way to look at the whole thing. It’s huge. 

We’ll be sending that out when it’s 100% complete and correct, so you’ll get it before you get your copy of The History of Sentinel Comics, but likely not before you get the Sentinel Comics: the Roleplaying Game Core Rulebook. We can only make so many things at once! But, with your help, we are going to make a lot of things!

We also passed the $75k stretch goal, meaning we’re rounding out the roster of heroes in the SCRPG core rulebook, adding two newly named heroes who have been around for a looong time:

On the left, Heritage is the Paul Parsons that many of you know as the hero Legacy. Recently, he’s hung up his cape and stepped into a more advisory and ambassadorial role, giving his daughter the opportunity to become the one and only Legacy!

To the right, we have Time-Slinger, A.K.A Jim Brooks, formerly known as Chrono-Ranger. He used to be a time-hopping sheriff, fixing the timelines after falling through time himself. Now, he’s landed in modern-day Megalopolis. He can no longer time travel, but he can still alter the flow of time in small pockets around him. 

These two heroes are part of the supporting cast of the hero teams the Sentinels of Freedom and Daybreak, and now their hero sheets and bio information will be in the SCRPG Core Rulebook!

Last, but certainly not least of the newly unlocked stretch goals is a little something called The GUISE Book!

Just what is this Guise book anyway? Well, it’s only the best book ever about the greatest hero to grace the pages of Sentinel Comics! Wait, who wrote that? I’m trying to do a serious update here! Who gave Guise my login information?!

The GUISE Book! will, unsurprisingly, feature the hero Guise. Sure, you’ll get his hero sheet and his bio info, but there will be So Much More. Minions, lieutenants, challenges, and environments, all related to Guise stories. Villains ranging from the self-righteous Judge Mental to the deranged Wager Master! A gallery of Guises! Even two major adventures… but I can’t give TOO much away! 

The GUISE Book! is an entire sourcebook dedicated to Guise, featuring writing from Clark Valentine and Christopher Badell, and art from Adam Rebottaro. Who thought this was a good idea? Well, I think you know who. 

Now, The GUISE Book! is the first of the supplemental book stretch goals. With these, we’re putting a ton of work into them - they’re all hardcover, full-color books filled with tons of great art and in-depth writing on story, mechanics, and more. As a result, reaching those stretch goals unlocks them as possible add-ons for this campaign.

Now that we’ve passed this level, if you’re interested in adding on The GUISE Book!, just add $29 to your pledge level. We’ll sort out what that increase is specifically for at the end of the campaign with the pledge manager. If you want just the PDF, you can add only $12 to your pledge, but do note that anyone who pledges to get the physical book will also get the PDF for free.

When is The GUISE Book! coming out? When it's done! It will certainly be in the not-too-distant future, but it will release after the other books and products being made as part of this Kickstarter. As each supplemental book is unlocked, they will be added to the queue of books being made, and they'll ship out to backers as soon as we have them created and printed. Since we're doing shipping in waves on this campaign, you don't need to worry about one product holding up another. Never fear! We will send you your rewards as soon as we have them, and we will communicate how that process is going for every book as we progress, so you'll always know where we are as we make our way through creating all of the content for this Kickstarter campaign and then shipping it out to all of you.

If we unlock any more supplement book add-ons, those will also be books that you can add to your pledge by increasing your pledge amount. But those aren’t the only type of stretch goal we have planned!

New Stretch Goals!

Now that we’re this far along, there are a few more stretch goals incoming! 

What could those mean? That third one is very mysterious… only time will tell!

More Historical Figures From Sentinel Comics!

When we launched this campaign, we were confident that we had at least 50 open spaces for names that could be added to The History of Sentinel Comics. However, we did not expect those 50 spaces to get snatched up so quickly! We’ve since talked to Darren Watts and dug into just how many people could get a chance at this, since most backers of this campaign never even got a chance to see that pledge level! As a result, we’ve opened 20 more slots for a total of 70 names becoming an official part of Sentinel Comics history. But! When those are gone, they’re gone! 

We’re thrilled that you’re all so interested and passionate about what we’re working on! We have so much more to show you over the coming weeks, so keep your eyes here for many more updates!

Thank you for being a part of Sentinel Comics!

-Christopher Badell, Editor-in-Chief of Sentinel Comics