D&D is For Nerds - Jarren's Development Blog #3 - The End Game

Episode Date: February 15, 2025

This week Jackson and Zammit talk about a much maligned aspect of board game design: The End Game aka how do you make the last round not boring aka I have glanced down at the score and I cannot feasibly win so what now? Who knew the answer was simply give people stuff to do which may also include wrecking their friend's day.You can play the tabletop sim version of Jarren's Outpost here, Follow us on Kickstarter and if you're a SP+ member, you can navigate to the member's discord via your account menu or join the public Sanspants Radio discord. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

["The Jaren's Outposts"] Hello! Welcome to episode three of the Jaren's Outposts development blog podcast. I think it could be two things. Yeah. I'm sad we didn't start calling it like the development vlog. Oh, this is kind of a vlog. I mean it is. Far out. Also audio.

Vloggers. What happened is also audio vloggers What happened all the vloggers that's something to think about anyway Today, I'm Jackson. Oh, I'm Joel. Yeah, and today we thought what we would talk about is the end game which is Like monumentally huge like such an integral part of developing a board game But one you might not think about initially, and that is how do you know when you've won? What does it mean to win?

How do you win? What do you do there? Well, because I think this also comes back to a lot of other board games that almost disappointing feeling you have in the last round or when things are about to finish up. Absolutely, this is something. And then what happens? Yeah, like even before we started developing Jaren's Outpost, or in the last round or when things are about to finish up. And then what happens?

Yeah, like even before we started developing Jaren's Outpost, we're in the really early days, because we play a lot of board games. We're huge board game heads. I mean, we've been pretty consumed by Jaren's Outpost for the last 10 years. Yeah. Six, that seems not long enough.

Probably about seven or eight. Seven or eight. But we've managed to play a bunch of board games, you know, in the middle of that and prior to that, and yeah, there's this thing that we always encountered, you get to that last round and in that last round, sometimes you can tell if you've won or not, or you win and it's just like, well, that's it, and it's like, whoa, whoa,

and we've finished the game, and time to count, and let me add this to this and oh and Xamarin one And it's like oh, okay. Yeah, you see this. I think it was scythe I thought like playing scythe was that one of those ones where I think it's like first to like There's like what 10 or 8 win conditions. Yeah, and if you get the first person to 6 win conditions Starts the end game. Yes, yeah.

And so then you all get one more turn basically or something like that. Same with ticket to ride. Ticket to ride, yeah, when the last person is down to three trains I think, three or four. Yeah. And so there is that kind of weird thing. And then yes, you then start like, you know,

the counting and I think it was for Scythe where I always like, cool, this is cool idea of alternate like history and these like cool mechs and all this like stuff that's happening. There's so much like, you know, storytelling that is happening in these like little cards and these objectives and all this kind of stuff and then it ends and I'm, we're done. Yeah, absolutely. Good job me, well done, yay. And this is like, and then? Yeah, exactly.

Well, I think especially in something like Scythe, well, I guess any game with a story where, you know, Scythe is designed, you're basically having alternate history, World War I. And so you're like battling and fighting for territory. And then on the last round, it's over and that's it. And you're like, oh well. You got the best points, good job.

I guess I kind of wanted more out of my finale. And I think there are some board games that do nail this. I can't think of any presently, but I know we've played games where we're like, oh, you know what, that was a fun end game. And it's an absolute challenge. Like I really understand why this happens in a lot of board games.

And I think even Jaren's Outpost for a long time felt pretty similar to that, where you would kind of just finish and it was like, well. I don't wanna like, we figured it out. I don't think we like 100% have either. It's one of those things where you're like, you kind of got to accept it. It's like, hey, just because it doesn't maybe

narratively feel good for you, doesn't mean that's bad right now. For sure, yeah. It's this kind of thing of like, look, it's kind of idea of what we've written at least. So the aim of the game is to end the week with the most prestige. Yeah. Jaren's Outpost is a town where anyone can be anything. And the thing you want, you want is to be known by everyone in this town. Do small favors, i.e. murders for halfling crime families. Visit every tavern in the city and get banned from them all. Kidnap the aristocrat for the other aristocrat, sorry, aristocrat. Oh my God. Or just do odd jobs for your nan.

These might also be murders. There are many ways to get prestige, but it just comes down to one thing. What do you want Jaren's outpost to remember you for? Yeah. So that's kind of what we put the objective and as well as like hey this is another kind of thing it's like I think this was also written by HT handsome Tom the other player yeah he played periwinkle in the in the campaign that you're presumably listening to he's a very very funny man yeah and very very talented and so like the whole idea

is to set this up it was kind of like well you know the why are you doing the things you're doing because once again this is not a one-to-one version of the game. You know, and initially, I think we did think about it in those terms, where we were like, you know, something that is not in at least the most basic form of the game is the weapon, which is a massive part of the initial campaign. And a lot of that initial campaign is where's the weapon and you're chasing it down oh now these people have it now those people have it and and and you know that's not to say the weapon won't

maybe it's who knows you know that we're still developing parts of it but anyway I know in the initial part of the game we were like well it's got to involve this we got it we got to match the story you know you listen back to the to the campaign you're like alright so maybe we're doing things from everyone's perspective. So Leo's got to do this, so Pierce has to do this, and Perry's got to do this.

And then you're like, wait. Yeah, you're like, but actually we've got to, again, we talked about this last episode, I think, but you're like, oh no, we're making a board game. Yeah, yeah, yeah. This is a board game. We're not trying to match the story. We're basically using it as inspiration

to make a board game set in the same sort of setting. Because again, when you're doing something like that and you board a gamify it, and one of the problems that we had for the very first iteration was that, hey, this is a lot of fun, but it felt like I was playing a single player game, and my good friends were also there. Absolutely, yeah, for sure. That was somewhat of a problem because you're like, yeah, well, I want to interact.

Yeah, yeah, I want to meet these other people here on the board. Yeah. And so it opens with, I mean, these other people here on the board. Yeah. And so, and so like, yeah, so it opens with, uh, and again, this is kind of, we were trying to get like the tone of this, um, board game. And for me, a lot of it comes from like being inspired a bit by like Terry Pratchett and that kind of like this world silly fantasy kind of stuff, which is what I really enjoy reading and kind of like what I think really helped with the tone.

Yes, yeah, absolutely. Anyway, so yeah, Jaren's Outpost is a bustling city located along the eastern coastline in the nation of Goldcrest, a nation that nobody cared about until the king was slain by a bunch of adventurers. Don't worry, he had it coming. Unfortunately, adventures did what adventures do and never once thought of the consequences of killing a powerful tyrant, promptly leaving the citizens of Goldcrest to figure it out for themselves. Today Jaren's outpost is at best complicated and at worst fundamentally broken. One might compare it to say a burst sewer pipe that has been inexplicably jammed by the bloated corpse of a dead rat. The rat acting as a sort of plug to stop everything else from

spilling out, but it's not doing an incredible job because there's a worm slowly eating it from within causing sewer water to spill out of its mouth periodically. Eventually the worm will finish eating the rat and eventually the rat will collapse under the weight of sewer water and eventually the pipe will completely explode and a torrent of sewage will flood out. But at this stage, everything is keeping everything else in check. Jaren's Outpost is a melting pot of religions, criminals, politics and paranoia. A winning combination, really. But for now, it works. And that's where you come in.

And that's kind of like... Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Based on the campaign we did. We bring you a game where you aim to earn prestige in this vibrant and scummy city, while also being a dick to your friends. Take control of one of the many outstanding citizens of Jaren's Outpost and compete with other like-minded citizens to be declared the hero of Jaren's Outpost and maybe, just maybe, you'll bring peace to this town. You won't. And so the idea there was like, look, there's this idea of a competition and you're going to be maybe king or queen of Jaren's Outpost,

or the hero of Jaren's Outpost, or you're gonna be hailed as the best kind of, we don't understand democratically elected things, so we're just gonna do a competition. I think part of that is, I mean, at least for me, from my perspective, it's like, you just need something. It's just something, you just hang on to something.

It doesn't really matter, and I think maybe this was something we debated early on. I kind of have vague memories of being like, probably I came at it from the perspective of like, no, it needs to mean more than that or who cares? It doesn't matter what it is. It's good. Yeah. But no, there does need to be some thinly veiled

reason you're doing this. Reason that you're participating, you're doing these quests, because otherwise, why? Like why am I here? But yes, and I think it's like those quests that really comes into how we try to fix that finale, that last round problem.

Because I remember in the early days where there were fewer quests, or you were sharing quests You so often got caught in this trap of it's the last round I'm I don't have the moves or I don't have the items to complete my quest and I can't do shit And so you do nothing for that last round you like I just heal I guess Yeah, I go the amount of times in those early sessions of developing the game where someone would just be like well I just heal I don't do my other actions and like again, it's that kind of thing where you're like,

you know, it could still happen in a sense of like, oh, okay, well, I actually can't do a certain thing. And initially when we had the quests, they were very long, or like they were multi-stepped, or like they were very like, you know, you have to get this and this and this and then do this. and very specific. And there weren't multiple ways of doing a thing. And like, and that doesn't mean as in like, hey, you have say a big gauntlet and you need to drop that off to say buttons and sweat rock Perry's kids.

That's not to say like, or you can drop buttons and sweat off to the big gauntlets. It's just like, no, no, no, no. You can drop the big gauntlets or the B-arm buttons that were yes yeah and so it was kind of like look it because you kind of want to be able to get go through a lot of the quests because you kind of like yeah we wanted them to be able to be done relatively quickly absolutely and that I know that became like a real measure of like we kind of use the amount of quests you managed to complete was around the board. I know that became like a real measure of, like we kind of use the amount of quests

you managed to complete as a measure of like how well a character plays. And also just in the early days of balancing out like the difficulty of the quests versus the prestige points you get from them. Like I remember the really satisfying feeling where we'd finish a game and you'd look around the board and everybody in the seven rounds

would have like five or six quests. And you're like, that's great. We're churning through them. Like that's exactly what you want. Yeah. I remember very early on, I don't know if we've mentioned this, but we used to have, I guess, an exploration phase. Yes. Yeah, we have it. I was thinking about this, I forget, like maybe last thing and I was like, I won't bring it up. But yeah, we did. The initial way the board was set out. So the way it's set out currently is that you have a bunch of flat cardboard squares, which are locations.

25 locations. 25, I couldn't remember how many. I got you, babe. Thanks. 25 location squares, which make up the city, and then on those squares, you have a face-up item and a face-up NPC. So from the beginning, you can look at the board,

and the quests are out there from the beginning, and you can say, oh, I need Papa Little-O, oh, there he is, and I need to take him to little owes restaurant BAM. There it is I'm complaining my moves, but initially every item in MPC was exactly the same but every item in NPC and location Yep, so the things that were not hidden was like a few choice locations Yeah, so the Suez and it was the tavern and the Jaren's outpost trading post So for the first three to four rounds of the seven rounds, you would step onto a location, flip the tile, which, and this is annoying as well, because you have to flip the tile

and the item and the NPC, and the item and the NPC are on the tile that you have to then take off, flip, and then place everything back. And so the first part of the game was, you know, like I said before in that, in the example of like modern play, it's like, oh, there's Papa Little, there's Little's restaurant. This would be like, I don't know where they where Papa Little is. I'm going to have to explore the whole board. Yeah. I don't even know that yet. I don't have to explore the whole board. Oh, I found him. Okay, finally. Now where's Little's restaurant? And that influenced some of the characters.

I remember back in the day, because Periwinkle had a lot of forward movement, being like, that's great for the exploration phase, which is funny because it just doesn't exist anymore. Same for Greg Pearson. There was a dash, as it was written or drawn on the cards, it was like you would basically not interact with the location in front of you, basically not interact with the location in front of you and then interact within the location in front of that. And so I was like, well, when you're exploring, do you still flip over? Yeah. If I don't interact with it, do I still?

I don't know. Yeah. And this slowed down the amount of quests that you got because one, again, at this point, the amount of quests available to everyone was extremely limited. So you might have had two quests, you spent the whole first half of the game figuring out where everything is, then you spend the whole back up, and so it would be like one quest a game maybe if you were lucky. Yeah, yeah. This is maybe not good.

Is it fun to explore? Is it fun to know? I mean like the identity, then again you go from with the numbers perspective of Adam or like the narrative perspective of me to be like, well, like you should know your city. If you know your city, even though it is randomly generated and like everything will change from game to game, you still know it as a person who lives in a city. You're like, oh, I know where that place is. So like then it started like, let's have locations shown.

And then to be like, well, let's then keep the items of the OPCs face down because you know you don't know who's gonna be there Well, yeah, that's it's that's a again that funny thing. Yeah, but you go in and you're like who's here at the tavern Oh, it's these two people but then we were like, no, that's annoying too. Yeah, so we're like, well, what if we just Hey, hey, is this fun? Yeah Is this fun and it's funny as well because I think part of the reluctance to have everything face up is we were like, it'll be too easy. But I think it's what it becomes about them is like, well, where's the difficulty? Exactly.

You know? And I really like that now. And now it becomes say, certain characters because they're zipping around and grabbing people doing some kind of stuff and dropping things at left, right and center. They're like, oh mate, oh, this is great. I'm like a little delivery boy going around and churning up some quests here and there and off I go. And then you've got like maybe a slower character

who's like, well I'm not doing those. I'm getting pipped on the quests there. I'm like, ah, he didn't beat me again, but I'm gonna try and beat some people who are worth some. Exactly. And so right now I'm kind of trailing behind and then with a couple of lucky lucky roles or like, you know

Strategic roles you're like well, I've now caught up Yeah, I know I took me a while but I am fighting these people and good luck to anyone else. Yeah, absolutely Again, there's a very satisfying thing of that like Greg Pierce say is going out in two three rounds has completed four quests You're like I'm killing it knock knock say hasn't moved on the board at all. And then by the next round, Knock Knock's like, and I finally killed the surgeon and Knock Knock rocks up right at your trail. And you're like, oh God,

I've got to complete a bunch more quests. You've completed a bunch of quests, which now gets a bunch of like, you know, defeat quests on the board, which generally just helps Knock Knock. And then you get the surgeon, then she's already fighting there. And you're like, yeah.

And she's like, oh, oh, well I got them. And then, oh, I guess I completed this quest, oh, and that quest, me! Oh, no, no, no, no, and then the, you know, which is exactly what you want, I think, that score tally is absolutely very dynamic throughout the whole game. Yeah, it's very relaxing.

In addition, I think we made a real effort, it's this funny thing where we made an effort to make the game easier easier in a weird way. Yeah. I think, you know, it used to be you would get to that last round and one person, often you, but you know, not always, would be like, oh, I can complete this quest that I've set up. But the rest of us would be like, well, good luck.

There's nothing I can do. But now whenever that last round comes around, and I love this in any board game, I think this is exactly the vibe you want. Everybody is like standing up, hands on their hips, looking at the board, looking at their movement and being like, all right, I got four turns, what can I do? And so often heaps.

Like, which is amazing. You can look at the board, like the amount of, like that's when you pull shit out of your ass. Is that like last round where you're like, wait, but if I go here, here, here, and you look at like, I think in a session we did recently, I remember me and you, I think it was just me and you, and we spent ages, we had that last round and we were just like looking

at our cards and being like, I need to do, I need to turn this way, then flip around and. Yeah, like, okay, I think I can do this, this, this, and if I can do that, if I do that. Yeah, like, oh, if I pass the skill check, I can summon them to my location and then I can, you know. And that's amazing, and it never used to be like that. And again, you know, obviously with any board game,

it finishes and the person who got the most prestige points wins. And, you know, but that last round isn't boring. Yeah, and that's, I mean, like, that's kind of all you can hope for, I think. Yeah, and like the reason why we also, you mentioned you kind of make the quest easier to do so that you can then do these things in the last round.

Yeah, exactly. Which is very, very nice. And sure, we had some iterations or at least some ideas that we never really kind of pulled the trigger on. And again, because what you're really doing when you're playing a bunch of board games, it's like seeing what worked for over here and seeing what worked over there, what you like, you didn't like. And again, this is still up in the air because I'm like, well, to me it's this weird thing because Adam isn't here to say we're done yet.

So I can kind of keep suggesting something. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But like in Scythe, how every game it starts with like, oh, cool, well, there's a bunch of like five or 10 different things, whatever, you can pick one, and that'll change how many points you get to the end. Oh yeah, I see like in Scythe, it's like, oh cool, well there's a bunch of like five or ten different things, whatever, you can pick one and that'll change how many like points you get. Oh yeah, I see like inside it's like, oh you built near a river? Well a good, that's a point for you.

Hey that's an extra point at the end of the game. I like, we like rivers now. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh hey you had, yeah, this kind of troop? Oh that's an extra point if they're remaining at the end of the game or whatever, yeah. And so I think another Fred called that like the Mario Party. Ah yes, yeah the superstars. At the very end like, well done for moving the most.

Yeah, yeah. As a star. You won the most mini games. Congratulations. Yeah. And so you either have like something like that or like, oh, you did the most defeats. Oh, you did the most this, which is like, sure, we could still try to implement something like that.

But then it's like, how do you keep track of that? Yeah. You're adding a whole other dimension to the game where you might have to make a little tracker or something Like yeah for sure, but I do see the appeal of like well You know at the end of the game you tally up the scores You know you look at the prestige board or whatever and then it's like plus Ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba again, I guess it's kind of that overpowering things, making things easy, like the amount of items and locations and even NPCs that give you extra little ability, like I love in that last round where you're figuring out can I get any extra points before the game is over, where you're like looking at every item that's adjacent to you, looking at every

NPC, every location and being like what can I use to my advantage here? Like it's such a good feeling and I'm glad we nailed it. And I think again, part of it is more quests available to everyone. You know what I mean? I'm a freer board, easier to navigate. Like all of that stuff contributes to stopping that final round. Yeah. And I think we've discussed this before, but it's that idea of that move forward, interact as one movement. And I think that helped. Because a lot of it, you had like different phases of the game where it was like, all

right, you got the exploration phase, then you kind of got like, you know, you're planning, figuring it out and you got the end game. And that was kind of how it started for so long. And it was a little bit like, okay, I'm trying to find things. Can be a bit tedious. I'm slow. But you sort of go back that way. Great.

It is funny though, cause you do kind of convince yourself it's fun. Yeah. Like, oh yeah. Like I'm exploring who am I going to find? And then when somebody's like, wow, isn't it kind of annoying that you can, like you can go whole game, you game you're like yeah actually they're right about that and there were games and not yeah where location like one location just was not flipped over yeah because you just didn't need to go there like you know okay you're like

actually is it good that people aren't engaging with this aspect of the game probably not um yeah getting rid of that and seeing where everything is really helped you able to strategize a lot more. And then for the, for the, um, those movement, uh, where you can say move and interact with like with anything and then the move and interact with say the location became the locations became a lot more valuable because we, valuable because you can all do that. And sure, some of them, you need to pass a skill check. Some of them you don't.

And there's been many times where you're like, I'm a character that sucks at skill and I need a six or a five or a six really, if you're saying knock, knock. You're like, I need a six and you roll it, you get a six and you're like, I am fucking cock of the walk right now. I feel great.

This is fantastic. I mean, I just rolled a nice right there. I feel great. This is fantastic. I just rolled a knock at dice. It feels good. But that's kind of, again, you know, last episode we were talking about that, like the DNA of D&D that does exist in the game. I think that's part of it. It's that joy of rolling a 20 and the horror rolling a one,

which you definitely still get, you know, and that's always a funny thing where you're like, okay, this is my last round. What what I need everything hinges on this skill check it's a one. Good. Curse my god damn life I'm gonna have to figure out something else you know. Yeah it's always fun when you try to plan something and you either give yourself I have one maybe if I if I if I if I if I muff it I got a backup one yeah yeah and then we're good I can still do everything I can but if I fight fight fight fight. I'm up it. Mm-hmm. I got a backup one Yeah, and then we're good. I can still do everything I can but if I if I get in one, I'm great Yes, I get into I can still make that work

Muff that muff the muff that muffed it or like this always happens to me because I Plan out myself weirdly where I'm like, right? I'm gonna give myself two rounds or like move here these next two movement cards I'm gonna use to interact at this location and I only need to pass a skill check once but this is my backup and then I pass it on the first one and I'm like well what I didn't expect to win what else am I gonna do and then I look at my movement and I'm like this is worthless to me I didn't think you know one step ahead like I should have been oh no that That's very funny. I like that you you

Assume you're gonna fail. Oh, absolutely Either always assume I'm not going to fail. Yeah, I will plan for like yeah No, I assume I'm gonna fail so sometimes the whole round I'm like I just cuz I need to pass this cuz everyone's brain moves a million miles quicker than mine I'm gonna give myself as much chance. I I can. Another thing that I think is important, because, so, you know, obviously that last round, that's when you strategize, that's when you go, okay, how many points can I get in this turn? And sometimes that hinges on a skill check that you fail.

Now, normally, I think in a lot of other games, you would be like, well, I fucked up that skill check and these last three moves are useless to me, I'm not gonna win the game, I can see it in the cards, I can see it in everyone else's cards, I'm not gonna win the game so it's worthless to me. And that was a thing that happened for a while. And then the sort of other side of this game I think started to come into play, which is if you can't win, can you make everyone else's time worse?

If you can't win, can you make sure somebody else, the person who does win is annoyed at you. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. That is kind of what happens if you know, like definitely multiple games. Your wife's a classic at this. She does, she's so good at it where she's like, well, I'm not going to win, but I can make sure I can wreck everyone else's time. I'm not going to win, but let's see.

The questions available are these ones. You guys are there, and there clearly you're gonna Do this? Yeah, but if I can disrupt this yeah, and I will Mike There's no way I can get pop a little low to you know the restaurant, but I can make sure no one else Yeah, hey, okay, everyone's like you know converges. I pick him up. I throw him in the bin Yeah, discarded you anywhere near the item deck or the NPC deck? No? What you can do about it? You know. Enjoy the game. And I think that really helped, you know, it became part of the mentality of the game is like Sometimes you're not gonna win but you know, or sometimes you're gonna lose but you can make sure everybody else wins

Less. Less. Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. You're not gonna win, but you're not gonna win badly. Yeah, and I think, I don't know, like, you know. You will be a sore loser. Yeah, you'll be, yeah, exactly. You can be a sore loser, we encourage this. This game encourages being a sore loser, I think. And that's fun, it just gives you that extra thing to do in that last round where otherwise you might not have,

you know, something to do. Like, I think that was another game changer for us to figure out. Yeah. And I like that when it's just like, you know, something to do. Like I think that that was another game changer for us to figure out. Yeah, and I like that when it's just like, you know, the scoring, because again, it is like, we are, we do use like small integers, like your attack is still one, you know, everything is like very much, you know, your health can be like four or whatever. It's all very small numbers. And so like, you know, one point, two points, that kind of stuff, it kind of stuff it does it's quite a lot. Yeah, and so It was nice seeing when towards like we started really refining it. Yeah, you'd get like a lot of stuff clumped together

Yes, oh, and then you know, it'd be like sweet, but then it's like with one breakout quest Mmm dot out and yes, absolutely like oh shit. I think you feel so good You're so so far ahead, but then it's like well, yeah. But then old mate drops off one item for two quests. Suddenly he's like up on like more competitive. And you're like, absolutely. You're like, oh no, oh no, oh no, oh no. You can never, it's very easy to get tortoise in the head. It's very easy to get complacent being so far ahead.

And I think that's a very cool part of the game. I mean, we went on BigSo Titty, the PNG recently, great podcast, everyone should listen to it. And we talked about how this is kind of a game designed to be broken a little bit. By which I mean, it's designed for you to think outside the box, you know what I mean? It's designed for you to be like, can I do this?

Like everything in the rules seems to imply that I can do this, and if I do this, this feels like I've broken the game, but can I do this? Like everything in the rules seems to imply that I can do this and if I do this feels like I've broken the game but can I do it? And you know the answer is nine times out of ten. Yes, absolutely. That's how we want it played. We've got a few questions like I think someone was using the blank spell book as an example they asked in the discord and it was a question that I was like oh fuck that's a clever way of doing it. I never thought about that. The blank spell book being an item

where the description of the item and the ability is that you can use it as any other item. Now typically people use this to complete a quest. You know, if you can't get to the spaghetti, say, but you're right on the blank spell book, well you can pick up the blank spell book and drop it off as the spaghetti. And the idea is you use it as a free action,

because like with the game, we'll get to the gameplay, don't worry, we're gonna get to the gameplay. We will show some gameplay as well, that is something we intend to do, we're just setting up for it. But, so the idea is as a free action, which can be done anytime during, or not even during, anytime. Literally anytime.

Anytime you want, and it can be like, in between the actions of your movement, as well as like at the start, at the end, in between the actions of your movement, you know, as well as like at the start, at the end, in between. So if you want to like, if you move and then- Free action, if it's a move and interact. Then move again and interact, or you could do move or do the free action, then move again.

You could do it in another person's turn, anytime, yeah. So that's what kind of like this idea of a free action that can just happen whenever you want. And I like the idea of like, you can do them as many, you can have as many as you want as well. Yeah, yeah that's what kind of like this idea of a free action that can just happen is whenever you want and I like the Idea of like you can do them as many you can have as many as you want as well Yeah, yeah, yeah, so you have like, you know four daggers that you can discard as a free action to do damage You can throw all four at once. Yeah, yeah me too. And so the the idea being like, alright, so I have the Blank spellbook and as a free action I can make that anything for the day like any other item or NPC That's like visible for the day.

And someone was like, hey, so someone was like, went to attack somebody and then we're like, well, I want to know if I hit or not. And if I do hit, I want to turn that into, can I turn that into like a big sword to do even more damage? And I'm like, that's a brilliant, brilliant idea how to use that.

Absolutely. Damn, yeah. Cause then I kept thinking to be like, well, And I'm like that's a that's a really yeah, very small use that absolutely damn Yeah, yeah that because then I kept thinking to be like well I could for example if I went to go hit somebody with the with a heavy my backpack and I'm like I missed But if I could turn that into say an item that gives me another reroll Yeah, or an item that gives me like plus one or two to your to your attack. Yeah Absolutely, that's great. Yeah, go for it. That sounds cool as hell. Yeah, a hundred percent. I like that. Yeah, I think that's very cool. And that's exactly the kind of thinking that you should be going into the game with, you know.

Like it doesn't say, I think you've described it in the past as the AirBird rule. Yeah. The game doesn't say I can't do this. So, I mean like why not? If it's gonna make the game more entertaining, if it's gonna lead to shenanigans I know cuz a few rules that are still currently they better in there that I even now I'm to this day being like We could just nix it. Yeah, you know, there's a reason like cuz there's one which is on the setup Which is because we have a bunch of different locations Yeah are have borders and they're there for a regular the the sewers have borders to kind of denote that hey they connect They're kind of like yes Transportwers have borders to kind of denote that, hey, they connect. They're kind of like a transport there, a public transport.

You can kind of go between them. And then the taverns and the Jaren's Apple, which is the centre of the square. And it's like, okay, initially we were like, hey, to kind of make things interesting for the board, it's like, try not to have anything that has a border share, like, you know, being adjacent to each other. But even now, as we're chatting and like, you know, as we're sort of developing this, as it goes along and very, very close to launch, I'm like, do I need to say that? Yeah, well, yeah.

You know, it's just like, hey, if you have two taverns next to each other or two sewers, does that, you know, hey, that's just the way the board is done. And like, if you want to, hey, you can move things around. But I'm like, well, it sort of doesn't matter. Yeah, for sure. Yeah, absolutely. And I think this will be the kind of board game

I kind of hope this would be kind of board game that when people play it and they get used to playing it they start Implementing their own kind of rules like I think that's it's it's very much. Oh, yeah, I would love that, too I think that's kind of in the DNA of the game is Kind of do what you want with it. I don't know, because I think that's what happens for us. Is we, I mean, we've, you know, obviously we're lucky that when we decide something, it's sad, it's canon. It's canon. But I mean, that's kind of how we've developed it

is being like, oh, this would be fun. Oh, this would be fun. Why can't I do this, you know? Yeah, and so I really hope that like, for example, it's like, you know, hey, I noticed we've done like, you do seven days and like, and that's great But we were thinking like what if it's like the first person to 10 prestige and then everyone gets a day after yeah I love the idea of people like, you know playing their own

Game in this within the parameters. Yeah, absolutely I think that's a like a fun thing that you know, we've done in the past with a bunch of other board games I think it's like a fun thing that you know, we've done in the past with a bunch of other board games I think it's like a survivor. Yeah, one where it's like a volcano in the middle and like, you know I love that game simply for the fact of like what you and Adam made. Yeah I mean that game yeah survival was fun And yeah me and Adam just homebrewed a bunch of different ways to play it because yeah And I think that's a fun thing to do of different ways to play it because. Yeah, and I think that's a fun thing to do.

For example, it's like PVP, it's like player versus player is something that we didn't really have for a long time in this game. Because I was always worried about the person who was trying to make everyone else's day shitty and it's like camping someone or punching someone, you know, go see, like that. And I'm like, well, why am I doing that? That person's a dickhead.

And why are you playing a board game with that person if that's like what they're doing and if they can't visibly see that they're upsetting other players. That's all them. Yeah, 100%. And so it was this kind of thing of like, well why can't we do that? Why can't we just, hey let's just have some... Like allow people to, you know, and that kind of comes back to that desire path thing, I think a little bit.

Like I know when we played it with people in the past, they've been like, can I attack, can I attack you? Like, can I attack another player? And we've been like, oh man. Haven't really set it up, but no, why not? But I mean, like, yeah, I can't, if you play with that person who does, you know, kind of abuse it, it's their, it's their, not their, not the game. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah abuse it. It's this it's on them not the game

One thing that I I'm always really grateful about especially with the game in its current incarnation is a thing that I get scared about Is that the game requires a real? Knowledge of the items and the NPCs in the locations. And that definitely helps. If you know what everything does, then, and you will after playing it like, you know, a couple of times, you'll get an understanding. But you know, my fear is that like, well, maybe that's overwhelming. Like you don't know what everything does.

You're picking up, you're looking at stuff. But every person that's played it in its current incarnation, by like the last round, they play like we do. Like, and now I don't know, something about that's so satisfying to see people being like, wait a second, but if I use this and this, and this, does this do this? Oh my God, I can, blah, blah, now I don't know, something about that's so satisfying to see people being like, wait a second, but if I use this and this, and this, does this do this?

Oh my God, I can, blah, blah, blah, blah, you know? And then they do crazy shit, like the kind of stuff that we, who've been playing it for 10 years, managed to pull out of our asses or whatever. Yeah, I always, I remember playing it with my mate Josh, and it's that kind of thing because it's like, oh yeah, watch Zammat do his bullshit of like, let me, for my first, Yeah, yeah, yeah his bullshit of like, let me, for my first time.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. As my first trick. As my first trick. And again, it's utilizing those free actions and then I'm playing a character that you're so familiar with and playing the board game you're so familiar with that you're like, oh, I'm grabbing all these things that have free action so that I can do this, this, this,

this, this, I'm on here so I can do this. And, you know, Josh seeing that being like, ah. Yeah, like, okay, cool. I can do that. Sick know Josh seeing that being like ah Yeah, like okay cool. I can do that Sick yeah You know turning his head being like yep cool. I got it. Mm-hmm. Yeah, absolutely It just does happen with everybody who plays it They just you see that like again cuz you know and I think you talked about this and maybe the first episode like a fear Is that the game is stratagems that you Look at it. There's too much going on your brain shuts down, but it's so like nice and and gratifying

To watch that happen in anyone's head when they play the game to be like oh I can go cuckoo crazy with this game. Yeah, I can break this game I can do this and that and you know, I think like a lot of that comes from again It's that sort of the emergent rules to gameplay where it is the hey I've got you know this this like you know what's getting using say buttons and sweat rock and say the B gauntlets. Well I've got in like the quest is like hey give buttons and sweat rock you know drop off button other B gauntlets to buttons and sweat rock and you're like but I've got buttons and sweat rock. And you're like, but I've got buttons

and sweat rock. Can't I just drop them at the gauntlets? Absolutely. And we're like, yeah, why not? Yes you can. By all means. And then you iterate on that where you're like, well, instead of dropping the gauntlets off the buttons and sweat rock, I'll drop buttons and sweat rock off to the gauntlets. Or hey, I noticed Zamet has the gauntlets in his backpack and I can get to his space. I'll drop them off at Zamet and oh, that completes the quest. Or, oh, I noticed Zammet has the gauntlets in his backpack and I can get to his space, I'll drop the more fat Zammet.

And oh, that completes the quest. Or, oh, I can roll in this location and I can bring any item here, swapping it out for the item that's there. I'll do that with the B gauntlets. Or, oh, this grappling hook lets me pull any item. Like, you know what I mean? It just, like, or buttons is where I can put it in the tavern.

This location lets me travel to, and like, just so many different ways to complete that quest. And then again, that helps with the end game as well. That helps with making kind of anything possible when it comes to that last round. Yeah. Do you remember any other end game ideas that we had?

Like was it always a matter of how much prestige you've got or did we have other ideas? Well, there was usually it was like, okay, like victory points. So it was like, you know, the most points you get. Yeah. I was pretty much there from the start. Yeah. Yeah.

Uh, I think initially it might, it was maybe money. Yes, that's right. Gold used to be something in the game. And, uh, so with gold, you'd be able to like say, pick up items and then go to a trading post and then you could like trade that in for the gold or you could say, swap out the item for an item in the, in the trading post. And then you get the, you know, the remainder in gold. So it was this kind of thing where like, you know, ah, and then there's like a victory points. And then it was a tie or something like that.

Oh, the most gold. Or it was like, well, gold would equal that. That's right. That was one iteration. Gold was like, it's great to think back to some of the stuff that we initially had and like, well, which ones were cut straight away? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Absolutely.

I don't think gold stuck around for very long. Gold was the first- Even when you started explaining gold, I was like, that's right. Victory points used to be gold. And then you kept explaining it and I was like, that's not right. That's not what we had. Gold was some mad separate, you know, so that was one of the first things that just went out the window.

Yeah. So we had that. For like the end game, we kept being like, well, what if it was like the last day, it was the kind of thing if you can't do anything, well, what else can you do? Yes. Which is also what really what helped put what if we started fighting NPCs for prestige? Yes, yeah, absolutely. Because it became that thing where we were like, well, if I can't do anything, yeah, like what, how do I spend that last turn if I have nothing else to do? And so there was like iterations of that and it was like, well, we could say, go, you know,

race to the tavern, whoever has the most health or whoever has most this. But because everyone has such varying degrees of... It just didn't. Like, how is that balanced? And even race to the tavern, again, it's the same thing where it's like, well, I was already at the tavern, so do I win? Like, what are we doing here? Yeah, absolutely.

And again, you're right, I suppose like we also, the quests used to be quite involved. Like there were many quests, or maybe many's maybe a bit much, but there were at least four I think that were like go to these like six locations and that was just annoying. Yeah. It used to be something like, okay, like long winded kind of quests. Which is part of it that I liked because it was like a little bit of a story. Yeah, yeah, sure. And like again, as probably evident now, I like the sort of narrative way things kind of flow. And so it was, okay, cool. Well,

hey, this character wants you to do these things or this thing. And there was always sort of like, it was baked into that. Yeah, yeah, for sure. It was a couple of like, all right, you need to go to this location, pass a skill check, then go here and drop off that. And so it was a couple of a little, you know, yeah, yeah. And so they'd become like, okay, well, I got to do this and then this and then this. You just didn't turn through them as much. And then I think that what that became an issue with as well was like, I remember several development sessions where we would sit down with all of the quests we had and be like, how many victory points are these worth? Because for a long period of time,

that was not something we were concerned with. Like the victory point number was random, pretty much. Yeah, it was like, oh, that feels, you know, we're vibing it. Oh, that feels like it's gonna take some time. Yeah, one point. Yeah, two points. Absolutely. Well, but I even remember the idea, cause did it used to be in iterations of like,

was it fives and tens? Okay, because I have this memory of being like one victory point feels so low, and like two and three as the absolute highest felt crazy, but maybe I'm just misremembering the way the scoring used to work. I think at one point, the idea was to like multiply everything for a factor of 10. Yeah. Yeah. Okay, so it's like, you know, 10 points 20 points 30 points

Which I understand the value of yeah, you can do 15. Yes. That is useful Which maybe that would be good. Yeah, but I quite like the way it works now I like how low scoring I mean it doesn't feel like it's low scoring because you know again you're doing like I guess That's the balance of like, you know't get a victory, a quest that's worth five points, but you're going to do five one point quests over the course of the game, which is far more interesting in the long run. Yeah. And I think what happened with that as well, and this kind of does get back to a little

bit more of gameplay as well. Initially, there was a few times where people were grabbing items and then holding onto it like it was their precious. Yes, that's true. People are hoarding. Yeah. And they were like, well, I don't wanna get rid of this. I like it. I want it.

This is mine. This is mine to keep. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I don't want to give it away. And so then we started being like, okay, we need to shorthand that none of these items are precious. Yeah, yeah, yeah, for sure. And you need to ch items are precious. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And you need to churn through them. Yeah, absolutely.

And so it was like, hey, get rid of the items. And so that's where the quests helped. Yes, yeah. Where the move and interact, the left, right interact. All those kinds of things where you could just, you know, grab this from the item deck or grab this from the board. Yeah. And then if you're discarding it, sweet.

It just, if you drop it off somewhere, cause it used to be like you discard it, it's there now on the floor. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Which was another kind of problem as well. Yeah, that's right. So you would discard it and it would remain on the location, but that meant that you could end up with like five items on the one location. Wasn't as bad as say ending up with say six hostile NPCs on one location. Yeah, yeah. And you're like, well I'm never never... I mean, look, something about that I do miss.

I have to admit. What I miss is back in the day, like, I'm glad it's gone, but I miss the vibe of being Greg Pierce picking up a big og, knowing that a big og being an enemy that does quite a bit of damage, knowing that there's a location people are gonna go, dropping the big og off and just letting them hang out there and making that tile a hostile tile yeah like that that was a good vibe but it just it got cluttered and it got it got messy and it was a you know and that's the thing it got cluttered yeah and so then this became like yeah this is great but now this this this environment here you just get

swarmed by enemies yeah is this fun yeah fun? Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly. And that's kind of the problem. Because what in your head when you're Greg Pierce, you're like, when people go there, they're going to, you know, cop a bunch of damage, but they need to go there for the quest. And what happens in reality is people are like, well, I'm not going there. I can't go there. I will die.

And you're like, oh, yeah, fair. I'll be defeated. And that's it. And so again, you start thinking about this idea of like, again, using the narrative to be like, well, they're in my backpack, they need to go somewhere, I drop them and I can drop them on the location. And then you're like, well,

and then they just wander back home. And that can be, they wander into the tapas. Or they wander into the item. The NPC deck, yeah. And then like right now, cause I'm like, well, what you could put in the rule set is like, well, if a location doesn't have an NPC, when you drop off the NPC. And you, if a location doesn't have an NPC when you drop

off the NPC, you know, they are on that tile now. And like that to me is, hey, that's a great way of maybe alternative rule set. Yeah, yeah, exactly. I think we're definitely at the stage where we've developed the base game or so satisfied with it. But obviously our brains are still churning. And so the amount of variant rules that just were like, we could do this. I mean, obviously we don't want to change, like we're very satisfied with the way it works. But what if?

What if? And I think that's kind of where we are at this moment where it's like, hey, this is a thing, but what if? Yeah. Because like, again, it's that kind of like, we've really whittled it down to the core of it all. Which is why I really hope that when people do Kickstart, they buy it and they get into little grab little hands and they'll be able to play it and get to the guts of it. I would, yeah, full-on love people to be like, hey, we played with this rule.

Yeah, me too. Oh, absolutely. Because, again, and using other board games is a good example of this. Uh, so the Stardew Valley board game, um, which look, if it wasn't for the name of Stardew, would I like this game? I have bought it. I'm guessing no. No. Uh, great. I, it, it, it, it, and look, if you've played the Stardew board game and you really

loved it, that's fantastic. It's good for you. Um, we, we played it, my wife played game and you really loved it, that's fantastic, it's good for you. We played it, me and my wife played it, and it is a co-op game, which is what I like, because it's very rare that you can, with these co-op games, like two players. But it felt a little underbaked. Yeah, okay. And then going online and seeing other people. People have the same opinion. And people being like, so we played it with this variant

we played it with this rule and we did this instead yeah yeah and that made it a lot better and it weirdly had uh so for example uh if i can remember the start at the top of my head uh so the community centers is your objectives and you don't know what they are yet okay yeah so but you need like little like heart tokens and then an action to go to the community center to then Spend your heart tokens to reveal what your objective and if you have those things you can then play that Then in there to complete objectives, but if you don't of course it's gonna take the next time to go there as an action Yeah, complete it.

And someone was like, yeah, we just revealed every objective. Yeah, that seems like they fell into our trap. Yeah. Yeah. And they're like, yeah, we just revealed the objectives first, because it's like, oh, depending what you're doing, it's also RNG of like, every game is a bit different because you might, your goal might be different. And so it's like, yeah, when you're completing it, you just add those love tokens, the heart tokens at the end.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. So you know what's going on, so it doesn't feel like you're wasting a turn revealing something that you can't complete. Yes, yeah. I'm like, that's very funny. We had the same problem. We had the same problem. We just decided, hey, that's mad. Let's not do it.

Yeah. That's so funny. It's interesting seeing how people will play something and that's kind of those desire paths. And that's what I'm looking forward to Yes. Yeah, I really hope people latch on to that because I would love nothing more I mean what I hope is that I mean like, you know, God willing There's no part of the game that people need to fix But that the game is so I'm sure there's a word for this

But there there's so much variability and crunch to this game. There's so much depth to it that people will figure out with the base mechanics, just crazy shit to do. And I think there's something as well where, again, we've been playing it for so long, that we're so close to it, that it's hard, and we're so embedded in the rules of it, that I think it's hard sometimes to step back and be like,

you know, what could I do or I don't know, something like that, like being so close to it, it doesn't restrict you, but I think it sometimes maybe makes it hard to see the forest for the trees. Yeah, and so when other people play it and they've never played it before, you know, like again, like the person in the Discord, and hey, on the Sam Smith's Radio Discord, both the plus and the public one, there are channels for the Jaren's Outpost game, if you wanna jump in there and discuss it and ask us any questions, please do.

But they were already doing stuff that we'd never considered before. And it's awesome to see people, like it's cool, it's cool seeing what people come up with and what people figure out, yeah. Yeah, it was weirdly very exciting because they were like, we saw a little clarification and my first response was like,

well, first off, what did you guys decide to do? And what did you think would be the most fun? Yes, yeah, yeah. That just comes down to it all. Oh, absolutely. I hope nothing people are like, we want this fixed and more about this was fun. This made it a little bit stupider and fodder.

Yeah, absolutely. And yeah, I was so satisfying seeing that those questions were not places where we'd made a mistake, which is what I was scared about. It was just people being like, wait, can I do this awesome thing? Yeah, yeah, baby. Hell yeah, you can do that awesome thing. And like even like, because we're also seeing, again, the Kickstarter does really well. Mm-hmm. Hopefully have a launch date soon, we're developing some extra characters, and even just amongst ourselves,

I was like, this one character, then Adam was like, well, if they pick them up, because again, this whole idea of when someone picks up an NPC, now they're an item, and they are classified as an item kind of stuff, and so you can't attack them. And then we were like, why? Yeah. Why not? Yeah. What's the problem there? Yeah. And so we're like, yeah, well, like, you know, if other items are considered in your location you were in, well, why not be able to fight them? And why not be able to like, you know,

someone's in your backpack and I can see you're going to drop it off the place. If I can get to you and then do as much damage like humanly can, you drop it. Absolutely. Idiot. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, cool. Let's do that. Yeah.

And so this idea came from that of like, yeah, whoever's in your backpack is also at your location, so why not? And I was like playing with this, so it's Evelyn playing. It's like the design is very, very cool. She's like a horse. Like, she's on a horse. Yeah. She's on a horse. She's on a horse. Yeah, she's on a horse She's on a horse. Yeah, and the whole aspect is like, you know, you are charging down the streets. Her movement is crazy

And so you could like you could theory could pick someone up and as you're charging she's like, you know Like you know, it does it does some tick damage and then attacks but it's like well If the NPC that you've picked up is in your backpack But it's like, well, if the NPC that you've picked up is in your backpack, in theory, could you just do like, you know, tick damage, tick damage, then fight them? And it's like, yeah, I guess you could. And then to me, that just sounds like, yeah, you've, you are picking them up or you're dragging them behind you in your, on like, you know, on your horse and you are just ruining their day.

And I like that. I think that's funny. Absolutely. And again, like, you know, the thing that would maybe make you reluctant to do something is you're like, oh, but that's going to make it really easy for them to kill that NPC. But actually, that's good. That's what you want. You want people to be churning through NPCs. You want people to be churning through items. Churning through locations. Like the more... I think my philosophy has become more and more that people should engage with every aspect of the game

You know what I mean? Like the more people engage with it one That's just that's that's what the games for but two it means you learn everything and you you become familiar with it And then you can get crazy with it. Yeah, I think I will add as well. It really helped that so the end game Was this idea of repopulate. Oh yeah, that was a game changer, dude. So because you're going, everything, there's 25 locations, they all start off, except for the two taverns and the trading posts.

They don't have NPCs or items on them. But everything else starts off with an NPC and item. But if you're there picking things up and throwing them out, sooner or later you have an empty city. Yeah. And everybody's in the item deck and everybody's in the NPC deck. Sorry, everybody's in the NPC deck and everybody's in the item deck.

Yeah. And so this came from, weirdly enough, the Deadlands board game. That's right. It did too. Because again, we play a lot of board games and we, for some reason, I think through Jackson, your pure enthusiasm for the broken game that is Deadlands, the tabletop RPG. I do love it. We have also become accustomed to it and also love it dearly.

And so there was like, Hey, did you know there's a board game of Deadlands? And I was like, it's already in my card, baby. And it was just as broken. Just as broken as the RPG. It's weird and silly and you're like, oh, wonderful. How does this game even work? Yeah, it rocks. But there is a mechanic in that where in certain rounds, townsfolk come to, like on train, they come and they then populate the map.

Well, that's a clever idea. Yeah, absolutely. Because we were playing here, it's like round six and the board's empty. And that means that everybody swarms to the item, the trading post or a tavern, or any of the locations that allow you to sift through empties. But even this might've even happened prior to those existing on the board. So you just were like, how luck. What am I doing? But now on the third and the sixth turn,

is that right? Yeah, third and sixth day. You repop, so any space where there's not an NPC or an item, you put it back on the board. And what's great about this as well is that it just, it's again, it's again, one of those like RNG pivot on a dime sort of things where, you know, you're sitting there, you finish your fifth turn or whatever, somebody's laying out the thing, you look down at where you are and you're like, oh, I'm now on this item, or I'm now sort of close to this NPC, hang on. And so that really helped with the last day

to be able to do something, because like, you know, day before things were back on the board. And also the idea of like, the end of every day, the item in the tavern, because that currently stands, you have four items in the, in the currently that are available. And if you're on the trading post location, there's four items there. And it's like, well, the last, the thing, the last thing goes to the bottom, the item in the last

square basically goes to the bottom. And then you, you know, and then you dole them out. So there's something else. It's a kind of conveyor belt constantly happening for the tavern and the trading post. And the same thing for the tavern. And the tavern, we have two tavern locations which act as your starting location, but we're also like, well you can access the NPCs that are currently in the tavern and they exist in both taverns. Exactly. And they're just for ease. It was one for ease and also again if you were trying to like, again, the whole thing coming back to narrative, which is what I like to do, it's like, look, it's a tavern, everyone's drinking, things are a bit hazy. Were you there? Were you in, like, were you in this one or were you in that one? Like, I don't know. Yeah, who knows?

I was drinking. Yeah, good point. It's funny, for me, I'm just like, I'm not making two tavern sort of boards on the side of the... That's crazy. Exactly. Whatever. They're all in the... consider them in both. It doesn't matter. Yeah, for sure.

But no, but that was a game changer as well, because it just means that there's always that... you're never restricted, because for a while you were. For a while that last turn, you were pretty restricted and if your one plan didn't work out, that's it, kaputzy, you're out of luck. But now, because there's so much variability and the board changes so frequently, and the items and the NPCs change so frequently, you're just never without an option,

which I think is great. There's the real pivot on a dime mentality to the whole game and an improvisational mentality where if something doesn't work out you'll have something else you can do you know. And another question that was asked, same person, it was the um you know if you have a dropping the bee gauntlets at Buns and Sweat Rock if you have that as an item but then the RNG happens to have you know Buns and Sweat Rock are on the location that is also has the B gauntlets it's like does that get auto completed? Yeah yeah. We're like no whoever gets there

first to do it doesn't. Yeah absolutely. Because I like I love the idea that it's like it's right you know you as the MP as the player character you're going up there like what are you after? You have the B gauntlets. They're here. Yeah. Why don't you pick them up? Yeah yeah yeah. It's right here. They're right here they're right here check them out my god here it is yeah in your little hands whoa there's nothing more satisfying than you get like the repopulate and you look down and you're like I'm exactly where I need to be what are you doing your turn oh I picked this up and instantly complete the quest what are we gonna do about it boys you know move me up on the bullet yeah oh

yeah I'll take this two victory points very nice yeah no I think I clever. What are we gonna do about it boys? You know move me up on the bullet. Yeah Oh, yeah, I'll take this two victory points very nice Yeah, no, I think I think we definitely to the best of our ability and to the best that you can I think in a board game where it's about earning prestige. I think we have yeah I don't want to say fixed no, but I'm very satisfied with how the game ends now You know again, I really liked how we managed to do that. Because again, it was very, very, very easy at the very, very start to be like, you know, there was like, you have 25 locations and on that 25 locations you have 25 NPCs and you have 25 items. And that's it.

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. And we were like, but there's so many more cool things we want to have. We want to have this guy and I want to have this person and I want to have this item. That's it. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. And we were like, but there's so many other more cool things we wanna have. Yeah, but I wanna use everything. We wanna have this guy, and I have this person. What about this, what about this Adam? And I wanna have this Adam. And so it was this idea of like, no, I wanted people to experience like,

hey, I wanna grab these boots of speed so that I can have an extra turn every day. Yeah. It's like, yeah, yeah, it's very, it's taken up my backpack. It's taken up a lot of my backpack. Sure, but damn, it's useful. Let me have some fun. Absolutely.

And I liked that. And I really liked the idea of like, you know, cause there's like all these little MPCs that we've put like a lot of time and effort into. And that was our thing as well. Like, you know, when we started going like, okay, cool. These locations, they do a bunch of stuff. And then it was like, well,

why don't we have MPCs to a bunch of stuff? And then bunch of items do like, you know, all the items are a bunch of stuff. And then locations did like, well, why don't MPCs we can kind of have some fun with as well. So then it means that like, hey, there's very, very, there's a lot of different ways you can complete a quest. Or you can do a certain thing.

Yeah, what I really love is that a quest as simple as like drop, pop a little off at Little Low's restaurant actually is, it can be incredibly, it can be completed in so many different ways. Kind of like, it seems really basic, but actually it's not, you know what I mean? Like, I mean, I guess the quest itself is simple. Yeah. However you go about it is, is kind of up to you.

Yeah. Another thing that I really like as well, this is a real basic thing, but there's no tallying at the end of the game. There's no like, okay, well you did that and that and that, so that's, Zammat got 15 points, okay, it's like you look at it and it's not really about the post game. There's no like, and Zammat won, or and Adam won. It's like, god damn it, oh I've got two more victory points, oh Zammat got one more victory point, okay, Zammat wins, well done, good game, you know what I mean? But that's the thing as well, like everyone, you know, don't want to be like the, it's not the destination, it's the journey. But part of this game, like it is a little bit like, it's the journey.

It's the journey. It's the 100%. It's the fun you can kind of do with it all. I think that's, it's, yeah, it's very much like, I've never really thought about it, but I don't really, the points don't really matter. Yeah. You know what I mean? You don't really, like, kind of who cares? You're playing it, the joy I get out of this game is is Doing sneaky shit and figuring out ways to kind of you know use the rules to my advantage

And obviously the points kind of just exist as a carrot. You know what I mean? It's like a carrot on a stick So why you doing a thing? Yeah, exactly like Just because we've been playing sort of the new characters, we want to sort of like, you know, hopefully the Kickstarter does really well. Yeah, if the Kickstarter does well, we'll just... So we can kind of like, you know, the whole idea is being like, okay, if we hit certain milestones, we can kind of start adding more characters and stuff like that. And so it's been, you know, play testing a few of these and going back to Evelyn, it was just like, we're play testing her.

And I came dead last, but by God did I have so much fun with the play style of Evelyn. And it just, cause it did, you know, we have this like the idea of rules, cause it's like, well, what happens when you're on the edge of the board, but you have a dash. Like, and then what happens? You're at the edge of the board, but you have a dash. Like, and then what happens? You're at the edge, you're at a dead end basically,

but your movement says that you go forward two spaces. Yeah. What do you do? Well, you do everything. So it's like, you know, it's basically, you're bonking into the wall. You do like whatever you're capable of doing. So yeah, you like move forward,

but you bonk your head so you can't. So then, and then the next one is like, so it's like move forward, move forward, interact. So it's like, you move forward, you bonk your head. Then while you move forward, you bonk your head so you can't. And then the next one's like, so it's like move forward, move forward, interact. So it's like you move forward, you bonk your head. Then you move forward, you bonk your head, but you interact, you interact with whatever you got. You can interact, yeah, you do whatever you're, yeah, the, say on the card, like,

to the best of your ability. Yes, and so then it's like, okay, cool, well knowing that is a thing, Evelyn has a lot of movement, and like a lot of dashing, a lot of like little tick damage here and there. So if you get someone in a corner. Yes, Evelyn might have a movement card

that's like move forward a location, do a damage. Move forward a location, do a damage, turn left and attack. But if you're in a corner, that's damage, damage, attack. And it's so very funny. And yeah, sure. You really screw yourself over for the next turn because you are now turned into the wall. Yeah, the two reverse.

Reversing sucks because you're on a horse and it rules. But yeah, it felt wonderful being able to just feel like you were trampling somebody. And it just felt very, very good. Absolutely, yeah. And that's really what you're going for. Like I think again, it's that funny thing where in a game, you don't really,

the bit you remember is not, man, I won by four points. No. The bit you remember is like, hey, remember when I figured out I could hood someone into a corner and trample them to death? Yeah, yeah. You go, oh, dude, that was so funny. Like that's the memory you have of playing the board game, you know, that's what counts. That's what I really like. Yeah, it's like yeah. Yeah, I was about to deliver someone. I did gonna be in two turns, but then like you came up from behind me. You just yeah. Yeah

I'm like, yeah, yeah, I killed the person in your backpack idiot. Yeah, exactly. I like that. I was like, yeah I was about to win and then you got the rock of whoops and you just kept getting it and you made me fuck it up. Yep. You made me fuck it up You didn't let me win. Well done. You wasted your turn. But you wasted mine too. You know, you were saying when people start playing it and people can play it they can play the board game simulator version if you want wanna try it out. But the thing I'm excited to hear about are those stories. Like I'm excited to hear people be like, yeah, like my friend pulled this out of nowhere,

they, you know, from the jaws of victory, like, that's the stuff that excites me, the emergent stories that come out of the board game. Yeah, and I guess that's because it comes from this campaign we did. Yeah, yeah, for sure. That is already a story and the board game. Yeah, and I guess that's because it comes from this campaign we did. Yeah, for sure. That is already a story and the ability to be like, alright cool, well, and we're natural, like you know, we like telling these stories.

Yeah, absolutely. We like telling little narratives, we just do it ourselves. And that's where I really like, and I really hope people sort of like, you know, glom onto and start doing that and I look forward to hearing those little moments of like... Yeah, me too. Yeah, I thought I was gonna completely just absolutely like muff this quest up, but I had the blank spell book, so instead I decided to make that this instead of this, and so then I could do this. Yo, I turned the blank spell book into the Blink Blade, which let me teleport to this

location and then with my interact, I, you know, I don't know, it was Greg Pizz's warehouse, so with my interact I looked through the item deck where my discarded blink blade was, which I then took and, like, you know, just, I don't know, the stuff people can pull out of their ass to. I love the idea, if you have all these dashes or whatever, but you have like a teleporter, you have something in there that's like, yeah, in between.

Yeah, yeah, exactly. Like this and this, I just teleported over here so I could do then this and then this, and it was great. That's the kind of stuff where I'm like, yeah, no, break the game, this. I just teleported over here so I could do this and that was great. That's the kind of stuff. And I'm like, yeah, no, break the game. Do more of that. Tell me how you did it. Like tell us how you did it.

And then, yeah, just to be like, yeah, yeah, yeah. So we did this, but also like we found this, like, you know, we also liked the idea of like this instead, you know, where like we're adding to like, you know, more little rule sets. Like, yeah, yeah, yeah. And it's just, that to me is, I don't know. I'm looking forward to it a lot. Yeah, me too. I could not agree more. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And it's just that to me is, I don't know. I'm looking forward to it a lot. Yeah, me too. I, yeah, I could not agree more.

Yeah. Well on that note, on that note, as we, as we like to say here at SansFans Radio on that note, I've been Jackson Bailey. I've been Joel Zammit. We'll see you for the next development vlog. Which this is in a sort of, in a way, in a way it very much is. Especially if you are watching on YouTube. Yeah if you're just listening to it not really. Yeah then it's like a OOOG. A-log. A-log. A-log. Anyway I didn't like it. I didn't like it, it came around to it. Yeah. Hello. Bye. Hello. Scratch that itch. D&D is for nerds plus, the symbol not the word, where you can listen to select campaigns that were once only available to Sans Pants Plus members.

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