Tariffs, CanCon, and You

In 1972 the CBC asked listeners to complete the saying "As Canadian as...", to match "As American as apple pie." The winner was "As Canadian as possible under the circumstances."

I never expected to use Canadianness as a selling point for RPGs. It never seemed relevant. It'd be like promoting them based my astrological sign or shoe size. And yet, here we are. It's suddenly very relevant.

🍁To be clear, my books are unequivocally Canadian Content. They are written, designed, and printed in Canada.🍁

The Monster Overhaul and Magical Industrial Revolution are printed at Friesens in Manitoba. People have, rightly, complimented the print quality. I couldn't be happier with how Friesens has handled these projects.

Currently, books are exempt from fluctuating US-CAN tariffs. Ink, paper, cardboard, etc. are not. Print costs haven't risen yet, but they easily could for future print runs. I don't do sales or discounts, so the books are unlikely to ever be cheaper than they are now.

At the moment, I intend to keep distributing my books via Indie Press Revolution in the USA. IPR has been great to work with, and it's difficult to imagine them benefiting from or supporting current American policies.

I am, however, shifting more books to my Canadian distributor, Compose Dream Games. They're also handling UK distribution, and ship worldwide. If you want books that don't pass through American hands or American borders, order from them.

I designed both The Monster Overhaul and Magical Industrial Revolution for versatility. If A4 printers weren't available, both books can be trimmed to letter-sized paper without impacting the text. Interior pages are black and white. The books don't require die-cut cardboard tokens, plastic dice, trays, hand-assembled packages, chits, stickers, measuring devices, hourglasses, geegaws, gubbins, or tchotchkes. They're just books.

I could have printed both books overseas. During the Kickstarter for the Monster Overhaul, I received several offers from fulfillment companies that work with Chinese printers (and one in Moldova, I think.) I'm sure the quality would have been the same, and the cost would have been much lower, but I don't like extra moving parts in a project. Friesens is also an employee-owned company with a strong track record and excellent service. 

That's the relevant part of this post. Below the line, I've written a few thousand words about the motivations behind the current American tariff policy.

OSR: Behind the Curtain: Session 3 & 4 Examination

Session Reports: 1, 2, 3, 4

Session Examinations: 1, 2,

Spoilers below. In the unlikely event that any of my players see this post, skip it. Trust me.

OSR: Behind the Curtain: Session 2 Examination

I'm trying a new series of posts, where I examine my RPG sessions in detail, trying to show how I GM, what rulings I make, and issues that a narrative writeup can conceal. This post won't make much sense if you haven't read the narrative session report.

Session Reports: 1, 2

Session Examinations: 1,

Spoilers below. In the unlikely event that any of my players see this post, skip it. Trust me.

OSR: Behind the Curtain: Session 1 Examination

"Analyzing humor is like dissecting a frog. Few people are interested and the frog dies of it."

 - E. B. White

Analyzing an RPG session is a similar process. Judging by the view count, not many people are interested in session reports in the first place, but it might be interesting to see how my mind works (or doesn't work) under pressure. You'll need to read this session report first.

This NGR play example from Zzarchov Kowolski is a great example of a highly detailed procedural examination. It's great because it's totally alien to my usual methods. 

Spoilers below. In the unlikely event that any of my players see this post, skip it. Trust me.

OSR: The Blockchain Mine

Good morning, and welcome to AdventureGild ®'s Blockchain Mine, sponsored by AdventureGild ®. As a new Adventurer, you may find the Blockchain Mine overwhelming, but don't worry! We are here to assist you in the onboarding process.

Cryptcurrency is this plane's newest and most valuable resource. In the earliest days of exploring the Blockchain Mine, we found huge lumps of cryptcurrency lying on the ground. We didn't know what they were worth at the time! Silly us. 

But now, we know that cryptcurrency is a wonderful, magical, and immeasurably valuable substance. Let me give you an example. Your local lord taxes you in gold, labour, or goods, but cryptcurrency is none of those things, and therefore cannot be taxed! That's right; every bit of cryptcurrency you mine, you keep!

As we delve deeper into the Blockchain Mine, cryptcurrency has become more scarce. But don't worry! Studies* show that it is not possible to delve too greedily or too deep, so keep on mining! Remember that any cryptcurrency you mine today will be worth more tomorrow, as supplies are constantly decreasing. You don't want to be left behind. This is a regime of natural hyperdeflation.**

Piotr Dura

Mining

Your mining rig (including pickaxes, lanterns, rope, and other gear) can be purchased at any AdventureGild ® location using gold pieces. Only certified rigs are permitted in the Blockchain Mine. A basic rig might not let you mine cryptcurrency fast enough; invest (your gold) in high-quality enchanted gear.

Serge Pricing

The Blockchain Mines are cold and damp. An outfit of thick serge is mandatory, and can be purchased at any AdventureGild ® location using gold pieces. Serge pricing fluctuates with demand, so try to purchase your outfit when demand is low, and resell it when demand is high. Remember, once you're in line you're locked in, and must purchase or sell at the market value when you reach the front of the line.

Alex Brock

Proof of Stake

In order to enter the Blockchain Mine, you must present proof that you own a sturdy wooden stake. Vampires are common in the lower levels. Stakes can be purchased at any AdventureGild ® location using gold pieces. Only certified stakes are permitted in the Blockchain Mine.

Proof of Work

To ensure complete transparency, all activities of Adventures in the Blockchain Mine, and all purchases made with cryptcurrency, are recorded in a series of immutable ledgers. Since these ledgers are large and heavy, they are stored in a locked warehouse near the Blockchain Mine. You, or any other Adventurer, can view any record at any time.  

Forks

Instability within freshly mined lumps of cryptcurrency can, in rare cases, trigger a Forking Event. Duplicates of Adventurers, cryptcurrency, items, and memories may occur. If you encounter a copy of yourself, the Blockchain Mine suggests you fight to the death to establish which version is correct. Collaborating with a Forked duplicate is strictly prohibited. Rugged individualism is the watchword of the profitable Adventurer.

Non Fungal Tokens

To validate your identity, and for fashion purposes, Adventurers are encouraged to purchase one or more Non Fungal Tokens from other Adventurers or from any of the stalls near the edge of the Blockchain Mine. Most Non Fungal Tokens are discs of wood, lacquered to prevent mildew, and attached to a handsome linen cord. Though they may superficially resemble each other, each NFT is unique, and can be used to identify the wearer. Thanks to variation in wood texture and lacquer colour, some NFTs are rare and extremely valuable.

Remember, in the Blockchain Mine, possession is ten tenths of the law. Do not lose your Non Fungal Tokens.

If you'd like to set up your own Non Fungal Token stall, please purchase an access permit from any AdventureGild ® location using gold pieces, and pay the Ghast Fee for each Token you create.

Igor Krstic

Ghast Fees

Transfering cryptcurrency from one location or person to another angers the Ghasts, who must be propitiated before the lump can be transferred or moved. They are usually satisfied with a small portion of cryptcurrency, but the hunger of the Ghasts is unpredictable.
 

The DAO™

A Deified Axiomatic Organism, the DAO™ lurks in the Innovation Pit. Anyone who owns a Governance Token (which can be purchased at any AdventureGild ® location using gold pieces) can vote on proposals. The DAO™ senses the intent of your soul and translates it into soundforms.

The murmuring of the DAO™ is interpreted by AdventureGild ® Peacelocks. Don't worry; the AdventureGild ® promises to faithfully obey the will of the DAO™, which is really the will of all Adventurers. 

Sacrifices to the DAO™ are held on Tuesdays and Thursdays at 5:30pm.

Unknown

Cryptcurrency Exchanges

You may have noticed that most items required to work in the Blockchain Mine can only be purchased with gold pieces, not cryptcurrency. Don't worry! You can exchange your cryptcurrency for gold pieces at the AdventureGild ® Exchange Hall.

Please note that all cryptcurrency is not equally valuable, and must be graded before exchange. An exchange fee will also be charged, in addition to the portion taken by the Ghasts. Exchange rates are subject to change at any time without warning.

Also, while cryptcurrency cannot be taxed, any gold taken from the Blockchain Mine can (and will) be taxed heavily. Why not leave your earnings in their natural form; lumps of cryptcurrency!

The Wyrms of Service

If you feel dissatisfied with conditions in the Blockchain Mine, please consult the Wyrms of Service. Remember, you're not a worker, you're an Adventurer! Workers have rights; Adventurers have opportunities!

Arthur Rackham

Inspecters

If you experience a critical mortality event in the Blockchain Mine, you may be eligible to become an Inspecter, and record Adventurer activities in the Proof of Work ledgers. Inspecters wear the Blockchains they forged in life; how fashionable!

Smart Contracts

By reading this contract, and entering the Circle of Protection Against Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt that surrounds this location, you have automatically registered as an Adventurer! Congratulations! Please submit payment (in gold pieces) into the box below. 

Thank you, and good night.

*Studies is the given name of an imp conjured AdventureGild ® Peacelocks and should not be interpreted as evidence of actual studies.

**As opposed to a regime of unnatural hyperinflation, such as Kiel Chenier's Blood in the Chocolate***

***If you know, you know. If you don't, you really don't want to know. 

OSR: Book Entrances and Exits

It might be useful to consider a book as a physical space through which the reader's attention wanders.

Entrance: where the reader starts reading.

Exit: where the reader stops reading.

It's not the only tool for designing an RPG book, and it can easily be extended to ridiculousness, but it might be a useful approach when planning or laying out a book.

Non-RPG Texts

Novels
Fiction generally has one entrance and one exit. A reader starts the book at the beginning, reads linearly, and arrives at the end. Chapter markers (optional) serve as waypoints when reading is not continuous, but they are not navigational; no one opens a book for the first time, finds the table of contents, and skips to Chapter VI: Sleary’s Horsemanship without reading the preceding chapters.

Novel layout tries to make the continuous reading process as smooth as possible.

Books of Poetry
Most poetry compresses easily, but each poem needs space to breathe. Poetry is contemplative. Moving on to the next poem is not necessarily encouraged by layout choices. Poems are sometimes linked or grouped editors or by poets, but there's rarely a correct or incorrect reading order. Poetry layout gives space for the mind to linger.

Random page from Teen Vogue.

Magazines

The layout of a magazine is designed to appeal to a casual browser. Reading a magazine linearly, cover to cover, in order, with each article linking into the next, is not common. Readers skip ahead, flip through, see what grabs their attention, and read that. Bits that don't appeal are ignored.

Callouts grab the reader's eye. A large quote, black bar, a bit of boxed text; they yank a browser from drifting-thought mode into reader-mode. Advertisements mix with content. Stories mix with other stories. Magazines are mostly designed to fill time.

Every page needs to be an entrance, but magazine design includes few exits. It's like a casino. Articles lead into other articles. Images grab the eye. Magazines aren't designed to be reread or referenced, so there's a basic table of contents, but no effort at landmarking or condensing content.

Nonfiction

Textbooks / General Nonfiction
A typical nonfiction work in any field has several entrances and exits.

• Linear (to gain a full understanding of the subject).
• By chapter (to brush up, check a reference, learn about a specific topic, etc.)
• By term.
• Internal cross-references.
  

While a novel may or may not include a table of contents and descriptive chapter headings, a nonfiction work of any length must (to support by-chapter entrances), and should also include an index (to support by-term entrances). Academically dissected fiction can use nonfiction tools.

Nonfiction works often include illustrations, charts, or pictures, which can serve as landmarks but are not intentionally placed for that purpose. Some textbooks use colour coding or other visual clues as a navigational aids. 

Instructions
Instructions are purely linear: one entrance at step 1 and one exit at the final result. They need to support very discontinuous reading (as the reader hops between the instructions and the object), but actively discourage nonlinear reading. Short instructions serve as their own index and table of contents.

Good instructions break a processes into discrete sub-processes (assembling one section of a chair first, measuring and mixing your dry ingredients, etc.) and mark out typical failure points. How many times have you read "taking care not to..." in a recipe? Little exclamation marks or boxes mark out difficult or easily confused points, or points where instructions branch into multiple paths.

Instructions are not a tutorial. They tell you what to do, but not why, and rarely explain the relevance of each step.

Manuals
Manuals typically incorporate sets of instructions attached to an introduction and some appendices.

• Linearly reading a manual might be a best practice, but nobody actually does it.
• By section. (Installation, Part #s, Warranty Info).
  
• By problem. (How do I replace this part? Why is it making this noise? Can I use this type of soap?)
  

How a manual addresses by-problem entrances is a key measure of its utility. Manuals, more than instructions, include warnings.

Summary

Novels are like a long hallway with a painted mural.

Collected poetry is like a circular gallery with statues in it. 

Magazines are like an open-air market. There might be lanes or clusters of stalls, but you can browse in any direction, and every stall is vying for your attention.

Textbooks / General Nonfiction are like a connected line of rooms, each one with a door to the outside world, or a museum, or an art gallery, or a shopping mall.

Instructions are like a line of rooms, or a long hallway with a series of linked pictures, each only making sense in the context of the previous image.

Manuals are a series of long galleries radiating from a lumpy central mass.

RPG Books

Relatively few nonfiction books have to handle the challenges RPG books typically cover. A cookbook can safely assume the reader will sart cooking one recipe and end with the same recipe. Instructions for repairing a car do not need to instruct the reader what a car is, how to drive, the purpose of a garage, or the history of the Interstate Highway System.  

For some multipurpose RPG books, the closest structural equivalent is a holy text, with all the associated baggage. 

Here are a few tentative examples of RPG entrances and exits.

Entrances for a typical player-facing class-based splatbook, like the 5th Edition PHB: 

• Linear (but skimming) to see what options are available. Art and summary blurbs help a lot.
• Class-specific entry, to reference during character creation or leveling up.
• Ability-specific entry, to reference as needed or when there's a confusing rules situation.
  

Since most of the entrances focus on a specific class, it makes a lot of sense to clearly landmark each class with a heading and eye-catching art. If abilities are shared by two or more classes, but not by all of them, it makes sense to duplicate the information instead of having the reader flip to a different section. Readers dip in and dip out.

Entrances for a typical dungeon:

• Linear, to get a sense of the dungeon or decide if it's worth running.
• By room, during a session, as needed.
  
• By NPC/faction name. Essentially, checking who these people are, why they're here, and what they want.
• For a dungeon-specific tool, like a random encounter table.

For most dungeons, a good table of contents works much better than an index. Clear choices when it comes to room order, including intuitive/flowing numbering systems and breaking a dungeon into sections, help with navigation.

Entrances for a typical bestiary:

• Linearly, to browse for ideas, or just for reading pleasure.
• By creature name, as directed by a random encounter table or reference in an adventure.
• By problem, but only if the reader already knows the bestiary contains tools/appendices to solve that particular problem.
  

Indexing takes a different form. Instead of presenting the same information as the table of contents (a list of creature names in the printed order), it might include.

• An alphabetical list (if the printed order is not alphabetical).
  
• By terrain type, then by name to the creature.
• By creature level / HD / difficulty, then by name to the creature.

Since every bestiary entry needs to be its own entrance (in theory), repeated formats and visual landmarks help with navigation. Bestiaries designed to be read instead of referenced can employ layout tricks to hinder exits and encourage further reading. Entries flow into each other; hints in one entry are resolved in another, etc.

Entrances for a typical GM Guide:

• Linearly, to fully understand the system (as written). Ideally, like a textbook, concepts explained in early chapters are built upon in later chapters.
• By problem. How do I handle wilderness travel? How much does a chicken cost? What are the core assumptions of this system. What do I do? Heeeelp!

GM guides (whether presented separately or as part of a single book), tend to act as a catch-all for any problems the author anticipates a GM might encounter. Organizing and indexing them is a difficult challenge. It's useful to know every time daggers show up in Macbeth; it's less useful to know every time they show up in the GM Guide. The index entry for "dagger" should point to the rules for daggers and (unless it's actually useful) nowhere else.

As a manual includes warnings, a GM guide can include sections that focus on potential errors or misunderstandings, or differences between this system and what the author considers "conventional" play.

Setting books that focus on at-table utility tend to support or even encourage non-linear reading; setting books that are designed, intentionally or not, for the reader (or the shelf) tend to follow a novel-like linear flow. There's no right answer. Some books are designed to load concepts into a GM's head before a game. Some are designed to be referenced during a game. And some aren't designed at all, but created by publisher mandate or perceived customer demand.

Second image via McMansionHell

Whitespace and Design

There's a difference between minimalism and the acres of beige carpet surrounding the bed of an overscaled American McMansion. Whitespace is not nessesarily wasted space, but it's very easy for a RPG book to feel bloated or empty. The reader wanders through vast oddly shaped rooms with a few bits of information spread on unloved side tables or stuck in high cupboards.

The clunky shots and long pauses in The Rogue's Tavern [1936] aren't pillow shots or moments of stillness. They're just the result of working on a budget, in a hurry, in a relatively new medium, and not quite managing to hit competence. Robert F. Hill directed 16 films in 1936. Quantity over quality, I suppose.

Back on topic. Low information density (or too much whitespace) feels most egregious when it leads to:

• Tool mediocrity (i.e. all the entries on this table are the same, just with different primary colours in the text).
• Tool disconnect (i.e. the explanation/detail/term I want is on a different page or in a different section and there's no good reason for it).
  
• Tool absence (i.e. I expected/wanted a tool to be here and instead there's a blank space).

It's very easy for information density to cross a line into impenetrability. Density does not nessesarily help with entrances and exits. It can trap, mislead, or bore a reader. Page after page of identical tables and two-column text is not ideal.

Side Note: tool absence is not an issue if the text, context, or format makes it clear that the tool will not be provided. It's only an issue when the reader expects to find something and doesn't.

McMansionHell
Look at all this density.

Fear of excessive whitespace can also encourage an author/designer to insert filler: badly designed tools, repetitive or sluggish text, long meandering descriptions of things that don't matter to anyone and fail to help with the book's stated goals. The density of information has gone up, but the density of relevant information has dropped.

Finally, if the primary goal is to convey a tone or a theme, especially with a limited pagecount format like a 'zine, use every trick at your disposal. I still remember the "Number Appearing" text from "Broken System #000" even if it took me an hour to track down the author and the original format.

Final Notes

If you're searching for a design vocabulary, architecture might be a good place to start. Architects tend to write interesting articles and worry about unusual problems.

OSR: What I Look For In An Artist

There are a lot of posts out there about how to commission art. There are plenty of dubious marketing-driven articles on how to be a successful artist. But there aren't too many posts on the client side of things. I figured I'd offer my views.

These views are personal. They might contradict sensible advice and common practice. Any lessons taken from this post should be viewed accordingly. This post is basically "What I look for in a condiment." Your condiment preferences may vary.

This is not a "what you should do" post. This is a "what I do" post. And what I do is a bit weird. It usually is. This is not art advice or life advice. It's just information.

 Enough disclaimers? I sure hope so.

I found Logan (lil_tachyon's) tumblr back in 2018, hired them for Epochrypha, and the rest is history. They just posted this handy Q/A, which convinced me to finish off this ancient draft post.

 

How I Commission Art

I trawl portfolio sites, bookmark interesting artists, sort them later, then commission people whenever I've got something that fits their style. It might never happen. The portfolio backlog is every-growing.

I tend to provide very short briefs for pieces, and try to hire artists that will take the brief and run with it, ignoring instructions where necessary. I'd much rather have the artist confidently execute their vision for a piece than try to stick to the brief.

Example 1: Robin Carpenter stuck to the brief (more or less) for this piece.

Example 2:Iguanamouth went in a different direction for this piece.

Here are a few elements I look for when picking an artist:

Portfolio

It doesn't have to be a fancy, professional, or bespoke site. A DeviantArt page or a tumblr or something will do. Just somewhere I can look at a bunch of their art at once, and only their art.

The more pieces, the better. Having a regularly updated portfolio is a sign that the artist cares about their work. It shows some degree of resilience to uninvited criticism. If a person's a real jerk, it'll usually come out in the comments. 

Twitter is good for a lot of things (allegedly), but it's not a portfolio site. Retweets and other social media chaff dilute the art; it's hard to find, let alone compare, pieces. Any site that requires a login (Instagram) is not ideal. 

The sums involved in RPG art commissions (and RPG work in general) are fairly small. Lawsuits are unlikely. If an artist takes the money and runs, a long ironclad contract won't help.

Reputation, reputation, reputation! Oh, I have lost my reputation! I have lost the immortal part of myself, and what remains is bestial. My reputation, Iago, my reputation!
-Cassio, Othello

Basic human decency and professionalism go a long way, but if all else fails, there's one's reputation to consider. Someone with no portfolio and no online presence has, effectively, no reputation to risk. 

  

Regular Updates

If an artist posts one finished piece every six months, it gives the impression they aren't practicing, or that it takes them that long to complete a piece. That's all fine and dandy, but book illustration work is on a schedule. Regular uploads suggests discipline; discipline suggest good results.

Ignore this blog's update schedule. La la la la la, I can't hear you.

 

Multiple Styles

I like hiring artists with a strongly developed style, but the presence of multiple styles in a portfolio is a good sign. It shows experience and a willingness to experiment. An artist trying multiple styles is also a sign they enjoy art. Iguanamouth is a great example. Tons of different styles, lots of experimentation.

This only really matters if the artist's main style doesn't perfectly match your goals. For example, Scrap Princess (as far as I know) mostly works in the one distinctive style, but that was a perfect fit for TotSK. 

People who see themselves as comic artists tend to focus on one style, which is fantastic for comics but less ideal for general illustration commissions. Either you like that style or you don't. If you do, great. If you don't, you're probably not getting anything else.

  

Multiple Types of Composition

Some people only post characters or monsters or landscapes or 18th century woodwind instruments. This isn't ideal for RPG illustration work. I'd like to know, before hiring an artist, that they can handle the material in the brief. If the illustration calls for a figure with a background, or a scene with implied movement, or a bit of complex perspective trickery, will they be able to execute, or will this be entirely new to them?

If you hire a plumber to install a dishwasher, it's not a good sign if they say, "A dishwasher, eh? Haven't seen one of those before. Well, here goes nothing." 

  

Strong Fundamentals

I try to ignore colour and texture and focus on the lines. This makes sense since all my commissioned RPG work to date has been in greyscale, but it's also a good way of seeing if an artist really has a handle on fundamental techniques. Good colour work can cover up a bad sketch, but a good sketch is always a good sketch. Do they have that elusive magic quality that takes a mere drawing and turns it into art? I sure as hell don't, but I know it when I see it.
 

A Primarily SFW portfolio

The imaginary standard I use is "How awkward would it be to explain this to an agèd relative?" A series of nude charcoal studies? Trivial. A pin-up girl version of Anomalocaris? Difficult, but not a dealbreaker. Sonic and Luigi enjoying a ⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛ with ⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛ in mashed potatoes, while ⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛ and a pink ⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛ is... something I'd rather not explain to anyone. I regret even imagining it.

If you do that sort of thing, it's probably best to keep a separate portfolio (and charge more money).
 

Some Degree of Professionalism

I don't care if an artist has never done commission work before or if they're a seasoned veteran with a ready-to-go price sheet and a half-dozen artbooks in print. I don't care if they're famous or obscure. I don't care if they have a full biography or if they're just an email address and a username. If the art's good, the art's good.

If an artist replies to the initial email say that they're not accepting commissions at the moment, they stay on the list. If there's no reply, I figure they're either too busy/wealthy/depressed for random RPG commissions, not active anymore, or have the wrong contact info on their site.

Seriously, if you do any kind of commission work, check your contact info on all sites and make sure it's up to date. Check your emails regularly. Check your spam box. Check direct messaging systems on social media; some of them don't provide obvious notifications of new messages.

 

Life happens. Art is hard. Brains are stupid. I try to plan around reasonable delays, but I'm a lot happier when I know about the delay.

Ashlyn Rudolph

So If I Do All That, You'll Hire Me?

Probably not, sorry. I'm extremely picky and I've got a list of artists already. Keep on doing whatever you're doing.

See Also:

• Sharpening the Axe - How I Plan and Write RPG Books 
• How to Do Reasonably Well on Kickstarter
• How To Become A Hundredaire On DriveThruRPG 

Sci-Fi: Space 1977 - An Analysis of Failure

 
I decided to revist my Space: 1977 setting idea. You should probably read that post first, but in brief, the idea was to combine every Star Wars knock-off film produced between 1977 and 1980 into one gloriously terrible space opera setting.

The Systems That Slip Through Your Fingers

I usually use Fate Core for Star Wars games. It's trivial to hack and emulates the genre fairly well. Money, weapons, etc. are sufficiently abstract in Star Wars.

But for Space: 1977, I also wanted to try writing a Troika! hack. Daniel Sell claims that Troika! is the greatest game of all time and will cure acne, wash your dishes, and teach your cat to play fetch. I've always found Troika! a little light for the kinds of D&D-type campaigns I enjoy, but for Space: 1977, where I anticipated more background-driven one-shots than long campaigns, it seemed like an idea fit.

(Also, don't tell anyone, but Troika and Fate Core are very cross-compatible. If you use a harmonized Skill list, Troika! backgrounds become a list of Aspects plus some suggested skill point assignments.)

I managed to put together a fairly tidy 7-page rules set. You can read it here. I had started to write the backgrounds when creeping doubt set in. Something was wrong. I'd missed a step.

The Vital Question

"The world is a cube with eight suns and twelve moons, and the names of the months are determined by..."
    "Ok, but..."
"And the Elves, except they're not called Elves they're called Drothgr't'zel, they have a secret plan to..."
    "Ok, but..."
"The head of the Colledge Arcanum is named Baxalwurda, and..."
    "Ok, but what do the PCs do?"
"What do you mean?"
    "I mean, what do the players characters do in this setting? How do they interact with any of this stuff?"
"Oh, I guess they explore dungeons and fight goblins."
 
"What do the PCs do?" is the core question of any setting. When you're doing worldbuilding, unless it's for a novel or pure fantasizing, you should always focus on how the material you're creating will interact with the players at the table. There's no need to map continents they will never visit, list the history of long-lost kingdoms, or invent names the PCs will never learn.

You can still do those things, of course, but there's no need to, and in a world with finite time and energy you may want to devote your time to other projects.

Space: 1977 is an interesting concept, but what do the PCs do?

A typical Star Wars game has the PCs acting as explorers, traders, scrappy smugglers, morally ambiguous participants in a larger conflict, unlikely and accidental heroes, etc. They are involved in a real world. It's fictional, but it follows certain rules, and there's plenty of room for new stories.

Space: 1977, because of the incoherent and often farcical source material, doesn't leave a lot of room for more than one type of story. You can tell the story of some unlikely heroes who gather and defeat the bad guys... but that's about it. No other modes of play feel sufficiently supported by the setting material.

The constrained setting introduces new challenges for a GM. If a GM wants to introduce a city in the clouds as an adventure location, is that a forbidden idea from Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back, or just a plausible in-genre development?

Finally, the level of care put into the films are just too different. Disbelief can only be suspended so far. Any attempt to harmonize the background material from the films of Space: 1977 runs into insurmountable problems. There are areas of overlap and areas of stark contrast, areas where a director clearly thought about an idea and areas where they clearly didn't.

Telling interesting space opera stories using Space: 1977 was actually harder than not using it, and produced less interesting results. A good setting should feel full to bursting with interesting hooks. Every post Arnold makes about Centerra, for example, feels like it has hooks for the PCs. Every line I wrote about the Space: 1977 setting felt like I was blunting a hook or closing off an interesting avenue.

Lies, Damned Lies, and Sales Figures

Continuing to write rules and setting material for Space: 1977 feels counterproductive.

I could continue to write the Troika! hack. Writing backgrounds isn't particularly difficult. I could finish it, get some art, and publish it... but then I'd need to tell people it's good, that it works, and that it's the best I could make it. That would be a lie. Not because of the core system or the work I put in, but because the entire basis of the setting is flawed.

I can make a Space: 1977 book appealing to a reader, but I can't make it appealing to a GM. Sound fiscal practice be damned, I'm not publishing anything I'm not 100% happy with.

So, what's left?

Interesting Things

Space Feudalism

The various Empires in the films seem to dominated by one central charismatic figure, with a small cluster of loyal retainers, and a large (but not insurmountable) number of uniformed troops. They demand tribute, accept pledges of loyalty, and conquer by treaty and light occupation, not by extermination.

The Galactic Empire from Star Wars: A New Hope has a substantial fleet, a giant battle station, and a regimented and fully organized military command structure. They seem to be doing fairly well, as far as Space: 1977 empires go. It's important to note that the Death Star's purpose is to keep the outer systems in line through fear. Very feudal; direct control is impossible, and, with the senate abolished, voluntary participation is curtailed.

The Empire of the First Circle of the Universe from Starcrash. Presumably there are other circles of the universe and other empires, or the title is just grandiose puffery. The villain is a rebellious Count. They have machine operated justice system, prison planets, and some form of Imperial bureaucracy and state police. When the Emperor fakes his death, he says [the Count] "thinks our armies have dispersed without a leader." Imperial power is, effectively, personal power.

The Gavanas Empire from Message from Space just wants a beautiful planet on which to build a palace. Emperor Rockseia XXII is a bizarrely honourable and poetic character, a sort of Marcus Aurelius in space. Sure, he'll massacre a planet's population and blow up the moon as a show of force, but he won't massacre all of them, and he'll ask politely for a negotiated surrender. Even in a dream sequence, he isn't threatening, just factual, and even scolding. "You do love her. She will die, and you are to blame." He keeps demanding the protagonists surrender and promises no harm will come to them, and he might actually mean it. He's got them at gunpoint. Why ask, if it's not important?

The Cylon Empire from Battlestar Galactica is rarely seen, but also controls tribute-planets, produces substantial space fleets, and manages civilian life.

The Malmori Empire from Battle Beyond the Stars is limited to one tribute-extorting ship. The rest of the setting seems fairly lawless. The Draconians from Buck Rogers in the 25th Century seem to be another roving band of tribute-seekers, or at least a delegation from a larger empire.

We don't see a specific named empire in The Humanoid, but the power struggle is between two brothers, and there are queens and nobles aplenty. Similarly, Escape from Galaxy 3 features many warring kings.

Space, it seems is awash with petty kings and collapsing empires. A charismatic figure rises, produces some uniforms, pays troops, and carves out a transitory empire that collapses within a few years. Any old soldier in Space: 1977 probably served under half a dozen different empires, warlords, or adventurers. Planets explode on a regular basis.

The Table of Distinguished Actors

One potential Troika background was called "Distinguished Actor". You were the venerated actor brought in to lend the production some credibility: Alec Guiness or Christopher Plummer.

It was fairly easy to do a data pull of award-winning actors who were between 45 and 75 in the years 1977 to 1980 (and therefore accessible to the directors of Space: 1977). But how many of those actors were recognizable to people in 2020? Not many. And would a sleazy B-movie director in 1977 realistically cast a woman in a "distinguished actor" role instead of spending the money to hire Corinne Cléry or Barbara Bach?

Casting wider net, including actors who might be called in to a film made in 2020, helped a bit, but there's another issue. I don't like placing embodiment restrictions in RPGs unless it's interesting, and the resulting tables, no matter how I sourced my data, looked remarkably monochrome.

Final Notes

If anyone wants to adapt or finish off the Space:1977 Troika! hack, feel free to. There are a few interesting ideas in there that I might revisit one day, but probably not in this context.

Always keep the vital question in mind. What do the PCs do?

Non-Euclidian Horror: The Writhing Spheres

I've always wanted to write an article on why "non-Euclidian" should be a synonym for "horrifying".

If you're a horror academic, this post will probably be trivial nonsense at best, and outright misleading at worst. I strongly suspect all this material has been covered before. So it goes; this is ostensibly a D&D blog.

Shamefully, I haven't read Jonathan Newell's book, "A Century of Weird Fiction, 1832-1937: Disgust, Metaphysics and the Aesthetics of Cosmic Horror", despite hiring him to draw the maps for Magical Industrial Revolution. It's probably dreadfully clever and full of useful facts, but it's outside my normal areas of study, all the local library lending programs are shut down due to the plague, and I've run out of bookshelf space three times since March. To atone for my sins, you should buy a copy or three.

As penance for not doing my assigned reading, I've decided to publish this post.

The Flammarion Engraving

Possibly Gilman ought not to have studied so hard. Non-Euclidean calculus and quantum physics are enough to stretch any brain; and when one mixes them with folklore, and tries to trace a strange background of multi-dimensional reality behind the ghoulish hints of the Gothic tales and the wild whispers of the chimney-corner, one can hardly expect to be wholly free from mental tension.

-The Dreams in the Witch House

 
Without knowing what futurism is like, Johansen achieved something very close to it when he spoke of the city; for instead of describing any definite structure or building, he dwells only on broad impressions of vast angles and stone surfaces—surfaces too great to belong to any thing right or proper for this earth, and impious with horrible images and hieroglyphs. I mention his talk about angles because it suggests something Wilcox had told me of his awful dreams. He had said that the geometry of the dream-place he saw was abnormal, non-Euclidean, and loathsomely redolent of spheres and dimensions apart from ours. Now an unlettered seaman felt the same thing whilst gazing at the terrible reality.

-The Call of Cthulhu
 

Even the pictures illustrate only one or two phases of its infinite bizarrerie, endless variety, preternatural massiveness, and utterly alien exoticism. There were geometrical forms for which an Euclid could scarcely find a name—cones of all degrees of irregularity and truncation; terraces of every sort of provocative disproportion; shafts with odd bulbous enlargements; broken columns in curious groups; and five-pointed or five-ridged arrangements of mad grotesqueness. As we drew nearer we could see beneath certain transparent parts of the ice-sheet, and detect some of the tubular stone bridges that connected the crazily sprinkled structures at various heights. Of orderly streets there seemed to be none, the only broad open swath being a mile to the left, where the ancient river had doubtless flowed through the town into the mountains.

-At the Mountains of Madness

 
That looking-glass had indeed possessed a malign, abnormal suction; and the struggling speaker in my dream made clear the extent to which it violated all the known precedents of human experience and all the age-old laws of our three sane dimensions. It was more than a mirror—it was a gate; a trap; a link with spatial recesses not meant for the denizens of our visible universe, and realizable only in terms of the most intricate non-Euclidean mathematics. And in some outrageous fashion Robert Grandison had passed out of our ken into the glass and was there immured, waiting for release.

-The Trap

Part 1: Geometry Class

Primary and secondary mathematical education has fundamentally changed in the past few decades. Proofs are out; they might be discussed by a teacher, but students are not expected to work through a proof on their own. Practical applications are in. Classical texts and ancient authorities are no longer cited. While some schools still require students to purchase geometry sets, they tend to be used for art class or prodding classmates instead of geometry.

But for hundreds of years, Euclid was central to mathematical education. Students learned his axioms by heart. Euclid took the visible world and transformed it into elegant mathematics. A pastoral natural scene, under Darwin, becomes red in tooth and claw. Because he assumed the points, lines, and circles of his system were the points, lines, and circles of the real world, he horizon, the columns of a building, and the shape of a cone of sand become living mathematics under Euclid.

All principles of Euclidean geometry - or, for thousands of years, simply "geometry" - derive from five postulates:

1. A straight line can be drawn between any two points.

2. Any straight line segment can be extended into an infinite straight line.

3. A circle can be drawn given a straight line segment as the radius and one end point as the centre.

4. Any right angle is equal to any other right angle.

The first four postulates are elegant and brief. They feel intuitively true. The last one even feels tautological; of course one 90 degree angle  is equal to any other 90 degree angle.

But the fifth postulate is troublesome. It bothers students when they learn it, even if they can't say why.

5. If two straight lines are drawn which intersect a third straight line in such a way that the sum of the interior angles on one side is less than two right angles, then the two lines, if extended infinitely, must inevitably intersect each other.

Draw a horizontal line on a flat sheet of paper. Drop two sticks on it. If the sticks are exactly perpendicular (vertical), then they will never cross, even if they're infinitely long. If one stick is angled to the right and the other to the left, then they'll cross once. If they're both angled to the left or to the right, they'll still cross, unless they've fallen at exactly the same angle.

The first four postulates are axioms, as solid (within their system) as bedrock. They're the the bottom of the stack and cannot be reduced further. The fifth remains a slightly wobbly postulate and requires more assumptions. This bothered mathematicians. Anyone who could untangle those intersecting lines would "purify" Euclid and earn eternal fame. Proofs of increasing complexity were published over the centuries, but every time some dreadful flaw emerged. The search consumed the lives of many great mathematicians. In 1820, Farkas (Wolfgang) Bolyai wrote to his son.

You must not attempt this approach to parallels. I know this way to its very end. I have traversed this bottomless night, which extinguished all light and joy of my life. For God's sake! I entreat you leave parallels alone, abhor them like indecent talk, they may deprive you from your time, health, tranquility, and the happiness of your life. That bottomless darkness may devour a thousand tall towers of Newton and it will never brighten up in the earth... I thought I would sacrifice myself for the sake of the truth. I was ready to become a martyr who would remove the flaw from geometry and return it purified to mankind. I accomplished monstrous, enormous labors; my creations are far better than those of others and yet I have not achieved complete satisfaction. For here it is true that si paullum a summo discessit, vergit ad imum. I turned back when I saw that no man can reach the bottom of this night. I turned back, unconsoled, pitying myself and all mankind... I have travelled past all reefs of this infernal Dead Sea and have always come back with broken mast and torn sail. The ruin of my disposition and my fall date back to this time. I thoughtlessly risked my life and happiness - aut Casear aut nihil.

But despite this warning worthy of any Gothic Horror novel, the son, Janon (Johann) Bolyai dared to continue his father's work. In 1823 he wrote back.

I am resolved to publish a work on parallels as soon as I can put it in order, complete it, and the opportunity arises. I have not yet made the discovery but the path which I have followed is almost certain to lead me to my goal, provided this goal is possible. I do not yet have it but I have found things so magnificent that I was astounded. It would be an eternal pity if these things were lost as you, my dear father, are bound to admit when you seen them. All I can say now is that I have created a new and different world out of nothing. All that I have sent you thus far is like a house of cards compared with a tower.

If that's not Lovecraftian prose, I don't know what is! The dreadful warning, the obstinate investigation, the transcendent discovery that smashes reality; this is a horror plot writ large.

In one of those odd coincidences of history, a half dozen or more mathematicians discovered non-Euclidean geometry at the same time. Euclid, the bastion of stability for generations of schoolchildren, was toppled from his pillar, and a realm of curving chaos enthroned in his place.
 

Part 2: A Matter of Perspective

The fifth postulate, as described above, matches our expectations of reality. Railway lines, sticks, towers; all seem to converge, meet once, and then diverge forever. But it is not necessarily so. Two equivalent postulates exist.

Draw a horizontal line on a flat sheet of paper. Drop two sticks on it, and imagine one stick is angled to the left, the other to the right. If they are extended infinitely and meet only once, then we have Euclid's fifth postulate, and all is well.

But imagine the sticks extending to infinity and never meeting, just continuing forever. That doesn't make sense if our piece of paper is flat, but what if it's curved? What if it, and the horizontal line, and the sticks, are on the surface of a sphere? Then the lines could extend infinitely and form a loop without ever meeting. This is elliptical geometry.

Or imagine the sticks cross once, then cross again  (at least once). That's odd. As they extend towards infinity, they loop back and forth like a pair of skaters or stitches in cloth. If our piece of paper is flat, that makes no sense, but if it's a sort of saddle-shape, the seemingly straight sticks can bend back towards each other. This is hyperbolic geometry.

Amazingly, for both elliptical and hyperbolic geometry, Euclid's first four axioms remain true. Strange bendy triangles and pointed circles arise, but with consistent and unvarying results. This raises a distressing possibility. Since all three variants are equally "true", which one is the "real" one? While the universe appears to follow Euclidean geometry, it might be because we can only see lines of limited size. If the universe is not flat but curved, it could easily appear locally flat. Compared to the universe, a railroad track or Grecian column is very small indeed.

Any scientific discovery takes time to enter popular consciousness. Lovecraft was born in 1890; just late enough to be educated on textbooks drawn from Euclid by schoolteachers steeped in Euclid, but well within the time when non-Euclidean geometry was percolating into popular culture. In every field of study, a world of fixed absolutes and thousand-year laws was collapsing into incomprehensible chaos, and geometry - the last bastion of law - was not immune.

I think it is impossible for a horror writer to fake disgust or terror. To make a scene authentic, they must be repulsed by what repulses their characters, horrified by the same scenes, staggered by the same conclusions. Horror must be drawn from life

H. P. Lovecraft was fascinated and horrified by the difference between perception and reality. What we see, and what is true. Do the sticks meet only once, or do they merely appear to meet? What is real, and can the human mind survive true comprehension of reality?
One can only hope that Lovecraft's racial views, his "fascinated disgust", will one day require such additional explanatory footnotes.

Part 3: Phase-Contrast Microscopy

When Meillassoux writes about the idea of the world-in-itself he invokes the idea of a “great outdoors” or “absolute outside” – a world that exists “whether we are thinking of it or not” and which “thought could explore with the legitimate feeling of being on foreign territory – of being entirely elsewhere”. It is precisely such an “outside” that preoccupies Schopenhauer when he writes of the will-in-itself, and while Schopenhauer inherits much from Kant, including an insistence that the world of our senses is one of mere phenomena or “representation,” his “strange immanentism of noumena”, as Thacker puts it, links the will-to-live to the phenomenal world, since the latter is but the manifestation in space and time of the indifferent and inaccessible former.

-The Daemonology of Unplumbed Space: Weird Fiction, Disgust, and the Aesthetics of the Unthinkable, Jonathan Newell

This is good academic writing. As far as I know it's solid gold. I can't tell Schopenhauer from Schubert, and Jonathan Newell strikes me as the sort of person who knows what they're talking about. There are several plausible-sounding quotes, and scattering of dashes. I'm convinced, and I'm not even on his dissertation committee.

The horror of the story lies not merely in the contemplation of an alien world, but, crucially, in the realization that the world has always been suffused with alienage. “From Beyond” reveals that reality has been already, always contaminated. [...] We could also read “From Beyond” as a sort of microscope-story, a science fiction tale about seeing things which could not normally be perceived but which science can now reveal, and which are omnipresent. The polypous beings vaguely resemble blown-up bacteria, made visible by the Tillinghast resonator just as bacteria are by a microscope.

-ibid

This is a horrifying realization, and in the abstract, it's horrifying to anyone. The idea that slimy things with legs do crawl within the slimy air, all around you, invisible and lurking, is horrifying. It needs no additional context. But there's an aspect that Newell didn't emphasize, a twist on mere microscopy.

In 1932, Frits Zernike invented phase contrast microscopy. He won a Nobel prize for it in 1953, but the Nobel committee is always at least two decades behind the times. Phase contrast microcopy would have saturated the scientific and near-scientific papers Lovecraft read. It was, and still is, astonishing. In 1934, H.P. Lovecraft published “From Beyond”.

The speed of light in a vaccum is constant, but the speed of light in different materials can vary. Imagine two photons in lockstep (in phase). Their peaks and troughs match. They are traveling in the same direction at the same speed. One passes through water, the other through air. The photon passing through water moves slower compared to the photon passing through air. Its amplitude and wavelength stay the same. If they both then enter air, the photon that passed through water will be shifted behind. It's out of phase, like Left Shark.

To the human eye, both photons appear to be identical. They've got the same wavelength (colour) and amplitude (brightness*). Light passing through a glass of water doesn't appear significantly different than light passing through the air next to it, right? If it does, get your tapwater tested. Light, as we see it, is wavelength modulated. Longer wavelength fall towards the red end of the spectrum, shorter wavelengths towards the purple. And that's it. Our feeble eyes can't see polarization or phase shifts. Phase contrast microscopy breaks down the barrier of mere human perception.

*yes, I know, brightness=/=amplitude but this is a D&D blog, give me a break.

Phase contrast microscopy uses very clever optics to turn phase shift - the delay in light - into a wavelength or amplitude difference. Suddenly, things that were invisible become visible. Everyone who uses phase contrast microscopy says something like "it opens up a whole new world", and it really does. Glassy organisms become sharply defined. An invisible world pops into full visibility.

I don't really "get" the optics behind phase contrast microscopy, and, bluntly, neither did Lovecraft. The principle is enough, and he didn't have full colour youtube videos (or a phase contrast microscope to play around with). A whole new world, parallel to our own, but hidden by our paltry and limited perception. This "newly visible world that lies unseen all around us" actually exists. It's real! It's under the microscope! Ick!

To the modern reader, phase contrast microscopy is fun, even adorable, but like anything else it can be turned into horror if taken to an extreme conclusion. Lovecraft saw the horror in reports of phase contrast microscopy, and turned it into a story. We can see, in living colour, what he could only imagine.

Conclusion: There Are No Straight Lines

They say of the Acropolis where the Parthenon is that there are no straight lines.

-Stephen Fry, QI Series E Episode 1

From our infancy, the idea of certain contrasts becomes fixed in our minds: water appears to us an element that moves; earth, a motionless and inert mass. These impressions are the result of daily experience; they are connected with everything that is transmitted to us by the senses. When the shock of an earthquake is felt, when the earth which we had deemed so stable is shaken on its old foundations, one instant suffices to destroy long-fixed illusions. It is like awakening from a dream; but a painful awakening. We feel that we have been deceived by the apparent stability of nature; we become observant of the least noise; we mistrust for the first time the soil we have so long trod with confidence.  

-Personal Narrative of Travels to the Equinoctial Regions of America, During the Years 1799-1804, Alexander Humboldt

Non-euclidian geometry turns straight lines and solid ground into curving and suppurating folds of incomprehensible space. Phase contrast microscopy turns a glass of clear water into a writhing column of vibrant life. H.P. Lovecraft was horrified by these things, and he tried to convey this horror to his readers. Without context, without knowing why an author was horrified, stories lose a degree of vibrancy.