WYRED Directional Survey
For the peeps who’ve been following my little cyberpunk rpg project, “WYRED”, could y’all be a doll and fill out this quick survey? Your feedback will help decide on what to work on next.
WYRED - Leaner, Meaner Edition
GET THE BAD BOY HERE. (2 MB Zip file)
Contains “complete” core rulebook, two pocketmod books, a character sheet and a pocket“character folio.”
Something I Learned from PocketMod….
So this week, I had a crazy idea: Could I cram WYRED into an 8-page PocketMod?
Short answer to that question: No.
But what I did pull off was condensing WYRED down to an 8-page document, including the character sheet. Only reason it wasn’t PocketMod friendly was I suck at layout/design theory, so the fonts came out teeny-tiny. This is also related to my hubris, as I hardly omitted or left out as much as I could. That isn’t to say I didn’t strip stuff out of there: Drugs and Toxins were omitted, a few pieces of Augmentations, little things like “Legality” and Edge-Link for the augments (okay, those can be pretty major things….but I felt they weren’t necessary for the enjoyment of the game.)
I could have taken a lot out and still have it a functional, pocket-sized cyberpunk RPG. Did I really need to put the vehicles in there? Are Range Bands detrimental to the game, or just an awesome carry over I borrowed from RAG?
Yes, this all stems from my recent enjoyment of Weird West. It goes back further, actually: like my friend Mathias who has been using WYRED to run his own space opera games and all the talks we’ve had about how nice it is to have a system that feels complete, but isn’t bogged down with the nitty gritty. Games like High Valor and ICONS where the mechanics are fast and easy to scheme up on the fly.
This week I was able to take a 38 Page Document and strip it down to 8. Granted, I removed a lot of flavor and fluff and discussion…..but at the same time, it makes me wonder how much is necessary for WYRED to be a complete game. Should I write it like it may be someone’s first cyberpunk game? Or is it safe to assume (yes, I know they say about that) that the bulk of my target audience will already have a good grasp of both the genre AND how to run an RPG?
Either way, I now have a draft of the bare naked game (well, scantily clad) that I’ve been slowly pecking away it from time to time for almost a year now. I may use this as a skeleton for a completely re-written draft. I’m pretty comfortable the nuts and bolts are right where they need to be….what I want now is a rulebooks that is as fast to read as it is to pick up and learn to play the game. I’ve taught complete newcomers how to build characters (that actually excite them!) in minutes. I want someone to be able to freshly pick up WYRED and be able to teach their friends how the character gen in a couple hours, no sweat.
WYRED Rough Drafts 5 & 6
WYRED, my cyberpunk rpg based off the WYRM rules found in games like Warrior, Rogue & Mage and Resolute, Adventurer & Genius, has just released its 5th AND 6th rough draft copies.
The 5th Draft is the “final” version of the original d6-based rules. The 6th Draft is the first version of our d12-based mechanic. It’s still essentially the same game, but the number scale has been beefed up for a wider range of success/failure to help remedy the issues of “feast or famine” dice rolls (where it felt like everything was either complete misses or critical explosions.)
But for those who enjoyed the d6 version and would like to continue building off of it for their own WyRM games, I’ve also made the “raw” un-formatted Open Office document available.
And, of course, the game and mechanics are being developed under a Creative Commons BY-NC-SA 3.0 Unported License.
