Experiment 9: Metal Badges

Sometimes, I wonder what the cool kids are playing. (Yes, alright, D&D 5E, but what else?)

It's never been easy to get hard numbers on that; in the past I have tried to approximate based on sales figures or seats in convention games, but for this experiment, let's take a look at DriveThruRPG's metal badges, awarded for high sales.

Caveats

First, just because you buy something doesn't mean you actually play it. Second, the site doesn't count free copies, or those not sold there; so things like Ironsworn (free) or Shadowdark (core rules not available on the site) can't get a badge, and in these cases I have assumed that a game has a badge as good as its best-selling accessory. Third, games that have been on the site longer have had more time to sell, so newer games are probably under-emphasised, and the rankings likely change over time. Fourth, I'm not sure what happens to badges when products are taken down then reinstated, as happened to D&D items, or when they are transferred to a new publisher, as happened with some Two Hour Wargames products.

Finally, there are well over 100,000 products on DriveThruRPG; about 80% of them don't have a metal badge, so having one at all marks you as standing out from the crowd; only a few dozen products have reached Adamantine, so in sales terms those are the creme de la creme, the top 0.1% or so.

That said, let's take a look at the items that pique my interest in one way or another. Alphabetical order within each category, as I can't see actual sales data.

Adamantine (minimum 5,000 copies sold)

Anything that gets this high up is worth thinking about, but for comparison, to get onto the New York Times Bestseller list, you have to sell this many copies in a single week, and the bestselling novels of all time are in the 100-200 million copies range. We're not ending world hunger with our elfgames, however important they are to us.

• Daggerheart (this is the only RPG except D&D 5E with sessions advertised in my home town)
• Dragonbane
• D&D (any edition from 1981 onwards, take your pick, I got bored of writing them all down)
• Ironsworn (estimated), Ironsworn: Starforged.
• Mongoose Traveller 2nd Edition
• Mythic GM Emulator, 1st Edition (my personal favourite) or 2nd Edition
• Savage Worlds Adventure Edition or Deluxe Edition (they both hit Adamantine)
• Scarlet Heroes
• Stars Without Number Revised Edition

Mithral (2,000 copies)

IIRC, back when I was writing RPG stuff for money the minimum viable print run for a game was somewhere between Mithral and Adamantine. In the 1980s, if a company didn't think they could sell this many copies - and they were guessing, because there was nothing like Kickstarter - it didn't get printed.

• Barebones Fantasy (surprised to find this one doing so well, although it's a cracking game)
• Classic Traveller (1981 facsimile edition; considering it's 45 years old, it's not doing badly)
• Mongoose Traveller 1st Edition
• Old School Essentials
• One-Page Mythic GM Emulator
• Original D&D (White Box facsimile, over 50 years old and still going strong)
• Savage Worlds Fantasy Companion (fantasy always outsells every other RPG genre)
• WFRP 1st Edition or 2nd Edition (my personal favourite). WFRP3 was taken down some years ago when the publisher lost the license.

Platinum (1,000 copies)

• Axebane's Deck of Many Dungeons
• Four Against Darkness
• Pathfinder for Savage Worlds Core Rules and Bestiary
• Ruins of the Undercity (another surprise)
• Savage Worlds SF, Super Powers, and Horror Companions
• Shadowdark (estimated)
• Solo 2nd Edition (Traveller solo play supplement)
• Spears of the Dawn
• Sundered Isles (Age of Sail pirate expansion for Ironsworn: Starforged)
• Swords & Wizardry Complete Revised
• Tales of Argosa (one to watch, it hasn't been out long)
• The Pirates of Drinax
• Traveller5 Core Rules

Gold (500 copies)

• 2300AD (the GDW version)
• MegaTraveller Player's and Referee's Manuals
• Nuts! (the highest-ranking Two Hour Wargames product I found)
• The Dracula Dossier
• T4: Marc Miller's Traveller
• Traveller: The New Era

Electrum (250 copies)

• 5150 New Beginnings 2023 Edition
• Classic Traveller (1983 Starter Edition)
• Gold & Glory: Seven Deadly Dungeons (Old School dungeon crawling for SWADE)
• Traveller: 2300 (1st Edition 2300AD)

Silver (100 copies)

• All Things Zombie: End of Days
• Interstellar Overthruster
• No GM's Sky.

Copper (50 copies)

• 5150 Fringe Space
• All Things Zombie: Evolution
• WFRP 4th Edition (surprised how low this was; and this is the VTT bundle, the PDF has no badge at all)

No Badge Awarded

• A Star for Queen Zoe (campaign seed for Interstellar Overthruster)
• Talomir Tales: Distant Shores.

Coda

Is any of this going to change what I play? Nah.

But am I curious? Yes, yes I am.

Fringe Space: Makavan 011 - Intimidation

"If you want to control someone, all you have to do is to make them feel afraid." - Paulo Coelho

No group game last weekend, so how about some more Fringe Space? Don't mind if I do...

New Hope City, Early July '01

The Green at the west end of Pub & Rec was slowing taking over from the Snakebite Inn as Makavan's favourite haunt. If you'd told him last year he'd be having dinner with a razor, he'd have laughed at you, but there he was. His patron was leaving; he could see her outside hailing a taxi.

"Do you think I look dangerous?" he asked. Adrasaia cocked her head on one side and considered this for a moment, appraising him frankly.

"No," she said. "Not in the slightest."

"You do, though."

"That's because I am," she told him. Today, her usual crop top and skinny jeans were covered by a long duster, but he could see a laser SMG on a shoulder strap under it when she moved. If anyone else saw it, they'd decided discretion was the better part of not being perforated.

"How about joining me on a job, then? Shouldn't take more than a couple of hours."

"What is it, and what's in it for me?"

"That lady just getting into the taxi is being squeezed, and she wants me to put the frighteners on the squeezer. I think we'd be more convincing as a pair. I'm getting paid four IRD for the job; I'll split it 50-50 with you."

"You amuse me, Makavan," Adrasaia smiled, showing disturbingly pronounced canines. "Very well. I'm in."

New Hope City, Late July '01

That night, it was Makavan's turn to step out of the shadows near his target. She was out walking arm in arm with a blue-skinned xeog. That could mean anything, and anyway it was none of his business.

"Good evening, ladies," he said, polite as ever. They stepped back, startled, and he noticed the xeog stepped between him and the basic woman, who started edging away from the scene.

That was okay, it meant she was getting closer to Adrasaia.

"What do you want?" the xeog asked, in a silky contralto tone that pushed all the wrong buttons.

"My employer is getting anxious about the demands your friend is making," he said.

"And who would that be?" the xeog said.

"Never mind," the woman laughed. "I know who he means. Tell her to go suck a neutron star, she'll have to do better than you."

"Yeah, we thought of that," Makavan said. Calling a little louder then: "Show her."

Adrasaia grabbed the woman, bent her spine uncomfortably over one knee, and pushed her nose out of joint with the barrel of a laser SMG.

"Stop making demands," the razor hissed. "You won't like what happens if you don't."

"How do you do that without falling over?" asked Makavan, genuinely interested.

"Practice," the razor replied absently. "You, woman; are you clear what you have to do?" There was a terrified nod. The razor twisted, and suddenly she was upright and their target was sprawled awkwardly on the ground.

"We found you once," Makavan commented as he and Adrasaia retreated. "We can do it again."

Later, after he'd paid Adrasaia her share - that was one person he didn't want angry at him - he sat in the comforting ambiance of Egregore's bridge, musing. Not daring to speak aloud or write, because who knew who was watching, or how?

Makavan was uncomfortable with how his personal code of honour was eroding under the constant pressures of New Hope City, which seemed almost deliberately designed to do that. Was he still one of the good guys, he wondered? How could he square the need to keep eating with the demands of his conscience?

To distract himself he tried to find a pattern in the last few months' events.

Xeogs kept cropping up in connection with New Hope's high society circles. Why? Whatever the reason, he had to assume Ribeiro was involved somehow, and that meant Guzman might be, too, so there was a limit to how much trust he could place in Mikal. Pity.

Someone had sent an assassin - or bounty hunter, or something - after him. Who, and why? Most likely House Cardenas was getting bored with waiting for him to be extradited. But why had House Cardenas fallen out with House Makavan anyway?

Were these strands connected at all? If so, how?

GM Notes

My goals for this session were further trials of both the Mass Battle tweak for single combat, and the Lonelog notation. Again, I've used my custom SWADE notation extensions and collapsed multiple dice rolls onto one line when generating encounters.

S1. Involuntary Encounter

d: 1d6=4 -> Chillin' with a Friend. 1d3=1 -> 2 PEFs

@ Swap PEF1 for a Job Offer.

(note: I always assumed I could buy as many Job Offers as I liked, but that's not what 5150NLMV page 32 actually says)

d: 1d6+5=9 -> Shaker. 1d6=2 -> Confrontation, 4 IRD + ship upkeep. 2d6=4 -> Rep 4. 1d6=4 -> unarmed. 1d8=8 -> trophy wife. 1d6=2 -> female. 1d6=3 -> no kids.

(note: pay a visit to another Shaker who is trying to squeeze the patron; this will be the next voluntary encounter)

@ interact with PEF2

(note: PEFs always begin friendly in a Chillin' encounter)

d: 2d6+1d6=6+4 -> Exotic Razor. 1d6=3 packing A-3. 1d6=5 -> Rep 5

(note: The Law of Conservation of NPCs dictates this must be Adrasaia, who has exactly those stats.)

d: 2d6=7 -> reaction Neutral. Persuasion 1d8w=7 -> S => reaction becomes Cooperative.

S2. Voluntary Encounter: Confrontation

@ Choose to engage at night.

d: No. of NPCs is 2 (us) + 1d3=3 - 1d3=3, so 2.

d: Variuous tables => Unarmed Rep 4 Female Basic Shaker with Unarmed Rep 5 Xeog Shaker accomplice. (note: Xeogs again. Interesting.)

@ Try to intimidate targets. Adrasaia 1d10=19 vs Xeog 1d10=8 => SR

(note: target intimidated, mission successful)

[PC:Makavan | Wealth +0-1 = d8]

The notation continues to go well, I think I shall adopt it permanently. The intimidation was successful, so I didn't get to test the combat mod again, but I'm sure Simon is fine with that. However, since splitting the fee with Adrasaia means he only gets 2 IRD (plus ship upkeep), no Wealth die type increase for him this month, and the automatic decay drops him back towards his default d6. Replacing Rep Dice that way is also working well.

I think it will be interesting if the recurring characters have persistent reaction levels; Adrasaia has now shifted from Neutral to Cooperative, so she will start the next meeting at Cooperative. If Simon can get her to Helpful and then shift her reaction more positive after that, she will join him as a party member. She's not strictly a member of the band yet, but I could have had her join for one mission in 5150 by succeeding at a suitable Challenge, so why not.

Fringe Space: Makavan 010 - the Shrine of Taraneh

"If no Confrontation occurs, congrats! You just got paid for nothing." - 5150 No Limits Maiden Voyage

Happy Pi Day, everyone!

New Hope City, Early June '01

Another day, another robbery. A basic ganger stepped out of the shadows uncomfortably close to Makavan, waved a large knife at him, and hissed "Give me your money!"

Makavan looked at him with the arrogance born of aristocracy and months fending for himself in the shady end of NHC.

"No," he drawled. "I don't think I will."

The ganger leapt at him, slashing furiously, but Makavan's armour turned the blade. Makavan sighed, and while the ganger was pulling his knife back for another attempt, drew his laser pistol and shot him.

As the would-be robber lay curled up around the agony of the laser burn, Makavan rolled him over, checked the burn, extracted the robber's wallet, then thought better of it.

"You keep it," he decided, tossing it to the ground near his assailant. "You obviously need it more than I do." He moved off, muttering to himself.

"You get a better class of mugger around the spaceport."

New Hope Desert, Late June '01

As their rented crawler approached the shrine, Makavan made the gesture his AR visor was programmed to recognise as a request to magnify his view. As he thought, the tiny dots in front of the shrine resolved themselves as sentient beings; a pair of women, shading their eyes and pointing at the shrine, while off to one side was a second crawler. Hearing Makavan and Victoria approaching, they turned to look, and waved. Victoria stood up in her seat and waved back.

So far so good; nobody shooting. In fact, neither of the other party seemed armed.

Pulling up alongside the other crawler, Makavan jumped down and helped his passenger out, scanning the horizon for threats as he did so. Victoria strode purposefully over to the others through the sand and talked to them animatedly while Makavan checked their packs and other gear on the crawler's flatbed. She'd said she wanted to be discreet, so he left it there and pretended to be checking something behind one of the wheels until his patron called him over. He walked over and nodded to the ladies; expensive but casual desert wear, he noticed, although not as expensive as Victoria's.

They talked so long Makavan started to think they were deliberately stalling while something else happened, but nothing did. Eventually the other two left, Victoria got out her recording equipment and took footage of the sunset over the shrine, which it turned out was what she had wanted to do discreetly. He had been expecting something more exciting, possibly involving laser burns or large fangs.

After that, he made a meal from ration packs in the crawler; they ate; and he drove her back through the evening coolness to New Hope City.

Money for nothing, he thought. Why bother to keep it secret, though?

GM Notes

This is my first experimental use of Roberto Bisceglie's Lonelog notation, which you can get here, free and in a variety of formats. For this run, I've inserted it below; I immediately found it easier to conflate several of the encounter table rolls onto one line and apply my usual SWADE dice roll notation. For those unfamiliar with that, "w" means the roll is made with a Wild Die, S is Success, R is a Raise, F is Failure, CF is Critical Failure. I don't note Aces separately as you can infer them from the dice roll.

S1. Robbery

(note: involuntary encounter)
d: 1d6=3 -> robbery. 1d3=1 -> one basic ganger. 1d6=6 -> no firearms. 1d6=4 -> Rep 4.
(note: initiative - draw action cards)
d: Makavan 5C, ganger 8D.
d: Ganger rolls to hit d8=9 vs TN 5 -> SR. Damage 1d8+1d4+1d6=3 vs TN 9 -> F.
@ draw laser pistol and fire.
d: Makavan rolls to hit d8w=9 vs TN 6 -> hit. Damage 2d6=14 vs TN 10 -> SR, 1 Wound.
d: Ganger rolls to survive d8=3+2 (self-cauterising) -> survives.

S2. The Shrine

(note: voluntary encounter to carry out current job offer)
@ Approach shrine.
d: 1d3 -> 1 PEF; 1d3=3 vs 1 => no confrontation
? Who are they? Various tables -> 2x Basic Shakers, female, Rep 5
@ Interact with PEF
d: Simon Persuasion d6w=4 S (note: d6 with Wild Die, roll 4, a Success)
[PC:Makavan | Wealth +2-1 = d10]

Well, that notation works well enough. It seems more concise than my previous ramblings; comment invited.

However, I kept getting the urge to wander away from the 5150 scenario generator into something else, say The Scheme Pyramid. There's no reason not to, but at that point, why am I using 5150 at all?

I'm in a weird mood this year, aren't I?

Fringe Space: The SWADE Equivalent of Rep Dice

"Instead of using cash, credits or gold pieces to track how well a Character does in his career, we use Rep d6." - 5150 No Limits Maiden Voyage

As I mused recently, the Increasing and Decreasing Rep Dice which are so prominent in 5150 duplicate other effects in SWADE, and are the clunkiest part of my current rulings. Let's look at their purpose and effects, and see if there are things in SWADE which cover the same ground.

Purpose: Rep dice in 5150 cover both cash and experience points.

• You get IRD for doing heroic things and being paid, and you lose them for doing unheroic things and paying expenses.
• IRD and DRD earned during a month cancel each other out.
• If, at the end of a month, you have only IRD, roll that many d6; if any result is a 6, or is higher than your current Rep, it goes up one.
• If you only have DRD left, roll that many d6; if any result is a 1, your Rep goes down one point. Notice that it is easier to increase Rep than decrease it.
• You keep a cumulative running total of all Rep Dice earned in your lifetime; the total when you retire determines your final wealth and lifestyle, and your overall objective is to make that total as high as possible.

SWADE character improvement is measured by Advances, awarded periodically for playing the game - usually one every other session, in my solo games one every 8 posts. This is the equivalent of improving actual Rep. However, available Advances include Rich and Filthy Rich, which improve your character's salary and lifestyle; these are the equivalent of lifetime Rep totals.

The equivalents of losing Rep points in SWADE are the rolls on the Injury Table or the Fear Table, which can give a character permanent reductions in characteristics or extra Hindrances. However, Advances can be used to buy these off, returning the character to their earlier status - just as in 5150, where increases in Rep can offset decreases.

I normally use SWADE's Wealth optional rules, because I really can't be bothered keeping track of every purchase and titbit of revenue; I did that for a living for over four decades and it is absolutely not fast or fun, though it does sometimes make me furious. That does leave me with the need to understand how expenses and payment are handled.

Expenses are easy, because Wealth die type reduces periodically (monthly) back to your default Wealth die type (usually d6). It can also be reduced by making large purchases. If I were feeling harsh, I could say that there is no limit to how low the periodic reductions can take your Wealth die. I think I might do that for Simon, to represent the crippling financial drag of maintaining a starship. Note however that most Job Offers pay your ship upkeep as well as whatever else you get.

For income, SWADE recommends increasing the Wealth die type one step for an average task, two for a particularly lucrative reward, and three for something truly outstanding. Looking at 5150, I see that pay for a job can range from 1 to 7 IRD, an especially lucrative salvage job could earn you 12 IRD, and a heavy freighter full of contraband could theoretically be worth 17 IRD to its captain. However, looking at the kind of work Simon does, a range of 2-6 IRD is more credible.

So, let's say a Wealth die type increase is equivalent to three IRD, and there's no lower limit to how far periodic losses can drop his Wealth die type. Let's try that for a bit and see how it goes.

Aslan Route 37: Meet the Navy

Previously, on the Aslan Route... The Macavity is on Acadie to repossess the far trader Perfect Stranger for Hortalez et Cie as she is in arrears with her mortgage. The Port Authority is delighted that someone has come to get the ship off their pad, but first they must repair what seems to be deliberate sabotage. They find that the crew hurried to a nearby mining settlement but were shot down on the way back. And someone is watching them...

Acadie, 1109 Week 12

Returning from the mining settlement at Houillon, the crew of the Macavity stop off first at the junkyard where the Perfect Stranger's wrecked air/raft was brought. Dr Matauranga and Vila search the air/raft and find a well-hidden compartment with a data crystal inside, while Mazun talks to the proprietor - a friendly, buck-toothed woman called Kate - and agrees with her that the air/raft should be considered an insurance write-off. Mazun takes carefully selected photos to support this idea, and Dr Matauranga and Kate collaborate on a convincing damage report. Hortalez et Cie are unlikely to send anyone to check up on this.

On the way back to the starport, the team visits the site of the wreck, now perhaps six months old. Despite the length of time that has passed, several more clues are found, the most intriguing of which is a scrap of a note in German; apart from that, the clues simply confirm what they already know, and they return to the starport to work on the Perfect Stranger, ignoring Rex's suggestion that they storm the control tower and kill and/or interrogate everyone inside.

The data crystal proves to be a 2FA key which unlocks access to an extra layer of data in the Perfect Stranger's flight computer; it transpires that the crew periodically took off-site backups of the data cores and stored them in a bonded warehouse at Herzenslust starport. They will be somewhat out of date, but if the original cores can't be recovered, they would be the next best thing.

Repairs take several days, during which time the crew confirms that they are still under surveillance, investigates but rules out the starport staff, and glimpses their watchers often enough to be sure who they are. Once both ships are ready to lift, Mazun tails the current watcher back to a suburban house. After much debate, the crew decides that they could snatch and interrogate one of these people, but that the likely gain of information isn't worth the risk, so both vessels lift for Amondiage.

The evidence so far suggests that the Perfect Stranger was intercepted, and her crew killed, by Neubayern agents, but it's not clear why; perhaps the crew stumbled on a plot by Neubayern to destabilise Acadie, and were killed to silence them?

Fast Travel, 1109 Weeks 13-19

Earlier, the crew had identified the salvage company which removed the data cores which are their main concern, and also the people sent to appraise the ship and the liner they travelled on. Using a combination of this information, boyish charm, and judicious bribes, the team follows the breadcrumbs to determine where the data cores went, taking them to Amondiage, Achille, St Genevieve, and finally the Schlesien Belt.

The team is split across the two vessels, with Mazun, Vila's friend, and Rex aboard the Macavity, while Vila, Dr Matauranga, and Kharrash crew the Perfect Stranger. Cynical, suspicious people might infer a certain lack of trust on Mazun's part towards Vila and his friend. Surely not.

Schlesien Belt, 1109 Week 20

While the others refuel and replenish the two ships, Rex and Mazun go to the Port Authority and trot out their well-rehearsed story; they have repossessed the Perfect Stranger for Hortalez et Cie for non-payment of her mortgage, and are now taking her back to Zuflucht. However, another salvage company has removed part of her last cargo - some data cores - and Mazun wishes to buy them back.

This innocent tale leads to separate interviews for them with Neubayern Navy officers and some bulky marines. Mazun sticks scrupulously to the truth and can back it up with solid evidence, so despite the Navy's keen interest in the past history of the Perfect Stranger, they have nothing on him and are forced to release him. Rex, spoiling for a fight and definitely the crewbeing with the worst interpersonal skills - unless you count intimidation - is much less convincing, but the Navy decide that anyone who was a genuine spy would have a better cover story than a litany of enemies killed over the past five years in other jurisdictions, and let him go as well, with a somewhat more bemused expression.

The team decide that first, the data cores are probably on Neubayern, and they're not going to get them back with the tools at hand, and second, the Neubayern Navy has an unhealthy interest in the Perfect Stranger and the longer they stay in the Belt, the more likely it is that the Navy will invent a plausible story connecting them to her past exploits, which will result in uncomfortable interviews for them which culminate in twenty years' hard labour.

Both ships lift for Sturgeon's Law, arriving in 1109 Week 22, with the intention of recovering the backups from Herzenslust.

GM Notes

And thus the clue I'd forgotten to give them was reintroduced.

As the scenario is written, the Travellers are supposed to identify and track their watchers (which they did) and then capture them for interrogation (which they considered, but decided against) before travelling towards Herzenslust to recover the backups (which they completely ignored, heading off in the opposite direction for several months). It all made sense at the time.

The interrogation at Schlesien Belt was a hard-fought duel of words between Mazun and his questioner, but Mazun said nothing that was untrue and nothing that he couldn't prove, so while the Neubayern Navy is deeply suspicious of the Perfect Stranger, they have decided that Mazun is an innocent catspaw. This means that they stand to learn more by letting him go and watching what happens.

Rex, on the other hand, has a d4-3 in Persuasion and was actually hoping for a fight to the death with his interrogator. He rolled a -2, and it looked like he would get his wish... and then the interrogator rolled a critical failure. You just can't get the staff these days.

Fringe Space: Makavan 009 - Confrontation

“Flee if you can, for it is wicked to injure. Strike down hard if you cannot escape, and kill.” - Michael Hundt, 17th century fencing master

New Hope, Early May '01 - Confrontation

Late night in the Pub & Rec District, and Makavan is making his way back from an unsuccessful round of looking for work. A figure is moving towards him, and flicks a glance at the inside of its left forearm; that makes Makavan suspicious, and he lengthens his stride to pick up speed without it being obvious, heading for a side alley he can vanish into. The figure draws a laser pistol and fires, hitting him square in the chest but failing to penetrate the body armour he wears constantly; he returns fire, missing, and they both duck into cover, using the corners of buildings to conceal themselves as best they can while still keeping an eye on their opponents.

After a few inconclusive exchanges of shots, Makavan looses off one last bolt, then moves as quickly and quietly as he can down the alley and turns right, hoping to flank his enemy. It turns out she has the same idea, but he sees her first and manages to score a hit before they both duck behind their respective buildings again. Judging by the swearing, that did not bounce harmlessly off the armour, but if there is still swearing going on, it wasn't a decisive strike either.

When he sticks his head and gun arm around the corner again, she's waiting for him, and although she doesn't hit him, her bolt is close enough to spall pieces of building into his face, drawing blood. Now, it's his turn to curse, but he snaps off a couple of unaimed shots to keep her head down; the power pack has enough for fifty shots and he can recharge it back at the ship easily enough, no point conserving ammo.

Makavan decides there's nothing to gain by keeping the fight going, and melts away into the night.

Later, back at the ship, he replays the encounter in his mind. The glance at the forearm bothers him; his assailant seemed to be looking at a device rather than the arm itself. He wonders if she was looking at a picture of him; if so, this was no chance meeting, she had been looking for him, specifically. He knows he's not on the bounty board - he checks for that regularly - so this has to be a private commission. The attacker was human, and seemed to be a woman. He tries to think of people he has offended badly enough to want to kill him; it's a short list, and consists mostly of House Cardenas, and in particular its matriarch, Sabine. There are a couple of hishen criminals on the list, but they would want to enslave him so they would have used stunners. Ribeiro might want to silence him about her trip, but to keep that quiet she'd have to silence several people in Traffic Control and an unknown number of xeogs; not likely.

That's good, because it means he can ask Guzman for advice.

New Hope, Late May '01 - Chillin'

"Any ideas?" Makavan asks, having described his encounter to Guzman over drinks in the Green at the west end of Pub & Rec. Guzman takes another sip of hot brown fluid and creases his forehead thoughtfully.

"It might be House Cardenas," he said. "Although I'd expect them to want a show trial; trying to kill you suggests you know something they want kept quiet. Do you?"

Makavan shakes his head. "I never bothered about politics. I wish I'd paid more attention, now. If I do know something, I don't know that I know it."

"It could be someone sending Ribeiro a message," Guzman mused. "But it's a bit unsubtle for her circles. Have you offended anyone else recently?"

"Not badly enough for them to kill me."

"I know a couple of bounty hunters. I'll ask around."

"Thanks, man. Let me get these."

"No, I think it's my turn. It all evens out in the end anyway. Don't go anywhere, I'll be back in a minute."

Curious, Makavan waited. Shortly, Guzman returned with a woman who turned all the heads in the diner until Guzman's thousand-yard glare quelled them and they went back to their meals. Makavan was disappointed to see she was wearing a wedding ring, although it was hard to see under the gems overhanging it from the engagement ring further up the finger. That ring might not stop her dallying, but it would stop him.

"Captain Makavan, this is Ms Miya. She needs an escort into the desert. I thought you might be able to help her. Why don't you get acquainted while I get us all something to drink."

"Delighted to meet you, Ms Miya. How may I help you?"

"Have you heard of the Taraneh Shrine?"

"I'm afraid not. My education was more scientific in nature."

"I'm sure that wasn't your fault." Makavan didn't rise to the bait, and she continued. "Taraneh was an ancient xeog goddess of melody, and she had a major shrine here on New Hope, or Amid Jadid as the xeogs called it during the Shikar Empire period."

"It must be thousands of years old, then."

"Indeed. For reasons of my own, I want to visit it discreetly, and Mr Guzman tells me you are a trustworthy fellow who has been helpful to the Ribeiros. I understand there will be certain expenses involved; would six IRD be adequate?"

"That they would, Ms Miya. And please, call me Simon."

"Simon," she acknowledged. "And you may call me Victoria."

They exchanged smiles.

Status at End May '01

• IRD/DRD: -2 ("leave the battle board in defeat"), -3 (ship upkeep), +2 (successful further interaction).
• 5150 Stats: Rep: 5. Month IRD: -3, roll 445 so no loss. Lifetime IRD: 14.
• SWADE Stats: Bennies: 3 Wounds: 0. Advances: 1. Wealth: d8.

It occurs to me that SWADE already has Advances to handle character development, permanent injuries which could represent loss of Rep, and Edges such as Filthy Rich to represent improving standards of living. So, I don't really need to track Rep for my Star in this particular campaign. I shall ponder what to do instead.

GM Notes

The random roll for early month involuntary encounters gives me a daytime Confrontation (5150NL p. 34) with one Exotic, a female Basic Bounty Hunter with Rep 5 packing a P-1. This is nothing personal, the dice say, Simon is just in the wrong place at the wrong time; but I think it's more interesting if his Enemies catch up with him.

I like to shake things up a little to maintain my interest, so this time I used a tweaked version of the Mass Battle rules for the fight; it's the only part of the game with morale checks, and while abstract and emphasising the Battle skill, it does allow for both sides taking damage, and the odd blaze of glory.

• Force Tokens are based on Wounds. That means Simon has 10 (Wild Cards have three Wounds) and the Bounty Hunter has three (Extras have one Wound).
• Battle Modifiers: Simon gets +7 for the Force Token advantage (ouch). BH gets +1 for better weapon skills and another +1 for being a professional bounty hunter. She also has a much better Battle skill - d10 against Simon's d4w-2. They have identical gear, so neither gets anything for that, and it's a meeting engagement so neither is prepared or has a plan.
• A battle round represents an indeterminate length of time, a few seconds to a minute.

Off we go!

• Turn 1: Simon Battle d4w-2+7 = 8; BH Battle 1d10+2 = 5. BH loses one Token; Spirit check 1d10-1 = 3, but I spend a GM Benny to reroll; 4. Battle continues.
• Turn 2: Simon (10 Tokens) Battle 14, BH (2 Tokens) Battle 17; Aces on both sides there. Simon loses a Token, Spirit d6w-1 = 3; I don't want to Benny that so far from a refresh, so Simon retreats in good order.

Well, that was fast.

With all his advantages, I expected Simon to either massacre the bounty hunter brutally or force them into a rout; but as is often the case, the dice had other ideas. That worked pretty well, so it's worth a few more tries; it would work better with more figures on each side. The regular Spirit checks to test morale are good, and align nicely with 5150. Maybe swap out Battle for Shooting for individual gunfights?

The meeting with Guzman is classic Networking; Simon rolls Persuasion d6w = 8 (thanks to Aces), a Raise, which I interpret as getting what he needs but Guzman pays for the drinks this time, and a "successful further interaction" under 5150. I gave Guzman a couple of Common Knowledge rolls to know something useful. I also decided this would be a 5150 Chillin encounter, the dice gave me 4 PEFs and I decided to use one for Guzman and the other three for job offers. I haven't bothered writing up the ones I ignored; the one I took was to Escort a Rep 4 Mover (Trophy Wife) somewhere for 6 IRD. As I often do, I forgot there should be PEFs on entering and leaving a location as well as the ones inside.

Space Corsair's site gave me the name for Sabine Cardenas, who by my usual trick of looking up the meaning of names should be honest, wise, blue or purple, and possibly a thistle or a goldfinch. I'll stew on that for a bit. Maybe she's a xeog? That could be fun.

Likewise it gave me Victoria Miya, who should be victorious and possibly a shrine, a temple, or just beautiful and relaxed, depending on who is translating the Kanji. I decided the shrine was something she was looking for, and the post mostly wrote itself after that.

Books in February 2026

The Year of Less by Cait Flanders. The author's experience of a year-long shopping ban and minimalist lifestyle. As is often the way with such books, the parts I'm interested in - how the author did it, what the effects were, how she would do it differently knowing what she knows now - have to be extracted from a detailed biography and multiple family anecdotes explaining her motivations. I'm interested in minimalism, but I suspect it works better if you're single and reasonably well-paid; even Marie Kondo gave up when she had kids.

Poseidon's Gold by Lindsey Davis. The fifth Falco novel, which I enjoyed much more than number four; this is a story of murder, suicide, and an increasingly complicated and interwoven series of fine art frauds. Additionally, the book delves deeply into the protagonist's extended family history, as several of the family are involved in the art frauds or suspects in the murder, and in the course of this we unravel what really happened to Falco's dead brother and runaway father. Despite these complexities, it rattles along at a reasonable pace. I begin to suspect that the mysteries centred on Rome itself are more enjoyable; we'll see.

Lonelog by Roberto Bisceglie; a standard notation for solo RPG session logging. I reviewed this in more detail here.

Shadow State by Luke Harding. An investigation into how the Russian Federation and its ruling kleptocracy use dirty money, hacking, misinformation and murder to influence Western politics. Basically, they realised they didn't need to overthrow the West militarily, they could bribe us to overthrow ourselves; I'm enraged and depressed both by how effective they've been at that, and how corrupt and spineless Western leaders have been in response.

Nuclear War: A Scenario by Annie Jacobsen. A Pulitzer-nominated author interviews many people with first-hand experience of the preparations for nuclear war, and outlines how such a war might start, escalate, and end. Key lessons for me were how fast it would go, how hard it would be to stop it escalating, and just how much damage it would do. Scary stuff. Looking at the people in charge of the planet's nuclear arsenals, it is hard to retain any sense of optimism.

City of Bones by Martha Wells. A post-apocalyptic tale of a city on the edge of a vast desert, dotted with enigmatic ruins left by a vanished but highly technological civilisation. Treasure hunters go into these ruins to find artefacts to sell to academics, fraudsters make fake artefacts. There is also intrigue, non-humans bioengineered to survive the desert in the last gasp of the dying civilisation, and a looming disaster tied to the treasures people are hunting in the desert. If this were an RPG product, it would be a Numenera supplement. I can't do it justice in a paragraph; go read it, if only for the world-building.

Ogre's 11 by Mark Finn. This is me starting to research the next group campaign but one; the book contains 13 system-agnostic fantasy heists for the thieves in your party, which can be played individually or threaded together into a campaign. This one is going into the pile for that next-but-one campaign; the heists are interesting, with entertaining plot twists, and I think the team will enjoy playing them.

Unusual Suspects by Mark Finn. System-agnostic NPC generation for modern, fantasy or SF games. It focuses on personality traits and memorable quirks rather than statblocks, with the intent of allowing the GM to create an interesting NPC on the fly at the table, generating only as much as is necessary in the moment, then expanding later as and when needed. It's good at what it does, but I'm not sure it'll lure me away from my existing tools.

TV

These days, I don't watch enough movies or TV to be worth mentioning, but this month a shout-out to Sandokan: The Pirate Prince on Netflix.

This is very loosely based on Emilio Salgari's novel Le Tigri di Mompracem and the life of the historical Sir James Brooke. Sandokan is a prince of 19th-century Malaysia, deposed by the East India Company, torn between seeking revenge on the British and his love for a British woman. Written as a magazine serial in 1883 and published as a novel in 1900, the story is unusual for its time in being anti-colonialist, with an Asian hero and British villains, and surprisingly historically accurate, using many real places, events and people - see here for an analysis.

The TV series - produced in Italy but shot in English - makes a number of changes both to the original and real history, and is a better story for it. The heroine is significantly more feisty and has more agency, the romance is a slow burn rather than mutual love at first sight, and all of the characters have been fleshed out and made more sympathetic, with credible motivations.

It's clearly a labour of love by people who know the book and have used a light touch in updating it for the modern audience; recycling the music from the 1970s Italian TV adaptation is a nice touch, as is adding the minor character Emilio who chronicles Sandokan's adventures.