New Urban Shadows update! We release the final playbooks with layout by Thomas Deeny and the amazing art of Juan Ochoa. The combination of these two creatives is nothing short of amazing! We also show off the new cover and FOUR new archetypes! Check it out.
Also, our community reached over 800 members! That’s just incredible. Thanks to everyone for being a part of the game and your posts here.
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1287928832/urban-shadows-rpg/posts/1165287
This is awesome.
Otoh, I just started a game last week so now I have to update everything. You suck.
Love you too, Brand. blows you a kiss
Looking good, though I notice the Vessel archetype doesn’t seem to have a blurb on its sheet?
Oh right. Good catch. (this is why we preview things). Mark Diaz Truman, we need to fix that.
I’m just beginning to scan the new playbooks but I like what I see. I had kind of expected the Scholar would have access to a suped-up Library, so I was surprised that wasn’t there, but I like the Arcane Network a lot.
Ah, yes! We’ll need to write that up…
I’m wrapping up my second season tonight, hoping at least one of these awesome new playbooks is chosen when we kick off season 3 in a couple week.
Cool!
I love the new layout of the playbooks. The new artwork looks great too!
The Angel and the Vessel are awesome! A lot of potential for some dramatic tension there.
The Scholar’s End Move mentions a Library move that isn’t in the playbook. Not sure if I like the Scholar archetype. The Scholar is a character who is all about objects in a game that strives to be all about people.
I find the Dragon a bit disappointing. The archetype feels like an Immortal wannabe to me. Stuff of Nightmares is actually not frightening at all, considering the puny rating the Dragon has (and will always have) in Blood. Some moves seem to be about the dragon’s instinct to hoard stuff, but there are no moves for making use of the hoard (which does fit the dragon stereotype fine but might be frustrating to players). The Soul Mates are a cool concept though!
First, the new art style is really nice. I like the layout of the playbooks.
I am having trouble wrapping my head around the angel’s miracle move. Could you perhaps expand it bit on what the first two options are supposed to do? Thx!
David Walker, you are referring to ‘It is witnessed’ and ‘It is permanent’?
Yup, that’s the ones. Thanks!
Markus Schoenlau – Thanks for the feedback. The Library move will be included in Dark Streets, so you’ll have access to it there. It’s sort of a modified Workspace/Sanctum that’s about researching lost information.
The Scholar is all about objects, but they are objects that people want. (It makes me thrilled to hear that folks are getting that US is all about people at its heart!) Try it out and let us know if that works for you in play.
As for the Dragon, there are good points. Give it a shot as well, and let us know if you have any ideas to improve it. These LE playbooks are still very much in playtest, and they aren’t quite up to the standards of the final playbooks we just released.
David Walker, what precisely confuses you about them?
If people are present and you make this move, you should choose that it’s witnessed. This implies that your ability to perform lasting miracles that satisfy your lord are dependent on doing so in private.
If you don’t choose to make it permanent, then it’s effect will begin to fade with time. So healing the blind will work, but eventually the blindness will return.
I guess the extent of the miracle. So pretty much you as the player say what you would want the miracle to be, and the roll can determine the effects that go along with it?
Example. I as and angel am visiting a dying woman in a hospital. We are alone, so I choose to perform a miracle to take away her illness. I succeed, and choose it is permanent, and pleases the lord. So the woman is healed, and it is all good?
The miracle can be anything? Are there limits to what the miracle can be?
Andrew Medeiros: What are the actual game effects of a miraculous relief for the suffering? The bible offers all kinds of examples up to raising the dead.
Mark Diaz Truman: If I get an opportunity to playtest the Dragon, I will! For now, an idea for a Dragon move: Gain hold by hoarding items (acquiring items you need for a specific purpose does not count as hoarding), spend hold to access your inner Dragon, e.g. to Unleash with Mind instead of Blood for one attack or to Let It Out as if you rolled a 10+.
Imo, that’s up to your MC, really. They arbitrate the moves. If they say you can offer relief to the person who is suffering, then you can. If it’s asking too much of your lord, they’ll tell you that too.
That sound right to you Mark Diaz Truman?
Andrew Medeiros: Okay, thanks! Another question: The Dragon’s Fire Born move does not have a box to check. Is that an ommission or does the Dragon get that move automatically?
It’s an omission, I’ll have it fixed in the next version. Thanks!
Absolutely. I think The Angel can perform any number of miracles, i.e. raising the dead, healing the sick, turning water into wine.
I think “it is witnessed” also specifies whether or not people believe it to be a miracle. Maybe they see it, but they don’t “witness” it in a religious sense. They assume it’s a coincidence or look for some other scientific explanation; if you pick “it is witnessed,” they are confronted with the power of your Lord.
I am with Guy… I preferred the previous cover. A question of taste, I guess.
I’d still like to see the Aware IM changed. I remember a suggestion a while back to switch the Hunter and Aware IMs, and I still think that would work very well.
I had a couple people explain to me tonight that Corruption is more than just “going dark side,” but is disconnecting from humanity in general. If that’s the case, then the Aware’s Corruption Move already adequately covers that — they already gain Corruption for forsaking mortal responsibilities. The IM should cover different territory.
I get where you’re coming from Derek, but I still love the asymmetry of it.
The Aware is the person on the edge of the shadow city who looks in and really shouldn’t, so the closer they get to its populace, the darker they become.
Whereas the Hunter is neck deep in it and getting close to that darkness has become second nature, so much so that it gleams new information from doing so. Make sense?
I look at it like the Vampire in Monsterhearts. Vampires are the masters of dark seduction and manipulation but their sex move is all about rejecting sex.
Another thought on this: sometimes intimacy moves and corruption moves are designed to make a playbook untenable. In the case of the Aware, they mean that it is often impossible to play that playbook through without jumping ship to another playbook. The corruption racks up so fast that you have to be very careful in order to stay in the “between two worlds” position you’re in. That’s intentional; most mortals who are in that position can’t keep it up. They eventually have to pick which world is for them!
Any idea when the physical books out for us sad individuals who missed the kickstarter and don’t get updates? I preordered, but the anticipation is slowly killing me
It looks like the book will ship out next month. I’m so excited too!! 😀
Yay! Just in time for me to use it for a summer campaign after term time. 😀
Getting tired of gushing to people. ‘My God, I played this amazing game! It was the best ever!’
‘what was it called?’
‘Urban Shadows, but you can’t go buy it. And I don’t have a copy you can borrow. But believe me, it’s amazing and you should totally play it! When it’s out
Andrew Lawton – We hear you! We’re working hard to get it out, but we want to make sure we get it right. Stay tuned.
Mark Diaz Truman I bet. I’m super amped, and I haven’t put months if effort into it. Hope everything goes smoothly for you all