Shard Drifter

Although the Void Splicer was my first 'junker' for Shards of Tomorrow, it was a little small and limited, and I didn't really like how it worked for long-term play. It was an 'ultra-lite junker', all things considered. I've decided to upgrade to a different ship with more nooks and crannies. I present to you the Shard Drifter... a ship I am probably going to make out of LEGO at some point soon :) When I do, I am totally posting pictures...

The Freemaker Adventures

So I'm maybe a little TOO excited about the Freemaker Adventures. I could never get all that into the Rebels show (not sure why), but this seems right in my wheelhouse. Basically, the concept for this show is almost exactly how I picture an ideal Shards of Tomorrow campaign running. Swap out the dad for a gnorom tinker (I wanted to do a drawing of one where he has a big wrench on his shoulder, just like that... but I'd already done an ant image like that a while back)... so the mom is the terran adventurer, the son is the terran templar, they have a S-Series service bot, and they're flying a junker. It will take every bit of my willpower not to immediately stat up these characters and their ship after watching the first episode.

Some Shards Actual Play

I actually got to play this afternoon with my friend and his son, and we made a few discoveries...

My friend played a synthoid. Their omni-knowledge is AWESOME if played well. He had INT 14 (we started at level 3) and was able to interface with the computer aboard the orak gunship from the core rules. In a few seconds, he had completely overridden their controls, and had gathered all of the information from the ship's database. He was able to remotely trigger a self-destruct mechanism as they were leaving aboard an orak interceptor. Seriously cool stuff, and easily supported by the rules (it was both challenging and awesome, requiring a roll of 30. He rolled 17 on the die with his INT 14, so he snuck it through the uprights).

His son played a terran templar, and the stunts balance very well. He tried to use a suggestion on one of the guards but failed, and then had to wait until next turn to call his sun blade to his hand, and cut himself out of the chains, which worked. 

We played with the rules for generating junkers, and we ended up with a junker that had a dependability of 2! It broke down twice during a short combat, and only escaped because he was able to get the jump drive back online and win initiative before three interceptors finished the ship off. It was down to 2 hp when it jumped.

***

I'm giving the rules for XP some serious thought. I wanted to honor the original XP system from Saga of the Splintered Realm, but a different XP system may be in order, closer to the one in Sentinels of Echo City. Right now, I can see that any Junker is going to require the credits to be coming in hand over fist just to keep it running, and the XP balance on that is going to be somewhat difficult. Plus, the game lends itself to making off with vehicles valued in the tens of thousands of credits, meaning that you'd be getting routine (and unbalancing) XP spikes. This will be addressed in the March 1 update. 

Shards of Tomorrow Errata

As I hear from players and spend more time in the rules, I'm sure that more things that need to be corrected/clarified will rise to the surface. I was intentional in waiting a month to release the print edition, because I knew there would be something somewhere that would need a tweak. On this thread I will post all of the errata for Shards as it comes up:

- Junkers start with a dependability of 2d4.
- Junkers start with speed of 1d10+10.
- The Junker Profile will be updated with these two attributes.
- Synthoids can survive in the vacuum of space; they do not need to eat or breathe.
- The nuaru must be lawful. There is a comment about chaotic nuaru, but that will be removed.

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Also, some changes I know will be coming with the March 1 update:

- An additional appendix will outline followers: your first mate, wingman, or best friend; that guy who is always by your side. The player classes will be available for the role, but I will also include a few other besties, including an advanced bot and a myconoid fungus dude.

Shards of Tomorrow Now Live

Shards of Tomorrow is now live.

I hope you love this game as much as I do.

The Banner for Shards of Tomorrow

Here's the banner I'll be putting up on RPGNow tomorrow... after I launch the game tomorrow afternoon! It needs one final editing sweep before I feel comfortable releasing it into the wild (putting it at roughly 99.9% done), and then you'll be able to pick up your very own copy. I think the banner below is hi-lar-ee-ous, but Mary sort of shook her head at me. Maybe I've been working on this too long...

Obligatory 99% Done Post

Shards of Tomorrow is at 99% done, and only needs a final editing sweep, page numbers citations throughout, and an index. That, my friends, is what we call nearly in the books.

There is a LOT I love about this game, but my favorite thing is the rules for rolling up and playing your own junker. This game within a game of keeping your starship going and just keeping up with the basic maintenance is just so much fun... here's the character sheet for your starship...

By the way, I'm thinking that one of the ads for the game is a starship bumper sticker that says "I got 99 problems, but my junker ain't one of them."