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11/21/2023 9:41 AM

I was part of a combat test run by two of the creators of Doomsong, yesterday afternoon. Half-party kill and the two survivors decided to run. Both killed PCs were single-hit kills. Horribly bad luck for both of us. Very deadly game. It's a cool combat system, if a bit board-gamey. You have two actions per round, with a free move per action. You set your action at the start of the round by setting 2 D6s (you can roll, if you want, like NPCs - one action for them) or set the dice - "I pick 2 and 4." There are two possible actions per number (2 is Dash or Quick non-combat action, 5 is Attack with advantage or Overwatch) and this sets the turn order for the round - all PCs and NPCs with a 1 do their 1 action, then 2...

The game is all D6. For attack, "D6 + weapon bonuses (any weapon is, at least, +1) + 1 for relevant attributes" vs the defender's "toughness + footing they decide to burn." Damage is attack - defense and it's a graded scale based on the damage type (piercing, slashing, etc) which mostly results in conditions (negative attributes). Then you roll a death check, but I don't remember vs what. Checks are all fail, success with a cost (roll equal to the target) or success. After any check, you can flip the DoomCoin, which shifts your result either one up or one down (success to either down to a success with cost or up to a critical success).

2025-01-01 12:00

I spent most of yesterday laying on the couch reading Doomsong. So good. Not much in there that I didn't know, either from the pre-release stuff, or the Guildmarches games, but nice to have it in one place and so excellently presented. I've mostly been playing (or running) FitD or Resistance games, recently, which are, when you get rid of the fluff, really competence-porn games. The single D6 with the push-your-luck Doomcoin after really drive home the not-quite-hopeless you're-doing-the-best-you-can aspect in this world. The world-building is phenomenal. So horrifying and macabre - the end is coming, we're just holding it off as long as we can. It created a lot of cross-links in my brain with The Bleakness - it's not that bleak, but I feel like there may be similar themes under the hood. (FYI - The Bleakness is a game where you should go in ignorant. I've read it, which means I can run it , but should probably never play it.) I started to read Lord Have Mercy Upon Us, but stopped when I got to the "quests" page - I need to finish my game of Teeth before I can bring it to the table, and there's a chance the Guildmarches games will pick back up, or I may join other sessions. I'm very curious about how correct the Church dogma is. The diegetic and non-diegetic presentation of the foundational deity stories seem to match perfectly, which raises the question "Where did the Church get all of this information?" Humans were created by Death after the Immortal was murdered. Why don't they worship Death? It implies the Immortal still has agency (or agents). There is also a big gaping hole - what led to the Immortal's death? Why did Exultation speak against the Immortal? Thought the stars should be all different colours? Didn't like that they were having the same thing for dinner, again? It's very telling that this is missing from the stories and I suspect Morgan (the creator) has a surprise in store for us.