Happy holidays!

By Salireths.

Hello dear patrons! I wish you a murry x-mas and yappy holidays!

This time it will be a rather mediocre post, because this month so far was a bit of a lackluster: I attempted a bunch of ideas, but didn't get to finish any of them because I got into more prototyping, and the requirements kept changing all the time, as I discovered better ways of making things!

The Tabletop

The most important news is that I started working on a gameplay prototype - something we should have done a long time ago (something we should have started with), but we kept getting carried away by things like programming various multiplayer-ready systems, animating sexy walks and trying to make tools so the art wouldn't take so much time to make.

Up to this point we didn't properly plan how the game is going to be played exactly, so this is what I set myself to figure out, finally. Currently, this prototype is taking form of a **pen-and-paper tabletop RPG**, and you might be surprised why I chose that approach, so let me explain why, and maybe even intrigue you with it!

A lot of videogames (and sometimes even entire genres) have roots in tabletop games, be it just from simple prototypes or from big published systems. So it can't hurt if I made one as well, and who knows, maybe it will grow into its own game eventually, especially if it ends up being decent and if there is enough interest.

First up, it is very nice to just focus on designing the play-process for a change, without doing programming, technical art, animations or shaders. The Pen-and-Paper RPGs are about making your own character and going on an adventure, and I'm going on an adventure working on it!

Instead of using a pre-made RPG system (like D&D) I'm making my own, something I intend to be reflected in the videogame later on. So far it features a list of 20 unique skills, character mechanics that reflect incredibly lewd nature of my world, crafting and inventory system just like I described in the previous post, and a strategic resolution system that doesn't use dice.

Rolling dice (and therefore the resulting randomness of skill checks) can be fun in Pen-and-Paper games, but it doesn't get translated well into videogames. If an important skill check (with dire consequences) is randomized, it can become frustrating quickly - it's always better to be sure of the outcome of your actions in videogames. However randomness also adds unpredictability and can encourage players to adapt to new situations.

That's why I'm attempting to marry two concepts together by using a deck of special cards. Cards that you keep in your hand and use as a resource to perform actions. Cards that you draw are still somewhat random, but because you get to choose which card to play it encourages strategic thinking - something I'm after. To draw more cards your character needs to consume Essence, and if you read the previous post, you will know what that entails ;}

To test out this idea I used Tabletop Simulator, where I only needed to make some cards with a simple LUA script so I could write on them. If i was to test that idea in Unreal... Well, I'd likely forget about that idea by the time I'm done messing my brain up with programming a system for it.

The overall goal of this tabletop game is to find out the core essence of the game, so we can trim the excess away, shaping the game into something that we can actually finish at some point. I also want to further develop my sensual world together with friends, via fun interactive storytelling sessions we'd be sharing. I hope that its something I can do together with Patrons as well (if anyone is interested, please let me know!).

Maps

Additionally I'm making maps. I love fantasy maps, I've been drawing them for even longer than furry and scalie goodness (back then internet wasn't really a normal occurrence, so I obviously didn't share them).

But because of this lackluster month I didn't get to finish any map though, instead I drew a bunch of trees, mountains and rocks to use as "stamps" on them, speeding up the tedious work. Making these maps should help me figure out designs for various places, houses, caves, forests, NPCs and their living routines there, etc.

The plan is to use these maps actively in the tabletop, and because they are just drawings, I can quickly iterate on and change them to suit the needs of the prototype. Later on I can use these maps as reference when making the world in the videogame-part, and because the layout will be tested by then, I'll be much less stressed about having to do potential re-works, and will have a clear idea of how much places and NPCs I will need to make in the end.

So if you like maps and want to have an overview of the world where a place called "Cock and Tail Drinkery" is a totally normal tavern name, please stay tuned, I'm on it xD.

Hizathri Village

Two days ago I got suddenly inspired, I saw this image like flash front of my eyes, so I started this concept art of a village from my world, thinking that it will be useful as a reference for a place I wanted to create for so long. But then I got distracted by IRL stuff, and didn't have time to finish it before making this post. Thus I'm showing you an incredibly unfinished picture, it is what it is.

However, looking at it now I'm afraid that, while it is an iconic landmark of my world and this picture has a neat composition so far, in the end this art is quite pointless. This village is just far too big, requires far too much work to create in a 3D game when I'm alone doing all the art and design... Just like that one time when I designed a city, if you remember.

It is similar in size (maybe bigger), in the amount of houses and NPCs as the city of Markarth from Skyrim, and as far as I know, that city was done by a team of ~20 people and it took them 6 months of work (I regularly watch GDC recordings). Sooo, if we do some crude math, 6 times 20... Yeah that number doesn't look good... If only I had a team of artists and designers and money to pay them all, darnit!

However, I could just spend a few more days and finish that image if you want to see it done. It won't be any useful concept art, but it can be a small glimpse into my world, and perhaps one day, I will get to realize this dream... Or instead I could spend these few days doing something else, something more immediately useful. Your choice, so let me know!

## Conclusion

So there it is, the news. I'm going to attempt to have a couple days off and then continue working on the tabletop afterwards, let's see where it leads me, maybe it will help us to make the game build faster, maybe not, but in any case I'm sure there is lot to learn from doing this.

I'm doing my best folks, but if you can tell, overall I'm feeling exhausted from never-ending gamedev work. I really should start having days off and go out more often that twice per month to keep my health.

But my biggest desire is still for everyone to experience this world, and I still must do whatever it takes to achieve that. I wish that the New Year brings us all more strength, creativity, and guidance from the Dragons!

Thank you so much for being a part of this long endeavor, for all the support, and of course, for reading the post until the end. I can't express how much I appreciate that.

With lots of Dragon love,

Salireths.