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jonnywaistcoat · 8 months

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Hey all, been an intense few days, and realised I haven't actually posted here about the fact the crowdfunder for The Magnus Archives RPG by the incredible Monte Cook Games is live RIGHT NOW.

It's going amazingly well, far beyond what we could have predicted, and I'm so excited by it. It looks amazing and I'm so psyched to see how Monte and the team bring the Archives to the tabletop. As someone who's been roleplaying since the 90s, Monte's work has obviously been a big feature in my gaming life, so you'll have to forgive me if there's a slight fanboyish tinge to how I talk about the project!

Check it out here!

#the magnus archives #ttrpgs #monte cook games #its all rather exciting isnt it

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ttrpgcafe · 6 months

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HOLY SHIT INVISIBLE SUN IS COMING BACK AND IT'S MY FAVORITE RPG OF ALL TIME PLEASE BACK IT SO I (or we, I guess) CAN GET THE WELLSPRING:

https://www.backerkit.com/c/projects/monte-cook-games/invisible-sun-return-of-the-black-cube#top

For those of you unfamiliar with Invisible Sun, it's an rpg where every single player is a spell caster of some variety, each with their own unique way of interacting with magic.

The Vances are the most traditional spellcasters, but they eschew spell lists in favor of literally filling a grid with spell cards, representing their limited cognitive space being taken up by spells. They get more space, and literally bigger spells as you progress.

Weavers take two concepts and combine them to produce an effect, very much like Ars Magica or Mage: The Ascension, if you're familiar with those. They get the ability to combine more concepts together, and to have mastery over more concepts as they progress.

Makers are this game's artificer, and they have a robust system for making quirky magic items that have fun, interesting, unique side effects or downsides every time you use them. Their progression is the most straight forward by the numbers "the things you make are more powerful and you're better at making them" of the bunch, but the system lets you, for instance, make a gun out of the body of a dead(?) god, so I'll give this a pass.

Lastly, there are the Goetics, who summon and bind otherworldly creatures to their wills. This takes the form of a conversation and negotiation with your GM over what you have to do for your bound creature, and what exactly they do for you in exchange. If you've ever played a warlock and felt like patrons weren't a big enough deal, this is an entire "class" that lets those relationships (yes, plural) take center stage.

The entire system feels very much like Cypher system 2.0, with a d10 dice pool system with a straight forward level of difficulty to hit, very much like the levels of difficulty in base cypher system, just made easier to manage. It even uses the "I'm an Adjective Noun who Verbs" character structure from Cypher system, here made much more interesting by the addition of a funky little xp system.

Invisible Sun has one of the most interesting advancement systems I've ever seen: aside from normal, average, "you do a thing, you get xp" system, here called "Acumen" (used to increase your stats and skills) there is a separate xp system related to good and bad things happening to your character, called "Joy" and "Despair" respectively. You combine one Joy with one Despair to get a "Crux" which is the xp currency you need to advance your class and focus abilities. This incentivizes players to not only let bad things happen to them, but to SEEK THEM OUT, which is huge! Players often think they want to win all the time, but they don't actually want that, it makes for a boring narrative. This is one of the very few systems I've seen incentivize this story structure, and I'm absolutely in love with it.

Lastly, because the game focuses so heavily on Magic, it has the only system for simulating the ebbs and flows of magic I've seen done well! This involves "The Path of Suns" and the "Sooth deck" which is the in game name for a specific pattern of laying out what amounts to tarot cards that make magic dynamic, interesting, and unpredictable in a way I've never seen before, and rarely since. (Pathfinder's Secrets of Magic is the only other supplement I can think of, and that was almost 5 years after this game came out)

Anyway, I can't recommend this game enough, the systems are unique, the vibes are immaculate, and it's so fuckin WEIRD in the best way.

#ttrpgs #indie ttrpg #ttrpg #indie games #rpg #tabletop #invisible sun #monte cook games #mcg #cypher system #magic #magic system

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rpgsandbox · 9 months

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Announcing The Magnus Archive Roleplaying Game

Monte Cook Games and Rusty Quill, distributors of The Magnus Archives podcast, are pleased to announce the forthcoming The Magnus Archives Roleplaying Game. Enter the archives yourself, investigating the supernatural horrors found in the podcast or those you create on your own. Work alongside Jonathan and Martin, Basira, Daisy, and the rest of the staff. Encounter the NotThem, the Anglerfish, or the Man Upon the Stair. Learn the truth of the books of Jurgen Leitner, the coffin that is also a pit, and The People’s Church of the Divine Host.

The 400+ page The Magnus Archives Roleplaying Game is built on the well-loved Cypher System mechanics. The rules are specifically tailored to reflect the horror and the action of The Magnus Archives stories, with the effects of fear and stress taking a toll on characters—but also unlocking access to mysterious supernatural abilities. Using such abilities might save your life—but might also send you further into the clutches of the entities at the heart of such powers. Your character might even eventually become an avatar… but is that a good thing?

You’ll have to discover that for yourself.

Crowdfunding Soon!

The crowdfunding campaign for The Magnus Archives Roleplaying Game launches soon. Sign up to be notified of the launch and get an exclusive gift with your pledge: a Magnus Institute training audio cassette. What will you find when you put it into your tape deck and hit play?

Sign up to secure a free copy with a pledge at any reward level and find out yourself!

#RPG #The Magnus Archives #Monte Cook Games #Rusty Quill #crowdfunding

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yumaisbored · 9 months

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screaming crying bursting into flame

(link in comments)

#tma #the magnus archives #rusty quill #monte cook games #gaming #horror podcast #jon sims #jonathan sims #martin blackwood #tim stoker #sasha james #melanie king #basira hussain #daisy tonner #georgie barker #elias bouchard #jonah magnus

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explorerrowan · 1 year

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Alternative systems to publish your TTRPG content under now that WotC is promising to steal your stuff if you make it with D&D:

Cypher System by Monte Cook Games:

Apocalypse World/Powered by the Apocalypse:

Blades in the Dark:

Modiphius (2d20 system):

I know there are many more, but those are the big systems that pop in my head at the moment. (Technically, GURPS also lives in my head, but that's more of a curse, really.)

Go make your cool stuff and don't let anyone tell you it isn't yours just because you used their game rules.

#ttrpg #roleplaying games #ttrpg community #ogl 1.1 #wizards of the coast #wotc #cypher system #monte cook games #apocalypse world #powered by the apocalypse #pbta #blades in the dark #forged in the dark #modiphius #2d20 system #d&d

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kristsune · 7 months

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After watching the interview of Jonny and Alex with Cypher Unlimited, I just had to make a post to capture some of the best bits. There were so many this had to be split into two posts. This first post includes such fun moments as: Head Archivist Alexander J Newall, we're cool normal people, disguised missile silo (x4), how RQ/Magnus formed, 10 year anniversary, Improv in Magnus, James Ross What Did You Say, Alex Swear Count: 1, making of possible Leitners, technically, technical, 1d20 Sanity Damage, and Jonny Is Not A Cannibal (again).

#rusty quill #cypher unlimited #alexander j newall #jonny sims #my audio #tma #the magnus archives #tma rpg #monte cook games #i loved listening to them talk about the game and everything else #such good times #what a great interview #fun fact: i was IN Edinburgh literally like 3 weeks after that exact mechs show #so narrowly missed it

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undergroundoracle · 10 months

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Introducing Our Current Setting Focus: Wyld Space!

Wyld Space is a science fiction setting designed on the bones of the Cypher System, so many of the common features, mechanics, and tropes that you would expect from that combination will be present while you’re playing in this setting. However, Wyld Space is its own fully realized world (or system filled with worlds, as it may be) with all of its own original tweaks that make it what it is.

The important quirks of the Wyld Space setting are presented below, as a helpful primer to get you in the right headspace while you’re getting started. Most of these highlights will be explored in greater detail in their appropriate sections later in this book.

You Go Hard, The Sci-Fi Doesn’t

Wyld Space is not a hard science fiction setting. The capability of technology that is available strays far outside the realm of current possibility and dances on the outskirts of the fantastic. Starships powered by cores that make traveling through star systems and back as easy as taking a trip to the town over, nanotechnology that can mend metals designed to withstand the wildest space anomalies, machines that can create food and water out of thin air. The difference in access between those living in collective space and those braving the unknown of flux space may make the availability of certain advancements difficult to come by, but even the most backwater station floating past the bounds of the helix sphere will have use of some piece of tech that would look like magic to those out of the know.

Who You Are

In this setting, humans don’t exist. And beyond that, only the dustiest xenobiologist believes that those ancient aliens ever really existed in the first place. You instead play as wylds, the dominant sapient genus that has claimed the known galaxy and carried the torch of civilization into space. Wyldkind is varied and beautiful, composed of highly evolved anthropomorphic versions of the myriad mammals, birds, and reptiles that you can currently see around you on Earth.

Additionally, you play as an outlier—someone who has been designated as irregular and nonconformist by the Intergalactic Network of Collectives (the governing body of collective space) and the sinister megacorps that truly call the shots behind the scenes. Being designated as an outlier could mean a lot of things in Wyld Space. It could mean that you take direct action against the systems that you see as corrupt. It could simply mean that you want to live as freely and purely as possible on your own terms. It could also mean that you’re an active criminal running various contraband back and forth through flux space. At the end of the day, being an outlier means that you refuse to cow down to the accepted status quo.

Who They Are

The primary antagonists of Wyld Space are the government and the corporations that secretly control it. The Intergalactic Network of Collectives (INC), although founded with lofty goals and good intentions, was quickly corrupted by the influence and money of the three megacorps that were allowed to bloat out of control. Mercenary groups, bounty hunters, and purchased police are just a fraction of the corpo agents that you’ll have to maneuver as you traverse the setting.

Void Titans

Colossal beasts with their own biological equivalents of ship-to-ship weaponry, void titans (or simply titans) are creatures that stalk flux space and hunt the starships that brave the sector. Trapped behind the fury of the helix sphere, those who stay within the safety of collective space never have to worry about these alien terrors—which is knowledge that the megacorps are more than happy to propagate.

Element 427: Foxfire

Element 427, called foxfire by everyone but corpo scientists, was the miracle discovery that changed the course of wyldkind forever. Not truly understood, but coveted nonetheless, foxfire is a quantum material highly valued for its matter-enhancing and physics-defying characteristics. Any of the truly fantastic properties exhibited by ships, weapons, cyphers, or artifacts can be tied to foxfire, and its presence in flux space is what drives the megacorps to push into the sector.

Kinetics

Whether the result of genetic tampering, the presence of foxfire, or a little of both, there are wylds who can manipulate the world around them using only the powers of their mind. Called kinetics, these incredible people can create fire, generate electricity, or turn their bodies into living weapons with only a thought.

And that’s only a portion of what you’ll be able to unlock and explore in Wyld Space!

Ready To Get Wyld?

Join our Patreon at the $3 monthly tier and receive all early access updates for Wyld Space as well as exclusive feedback and playtest surveys that allow you to impact the setting!

#cypher #cypher system #ttrpg #monte cook games #ttrpg community #indie publishing #sci fi #furry #anthro

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painted-kneecaps · 8 months

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honestly the thing i’m most excited for when it comes to the TMA TTRPG is just seeing everyone’s silly little characters and their inevitable downfall into becoming avatars

#tma #the magnus archives #tma rpg #monte cook games

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fullmoonandstar · 8 months

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An Interview with Jonny, Alex and Monte about the ttrpg!!

youtube

#Alex in a sweater??!#the magnus archives #tma #the magnus protocol #monte cook games #Youtube

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caprisunsweet · 8 months

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the magnus archives fans going ABSOLUTELY bonkers on the ttrpg kickstarter is such an act of love and appreciation for the podcast and the writers and jonny and alex

they've almost raised 7x the goal, and it just keeps going up in only a single day!!

also the poll at the end is hilarious, martin bby girl of TMA fans

#the magnus archives #TMA #TMA podcast #Martin Blackwood #Jonathan Sims #monte cook games #kickstarter #backit

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ashes-in-a-jar · 8 months

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The monte cook tma rpg game has taken over my ads absolutely everywhere

It's almost as though the Internet was like "we never manage to find the exact thing that matches your statistical profile given what you browse for and talk about and then this comes along?? It's so much exactly your profile and what you do online that we are gonna milk this from now on until they make us stop"

#tma #monte cook games

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secondhandbagofholding · 5 months

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I have a player that says, "Gaaaaaah. So good!" At the end of every Cypher session we play, and as a GM, that means everything to me.

#musings #silly goofy mood #cypher game system #cypher #monte cook games #numenara #ttrpg community #ttrpg #gming #game master

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straightedgesavior434 · 6 months

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