[Kickstarter] Demon City by Zak Smith aka. Sabbath

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Does anyone know how the whole Tarot card-based system works? Is it a touchy-feely symbolic interpretation thing like Everway* or an actual numerical mechanic (i.e something like "Card X adds +1 to your ability, Card XX adds +2, but Card XXX is an automatic success and Card Y is an automatic failure")?

*A now utterly forgotten game I actually really liked.


That part interested me because I've been playing with a Tarot based system myself, but as it states you can replace the syste with a d10 roll I think it's simply a matter of the suit cards providing a 1-10 result to compare to Attributes for success. Whatever effects the minor Arcana or Trumps have they probably thus align to a "wild die" of the D6 system variety.
 
Does anyone know how the whole Tarot card-based system works? Is it a touchy-feely symbolic interpretation thing like Everway* or an actual numerical mechanic (i.e something like "Card X adds +1 to your ability, Card XX adds +2, but Card XXX is an automatic success and Card Y is an automatic failure")?

*A now utterly forgotten game I actually really liked.
I liked the way that Everway had elemental stats, so even the cards were open to touchy-feely interpretation, the elemental symbolism in the cards meant that you could often read them in somewhat concrete ways. I got rid of my copy during a massive game purge (although I held onto the Spherewalker Sourcebook), and I really regret it.
 
Everway was underrated and ahead of it's time. Too ahead of it's time, perhaps. We very seldom actually used the fortune deck (The game's pseudo-Tarot) because, as Baulderstone pointed out, the elemental stats were already a very clear guide as to who could what. The image-based character creation was a great, simple idea and was a perfect hook for kids or novices new to RPGs (Pick three pieces of fantasy art- The game came with about a hundred fantasy art cards, but you could use anything- then explain them as things your character did or saw during his or her life).
 
I liked the way that Everway had elemental stats, so even the cards were open to touchy-feely interpretation, the elemental symbolism in the cards meant that you could often read them in somewhat concrete ways. I got rid of my copy during a massive game purge (although I held onto the Spherewalker Sourcebook), and I really regret it.

Just got a copy for $30 USD on Ebay thanks to Charlie D Charlie D in this thread. Reading it over right now, will post some pics, it was sealed and in amazing condition.
 
Time was you could pick up copies of Everway for $5 in a bargain bin, as the hobby was largely distracted by D20 games flooding the shelves. Snagging the Spherewalker's Handbook took me a bit more effort back then, and nowadays its as rare as a Planescape supplement, but it's easily one of the greatest RPG sourcebooks ever published.
 
I still have an Everyway box in excellent condition - although I don't have any of the Spherewalker or other add-on cards you could collect for a while. I just have what came in the box.

My major issue is the Fortune deck is too small - as in there should be more cards (only 36 of them) and bigger than standard playing card size (i.e. Tarot sized). My prefered mode of play is to have players make a pyramid of cards out in front of them, and have them turn them over when they choose to add a bit of fortune to the reading. Although they can be a bit open to interpretation, they'll either be up or down meaning the good or bad fortune is clear.

My other issue is that there really wasn't much setting in the game, until Greg Stolze wrote Spherewalker some years later.
 
I still have an Everyway box in excellent condition - although I don't have any of the Spherewalker or other add-on cards you could collect for a while. I just have what came in the box.

My major issue is the Fortune deck is too small - as in there should be more cards (only 36 of them) and bigger than standard playing card size (i.e. Tarot sized).

I agree with you on the physical size of the Fortune Deck cards. They really should have been oversized. I don't think they needed more of them though. I think 36 allowed for enough permutations of the four elements.

My prefered mode of play is to have players make a pyramid of cards out in front of them, and have them turn them over when they choose to add a bit of fortune to the reading. Although they can be a bit open to interpretation, they'll either be up or down meaning the good or bad fortune is clear.
I like that.

My other issue is that there really wasn't much setting in the game, until Greg Stolze wrote Spherewalker some years later.
It's possible that this game never could have taken off in the gaming mindset of the late '90s, but it would have had a much better chance if the Spherewalker Sourcebook had been in that box.

Realistically, it was always doomed. It was a game aimed at a niche audience, with high production values and a huge production run. It was also made by a company which had so much success that even if it had picked up a moderate cult following, they still would have considered it a failure and killed it. We'd seen that with their very brief ownership of Ars Magica, a game that did actually have a decent niche audience by RPG standards. WotC wasn't interested in that kind of small potatoes action though, so they quickly unloaded it to Atlas.

At least Stolze didn't have to wait too much longer before Unknown Armies and City of Lies came out and served as his breakout hits, making him a name-brand game designer.
 
It was a hard choice for me. The system sounds kinda interesting, though it's a class system, which is a strike against it:smile:.
Then again, I've decided probably the next three campaigns I run, and this one is scheduled to last until the beginning of next year at least...
Zak's art isn't to my taste, which is all that matters for art. Then again, I treat most art in RPG books as "wasted space" (especially in the rules chapters). So that wasn't the decisive factor.
His personality is something I'm just not going to comment (I don't care about the "political" implications of him being an abrasive...well, something). Then again, I've bought books from far worse people.
In the end, it's what I can do with the system (and other systems aren't doing already) that matters. The setting is an important part of it, even if it's just an implied setting.
And this is where I ultimately decided not to back:wink:. Ultimately, I see nothing that I can't do with other systems.
Though I'm going to pitch it to one of my players who's into Tarot, and see whether she'd want to run it. But since I know why she started to avoid running, and it's got nothing to do with the systems we've got in store, that's unlikely. If I'm not inspired, I'm not inspired, and that's all there is to it:grin:!
 
Realistically, it was always doomed. It was a game aimed at a niche audience, with high production values and a huge production run.

Everway was doomed because of WotC's hubris. They tried to catch lightning twice. After revolutionizing the card game market they thought they could do the same with RPGs, with a game that did everything "against the grain": no dice, esoteric attributes and artwork, oversized box, oversized price tag...

But the nail in the coffin was that shop owners hated the game. It didn't fit their fixtures, and worse: WotC tied their order of the then-newest Magic the Gathering expansion to their order of Everway boxes. To be able to receive the hottest product of its day in a meaningful quantity they had to order another expensive product they didn't want.

They (we, as I was one of them) grumbled and ate that extra cost, and when it became clear that Everway was never going to be the smash hit WotC hoped for the thing went into the discount bin.
Especially when WotC killed the game mere weeks after its release...
 
In the case of Wizards of the Coast, you have to remember that they weren't quite the corporate juggernaut in the 1990s that they became later, when Hasbro bought them out. They were a young turk company in the early 1990s with one mega-hit (Magic: The Gathering) which then gave them a load of purchasing power. So they made a few mistakes along the way - buying games like SLA Industries and Ars Magica (just because they were fans, it seems), and developing Everway.

Once they got to grips with a business plan - buying D&D - that's when they dropped everything else.
 
For those, like me, who have no interest in giving money to Zachary Smith, I would suggest buying Silent Legions, Kevin Crawford's take on modern horror or even Nightbane from C. J. Carella.

And if you went inspiring pictures from an alternative artist, I would suggest Olivier Ledroit : https://www.google.fr/search?q=oliv...wrPcAhXpIsAKHdAHCeUQ_AUICigB&biw=1920&bih=974

Hello Yann!

And I'm seconding the recommendation. Like everything Kevin Crawford, you don't even have to run it to get your money's worth.
 
Hello Butcher ! Lon,g time no seeing you !

Just a word of cautious for the people who want to buy Silent Legions : it came from a time when Kevin Crawford was rather extra-cautious in his approach in KS and the production values of SL reflects this. The illustrations are rather simple and kinda cheap. But the book itself has all the hallmarks of Crawford's productions : simple and highly functional rules, lots and lots of random tables.

It is no brainer for me to favor SL over whatever stuff Smith wants to sell.
 
I've read that page but still not feeling it. How is the game basic playloop like? Does it work like a investigation as in CoC? Do players have demonic powers too? Is superheroic/supernatural action expected? Are they competing for status inside some organization? Is this Unknown Armies, now with demons or something? :worried:
 
I've read that page but still not feeling it. How is the game basic playloop like? Does it work like a investigation as in CoC? Do players have demonic powers too? Is superheroic/supernatural action expected? Are they competing for status inside some organization? Is this Unknown Armies, now with demons or something? :worried:

Zak’s stuff often strikes me as too baroque, too convoluted, too in love with itself. I appreciate the effort and technique that goes in the presentation but it ultimately works against the book’s utility at the game table.

(Let it not be said I’m singling him out; I have similar issues with the DCC core rulebook.)

Contrast with the crisp visual economy of something by Autarch, Sine Nomine or my more recent OSR crush, Hydra Collective.
 
I have a lot of Zak S. stuff. Presentation is always good to great, or at least interesting. Not too hot on his art style, but for some of his products, it evokes the right feel.
However, I've come to the realisation that his books never really wow me content-wise for all the praise they get. Maybe apart from Death Frost Doom, though that's a rework.
 
I have a lot of Zak S. stuff. Presentation is always good to great, or at least interesting. Not too hot on his art style, but for some of his products, it evokes the right feel.
However, I've come to the realisation that his books never really wow me content-wise for all the praise they get. Maybe apart from Death Frost Doom, though that's a rework.
Yeah, I also like the feel that his stuff evokes. Vornheim, Red & Pleasant Land, Maze of the Blue Medusa, etc. are settings and/or accessories that I find pretty cool. But neither presents a new game or rules from scratch. If this was PC gaming I'd say he is a good modder, but not necessarily a good game(play) designer.

Who knows, maybe he surprises me this time.
 
No, that was his friend. Who uses his computer. At his house. And talks like him. And is into the same hobbies. And has the same grudges. And likes defending Zak S online. And hasn't logged into Reddit since all this became public.

Actualy, the impersonation involved Shannon Applecline, co-owner of Sotos tech, the owner of RPGnet, from which Smith was banned since 2013, with Applecline's consent. And RPGnet is in buisiness relationship with Evil Hat, which is owned by Fred Hicks (amongst), who also has an antagonistic relationship with Smith. So, he is totally compromised in this case ...
 
Actualy, the impersonation involved Shannon Applecline, co-owner of Sotos tech, the owner of RPGnet, from which Smith was banned since 2013, with Applecline's consent. And RPGnet is in buisiness relationship with Evil Hat, which is owned by Fred Hicks (amongst), who also has an antagonistic relationship with Smith. So, he is totally compromised in this case ...

Ladybird was being ironic.
 
Sure, I got that. But the facts are not Smith impersonating a RPGnet moderator but Smith impersonating the co-owner of RPGnet, whose name is internet famous.
 
Ah, I see so you were responding to Justin Alexander Justin Alexander then.

I was actually responsding to the both of them. But it is not that important. If people enjoy Smith's works and want to buy it, I have no issue with them. I personaly think he is not longer entitled to my money but it is just my opinion.
 
I was actually responsding to the both of them. But it is not that important. If people enjoy Smith's works and want to buy it, I have no issue with them. I personaly think he is not longer entitled to my money but it is just my opinion.

No one's EVER entitled to your money. I'm a massive Savage Worlds fan, but I still skip Pinnacle Kickstarters when it's stuff that doesn't interest me (like Last Parsec, since I'm not a big sci-fi fan).
 
No one's EVER entitled to your money. I'm a massive Savage Worlds fan, but I still skip Pinnacle Kickstarters when it's stuff that doesn't interest me (like Last Parsec, since I'm not a big sci-fi fan).

You are right, I did not write my sentiments about this properly. I mean, I have support him in the post by buying his stuff and even defend him but given his current behaviour and the fact that both Frostbitten & Mutilated and Demon City do not interested me, I am no longer willing to support him in any capacity.
 
That's his... acting... name.
His "acting" name. Sorry, I couldn't resist making that joke.
Anyway, his games look cool, this setting is right up my alley and some of his game advice and vision on how to run it make perfect sense to me. I don't know the guy, but looking at him and the people he hangs out with it seems like they are all auditioning for Avenged Sevenfold or being extras in a Marilyn Manson video. But who cares anyway?
 
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