Welcome back to the Crossblog! The official game development blog for the tabletop role playing game, Crossroads: The Yzyrra Chronicles. This blog post will be in the spirit of the last post where I am just going over changes and advancements happening with the game. ALL ABOUT COMPRESSION First off, I have completed the adjustment of text so that it now falls in line with the concept of a cap of Lv. 20. That meant pulling out certain elements of character creation that grew to Lv. 50, and some elements were outright cut because of their bogging down the math for rolls. They were elements that simply bloated the formulae for strains. This also involved adjusting prerequisites for each of the 81 abilities in the game, but it also meant that I had to re-read everything to make sure that I noted down any abilities that grew bonuses to a cap of Lv. 50. Some had tweaked wordings, while some abilities were just outright replaced with something that I felt was more utilitarian or just pla
Posts
From the ashes and into the flames.
Welcome back to the Crossblog! Please pardon our dust as we continue the construction. We are continuing to work towards the completion of this endeavor. As such I figured that I would do something a little different this time, and simply give a couple updates as to things that are happening with the game. LIKE A PHOENIX RISING FROM THE ASHES... First off, the playtest that I spoke of in Playtest Evolution #1 that was on indefinite hiatus is starting back up. We actually just completed the first session this past Sunday and it was a roleplay heavy session which was good for reintroducing everyone back into the fold after being off for 7 months. The session also started with them being walked through a level-up. This was significant because as the previous posts stated, their characters started as Lv. 4 characters that were sent out from the Adventuring Academy on their first assignment. For the sake of the playtest, I was going to grant them an accelerated TRIPLE level up to get t
Consequences of Heat & Recklessness
Welcome back to the Crossblog! I know in the last post that I said that we would be discussing the playable races in Crossroads, but before I post that I'd like to include some visual reference for all nine races to accompany the descriptions and evolution trait explanations. So I ask that you be patient while I work on those as well. Crossroads: The Yzyrra Chronicles has been a predominantly one-man operation, so I have to focus on the areas that will yield the biggest, most immediate gains, while conducting my playtests. As such... This time on the Crossblog, we will be taking a slight detour from our itinerary to have a look at a topic that was briefly touched upon back in Post #3: "What Do You Do?" Resource Management . We skimmed the surface of the concept of "Heat". We will be looking into this mechanic and what comes with this little floating number. WHAT IS HEAT? At its core, Heat is a moment to moment measure of how well your character is able to
Playtest Evolution #1
Welcome back to The Crossblog! Sorry for the delay but, there has been a few pretty drastic changes that are happening with Crossroads: The Yzyrra Chronicles. All of them are things that will make the game more exciting to play over the long haul. I will go into a couple of them in the next Crossblog. I've conducted several sessions of the playtest but due to life events, holidays, and such, I had to put the Third Act of the playtest on indefinite hiatus. I will be working to arrange another, more than likely to be played using Roll20 augmented with Discord. I also have a face-to-face playtest on the horizon with some really good friends I've played all kinds of games with over the span of 20+ years. I just wanted to keep those reading this aware of the state of things. Without further adieu, we move forward... Last time we took a look at the concept of Heat and how it works, allowing enhanced performance at the cost of increased stress. We also looked at how when a chara
Both Sides of the Same Coin
Welcome back to the Crossblog! Last time (before we lightly touched on how the game continues to adapt and evolve from a design standpoint) , we looked into how one advances through the Ability Tree for one's Path and how Elemental Affinities can impact said abilities. This time we will be looking into the dual-class nature of Crossroads. In the setting of Crossroads, there originally just two Paths: Martial Artists & Priests. During the Exodus of Ogari Sundura, people journeyed out in caravans but it was not easy. There were dangers still out and about. Martial Artists were needed to defend these caravans, and Priests were needed to heal the Martial Artists. These were simpler times. As time persisted and the outward expansion of Ogari Sundura continued, new Paths began to develop. The architects who built the civilizations upon Elementia's backdrops and the Priests who wanted to have a deeper understanding of how magic truly worked collaborated and developed the Mana-Ph
An Organic Evolution
Welcome back to the Crossblog! I have been quiet recently because I've been working hard on the game and designing the playtest adventure that I will be running soon. In preparation for this, I've been discussing things with my players, getting feedback, and answering their questions. It's been really exciting for me, because the more questions I am asked, the better I get at explaining things about it more efficiently and clearly. (At least in my head, I do.) As these conversations continue, sometimes I come across a stumbling block that I can't reason out and I have to go back and revise for the sake of keeping the game fun, exciting, and co-operative. One recent set of examples takes place in the edits of the second post on game mechanics . On that edited post... There are strikethroughs on ideas that are no longer part of the game. There are bold texts for new ideas that are implemented. There are also red italicized editor's notes that explain s
Recording One's Journey
Welcome back to the Crossblog! Last time we went over character resources at their disposal when combat breaks out. Today we will go over some elements of character advancement. Crossroads was intended to be designed in such a way that two max level characters of the same race and Crossroads could play completely different from each other. In the end, a character will have access to all 18 Path abilities granted by both of the Paths that they follow, but what makes them unique is their proficiency of each individual ability. This recipe of Path Ability Ranks is the character's "journey". Other games would call it a character's "build" or "spec". Whenever a character levels up, they among other things, receive 3 Path Points (PP). These Path Points are the currency used to acquire and improve Path Abilities. These Path Points can be spent or saved as the player chooses. Each Path has nine abilities arranged in a branching tree. Each tree ha