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Just got my backers PDF and it's an amazing read. A really great setting and really interesting rules set.
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Jul 1, 2017 08:37
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If there was any shadow of doubt about the political position of the author of this game, it's now all but spelled out in the backstory. Now even the most willfully blind nerd isn't going to be able to deny it. I am frankly grateful that this game exists, even if I might end up never playing it. There is no denying that said backstory is a bit thick, though. The setting is great, don't get me wrong, and needs to be explained for the basic concept to work; but drat. 110+ pages of backstory is a tall order.
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Jul 1, 2017 11:02
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paradoxGentleman posted:If there was any shadow of doubt about the political position of the author of this game, it's now all but spelled out in the backstory. Now even the most willfully blind nerd isn't going to be able to deny it. I am frankly grateful that this game exists, even if I might end up never playing it. Bernie Would Have Stopped The Crash
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Jul 1, 2017 12:20
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I also added on a hardcover book. Really looking forward to getting it and running some games of this!
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Jul 1, 2017 12:23
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paradoxGentleman posted:If there was any shadow of doubt about the political position of the author of this game, it's now all but spelled out in the backstory. Now even the most willfully blind nerd isn't going to be able to deny it. I am frankly grateful that this game exists, even if I might end up never playing it. Caleb has never tried to hide his standing.
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Jul 1, 2017 15:37
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Kommando posted:Caleb has never tried to hide his standing. Oh, absoltutely not. But there is a certain type of nerd that has the tendency to twist every narrative to fit their world view. I was commenting that in this case, it's not going to happen.
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Jul 1, 2017 15:58
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I've only glanced through it but it's definitely a lot of content for the money. I think a "Takers Version" of the rulebook, which would just have the player rules and equipment, would be a good idea for a future supplement. Much like Delta Green, it's cool we get this massive tome but in terms of ease of play there should be an abridged version for player reference.
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Jul 1, 2017 16:31
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Having read the corebook I have already ideas on using the system on other settings. I will test it first with the canon setting but the possibilities are attractive. Warhammer: Crews of Sylvanians, Arabyans, Norscans, surviving and trading the spoil of Sylvania/Nehekhara/The Chaos Wastes to more secure people Fallout New Vegas; You have the New California Republic, the Legion, and New Vegas, between them is the Wasteland its secrets and its wonders A medieval fantasy setting where great sorcerers kings live on flying cities leaving the survivors of some unexpected catastrophe range the earth to bring them reagents and struggle to become their apprentices.
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Jul 3, 2017 00:10
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I will admit. I have no idea how Spawn and Cull work. That paragraph made no sense to me.
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Jul 3, 2017 03:58
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Kommando posted:I will admit. I have no idea how Spawn and Cull work. That paragraph made no sense to me. My best understanding is that it was a data mining program that would hunt other data miners and listen in on what they were doing. It would take that info and generate a number of possible outcomes, and then it would high jack the other programs to simulate those outcomes, and feed the best one back in so the information could be acted and built upon. Basically a despot data miner that would enslave all the other data miners and make them fight for its amusement, and the winner would be consumed. No telling what it's turned itself into after being left to run wild for 5+ years. The description of the Aloft servers gave me some ideas. They're made out of carbon nano--tubes and the ability to make them after the Crash is minimal. There's a thousand mountains of gold floating above everyone's head with no real way to grab them. If one of them were to ever come down it would be absolute Wacky Racers level insanity to try and grab it first. Gnat alone would probably pay through the nose just to find out why it decided to fall out of the sky.
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Jul 3, 2017 05:11
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Caleb actualy talks about part of how this turned into a massive tome in the latest RPPR: Game Designer's Workshop. The gist: Yea, a lot of this should probably have been broken off into a supplement or two, but the time/money cost of redoing the layouts for PDF/Printing at this late stage made that unworkable. Spawn and Cull boil down to applied phlebotnum to set up UBIQ being a data powerhouse. The heart of Spawn and Cull seems to be an automated hypothesis generating and testing system. Spawn: Gather meta-data, use this to hypothesize possible outcomes. Cull: Then spawn off a bunch of data-miners that attempt to confirm/deny these outcomes. The digital agents that made the most accurate predictions then get fed into the next cycle and are used to spawn the next generation of data-miners that generate hypotheses and the cycle continues. It still needs human intervention. About a week or so of everyone hiding in closets or dead instead of maintaining the system and it was about to 'self correct' itself to death. I'm thinking of throwing together an 'introductory adventure' to introduce the basic ideas of the system and setting. Start the players off in a large crowd at the beginning of the crash, before they even have character sheets: "You hear yelling at the other end of the square, then screaming. That's a lot of blood in the air. The crowd isn't thinking, just moving, trampling anyone slower than the herd." "You see a door, it leads to safety." Then have them roll the dice to make it without getting hurt. Immediate action and introduce the core Red/Black dice mechanic. Probably the damage rules at least once. So, yea. Basically a string of scenes that introduce the core concepts from "there are zombies and you roll these two dice" to "Your first job is to make it to the enclave we just generated" I'll get to work on it now. Would anyone be interested in play-testing?
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Jul 4, 2017 10:44
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Is there an ETA for when us filthy non-backers can get a copy in print yet?
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Jul 4, 2017 15:57
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not exactly, but you can preorder it now https://red-markets.backerkit.com/hosted_preorders
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Jul 4, 2017 19:09
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I probably should have used Australia Posts fright forwarder rather than backerkit. I'm also inspired by the Reclaimers podcast telemedicine exports to make a call centre like enclave that exports primarily digital expertise. Situated in silicon valley, inhabited by rapid prototype coders, expert web researchers, social media experts, SEOs, project managers/facilitators and call centre therapists The Hub offers phone in data services for people who don't have the time or on site personnel to spare. It's basically reference Central. Part Indian call centre, part matrix operator. Imports would be physical goods, power, food, water and stimulants. Lots of stimulants.
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Jul 13, 2017 01:53
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Oats Studio is great for aberrant ideas: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pKWB-MVJ4sQ A review of Red Markets! https://cannibalhalflinggaming.com/2017/07/12/level-one-wonk-red-markets/ Anyway, I ran a one shot that I plan to post sooner or later about a tech company HQ with multiple jobs available at it. It was overrun when the Crash hit, but 5 years later, enough casualties have wandered away that it is possible to get inside. I may have been inspired by a fruit-named company's new HQ...
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Jul 13, 2017 07:07
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Sweet stuff Ross. I've just started fallen flag.
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Jul 13, 2017 10:22
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I've started reading through the rulebook finally this week and holy poo poo the Bust optional rule for making budgets and not having a bank is loving brutal. I don't think I'll have players who can hack that kind of stress/bookeeping/predictions, but I can see how it would amp up tension. Maybe I'll introduce some bust rules as people get comfortable with the system. also the black math cult is metal as hell 
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Jul 19, 2017 04:49
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Fellis posted:I've started reading through the rulebook finally this week and holy poo poo the Bust optional rule for making budgets and not having a bank is loving brutal. I don't think I'll have players who can hack that kind of stress/bookeeping/predictions, but I can see how it would amp up tension. Maybe I'll introduce some bust rules as people get comfortable with the system. That they are, though the stress checks to simply move around the crowd of casualties instead of charging in and killing them can get brutal on you, or brutal on the rest of the party when you decide you really need to keep that humanity...
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Jul 19, 2017 19:12
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On the facebook group, Daniel Griffiths made an excellent GM Screen / player cheat sheet https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B1brRlxIN1flMzR1T2w5MGx5Qk0/view
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Jul 24, 2017 16:02
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Fellis posted:I've started reading through the rulebook finally this week and holy poo poo the Bust optional rule for making budgets and not having a bank is loving brutal. I don't think I'll have players who can hack that kind of stress/bookeeping/predictions, but I can see how it would amp up tension. Maybe I'll introduce some bust rules as people get comfortable with the system. I admit I wasn't entirely sure about how to interpret that rule. I get the sidebar explanation about "you waste that tax refund money on a fancy new TV before your car breaks down and 'steals' it". But what's the setting equivalent of this? How many things are there to "fritter your money away on" after a goddamn zombie apocalypse that won't at least stimulate the economy of the area you've living in as a result? It seems a bit difficult to fit in.
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Jul 24, 2017 17:15
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hyphz posted:I admit I wasn't entirely sure about how to interpret that rule. I get the sidebar explanation about "you waste that tax refund money on a fancy new TV before your car breaks down and 'steals' it". But what's the setting equivalent of this? How many things are there to "fritter your money away on" after a goddamn zombie apocalypse that won't at least stimulate the economy of the area you've living in as a result? It seems a bit difficult to fit in. I'd imagine the same things that the bounty spent on dependents in their vignettes represents: fancy ingredients, entertainment, etc. Or random things like paying somebody in the enclave to make you better-looking curtains for your quarters, or a real bath with all the hot water you want.
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Jul 24, 2017 20:40
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ThreeStep posted:I'd imagine the same things that the bounty spent on dependents in their vignettes represents: fancy ingredients, entertainment, etc. Or random things like paying somebody in the enclave to make you better-looking curtains for your quarters, or a real bath with all the hot water you want. Cool, but given that bounty is pretty valuable, how's that going to change things? You're adding potentially significant luxury demand to the enclave and people might compete for your entertainment or curtain buck, especially when it's the kind of buck that buys medicine. That's just what bothered me about the rule, in that kind of small economy, just because the purchases are useless to you doesn't mean they have no effect, and production of frivolous or luxury items is going to be very conditional. Edit: also if you underbudgeted medicine is your character buying new shoes while they have a broken leg? That seems... strange. hyphz fucked around with this message at 22:21 on Jul 24, 2017 |
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Jul 24, 2017 22:14
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hyphz posted:Cool, but given that bounty is pretty valuable, how's that going to change things? You're adding potentially significant luxury demand to the enclave and people might compete for your entertainment or curtain buck, especially when it's the kind of buck that buys medicine. That's just what bothered me about the rule, in that kind of small economy, just because the purchases are useless to you doesn't mean they have no effect, and production of frivolous or luxury items is going to be very conditional. Bounty's valuable, but its also in a weird place because its value is tied up in a way that isn't really applicable to most people in the Loss so the numbers are skewed a bit. Plus the economy isn't that small unless the enclave is really cut off from their neighbors or the Loss as a whole. There's drone deliveries to consider too; that bounty is leaving the enclave, maybe even making its way to the Recession. As for the example of a Taker with a broken leg or some other injury, the Bounty's probably wasted on things to distract them from the leg while they reassure themselves it's nothing serious, just a sprain or maybe (but probably not) a fracture that they'll get checked out for sure the next time they're paid. In the meantime, they're going to sit around with some ice on it and have a few drinks and watch something on Ubiq. Twibbit posted:On the facebook group, Daniel Griffiths made an excellent GM Screen / player cheat sheet This is pretty awesome and I'll have to print it off for the RM Pacific Northwest game I'll totally run one of these days.
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Jul 24, 2017 22:52
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hyphz posted:I admit I wasn't entirely sure about how to interpret that rule. I get the sidebar explanation about "you waste that tax refund money on a fancy new TV before your car breaks down and 'steals' it". But what's the setting equivalent of this? How many things are there to "fritter your money away on" after a goddamn zombie apocalypse that won't at least stimulate the economy of the area you've living in as a result? It seems a bit difficult to fit in. There's also the bit about spending it on humanity-recovering things like dependents or whatever but that recovery is balanced out by the guilt that you could have saved that money. Or just the traditional vices: gambling, drugs, and/or sex. I don't think its about your effect on the economy though, its just about how your taker is working towards their retirement goal and instead of diligently saving, is spending money on other stuff. Example: I have student loans to pay off, but instead I threw $70 at a kickstarter so I could roleplay making poor economic life decisions with my friends.
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Jul 25, 2017 04:02
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hyphz posted:I admit I wasn't entirely sure about how to interpret that rule. I get the sidebar explanation about "you waste that tax refund money on a fancy new TV before your car breaks down and 'steals' it". But what's the setting equivalent of this? How many things are there to "fritter your money away on" after a goddamn zombie apocalypse that won't at least stimulate the economy of the area you've living in as a result? It seems a bit difficult to fit in. It's not about whether what you bought still stimulates the economy, it's about spending the money on something else because you're a weak human being even if in the back of your mind you know you should save or re-prioritize.
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Jul 25, 2017 04:13
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Instead of upping a skill or putting money away I'm buying a tacticool sling and rail for my gun that doesn't have a functional benefit but it might if I find something later that I can stick on it. Hoping. And some Fanta, that guy found a soda machine still with cans in it. gently caress I've missed Fanta. Now I have the sugar jitters and some budget regret.
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Jul 25, 2017 04:19
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You didn't feed your dependents this week and your legs still hurt but you got a sweet jacket. It's the 'ooh shiny' poor impulse control that sees you living in the loss for years longer than you might if you had some budget rigor. -- Disinfectant. Does it even work on the Blight? It would still be useful for preventing dysentery and various other diseases caused by the poor living conditions of the post crash. But might not be essential for avoiding Blight, unlike rubber gloves.
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Jul 25, 2017 04:29
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Fellis posted:I don't think its about your effect on the economy though, its just about how your taker is working towards their retirement goal and instead of diligently saving, is spending money on other stuff. Example: I have student loans to pay off, but instead I threw $70 at a kickstarter so I could roleplay making poor economic life decisions with my friends. Sure, but how many kickstarters are there after the apocalypse? That's sort of what my question was, the amount of frivolous spending available is going to be limited. And someone who spends big on luxuries could well be rare enough to affect local priorities. That was all. As for the underbudgeting issue, I've totally seen people who'd do the "I got a tax refund but my car is broken right now, well, the tax refund was an unexpected bonus so spending it on a TV only leaves me 'where I was going to be anyway' but with a bonus TV" so I guess that makes sense..
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Jul 25, 2017 13:51
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At the bare minimum there's going to be guns, booze, drugs, and hookers available in the Loss, on top of more esoteric poo poo like paying someone to pedal-push the generator long enough for you to download the last pre-Crash season of The Simpsons and bingeing on that for a day or two.
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Jul 25, 2017 13:56
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hyphz posted:Sure, but how many kickstarters are there after the apocalypse? Tangent to the discussion, but there is totally a sidebar in the book about how kickstarters are still a thing in the world of red markets. They even have a mockup website page graphic with a "30 out of 70 Bounty Goal" progress meter Just looked it up, pg 437
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Jul 25, 2017 16:38
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Ways to spend bounty to heal humanity damage: 1. Better quality of food - real meat and fresh veggies, prepared by someone who knows how to cook! 2. Taking time off - literally not doing anything productive/working a side job/paying someone else to do basic chores or take care of dependents - babysitters ain't cheap in the Loss! 3. Religion: tithing to an actual church, or paying a Satanist to ritually enchant your weapons - whatever activates that part of the brain labeled 'faith' 4. Charity - feed others or take care of animals - whatever makes you feel good. 5. Aesthetic improvements to home and enclave - fresh paint on that shack's wall or pay an artist for a mural to commentate a dead comrade 6. Pay for everyone's drink and bask in the positive attention 7. Gambling! It's still a thing. Bet on latent v. zombie arena fights over ubiq or play poker with your neighbors. 8. Pay off other takers or fencemen to put down zombies near your side of the wall so you can get some sleep without hearing them clang against the barricades 24/7 9. Visit a nearby enclave for shopping or entertainment - gotta pay the caravan for a spot on the truck 10. Any of the above, but not for you, but your dependent. The smile on their face is worth it.
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Jul 26, 2017 07:44
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I like the idea of trying to simulate poor impulse control, but the No Budget No Buy rule really goes overboard, from 'poor impulse control' to 'actively brain damaged' I think I am exactly the type of person it's trying to simulate, and when I find myself with an unexpected boon, I have to fight to not waste it fast. But when I make a budget that says "X goes to the car payment, Y for enertainment" and I later find myself with "X+Y medical bill or die in the street", the budget falls to more pressing issues. Under NBNB: NOPE you keep that obviously broken ankle, but the car and netflix keep rolling, and if you really scored, then also enough beer to pay for treatment instead of treatment. -Short rant: Press X to Skip- I guess it gets on my nerves because it reminds me of the well-meaning but ignorant refrain of "why did you buy <Minor Luxury> instead of thing that will fix X" when the minor luxury was about 1/1000th the cost of the fix. Just one story. After about $500 in expenses for the month, I had $5 to my name, and then /really/ hosed up my knee. Probably needed surgery, but the hospital wanted a few thou just to figure out how bad it was. Hurt a lot, more if I'm standing. Didn't want to suffer standing in the kitchen to cook dinner so I grabbed a $1.07 double cheeseburger. Then what does this asshat say?  You can't afford medical care, but you can afford Burger King?NBNB Feels like that guy wrote a rule-set to describe how he thinks that situation actually worked.
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Jul 27, 2017 01:46
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Anyone got a game of this in yet? How's it run in practice?
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Aug 4, 2017 20:36
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hyphz posted:I admit I wasn't entirely sure about how to interpret that rule. I get the sidebar explanation about "you waste that tax refund money on a fancy new TV before your car breaks down and 'steals' it". But what's the setting equivalent of this? How many things are there to "fritter your money away on" after a goddamn zombie apocalypse that won't at least stimulate the economy of the area you've living in as a result? It seems a bit difficult to fit in.
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Aug 4, 2017 21:58
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tokenbrownguy posted:Anyone got a game of this in yet? How's it run in practice? it's pretty fun (working on a new campaign with Caleb. Running 2 groups - I GM one and he plays in it and vice versa. Gonna test out mass combat rules)
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Aug 5, 2017 05:59
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RedMarketsCaleb or others: what's the best way to submit copy-editing feedback? I'm reading through the book and have found 10-20 errors that should probably be corrected. They range from typos and punctuation errors to word choice ("concurrent" that should be "consecutive"). I'd love to help improve the book even in a tiny way.
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Aug 14, 2017 15:49
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Subjunctive posted:RedMarketsCaleb or others: what's the best way to submit copy-editing feedback? I'm reading through the book and have found 10-20 errors that should probably be corrected. They range from typos and punctuation errors to word choice ("concurrent" that should be "consecutive"). I'd love to help improve the book even in a tiny way. You can check this doc to see if they were already reported: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1FMANGc9-onkplyIC0nt4oShh_R1LRF8FaDcxf3N6ohk/edit?usp=sharing However, the book is already being printed. https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/159466030/red-markets/posts/1958132 You could ask on the Kickstarter about sending in errors for updating the PDF BTW the Kickstarter is the best place to get answers for this kind of question. Caleb checks it pretty often.
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Aug 14, 2017 18:48
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Great, thanks!
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Aug 14, 2017 19:07
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That spreadsheet being a bunch of images sure makes it hard to search and see if stuff was already reported!
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Aug 14, 2017 19:50
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Post your favorite gimmick rival taker teams to have your crew clown on/get undercut by! The two that were generated at my first session were: Fieri's Furies: a group of devotee's to the great American chef. All the takers sport frosted tips and awful flame decal bowler shirts. They drive around in a food truck and heavily compete with food-based scores/contracts where their "culinary knowledge" provides value to the clients. They also sell food out of their truck as a secondary source of income The Best Buds: a Detoxin-affiliated taker group that strives to cultivate the best weed in the Loss by exploring areas where legalization efforts were successful to find new strains of cannabis to breed with plants in their secret gardens. Mostly compete with scores and contracts related to farming, but also general scavaging as they can double dip on tending their weed farms out in the Loss while on the job. Secondary income is selling weed and seeds. My crew decided to set up in the Coors Brewery in Golden, CO which is a really interesting location geographically. I've never been there but two of my players have (one lived in the area). The nostalgia of Pre-Crash beer is a hot commodity! Can the enclave balance producing food to eat and ingredients for beer with their small supply of farmland? Fellis fucked around with this message at 21:31 on Aug 14, 2017 |
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Aug 14, 2017 21:27
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