Hello. C J here. I’m finally done the core rules of Quantum. Dear All, that took a while. That’s the last thing on my list of heavy lifting game design projects, probably forever. It’s an all in one tabletop RPG in a card game that generates its own plot line using card draws. If that sounds hard to make, well, it was. My main job going forward is to add to it. I might also write some longer format setting sourcebooks for fun now that I have the time to write for fun again.
I’ve gotten bored of Ascala the setting. I think I’ve mentioned that here before. Then, I realized as I was getting ready for bed last night, I haven’t really. I’ve gotten bored of the card game version of Ascala. Of the dry technical language that setting is presented in. My original vision for the city and nation is still intact. In fact I haven’t had the chance to use it. It’s supposed to be a fusion of the industrial and technological elements of modern day life with the glamour and mysticism of conventional magic and fantasy storytelling. This is an idea that I can’t burn out no matter how much I do with it.
What happens if a team of urban witches meet in a warehouse and fill the room with ritual magic? What happens when the police force of a city deal mostly with rouge necromancers raising the souls of the dead from their graves and arming them modern day firearms? What happens when dragons, Fair Folk, vampires, werewolves and wizards are all conforming citizens of a peaceful democratic nation? Well, I don’t know. Maybe I should figure these things out.
Ascala the city is beautiful but it’s a stark, industrial beauty. Ascala is everything modern day and everything fantasy all being perfectly compatible with each other. It’s limitless by design, and with five million people in it it’s never running out of room for more stories. Now that I have Quantum done I have a medium to share these stories more reliably. There is magic in the modern day world and in the busy lives we all lead if only we take the time to look for it.
I’ve also been thinking about what I can do with Quantum in a mechanical sense. The game is designed to have all of real life spirituality and also science and storytelling in it as game options or character traits. This is why it took so long to make. It’s nearing Spring here where I live. The seasons have always had mysteries and magic of their own. Maybe I could do a seasonal magic themed card deck. How would I describe Spring in the game’s mechanics or character traits system? Do we need spells of damp earth, meltwater and warm sun in a blue sky? That sounds great. Time for actual fun.
C J Mcpherson
Hello. C J here. I've got four new recipes for everyone here. We have everything from Chinese chicken to homemade hot apple cider. Enjoy. The Emperor’s Potatoes Here we have the first food item I ever finished designing for Food of the World – Carthia. I tried three combinations of traditional Asian ingredients and pasta under the assumption that I was doing Italian-Chinese food for the book. I could not for the life of me get any of them to be exciting. They were fine. I don’t eat fine. I got bored of the pasta thing and then thought to myself, ‘what happens if I swap the pasta for another starch? What about a potato?’ It worked. Really well. It worked so well I named them The Emperor’s Potatoes. They’re mashed potatoes and I left the skins on because I like vitamins and then that got me thinking about the traditional medicinal food of Ancient China, ginger. Could I put ginger in a potato dish and have it work? Yes. I can. That surprised me. Be warned, these are almost dangerousl...
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