The Oneironaut Launches! Downtime in Zyan is back in print!

There are two pieces of big news I want to shared with you. The first is that I have launched the first installment of my new physical zine for my Patreon titled The Oneironaut. It is a zine that shares my second thoughts, items from the cutting room floor, previews of things that are ready, but won’t printed for a long time in Through Ultan’s Door. Before I say more, just look at this beautiful cover, with header and design from Lester B. Portley and the stunning illustration by longtime zine collaborator Huargo.

It follows the journeys of the titular Oneironaut, a Phantamorian from the dreamlands of the dreamlands. Separated from his crew and forced by the pull of the strange currents of Oneric Sea through the splendors and horrors of Zyan. The first issue revisits hrough Ultan’s Door 1. In addition to introducing the story of the Oneironaut, it provides more lore on the strange denizens of the Inquisitor’s Theater, more materials for more dynamic faction play there, and also gives you a glimpse of some of the sources of inspiration in my design.

Some of the material will ultimately be republished in reivisions of the zines or in an integrated final hardcover version of Zyan. But it will never be reprinted in this form.. I printed only 200 copies. Half are already gone. When the remainder are claimed, they are gone forever and will never be reprinted. Until then, While copies remain, I will gladly mail one to any Patron who supports at the High Priest of MĀNA YOOD-SUSHĀĪ level.

Future issues will contain more new material. The second issue of The Oneironaut will introduce a secret extra-planar mini-dungeon accessible through The Catacombs of the Fleischguild (among other places) titled, “The True Temple of Vulgatis”. I can assure you that it is wild. But that’s not all. My Patreon has also released 150 pages of never before published draft material for future issues of Through Ultan’s Door. I’ve been sharing hexes from The White Jungle, new dungeons, a whole new base camp for exploration in the dreamlands, and much more. Backers have already seen the full drafts for issues 4 & 5, as well as parts of issues 6 & 7. Honestly, if you’re into my zines, you should back for this reason alone. The Patreon has been an incredible help, since it has both given me deadlines to meet, and funds to pay for art and layout. After years of being stalled, it has allowed me to move forward with relentless purpose. I hope you will join! You can do so here.

The second piece of big news is that I have reprinted, at long last, Downtime in Zyan, which I rapidly sold out of after fulfiling the Kickstarter. Downtime in Zyan presents my elegant and expansive system of downtime activities, the actions that players take in the space between adventures. It supercharges sandbox play, getting the players invested in the setting from the end of their very first adventure. From cultivating a relationship to building an institution, from crafting a splendid item to martial training, the system has it all! You can, at long last, order a copy here. I’m selling to US customers only. But I’m happy to restock any international resellers, provided you can handle the tariffs and any VAT and EU compliance issues for me. Just email me at throughultansdoorATgmailDOTcom.

The Future of Through Ultan's Door

 

Two Problems

Although I haven’t exactly been quiet for the last few years—I’ve created a supplement about downtime and a launched a first season of a podcast on megadungeons—I have been stuck on releasing new issues of Through Ultan’s Door. I’ve been flummoxed by two things.

The first was that my Zyan material is a tightly integrated weird setting designed at each step to pull players deeper and deeper into exploration. This makes presenting material in an episodic fashion a nightmarish question of information design. The ideal solution to this problem would be to release single giant version of the setting in book format. Then you could get it all at once, and have everything you need to run an entire 5+ year campaign in Zyan.

But the issue is that I don’t have the time to do that. It would take even longer than it took for BREAK!! to come out. Working in smaller chunks is how I make progress. The small scale of the zine format is a huge stimulus to my productivity. It gives me a timetable, forces me to think about how to present information, and gets me writing. Just as importantly, the zines also fund my purchase of art, editing, and layout. But I’ve faced a lot of decision paralysis, and flip-flopping, about what to tackle first and how to carve up the material.

The second issue is that fulfillment for the Kickstarter for Through Ultan’s Door 3 burned me badly. It ate up a larger portion of my life than I can afford to give again. Since I’m not a full time game designer, my other commitments put uncomfortable limits on how much time I can afford to devote to my hobbies or (when money is involved) “side gigs” like rpg publications, even where these are labors of love that bring me joy. This didn’t stop me from running a Kickstarter for, and printing and fulfilling Downtime in Zyan. But that was an intentionally scaled back project: a single zine, possible to ship with minimal packing in a single rigid mailer. The thought of publishing and fulfilling multiple zines, along with reprints of past issues, has been paralyzing.

So I’ve been trying to figure out how to surmount these problems so that I can, at last, develop and share my Zyan material with you.

Two Solutions

Solution 1: Move to Patreon

I’ve considered two possibilities, neither ideal. I’m genuinely torn between them. If I moved to a Patreon format, this could motivate me to release things in bite-sized pieces in the same way that zines do. In fact, since less work would be required for each release, it might work a lot better than zines for this. I think I could release a nice chunk of Zyan material once a month. Since no physical printing is involved, it would allow me to set aside logistics until we arrive at the final printing of the actual project.

The model here would be Luka Rejec’s Ultraviolet Grasslands, or Miranda Elkin’s Nightwick Abbey. They both have used Patreon to good effect, supporting longterm, ambitious dream projects. The support here would be both financial and social in terms of building an enthusiastic base of supporters who helped to take the actual physical launches over the top. The modern social media landscape is very alienating and fragmented, and I do worry a lot about reaching people and drumming up support for my projects. While not solving all problems, Patreon would give me a leg up.

I could use Patreon money to commission editing, art, and layout for the posts I release as I go along. So people would get real value, and I would make real progress towards what I hope would be a jaw dropping final physical release. I could involve a graphic designer for layout, and some artists, on a more regular basis and just get working. As you’ll see below, I probably already have almost a year’s worth of material that I could get into shape to share in (say) bi-monthly posts starting as soon as next month.

Solution 2: Continue with Printed Zines in Batches

One problem with Patreon is that people have connected with Through Ultan’s Door as a physical object. I’ve worked really hard to fuse the physical quality of the zines and the luxurious imaginative content into a single unique package. What buzz they have created has, I think it would be fair to say, been in no small part because of their quality as embodied artifacts. My suspicion is that there are a not insignificant number of people who would buy physical zines, but who would be disappointed by the digital format of a Patreon. I would potentially lose momentum by moving into a purely digital format on an entirely new platform. Although it involves a lot more work, and the zines cost so much more to print than other people’s zines, I still suspect I could better financially support the project, and build buzz, by just getting on with printing more zines.

If I stay the course with physical zines, to overcome the first problem, I will need to release them in batches. Where a zine needs more context to actually use, the idea would be to release multiple zines to provide that context, to the extent possible. My standard in general will be to give people enough to actually begin playing the new material. It won’t ever be perfect, since anything published will always point towards further unpublished material. But it will be enough so that each new release can be profitably used.

As for the problem with logistics, I will need to run Kickstarters, so as to know how many physical copies I should print and to raise the money for printing. I will also need to partner with a warehouse that can do Kickstarter fulfillment for me. This would free me from the most agonizing and unmanageable portion of the process: packaging and shipping the zines.

At one point Matt from Exalted Funeral offered their warehouse for this purpose, as has Andy Action, so I’m hopeful that one of those two might provide a solution. I’ll still be printing the zines locally, so I’ll also have to figure out how to package them securely and ship them by freight to the warehouse in question. They also have a lot of separate parts, including encounter cards and so on, so I’m a bit nervous about having a warehouse do it, as it would be an ungodly number of pulls for each order, unless I did some pre-packing. I’ve never worked on these kinds of logistical difficulties before! But it will be well worth it if I can outsource fulfillment. In truth, there’s no other way I can move forward with the project if it remains in physical form.

Given that physical zines are a formula that I know works for me if I could just solve the logistics problem, I lean in this direction, although the Patreon option is veeerrrrryy tempting.

The State of the Zine

There is so much in development, it’s almost comical.

Republishing Downtime in Zyan

Since Downtime in Zyan is out of print, I have plans to republish it, hopefully by the end of July. I should be able to put it back up for sale in my store by late August. So that’s good news!

New Issues of Through Ultan’s Door

Temptations to switch to a Patreon model aside, I have been working productively on the zines this summer. I’ve gotten to a point where I’m inching up on four or five zines worth of content. Here’s a quick rundown of what’s in the hopper.

Through Ultan’s Door 4

This issue of Through Ultan’s Door takes you to the threshold of the White Jungle, presenting the hanging merchants, a launching pad for exploration of the White Jungle that lies just beyond the harbor that ends issue 3. It’s a jostling set up, full of Vancian shenanigans, with writeups of four backbiting merchants from the city of Zyan, and a few other notable NPCs, their wares, rumors for adventure in the White Jungle, possible otherworldly patrons who might sponsor jungle exploration, and more. It also shows how I would use the downtime system presented in Downtime in Zyan to build what I call a “basecamp”, a way station or home away from home, where one can engage in downtime activities on a smaller scale. It also shows one way to integrate that system with a table of campaign events and rising threats that keep the pressure cooking, while bringing a medley of strange visitors to the merchants, along with many opportunities for downtime and adventure. In some ways, although the issue is constrained to a single location, it’s also the most ambitious of Zyan materials I’ve penned to date.

The rough draft of this issue is 90% done. So it’s pretty close!

Through Ultan’s Door 5

This issue presents rules for exploring the dreamlike environment of the White Jungle that hangs from the bottom of the flying island on which Zyan sits. The White Jungle consists of four stacked hex maps that allow movement in 8 directions (the normal 6 hex faces plus up and down between maps) in a giant wilderness exploration hexcrawl where falling is a constant danger. This issue also presents the first level of the white jungle, the Brambles, a nighted level filled with hanging mossy isles, bramble thickets with wilted albino roses, and many strange locales. This issue includes a massive d100 encounter table for this level of the jungle, a hex map, and a hex key with entries for each of 51 numbered hexes for this level.

The rough draft of this issue is 50% done. Right now I’m working on expanding encounter tables and further developing the hex key, one bloody hex or encounter entry at a time. It’s grueling, but I’m making progress! (This is what I’m currently working on.)

Through Ultan’s Door 6

This issue presents three adventure locations from The Brambles in greater detail: The Cenotaph of Shirishanu, The Tower of the Golden Spore, and The Cages of the Empty Witch. Think of them as three 1- or 2-shot location-based adventures that can be found on the hexmap from issue 5. They integrate deeply with factions from the level, intimate significant lore for the setting, and give characters a crack at getting some wild magical objects with campaign altering significance. Having run each of them now several times, in several different dreamlands campaign, I think they’re a lot of fun.

The rough draft of this issue is 80% done. The work that remains here is much less grindy than on Issue 5, since it mainly involves polishing, expanding, and perfecting already existing material.

Through Ultan’s Door 7

This issue presents the second level of White Jungle: The Depths. The Depths are the beating heart of this vertical jungle. They present a fever dream of rich beautiful and dangerous flora and roaring fauna. It also hosts some of the farthest out hex locations imaginable, including Lake Yannu that hangs like a teardrop in the jungle; a holy dungeon in the body of a giant snake; and the wreck of a ship that once traveled the Oeneiric Seas and is now leaking the Id of its former crew into a corrupted portion of the jungle. This issue also introduces some otherworldly factions that have only been hinted at in earlier issues, like the Phantamorians, beings from the dreamlands of the dreamlands, and the spirits of the air, demons of the Endless Azure Sea.

The rough draft of this issue is 50% done. This is the level that has seen the most play in my campaigns, so it needs less grindy filling in than issue 5, as more hexes and encounters already exist. But I also haven’t polished it at all yet, so there’s a lot of work to be done here.

Pale Echoes

Finally, when I published Through Ultan’s Door 3, I promised to pull together a new line of zines called Pale Echoes that would explore different campaign premises, set in different versions of the waking world.

Pale Echoes 1

Pale Echoes 1 presents an alternate campaign frame, called “Elspeth’s Letter”, where the players travel to the dreamlands through the memories of a dead adventurer, the titular Elspeth. The party inherits her estate along with a host of problems. I have been play-testing this campaign frame with a full campaign for the last 3 years, and it is working just splendidly. This issue showcases a tight integration of local setting in dreary waking world, downtime actions, campaign events, and a campaign calendar, where most of the tension comes not so much from the waking world as from Elspeth’s past itself. It’s a premise designed to work less with an open table and more with a dedicated stable party of 4-6 characters.

This is 75% done. I’m still trying to crack the best version of campaign events, which are a devil to design with enough detail to be interesting, while also being flexible enough to support half a decade of play. I’m getting there, but there’s still some distance to cover.

Pale Echoes 2

Pale Echoes 2 presents in much greater detail the campaign frame that I originally employed, called “Ultan’s Door”, where the adventurer’s travel to the dreamlands through a door that has recently opened. In this issue I present the waking world setting of which Through Ultan’s Door 1 provides only the slightest glimpse. In this issue, expect writeups of the fickle Chatelaine of Storms, her seven colorful wizard apprentices, the state sanctioned religion of sleep and dreams, and the quaint customs of this ancient city. This setting is dominated by the fact that this is not the first such door to open, and that the last time it opened it brought the Chatelaine and prevailing religious order to power. This premise can be run either with a dedicated stable party, or with an open table. Most of the pressure comes from the fact that the campaign begins with a very unstable situation that threatens the involvement of many possible rival adventuring parties, and eventually the Chatelaine herself. The integration of downtime actions and campaign events is tied to the pressures that arise from this unstable starting situation.

This is 20% done, so quite unfinished. While I look forward to working on this, it’s definitely been on the backburner.

Thoughts?

So that’s my exhaustive update on everything in development. I would love to hear your thoughts on this situation. While I don’t make decisions by consulting polls, I do value your opinions. What are you most excited about seeing published form? How do you feel about Patreon vs. physical zines? If you are a publisher how have you navigated fulfillment headaches?

Further Thoughts on Downtime and the Campaign Arc

 

Art by Evlyn Moreau

I have been using my downtime system, published in Downtime in Zyan and originally presented across this blog here, for my face to face dreamlands campaign. This is a game with a stable group of 4 players rather than a bigger open table game. Over this campaign and my previous one, which also have shrunk to a 4 or 5 person group of stable players at the higher levels, I've discovered a tendency that undermines the use of downtime over time. I think it's a tendency that arises in games where the initial default at low levels is short jaunts to perilous adventuring locations--getting into and out of a dungeon in one or two sessions. In that context downtime as I've designed it works very well. 

On my system, each character gets one downtime action between adventures from a large menu of freeform options. It involves a 2d6 roll with base and situational modifiers. Generally, there's a tracker with a certain number of steps to complete the project. A 7-9 is a mixed result that often requires one to adventure to make progress or eliminate an obstacle. A 10+ is a straightforward success. The general idea is that in a game relentlessly focused on cooperative play, this allows player characters to pursue their individual dreams and leave their mark on the campaign world. 

In online games I handled downtime actions in discord between sessions. This was fun, because you could prep and go deep with downtime, dropping tons of lore or colorful NPCs. But sometimes it was hard to corral people to do downtime between sessions, and I very often found myself failing to "do my DM homework", which sucked the air out of downtime. In face to face games I've found it works better to resolve downtime at the start of a session in about 30 minutes at the table without much prep on my part. 

Here's how I start that 30 minute period. I have a system of tables for campaign events, along with some clocks that get triggered by past player actions. So I start by telling them the campaign news to give them something to react to if they want to, which every once in a while includes a threat that needs to be dealt with in downtime or the opportunity to perform time-sensitive downtime actions. Then I remind each player of all the downtime actions they had going in the past. Without keeping notes about this and reminding them what they've been doing, I find that they leave a ton of loose threads and have trouble remembering what they had going. This really diminishes the significance of downtime. But with a little reminder of what they've been up to in the past this problem vanishes.

I then move around the table to have them declare downtime actions. I then begin resolving the actions. I find that I weave between different players as they resolve the actions, switching the spotlight at dramatic moments. They often advise one another or make creative contributions along the way, so people stay pretty engaged. This makes for a very dynamic 30 minutes that players look forward to as a reward between adventures. But the main point is that it doesn't involve very much homework for me at all. Sometimes I think for about 15 or 30 minutes before the game about it, but sometimes I don't think about it at all. Everyone understands that it's more freeform and improvisational than the sessions we're running, and I think they like that rhythm of the more structured adventures and the more improvisational downtime. 

The problem I've identified is that as the party rises in level, and gets invested in the campaign world, they start going on longer and longer adventures. What was once one or two sessions in the dungeon becomes six or seven sessions of hex crawling, or city crawling, or hopping between three different adventure locations to accomplish some multi-part mission. I could try to stop this but I wouldn't want to because it feels organic and allows us to play a deeper game driven by more ambitious player objectives. This means that downtime diminishes in significance to a nearly vanishing point since it happens so rarely. People feel disconnected from their projects, which feel impossible to finish anyway. Downtime decreases in importance precisely at the point where it should matter the most, when the player characters become increasingly invested in the campaign world, and ought to care the most about accomplishing self-invented projects. 

My new solution to this problem is to grant the party multiple downtime actions after a longer adventure. The thin rationale is that if an adventure takes 4 or more sessions to complete, then the characters need a longer break and may take an extra downtime action. (This is related to an earlier idea I had about using downtime to model a campaign hiatus, discussed here.) I've found this solves the problem. The difference between 1 and 2 downtime actions is noticeable in play. It allows each character to pursue two different dreams at once, or to suddenly make a lot of progress on one project. Each downtime feels like a big deal. Given that downtime is happening less often, I think it really helps to keep them invested in the downtime phase. When they've just come back from a six or seven session adventure, it also creates a lovely feeling that we're closing one chapter and opening another. In an anarchic game that is a player driven sandbox without narrative arcs or discrete planned chapters, this is a nice organic substitute. 

Downtime in Zyan: Pants or No Pants?

Downtime in Zyan, my new zine, has just launched on Kickstarter! The zine presents a system for downtime, the activities characters engage in between adventures. Brought to life by the whimsical and alluring art of Evlyn Moreau, the mole rats of Zyan will show you how to transform the neglected space between adventures into a site where player-driven schemes and dreams grow with delightful results.

Head over to the campaign and you'll see some exciting stretch goals. Half of the stretch goals for this project are about sharing the profits with my dream team. It’s a way of recognizing Evlyn for her fantastic art that has brightened our collective existence for the better part of a decade in this corner of indie rpgs, and Lester for his visionary graphic design and layout, which has given Through Ultan’s Door its distinctive (and award-winning) look. Both members of the dream team also played in my original dreamlands campaign, Evlyn as her character Satareh who explored the hanging Summer Palace in the bright groves of the inverted White Jungle, and Lester as the lizard man gladiator Sleestakarus whose dreamland picaresques include snatching victory from the jaws of defeat in the Gauntlet of the Panther Priests. It means the world to me to be working with them both on this project. Along the way there are also Kickstarter exclusive stretch goals that provide a handy reference to the system of downtime activities as well as a pamphlet with special rules for carousing in Zyan!

This Kickstarter presents two versions of Downtime in Zyan. The first is the modest edition. In keeping with the human preference for pants, this version has added bottom coverings to the illustrations of mole rats that otherwise would appear naked to human eyes. The cover illustrated above is drawn from the modest edition of Downtime in Zyan. But this Kickstarter also presents an option to purchase a Kickstarter exclusive bold edition of Downtime in Zyan that presents the mole rats as they actually dress and prefer to be seen: without pants. I encourage you to think of your pledge for the zine as a vote between these two editions. Choose sides in this eternal struggle and back this Kickstarter by clicking here!

Stay tuned, I'll have more exciting news on blog soon about Through Ultan's Door 4. Until then, I'll see you in slumberland.