Tag: game

[Monsterball was our March patreon game. It has now been taken down but you will soon be able to get it on our itch store.]

Hey everyone!

This month’s game is a brutal fantasy monster version of football (or soccer for USicans), played as a journaling game. Monsterball creates a procedurally generated and very lightly tactical game of football, either against a fellow human or an NPC team. It is surprisingly gripping and you may find yourself blowing on your dice as your ratling striker nears the ideal position to score a goal.

Monsterball obviously pays tribute to a certain tabletop fantasy ball game, but it has taken on a life of its own and feels similar but different. I’ve incorporated ideas from American football, most especially the draft, which means your team will be a mishmash of players from a mix of fantasy races. As you play through matches you’ll have to retire players due to injury, while others will become invaluable star players.

It’s a good laugh and I hope you enjoy playing it. Let me know how you get on!

By the way, I’m just under 2 weeks off my last day at the office job. It’s been a very long wait. I’m very much looking forward to getting stuck into some more great designs and I hope to share some new stuff with you very soon.

Yours

Josh

Desperate measures was our January Patreon release. It will appear on our itch store soon.

Hey folks

Last year was a funny old year. This patreon has been a bit quiet as we struggle through the late stage of the pandemic. But as we move into 2023, we have big plans afoot for Black Armada and we’re really looking forward to sharing them with you very soon.

In the meantime, I am delighted to share with you a new mini-supplement for Last Fleet. Desperate Measures combines a quick-play scenario that I’ve written with convention play in mind – but which would be suitable for any situation where you want to jump into a tense situation and tell a complete story in one session. It comes with a pack of planets, ships and other bits that you can drop into your campaign.

Hope you enjoy them!

Josh

[Imposters was October’s Patreon game. It has now been taken down but you will be able to find it soon on the Black Armada itch store.]

A few months back, I was thinking about imposter syndrome and how many of us experience the feeling that we don’t really belong where we are, and that thought sparked a game. In Imposters, you really don’t belong: you’re secretly a robot, a ghost, a vampire or a time traveller. The world around you doesn’t make sense and constantly trips you up.

Imposters is about that experience of a world that isn’t made for you, the ways in which the human world doesn’t really make all that much sense, and the ways in which you can support each other through it. It has a vibe similar to What We Do In The Shadows, Being Human, Ghosts and (for those with long memories) Third Rock From The Sun. You can play it as a straight drama or with more of a sitcom feel, or perhaps blend the two together.

It’s a lovely little game, juxtaposing farce and pathos, and I hope you enjoy playing it.

[Not Your Witch was our August patreon release. It is now available on the Black Armada itch store.]

It is the middle of our second heatwave in the UK and even though I usually love the Summer, I find myself longing for the bite of Autumn.

I want mist, leaves that crunch because it is their time and not from drought, blackberry crumble and sharp cool sunshine.  

This is a solo journaling game to scratch that itch.  

In Not Your Witch you play a person who has recently moved from the city to a small cottage on the edge of a wood.  Why you moved is mostly up to you, save that this place was available, you can work remotely and the rent is incredibly cheap.  Some might say, suspiciously cheap.  

You are not here to be anyone’s Witch. You are here to do up a run down cottage, live in peace and quiet and maybe save a little money.

Unfortunately the universe has other ideas.  Whether it is the familiar who bothers you daily, the locals bringing you both gifts and minor problems or the creature you end up trapping in the;  it is pretty clear this place needs a Witch and it has made its choice.

Go on a solo journaling adventure to discover how you are (despite your best intentions) someone’s Witch.

You will need writing materials and a D6 to play this game.

Fists Of Fury was our June game. It will be published soon on our itch store.

This game has been a gleam in my eye ever since I watched Cobra Kai and got totally hooked on it. I wanted a game that promised the same focus on martial arts and teen drama, with mechanics that drive explosive emotions and correspondingly explosive actions. As it happens I’ve recently been doing quite a bit of martial arts myself, which made it feel even more relevant (though I promise my real life exploits are nothing like Cobra Kai).

Fists of Fury is the result. It’s mechanically inspired by the gameplay I encountered in Apocalypse Keys – moves that produce trouble when you roll too low, but also when you roll too high. The game focuses on ratcheting up your characters’ Feels, which in turn ratchet up the bonuses you get to each roll. Your out-of-control Feels push you first towards success, then past success into disaster.

A thing I love about this game is, you get to decide for yourself when your character’s emotions are boiling over. Like a tempting cookie jar that you always have the option to steal from, you can boost your Feels almost any time you like – but you may come to regret it as they take on a life of their own.

Anyway, if you like the sound of out of control teenage martial artists alternately kissing and punching each other, you need to give this game a try.

Josh

Stealing your Heart was March’s patreon release. It will soon be available on our itch store.

Dearest hearts,

This month’s new game is Stealing your heart, a regency romance heist game for two players. In this game you play young people courting in the age of Jane Eyre and Bridgerton – but one of you is a scoundrel secretly planning to win the other’s heart for the sole purpose of robbing them blind! Scandalous.

SYH uses a trick-taking mechanic to guide you through the ups and downs of your romance. By the end we’ll find out who has fallen for whom, and whether the scoundrel can truly bring themselves to flee into the night with their sweetheart’s worldly possessions. Perhaps the two will marry.

It works equally well as a parlour game with a light improvised story overlaid on the cards, in which mode it can be played in an hour, or as a more in-depth romance played over several hours with the cards guiding the flow of the story.

Yours with deepest affection,

Sir Joshua Fox

Unsolved was the Black Armada Patreon game for January 2022. It will be published on the Black Armada Itch store soon.

Welcome to 2022 and our first Patreon game of the year.

This is Unsolved, a semi-solo journaling game about an unsolved mystery.  

You play a tireless (perhaps obsessed) investigator gathering evidence and interviewing witnesses to uncover what happened, how and why.

The week before Dragonmeet in the UK I was struck down with a virus.  Not the famous one, just one of the old pre-2019 classic viruses.  I spent much of the week lying down, feeling sorry for myself and watching an endless diet of true crime mysteries (thanks Netflix!).  Having absorbed the maximum amount of tropes and conventions of the genre my mind (even in its weakened state) decided to write a game.

Don’t worry it has been properly checked and playtested (once I’d stopped taking the cold and flu medication).

First, roll on random tables to establish the initial facts of the mystery.

Next pester your friends to play the experts, suspects and witnesses.  Arrange a 20-30 minute chat with them to ask your questions and finally… leap to conclusions about what really happened.

The game is afoot!