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  • Lore24 and Asteanic world

    Lore24 and Asteanic world

    With last year’s Dungeon23 │ City23 still unfinished (don’t worry, it will be finished) I thought that it would be a great idea to take part in Lore24. I won’t be posting every day or even every week, but from time to time, as I will be working naturally with the lore of Asteanic World – a thing I have to do anyway, as the lore chapter still needs to be translated for the Full SAKE Rulebook.

    And what’s a better place to start with the lore of the Asteanic World than its history. So here is the first part translated just now:

    The Short History of the Asteanic World

    Asteanic chronology divides the world’s history into four eras: the Mythic Age when Thefna (the Asteanic motherland) was home to the lost Azzurian civilization, the Age of Heroes when gods walked the earth and ancient heroes cleansed the world of all kinds of monsters, making it habitable, the Age of Kings when the first Asteanic kingdoms rose, marking the beginning of credible written sources, and the Age of Empires or the New Age, that marks the start of the Asteanic calendar.

    Mythic Age

    Little has survived from the Mythic Age, likely ending approximately 3000 to 4000 years ago. During this time, Thefna was home to the Azzurians, a completely extinct or assimilated people among the Asteans. The remnants of this era on Thefna include several ruined cities with massive necropolises and ziggurats. The largest among them are Urtari, Hatussa, and Mitanni, located away from the main civilization. Cities closer to civilization have largely been dismantled by the Asteans for their construction projects.

    From the Azzurians, Asteans inherited something of immense significance: their gods. Asteans consider the Azzurian gods as deities of natural forces and continue to revere (mainly fear) them to this day. Azzurians identified themselves as the children of the sun god Azzur and worshipped and feared their gods fervently.

    While some aspects of Azzurian writing have been deciphered, the absence of significant texts raises more questions than answers about their culture. Historians debate whether the Azzurians were aware of the Astral Projection magic school. What led to the demise of their culture and paved the way for the Asteans? Some signs suggest that the Azzurians harboured immense fear of otherworldly forces and death. Why, what was so different in that time?

    The old watercolour map of Thefna Archipelago, the new – fancy one, still doesn’t have all the names. But this one has been used for years in my games. The mentioned Azzurian cities: Urtari, Hatussa, and Mitanni, are findable here.

    Age of Heroes

    The Age of Heroes marks the beginning of Asteanic mythology. The era commences with the tale of how the Asteans descended from the Eternal Waters (pocket of the Otherworld) to the human world. All stories of the deeds of Asteanic gods fall into this era.

    The Age of Heroes also encompasses tales of various human heroes and the slaying of monsters and dangerous lesser gods.

    There are no written sources from the Age of Heroes because the Asteans had not yet developed writing. All stories have been preserved as oral traditions and are therefore more myths than subjects for serious historical inquiry.

    It is unclear whether the Azzurians lived alongside the Asteans during this time. Oral tradition is contradictory in this regard. In some tales, Asteanic heroes battle seemingly foreign nations, but these may also be kinfolk of the Asteans (Asteanic language only becomes standardized in the Age of Empires) or the Hattu peoples who lived in Northern Thefna. In other stories, the Asteans find Thefna seemingly empty, abandoned by its ancient inhabitants.

    In some ways, the Age of Heroes has the most stories, being the core of Asteanic mythology, but it has the least credible historical information. Modern Asteans view these stories as what they are – myths. Certainly, some tales may contain a grain of truth.

    Age of Kings

    The Age of Kings is considered to span seven to eight centuries before the Age of Empires. During this period, writing emerges, providing ample opportunities for a more detailed study of this era. However, there are challenges in precisely dating events because it is nearly impossible to reconcile the different calendars used at that time with the contemporary one.

    At different times, dozens of small kingdoms coexisted in Thefna.

    This era also marks the first attempt at empire building when Pyrdema, the sorceress queen of Niobe, compelled all the Southern Thefna kings to swear allegiance to her over her long life. Pyrdema’s grand empire lasted for several decades until her own grandchildren rebelled against her and dethroned her.


  • Field Report After the First Week of Publishing

    Field Report After the First Week of Publishing

    As I type this, the SAKE Basic Edition has been published in Itch.io and DriveThru RPG for exactly one week. This field report is aimed more at myself and other novice game designers. I aim to describe the behind-the-scenes aspects as accurately as possible, but there might be some limitations – for instance, I am unsure if I can take screenshots from the Publisher section of DriveThru RPG or Itch.io without violating any rules, so I refrain from doing so just in case.

    Everything preceding this: designing the game, testing it, and designing a beautiful book, is generally straightforward. However, the real work begins after this process is complete, and as a novice game designer, it feels like uncharted territory. Although I have designed and/or compiled two books in my lifetime, I have never had to sell them myself, and they have mostly been local publications.

    The Field Report (nr 1)

    The first thing to note is that the feeling is good. Now, it’s done. Before publishing, I had this sort of ambivalent feeling, thinking of myself as a TTRPG designer. Yes, I have been designing this for years – it should mean I am one, but nobody else than my groups had played or even seen it – so, am I really? Would anybody else believe that I am? Like, if you study jewellery and never finish or sell a piece of jewellery, then are you a jewellery artist? So, I am happy I pushed it out, even if I would have liked to have an accompanying adventure, which it doesn’t have yet.

    Numbers

    In the first week, SAKE has been downloaded 298 times: 95 times from DriveThru RPG and 203 times from Itch.io.

    On Itch.io, there are 1062 views on the page, so that’s 19.1% of page views.

    On DriveThru RPG, those 95 downloads came from 484 views, so that’s 19.6%. Surprisingly similar. I am not sure if I can know how people found their way there.

    Most of those downloads on Itch.io (135) happened in the first two days, and Itch.io shows me that most people came to the page from Reddit, followed by Itch.io’s own new and popular category, and after that is Facebook. Which is understandable because…

    Rant on Facebook

    I have always been able to share pictures and links to the webpage with the SAKE Facebook page, but this time it was impossible, like Facebook understood that those links are shop links and no-no, those things we don’t share freely – you have to buy advertisement or not share at all. Comparison: some random map picture – 2800 views (just checked, some even have 10K views), an important post about SAKE being published – 485 views. And the first several days it was under a hundred. Okay, no problem, I understand this; that is their business model, just was not prepared to discover it this way.

    Anyway, 300 downloads sound great (maybe, I am not sure, first time doing it), but it comes with a big ‘but’ – the game is PWYW (Pay What You Want), so the number of readers may be a lot lower. But that’s something that I can’t evaluate yet.

    About the PWYP model

    I have been told that I should ask money for the game as nothing else than this book is needed to play it, but I still decided to go with PWYP because at this moment I feel that getting the game to as many people as possible is more important than trying to earn a few hundred bucks. I am unknown and building some audience is crucial.

    Anyway, if things go the way I want, then this is just a start. On my computer, there are hundreds, if not thousands, of pages on the Asteanic World, monsters, adventures, etc., waiting to be translated, edited, and converted into books. So having the first one free is not the end of the world in an economic perspective.

    Having the Basic Edition published comes with a great benefit in those shops; everybody who downloads SAKE – I can send an email. I will not abuse it, sending some random news, but I will send an email when I publish something new or the Kickstarter opens.

    Speaking of Kickstarter, I haven’t advertised it much yet, but the link is in the PDFs and on the Itch.io page (it’s not allowed to put this sort of links into DriveThru RPG page), which has brought in 34 pre-subscribers. Again, I don’t know if those numbers are good or not – I have read that around 20% of pre-subscribers convert to backers. Is it true? Maybe? Anyway, I wouldn’t dare to open Kickstarter before there are around 500 people interested – it’s just a limit I have set for myself. Maybe after I find some more info, I may reconsider it one way or the other.

    Promotion

    Apart from Reddit, Facebook (where I invested 10 euros in an advertisement to test the system), Instagram, Mastodon, Twitter (where I proudly have just one follower!), and now Threads, I have posted the game ad on various TTRPG forums across the internet. However, the download numbers have slowed down – yesterday, Monday (18.12.2023), saw 6 downloads on Itch.io and only 1 on DriveThru RPG. So, it’s time to move to the next stage. Simply posting shop links doesn’t work anymore – which is logical, as nobody likes relentless advertisements.

    Near Future Plans

    I plan to reach out to a few reviewers and hope to see some reviews after some time. Right now, there are none, which is okay. I am unknown figure in the TTRPG world, and the game is a lengthy read (246 pages + all sheets), making it challenging to review right away.

    What I didn’t have at the time of release is a sample adventure. That is the next thing I plan to change. This will also allow me to test a few other things, like what happens when I put a price tag on it. Do 300 downloads become 3, or even 0? I would call it a great success if there were 50 downloads with a price in the first week. Let’s see.

    So, the plan is to use the material that I have been creating for the #dungeon23 project and convert part of it into a city district-themed dungeon, which is going pretty well.

    I drew a basic plan a few days ago:

    After gathering all existing materials, I am now reviewing them, adding some Hazards, Opportunities, and Secrets.

    The same file this morning:

    And the Crime Districts Dungeon Sheets as they are now:

    But the main work hours will go into the design of battlemaps because, while mostly done in Rhinoceros (CAD program that I use to draw), they still haven’t been converted into Illustrator.

    Right now, I have these:

    Other Plans

    I still don’t understand how to use all those Meta tools; the business part of the page is extremely confusing to me. It’s pretty hard to even say what exactly I don’t understand 😀 So, that’s the thing I have to study more. I plan to use Meta advertising, just have a 10 euro a week advertisement running basically all the time. But to make this effective, I just have to understand better what I am doing – and find a way to see the results better. Last week’s 10 euro advertisement brought 46 clicks into Itch.io, which altogether has 1062 clicks. But I have no idea how many of those 46 clicks became downloads. There probably is a way to know it.

    And I have to do something with the webpage, which hasn’t aged well in one year 😀

    Another thing I am thinking of is making the Basic Edition into Print on Demand in DriveThru RPG. It shouldn’t be too complicated – famous last words. Really, probably just add bleed, make a separate file for covers and … ??? The downloadable parts of the file are, anyway, a separate layer in the InDesign file; those will be gone with just one click. But even simple things take time, and that’s why it’s down here in the list of things to do.

    So, that’s the report and thoughts for now. I am happy for all sorts of advice! The next report will probably be after the release of the dungeon and seeing how that goes, so probably a month or something.

  • Religions in the Asteanic World

    Religions in the Asteanic World

    The Doctrine of Eternal Waters

    Also known as the Temple of the Divine Ocean or just Asteanic Polytheism.

    The Asteanic people believe they originated from the Eternal Waters, an ancient realm of water from which they were once expelled. All Asteanic individuals are descendants of the ancestral deities, Bellaris and Regulla, and most of their other major deities as well. The majority of Asteans also adhere to the concept of Reincarnation, believing that after death, they are reborn as water elves (a concept difficult to prove or disprove).

    What sets Asteanic religion apart is the absence of any gods associated with the creation of the world. Instead, they have adopted local creator deities when subjugating other lands. For instance, in Orenic lands, this has led to a syncretic religion known as the Cult of the 18 Gods, blending local creator deities with the Asteanic deities.

    As the Orenic belief is that after death, all individuals merge into the Collective Spirit from which they were originally born, this has stirred up strife within the Asteanic community. The conflict has even spread throughout the entire Asteanic world. This concept is equally challenging to prove.

    Old or Azurian deities complement the Thefna Asteanic pantheon, associated with natural forces and feared rather than worshipped. Azurian deities are regarded as demanding and hostile toward Asteans. The major Asteanic deities symbolize the Asteanic capacity to withstand those forces of nature.

    Asteanic belief is that all Otherworldly beings are aspects of some deity. Aspects linked to their major deities are sometimes invoked and venerated. Special temples house some of these aspects, serving as significant pilgrimage destinations. Asteans also venerate numerous local lesser deities with whom they interact closely.

    The official doctrine of the Temple of the Divine Ocean rejects the idea that anyone, even the aspects of the gods, can predict the future. Divination is considered heretical.

    But in general, their religion is quite tolerant of other faiths. They recognize other nations’ gods as local deities, and when they settle in foreign lands, they also worship them. Only the monotheistic beliefs are foreign and incomprehensible to them.

    While Asteans generally offer animals or material goods as sacrifices, it’s not unheard of for a human to be offered as a sacrifice before significant military campaigns or other extraordinary events. However, this tradition has almost died out, as many Astean people no longer tolerate this brutal tradition.

    Asteanic polytheism and the priesthood of the Temple of the Divine Ocean support a complex, multi-caste social hierarchy through traditions and myths.

    However, a deep rift exists in Asteanic culture when it comes to beliefs about the Concept of  Collective Spirit and the Concept of Reincarnation. Both concepts acknowledge the same gods, but the central dispute revolves around what happens to the soul after death, leading to significant differences in their approach to traditions and the world.

    Most Asteans believe in the reincarnation as water elves, a cornerstone of the Asteanic religion since its inception. Believers of the Concept of Reincarnation view themselves as superior to other nations, as only an Asteanic person can be reborn as a water elf when a proper waterfuneral is performed. As you can imagine, this raises the question of what happens if one parent is not Asteanic? This has led to complex debates among believers in reincarnation on whether the soul comes from the mother, the father, or both. Among the common people, there is a belief that one Asteanic parent is sufficient.

    Additionally, believers in reincarnation regard ancestor spirits in the Otherworld as beings who failed on their life journey, not achieving rebirth, and becoming trapped in the spirit realm. Hence, the veneration of ancestors is not prevalent among them. Why worship a failed ancestor?

    Supporters of the Collective Spirit Concept believe that after death, the souls of all the world’s people unite into one great Collective Spirit, from which all the world’s souls were originally drawn. This belief has led them to feel more equal to other nations, and they do not see intermarriage with foreigners as taboo.

    There is also a significant difference in burial customs. Collective Spirit believers advocate cremation because they believe it helps the soul move on more effectively. The ashes are either interred in a necropolis with an urn or scattered. On the other hand, those who believe in the Reincarnation concept favour waterburials, where the deceased’s body, encased in concrete shoes, is submerged in the sea or another body of water to expedite rebirth as a water elf.

    The view on ancestor spirits also varies. While they may not have succeeded in uniting with the Collective Spirit, they are believed to remain in the Otherworld to support and guide future generations.

    In most Asteanic nations, the Concept of Collective Spirit is prohibited, and its practitioners are actively pursued by temples and theologians. However, it is relatively easy to conceal this belief since it is not directly observable, except for the burial traditions.

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