ARC: Doom - Fight Against Time & Defeat the Apocalypse

The Apocalypse is coming and time is running out fast. You are the only ones that can prevent the Apocalypse from happening or even worse, the world from ending. 
But how will you fair when you only have a couple hours of real life time to do this?

Will you defeat the apocalypse or will time run out to soon? 

That is the premise of the game we are exploring today called ARC: DOOM! A brilliant TTRPG created by Momatoes!
 
I bring on Grant Nordine to explore ARC: Doom with us and how much he has fallen in love with this TTRPG after recording his new AP using the system Bella's Comet! 

So if you want to hear about how tragic ARC: Doom is along with the thrill and tension of racing against the real world Doomsday clock then come on and explore Arc: Doom with us nerds! 

Get the full game of Arc: Doom here:
https://momatoes.itch.io/arc 
(The free Quickstart is available at the end of the Itch page) 

https://www.exaltedfuneral.com/products/arc-doom-tabletop-rpg

Find Grant here: 
https://linktr.ee/grant_nordine

Listen to Bella's Comet NOW!
https://www.bellascomet.com/

Transcript

0:01

Hi, everyone. It's me, Willow. Please ignore the ticking sound behind me. Everything is fine and normal. This week, I am talking to Grant, the guide for the actual play podcast, Bella's Comet. They run their game using the Arc Doom system, a game all about stopping an apocalypse before a very real timer runs. Huh? Time timer. Odd. Anyway, their show is great, and the system they run is hectic stressful and, as you'll soon discover, an amazing one to help your players make big choices and fast. I made a big choice recently, but I don't think it changed much about me. Is the taking getting louder or is that just me? Anyway, here's the episode. Hope you enjoy it. Welcome, everyone, to the RPG Goblin. I am your host, Willow, and I am the one who asks all the questions because I have a lot of problems with talking and really loving TTRPGs. So this is my way to get that all out. And the RPG Goblin is a podcast where we basically bring on a bunch of really cool guests, we talk about games and basically make it easy for you to start exploring TTRPGs in a fun and easy way. Because guess what? We have a bunch of fun conversations. And in today's episode, we have on the fantastic guest Grant Nordine, and we are going to be talking about a really cool game called Arc Doom with him. And so before we get into what Arcdoom is and stuff like that, grant, would you like to introduce yourself and tell everyone what you do, where people can find you and all the cool things? Why, certainly all the cool things. So I'll start with trees. No, I'm kidding. No. Hi, I'm Grant. I am the titular Game Master over at Game Master Monday, that show if you're into well, if you like Willow's show, you'll probably like our show, honestly. We play a different one shot and a different system with a different cast every two weeks. So if you've ever wanted to check out a wide variety of indie and big name TTRPGs but have been intimidated by their rulebooks or actual plays that are longer form campaigns of those things, come on down. We've probably played it at some point or will play it eventually, but I'm not talking about that particular podcast much today. I mean, you probably can't stop me, but my goal is to not talk about it as much today. I'm also the Game Master and showrunner of an upcoming podcast called Bella's Comet, where we are playing a cyberpunk Sci-Fi adventure in the Ark Doom system. Yes, this is so very exciting. And at the time of recording, this podcast isn't out yet, but I believe this is probably going to be out in October. Will Bella's comment be out by then? Yes, October 4, Wednesday. October 4 is our launch day, so it'll be on its way soon. I'm here to talk about that and the system we played that game in because as far as I know, based on my research and my co producers research, we're the first ever podcast to use Arc Doom for an actual play. Yes. That's insane. Oh my gosh. Because I've heard of the game and I've seen it a lot, and it's been a big one that I've been wanting to play, but I would assume that it would have at least something, at least maybe someone who did something short form, really. There's been some short form things here and there. The games creator, Momatos, did like a very limited run YouTube episode or two with another streaming group to show them how the game works and stuff and to play a sample adventure, a video I have watched no less than ten times as I've tried to teach myself this game to run this particular show. But as far as actual play, long form, well, not long form, middle form, if you will, podcasting goes, I believe we're the first. And if I'm wrong, well, then send me your podcast. I want to hear it because Arc Doom rules. Yeah, absolutely. And so I think the first thing, just so that we have some context of what this game is and what it's about, can you introduce what Arc Doom is for everyone? Why, certainly. Arc Doom, as mentioned, it is a 2021 tabletop RPG created by Momatos. It's won a whole bunch of awards. It's a beautiful art game. And if you want to know what the big selling point is for it, if I had to name like, one big thing to hook you into Arc Doom because it's the thing that hooked me into it, especially as a person using it for storytelling purposes, is the game is played on a literal timer. So it's called Arc Doom because your campaign, your one shot, what have you, is ticking down to an apocalyptic event in real time, and you and your party have to stop it. And because it's on a timer, it makes your players not waste any time. You are making very spur of the moment immediate decisions. First thought, best thought, big swings are a must. The way they have you approach things is really cool and unique. But if I had to put no finer point on it, it's a timed game and you feel every passing second of this game oh, my. That, I think, was the big thing as well. That hooked me in when I saw that it was a real life timer that is ticking down. And so actually, is there like a set amount of time that you are given for that? Or do you get to, I guess, create your own timer? A little bit of both. Arc does give you a template for how long something should take in a game. So, for example, with Bella's Comet, we are doing an actual play podcast. So Arc kind of gives you a general vibe of what to do. If you're going to have more than four sessions, which Bella's Comet does, and if you're doing more than four sessions, they want you to well, they advise you have one and a half hours per session as your general timer. If you're doing anything less than that, they have their own guidelines. So, for example, let's say you're like, okay, we're going to do arc as a one shot. The advice is, hey, you're probably going to have, like, 3 hours to play this, and we advise that your Doomsday Clock, which is a whole other separate thing going on in addition to your real time timer, advances every 30 minutes or so. Yeah, two things you got to keep track of if you're going to run this game. So if you love spinning plates while everything's going on, this is the thing for you. But for Bella's Comet, we do over four sessions. And in our particular situation scenario, the Doomsday Clock advances every session. So I didn't have to keep track of a second timer. I just knew after an hour and a half, the session ends, the Doomsday Clock advances, et cetera, et cetera. I love that. And especially if you're like a group that is pretty you only have so much time to play, and you're limited on your time. Having that almost like that being the structure of the game, where it's like, okay, you play for an hour and 30 minutes, and that is it. I actually really enjoy that because it does make the players get into that serious mindset a lot quicker because they only have an hour and 30 minutes to play. Yeah, you don't have a lot of time to sit and hum and ha and plan and be like, okay, well, what do we know who has what? It's just like, okay, we have to just figure it out now because an hour and a half sounds like a lot of time at the beginning of an hour and a half. And then all of a sudden, your GM chimes in like, hey, it's been 30 minutes already. And you're like, oh my God, but what do we do? Shit, we didn't go forward at all yet. Hold on. We have been talking about soup. We got to go. So you're keeping track of both of these clocks. They're both advancing at the same time, so they're going to have that, I guess, doomsday event at the very end at the same time. They're going to reach that point at the same time. Exactly. Right. And the game even gives you ways where you can delay the Doom, if you will. That's the whole point of Arc here. Right. So they give you a mechanic that's called moments. The moments are what makes up your Doomsday Clock, and there's a little bit of math that goes into that. So bear with me here. As the person who did a non Stem major in college explains how math works. What's up, performance artists out there? Anyway, in our particular game in Bella's Comet, we are doing over four episodes. So I'm just going to pick an arbitrary number here. Let's say six. So if you have six sessions, the way the math works, it's the number of sessions you're planning on doing, and you multiply that by 1.5. It's the same if you do, like, two or three. So if you're doing over four sessions, you take your number, you multiply it by one and a half, and that's how many moments you have to essentially stop the Doom. The number goes down at the end of each. Whatever advancement tool you're using, for us, it's per session or per episode. So if you have six sessions you're doing, you're going to have nine moments to work with, and that number goes down every session. That number can also go down if you are failing to stop or complete what are called Omens. What are omens? I must know. What a great question. It's almost like you were planning on me asking this. The game has a built in mechanic called Omens. These are borderline optional, but optional in the way that drinking water is optional. You don't have to do it, but it's strongly recommended you do it. But I mean, that's a personal choice. It's no big deal. Omens are events that can precede or be adding on to the apocalypse that is coming. So let's pretend your apocalypse is like a volcano is about to go off, and there is an Omen that's like a whole bunch of culty guys who live underground are shoveling coal into the bottom of the volcano to make it erupt faster. You can choose to go take on those guys and stop that Omen from happening, and that'll save you the loss of momentum. But if a session ends and those guys are still down there, you run the risk of losing more time and advancing the apocalypse. Man, that's really tricky. Like, you really have to be on top of what you're doing so that you can stay ahead. And that, I think, can be very difficult for a lot of groups. Yeah, this game is the equivalent of it's 1130, and you didn't turn in that assignment. Let's do at midnight. So it's all about like, time management. So at least from a GM perspective, since you are the one running the Arc Doom game, aka Bella's Comet, how have you found using that system with the ticking time clocks? Honestly, so I'll put it this way. So having the ticking time bomb just sitting in the background watching the stopwatch as I run the game both fills me with dread for my players because I know what I have to do and there's no way around it. But it also gives me a bit of a rush to be like, I know that where the timer is, and I know where they're at, and I know how much time it's going to take them to do the thing, and I got to keep quiet about it. And that's kind of exciting. It also makes me never want to do I don't know, I won't say that's for certain, but after running a game like this so efficiently, just having that timer keeps you honest and keeps you together as a group. I might never play D and D again because those sessions can go for, like, ever. I just finished a recording for another show I did that was hitting the three hour mark close to and I was like, man, I kind of miss Arc right now. I wish I could just be like, you have to end here. There's no way around it. Yeah, no, actually that's fair because I've especially found that when I have come to play one shot games or have run one shot games, DND ones always last longer every single time. They always go over the limit or they get extended or whatever when it's like, oh, this was supposed to be one game. How did this turn? Yeah, it happens to everyone, and it's a good thing that it happens. If we're being honest, if you're playing a one shot and everyone is loving it so much and you're going for that long that you can tell your Game master, like, hey, can we continue this story so I can go to bed? That means you're doing a good job. And I'm honestly really proud of that three hour thing we did. It's like, one of my favorite things we've made for Game Master Monday. But also me being a guy who's, like, I told my wife, I'd be somewhere at a certain time, and that time is coming and we're only halfway through this dragon situation. Oops. So Arc Doom is great if you want to feel all the emotions in a real nice condensed space. I love that. And so I am curious, though, with your experience in running it so far, with it being timed, do you find that your players don't take as many opportunities for roleplay situations, things like that, that may make them sidetrack and may, I guess, waste time? I think that's kind of the beautiful design of Arc because this game, the way it's written, which is beautifully, by the way. We haven't talked about it yet, but the art in this game is amazing. The pros in it just as amazing. Out of the park, feast for the eyes and brain in this game. But the way this game is structured is that roleplay serves a mechanical purpose. So there are folks out there who are like, I'm more combat focused, right? Or I'm more action focused. Arc makes your social game and your role play game part of the mechanics. And you can take damage for not role playing or not playing along or not talking to the right person in the right way. And I can expound on that. Of course, there's multiple ways to do what this game does. There's like two things you got to keep track of as a player. One is called your blood and one is called your guts, which sounds like the same thing, but it is not. Blood is like, you're very prototypical like. These are my hit points. If this number hits zero, then I have to start doing other things to keep my character standing up. But the other half of that coin is something called guts. So, like, if a character embarrasses themselves in a social situation or acts knowingly aloof or does the wrong thing at the wrong time is just kind of a Buzkill, if you will, or is too ecstatic about something, doesn't read a character right. There's a whole bunch of ways you can fail socially, which I know is a dangerous thing to tell an audience of nerds, but it's true. You can lose guts for that. And if you're at a zero in guts, you can also be in a situation where your character is a pariah, can't do anything, is socially dead, if you will. So the game isn't just like you have this hour and a half countdown situation. Do the biggest thing you can think of. It's also like, hey, you also have to maintain a social presence and play this half of the game correctly. Yeah, for sure. And I'm guessing even be able to work with the community that you may be in because this is like an apocalyptic event too. You need to work with people. There is a lot of social aspect there. Yeah. I'm going to give a little teaser taste here for what to expect in Bella's Comet. But there's many situations where the city of Bella's Comet where the story takes place, becomes aware of the danger that is befalling them. And our heroes are going to have to encounter and meet with and talk to certain types of people who are playing a hand in the apocalypse coming this quickly. So there are important people they have to talk to and talk to correctly. There's roles they got to make to make sure they're persuasive enough and say the right thing. Listen, our cast is absolutely brilliant. I know every showrunner is required to say that, but we have three heavy hitting women in our initial cast here who just absolutely crush as role players and are so aware of the story they're telling and want to tell and so into their characters. So you're really in for a treat with some of these situations. And man, this game and this story and everything we've done with Bella's Comet just meld so seamlessly together. There are moments where we're trying to figure out what we're doing. So we might mess up a time or two in the first initial episodes, but never let them be daunted. They were always shooting from the hip, knocking out of the park. So if you want action and you want roleplay, boy, do we got it. Oh, man, I am so excited for this to come out. I can't wait. Oh, my gosh. I can't believe it's happening. Honestly, I was telling you a little bit before we started recording, but this was basically the brainchild of me and Leah from Slave of Stars, just chatting in a discord one day, being like, man, we're going to slow down for the summer. We're going to take a little bit of a break, get our brains rested and healed so that when fall comes, we can hit the ground running. And then we were just like, you know, one of these days we're going to wind up creating our own podcast together. And then, whoops. That summer of taking it easy, was this. It'S for the better? Because now we get to hear an amazing story about freaking Bella's comment. Hell yeah. Exactly. If y'all like Blade Runner and Jurassic Park. Here it comes. I mean, Jurassic Park is one of my favorite movies. Let's get going. Hell yeah. Hey, no, but I love that. And I do love also what you said about even though you had some moments of not necessarily messing up, but getting used to the rules and getting in the motion of that, still keeping going, still keeping to the game and pushing through it. Because that's always how it's going to be with the new system. There's always going to be rules that you mess up or that you just learn along the way, even if you may be as prepared as you can be at the beginning. Yeah. In one of the episodes of yours, I was listening to how to choose what RPG to work with and what new systems to bounce around in. And it's noted that you can do all the research and watch all the videos and do all the preparation you need. And then the minute you hit the record button, it's like, I have never seen this in my life. This is entirely new. I do not know what I have to tell them to do anymore. I have written a cheat sheet. It is out of my brain. Exactly. There's a little bit of that in our first two sessions. Yes, but overall, how easy do you think the rules were to pick up for your group? It's going to be, from your perspective, the level of difficulty for different games is going to be different for different people. But for you, how have you found it? We caught on pretty quick, I think, as far as RPG standards go. After session two, we had our legs under us and we were ready to rock and roll and had everything figured out because session one, we used a lot to just do the exposition stuff and get used to the act of rolling the statistics. Right. That was our first challenge, usually as a GM running a new game, I like to introduce mechanics bit by bit, slowly by slowly, and give them story reasons for why those are there. So episode one is mostly us talking about your stats and the other half of that, there's a lot of two halves of one thing going on in Arc. So statistics in this game kind of work. Like, you have five categories with four stats each not too dissimilar from DND. For various situations, you have like, knowledge skills, social skills, physical skills, things like that. But what makes Arc unique is that you can choose how you approach each of those situations, and then you have stats based on that. So you may have a really high, let's say, inside check for this game. Right. Maybe you get like a plus one or a plus two in that. But you also have three what are called approach scores, which are careful, concerted, and creative. So you can choose how your character is handling a situation and then roll from there. So maybe you're in a situation where you have to be really creative and how you get insight from something, but, oh, no, your creative is a zero, so it might be a little harder than you're accustomed to. Yeah, so you mentioned. So you have those different approaches, and with being creative, you could arrow and it would just be more complicated. It doesn't discourage you from still using stats like that, though, even if it's low. Yeah, I mean, absolutely. There are some situations where so the point of Arc is it's a D Six system, so every boost you get is increasing your likelihood to pass something, which I know sounds pretty intuitive. So let's say that I have a character who's making a charisma check, because that's a thing you can make an Arc, too. And I am doing it in a careful way. I'm treading lightly with someone. So maybe I have a two in careful and a two in charisma. That means I have to roll under a four for this to be successful. And there are other situations where maybe I have a zero in my approach and a one in a certain stat line and I might tell someone, hey, make a this role. And they're like, I only have a one in that. I don't think I can pass that. So there are ways where it's like there are some things where your character just might not be equipped for a situation. So you're going to need to find another way out of it or approach it differently. Yeah, creative thinking, like work around it. So I do want to confirm. So the way the system basically works is adding together the approach and the stat, and then you have to roll under that number with just one die. Yes, with Jeff, just the one die. So you're using a D Six for everything. And then your game master can also set what is called a TN. Think of it like a difficulty check, if you will, and they can choose to add something to a TN. Like if a situation warranted and you were doing good, like, hey, whatever you roll, you can put, like, one more on top of that. So if you would have had a three for this, now the threshold is a four, same vein. The GM can also choose to take away something like, oh, you would have had a five in this situation. I'm setting it as a TN minus two. Now it's a three because the situation is dire and it's going to be a difficult thing for you to yeah. OOH, I like that a lot though, especially because at least the base system to do it seems pretty easy. Just add the two numbers and roll a die. And then obviously up to anything that the GM may do. Is there any way for the other characters to help each other with roles? Yes, there is. And I'm glad you asked that because we asked ourselves that question around like, I want to say session five in our game, and then we were like, we should probably know the answer to that. So this game also really encourages role play for another mechanical reason, and that's called bonds. So your relationship to your fellow players can literally pay off later on in the form of bonds. So you can help someone out in a situation, you can literally save their life. You can give them a pep talk, you can be their friend, you can give them a kiss in the mouth. There are lots of ways to make bonds. Mechanical reasons for Smooches here, folks, we have it all in Arcdoom, but different things you can do. And if your bond increases with someone, you can say, hey, I have one bond with Willow, for example. Can I help her make this role and increase the TN by one? Because we have a bond together. And yes, you can. And that's how you would help someone. If you haven't been role playing and haven't been getting to know your fellow players, you're interjecting yourself into their lives might be more difficult to help. At which point you can make certain sacrifices with your own stats to help if you want. But primarily it's the bonds thing that's really cool. And I know there's a lot of people who have issues with games that have mechanical value to role play or things like that, but I think it's really cool because it is literally rewarding you for building those relationships, for going out of your way to create bonds with the other exactly. And characters. And then you get to be friends. Exactly. You get to be friends. You get to get to know these characters on a much deeper level. I know there's a lot of folks out there, and I don't fault them for this at all, who are like, I'm a little bashful when it comes to role playing, I don't have the way with words or a flourish for descriptions or anything, and that's totally fine. Games like DND and Pathfinder and all sorts of things have relied heavily on not needing a roleplay mechanic per se. A little cherry on top for what's already a fun game with other systems like this arc is like, roleplay is not just something fun to do. It is essential to do it. So it's a good way. Like, if you're a mechanical minded person, you can get over your Roleplay fear by being like, the clock is ticking, I need to help the party. I need to make sure I'm developing social relationships with these people so I can get that little check mark on my sheet and get the plug so I can use it later. So I think it's really helpful for people who are analytically minded because now you can make very analytical pointed decisions for who I am friends with and why. Yeah. And I think that's actually a fantastic thing to view it in that way. It's basically a tool to help get used to roleplay. Because I know when I first started to play these games, I started off with D and D and I had a really hard time with Roleplay because it wasn't really introduced to me. I'm like, Is this something that you have to do? And then everyone else would do it. I'm like, what am I missing? But having something in the game to kind of help guide you, like, yeah, you're building relationships, you're getting to know characters, and then you can help them. That's a much different way to approach it. And I think a way that for me, when I started to play, I think that would have been really helpful. Yeah. And I mean, I think 70% of people who ever played a tabletop role playing game have had that question the first time. They get into it, like, do I have to? The DM is like, hey, you encounter this cobalt in a cave and they look sad. What do you say to make them not sad? And you're like, I don't know. Do I have to do that? Can I just stab it or something? I thought that was a stabby game. I have a sword in my inventory. What do you want from me? I don't have therapy on my skills list here, sir. Add therapy to D and D skills, please. I believe it's called your charisma stat. No, but yeah, I think it is a weird thing to wrap your head around if you're just not used to that idea already. Yeah. And I like that Arc gives you a reason to do it and listen selfishly. It's great for an audio drama format because, like, oh, cool. We're playing the game that makes my players communicate and have feelings and do drama and explore their emotions. So good. That's good audio right there. Yes. It is. I love that, actually. I didn't even think about how good it would be for audio drama, man. That's my personal curse, Willow. Every time I read a game and it sounds cool, I have to ask myself, does this work for a podcast? And dare I say Arcdoom works the best for a podcast. It is timed. It makes your characters act. It's perfect, folks. It really does. Oh, man, I need to play so bad now. Actually, I'm curious now just because you said that. If you do want to share, has there been a game that you've come across that isn't good for a podcast that you find? I'll give the safe answer, and it's any game that requires a physical element of the game. So I love stuff. Like ten candles, for example. Ten Candles, I am obsessed with as a horror fan, love it. I cannot play Ten Candles in an audio format because you cannot see the ten candles. That is element and key to the drama of the game. And it would literally just be me being like, just take my word for it. A candle went out. Okay? I swear. Believe me. Oh, gosh. I'm blanking on the name of it, but it's always like floating around in my orbit. Okay, I don't know the name of the original system because I'm on the spot and my brain shut down, but I do know the adaptation of that system that's been sitting in my shelf for a year and a half, I literally think. And they were dotermates. And it is a two player or more. I guess it can be more than two player, but primarily two player game where you're playing two nuns who live in a nunnery, if you will, and you are creating and developing a story of forbidden love with each other. And the way that that unfolds is you remove Jenga blocks. Dread. Dread. That's the one. Yes. It's a spin off of Dread, and I've always wanted to do that, but alas, what do I do? Guys, you got to trust me. The tower is still up. They're still flirting. It's happening. And if the tower falls at any point, then the nuns are caught in situation where you can't be a nun and do that thing. It's so cool. And I can't play it on any of my podcasts. I could maybe do a live stream for it, but then I have to do a live stream. Maybe it's worth it. Maybe it's worth it. You know what, Willow? For you, I'll think about it. Yay. Here's what we're going to do. We'll do a Ten Candles Livestream in 2024 when I finally have time to sit down and think about stuff. And we'll put you on it. Fuck yeah. Please. I have been obsessed with Ten Candles since I've talked about it with Curtis because it's just like, man, this game sounds so tragic in a way that's going to destroy me and I need it in my life. Can I just say that's the episode that got me into RPG goblin, that's the one I started from when I found your show in my orbit and I was like, oh, I also love Ten Candles. I also hear the show be talked about. Then I was like, Willow is a delight. I got to reach out to her. Thank you. I'm so glad that you did because you were also on my radar. I'm like, oh, because I'm always nervous. I'm like, I don't know if I'm popular enough to reach out to some of these people. I have learned that all of us in the Tcrpg podcast space are all so desperate for attention and to be reached out to. So at a certain point in my career, especially because our show relies on a literal, rotating, different cast all the time, that I just ask, it's just like, hey, I saw you. I checked your stuff out. You seem chill and not problematic. Would you like to be a guest? Of course. And I think that's definitely what I'm starting to get into. Like, yeah, just ask people. Because usually it's just another nerd when you break it down, it's just another nerd that you're going to be talking about games with or playing games with. Either way, it's amazing. Exactly. If I could set listen, as one of the rare extroverts in the TTRPG community, I got to tell you all, if you're nervous about talking to a creator you admire or you just want to tell someone that you like their stuff and you're worried they're going to be a jerk, we probably aren't. We probably are also nervous to do that. So if you want to message Willow or any other indie RPG show you like that isn't hosted by Brenna Lee Mulligan or Matt Mercer, they'll probably really appreciate the sentiment. Absolutely. Because it makes my absolute day when anyone messages me or even comments on a tweet or anything like that. Like, oh, man, I really enjoyed this episode. I'm like, thank you. If a tweet gets more than five likes, I'm like, texting my wife about it. Like, look, honey, we made it. Just push the button. Exactly. It's just the best thing ever. It just makes my absolute day. So, yeah, just reach out and say hi. And that's why I also need to I actually love your discord because there are so many people that just interact. I'm very excited to open up my own to actual people and be like, hey, want to talk about games? Because I literally can't stop thinking about them. Please. Yeah. Thank you for plugging the Game Master Monday discord my safety net in case Elon breaks Twitter forever. Yeah, if you like what Willow and I are doing right now and just want to talk with a whole bunch of cool Creators and fans of games in general. We're pretty happy in space, not to toot my own horn, but we had two game creators encounter each other in that space, and they created an in joke in our discord where our general chat became a Waffle House. And then they worked together to make a game where you play little dumpster creatures like possums and bears fighting each other in the parking lot of an unnamed breakfast diner facility so you can join our group and make a game out of Know. So it's pretty rad reaching out to people. That's literally how Bella's comic came to be. It was just me reaching out to the creator of one of my all time favorite podcasts, Layla Stars, and over the course of several months, convincing her that I am, in fact, cool and we should do something together one day. Leah, it's all been a ploy. I'm sorry. Yeah, I'm really not cool. As you can see, I cannot stop talking. No, she knows. She's very aware that I cannot shut. That'S just the way it is. It's just always got to keep talking. But, yeah, I love this so much. Should probably talk a bit more about Arc Tome. Yeah, the thing I'm here to talk about, I'll talk about every podcast if you let me. It's just more fun that way. And I do have to say, and I think this at least, is maybe a way to commit it, I do really want to do the Designing One Shots episode with you still, because I think that would be awesome. So we should hell, yeah. I'll do it here. I'll do it now. We'll do a two parter. Sadly, I've committed to a game of the Quiet Year after this, so not today. I understand. Listen, it won't be the last time we encounter each other. Here, I'll make a plug for you. Willow's going to be on game master Monday soon. Come check her out. Yeah. Playing paranormal inc. I'm so excited. Yes. Because she loves horror, so I threw her into a horror game. Thank you. No, it'll be great. I'm so excited for that. And you guys will definitely be hearing about that when it is out. So, yeah, just keep looking on Twitter and stuff and just keep connecting. Remind me to plug it later to the date. I have the date on my computer. Of course. All right, perfect. So I'll actually make a quick note of that, but yeah, so I don't even know where we were. We were talking about role playing, and then it was like, yeah, of course. What we like as creators, because you can't put two podcast hosts in the same room and not talk about the biz, as it were. But yeah, no, listen, I really love all of the structure of Arc Doom, because I'll kind of go in backwards order here. When we were developing the idea of what podcast like, what kind of podcast Leah and I wanted to make, we were like, well, there's no way we can do a long form podcast. And we want to do something that we're not currently doing. So Leah's show, Slave of Stars is kind of like a dark fairy tale vibe, playing D D on her. Then, you know, our show is just a hot mess of a whole bunch of different comedic one shots. So we were trying to find the happy middle of, you know, we landed on this idea of doing a series and trying to highlight systems or a system that hadn't really been heavily utilized in the TTRPG space because so many systems are being used, d and D and Pathfinder chief among them. The Fate Core system is gaining a lot of steam in the TTRPG community. Shout out to monsters only dice and five GMs in a trench coat. I see. They'Re great. You've got people using Starfinder a whole bunch now, which is a dope system if you are sick of your usual fantasy fair. I have a friend who runs a Doctor Who role playing game themed podcast. So there's really something for everyone. So finding a system that no one had used before was the principal challenge. No one had used before wasn't high in our list, but we were like, we should be doing an indie system. We should be doing something that isn't backed by huge money. And in my research, I find Momados on Twitter because I was already following A-D-D collective that they started called the RPGC, which is sea standing for Southeast Asia. So it's a lot of these creators of Southeast Asian descent or living in that area hyping each other up to make cool RPGs. And through there I find Momado's, its founder. And then I find Arc Doom. And then I buy Arc Doom because the art from the COVID was amazing and I have poor impulse control. And then I read Arc Doom. And I'm like, Momatoes, accidentally. I don't know if it was intentional or not because no one creates an RPG thinking about how people are going to use it. They just want to make something cool. And they like, but I was like, this is perfect for a short form miniseries. Actual play podcast. So I get excited about the mechanics. I get excited about how combat in this game is handled so very differently from any other game I've ever seen. I get excited about the social mechanics of it and I show it to Leah and we just immediately fall in love with it. And the system was so fluid and easy to understand that when we started reaching out to people who we trusted to be in the cast, we barely had to sell it. We're like, the games, play it on a timer. And they're like, Say no more. I'm in. That sounds great. So I'm obsessed with Arc Doom. We ran it, we tell a beautiful story, clock my bias, but I think it's a pretty beautiful story. I'm pretty goofy, just in general as my default setting. I'm very much so into creating NPCs whose names are ridiculous puns. The most recent episode we released prior to this recording had two elves named Tinder and Grindr. So that's the level I'm usually writing at. Of course. Yeah, naturally. What else would they be called? It's Elvish for I don't know, Boning. This is the quality you get from me. Willow and then this game is something completely different for me to do. It's drama, it's Sci-Fi, it's cyberpunk. It's a lot of. Something that's even a little bit more serious, but you still don't have to take it completely serious as well. You can still give your own flair to it. Yeah, it has its moments. I'm not going to blow the surprise, but there is one moment after episode one finished where we all just kind of decompressed afterwards. And my sister, who's on the cast, her name is Jenny, was like, you were doing so amazing with the drama of everything, and I was so impressed that you had this in you. And then you dropped that one NPC on us right at the end, and I was like, there's my brother. There he is. I knew he was hiding in there somewhere. And I told her that's my one. And I just had to get it out of me. It was my one. I swear. There will be no more. That is the one dumb joke you get out of me. I just had to remind everyone that, yes, this is the same guy from Game Master Monday who made them play the game where they all turned into shrews. So it's still me in there, I promise. No, that's so good. And clearly, everyone who's listening, you have to go check out Bella's comment. Comment. I keep wanting to say comment, bella's comment. You can leave comments on Bella's comment if you want. That would make me feel good. This is so true. Yeah. Now you must check it out. To hear what that's? How excited you are about this game just fills me with so much joy right now because I've been so excited about it, and it makes me now want to actually go sit down and read it, which I've been dying to get the physical copy of it for forever because it feels like a beautiful book to have in hand. I'm very tempted. I bought the PDF for efficiency's sake, so I just start right away. And after running it and living in it for, I feel like I've been living in this world that we created together for the entire summer. And I was listening to different music back then. I was reading different kinds of books back then. I was so engrossed in this. And now that it's behind me and it's been recorded, I'm just like, what do I do now? What do I do with my life? I missed my sad little futuristic, apocalyptic world. What's going on? I listened to a lot of electronic music. I read a lot of cyberpunk books, and now I'm like, oh, it's Spooky season. I should read Horror again. And then I'm like, this isn't Android's dream of electric sleep sheep. What's going on here? No, I love that, though. Just, like, completely getting in that mindset, just, like, going into the media and the music and just setting the stage. I think it's just really beautiful to hear about it. Helps if you're an insane person like I am, and if you're not, hey, listen, Arc Doom also gives you a good adventure. You can run yourself. So if you're like, I can't do the whole method actor shit that Grant's doing here. Clearly, you don't have to. The game gives you monsters off the bat. The game gives you gods you can fight. The game gives you a really cool, actual sample adventure. I've been tempted to just be like, do that on my other proper show and just be like, hey, I like Arcadoom. So much for running the sample game that comes with the game. Live in that world again. Do it. Obviously, you love this game so much. I will say Arc Doom isn't designed to be a cyberpunk adventure. That was just me coming up with a concept. This is what I always do. I come up with an idea for a story, and then I find the system that suits it. And so that's what this was. Arc Doom itself can be anything you want. It can be modern, it can be Sci-Fi, it can be fantasy, it can be celestial, it can be religious. There's so much beautiful inspiration in this game and so many varieties of things you can play. I haven't even touched on character creation yet that much. But listen, there are items your characters can come equipped with, and you have a point system for how many you can take. And there's magic in the game. Where do I start? Hold on, I'm losing it. I think character creation is a good point to start with because I always like covering character creation before getting really into a lot of the GM side. So we can go straight into that after talking about character creation because I've been very curious on how that works. Hey, everyone. It is time for the midpoint break of today's episode. When we come back, we are going to be starting to get into the character creation of Arcadoom, which is really, really exciting. But if you are enjoying the episode so far, and the RPG Goblin in general, please make sure to give us a review anywhere that you listen to your podcast. It really helps keep this thing going. And I have a dream to create like, the TTRPG Empire, help introduce people into these games and why they should try them instead of struggling with systems that they are familiar with but don't fit the types of games that they want to play. So yeah, if you also think that is an awesome goal, please support the and, you know, tell your friends all about us so that they can start learning about a bunch of awesome games. Also, apologies for sounding gross. I am sick right now. And thank you to Grant for actually doing the intro to today's episode. You did absolutely amazing. And yeah, it is totally me at the beginning. But if you're enjoying hearing about Arc Doom again, please make sure to go check out Bella's Comet. It is out right now. I believe it is four episodes that. Are out so far, which is honestly amazing. So please go check out the show. And hear Bella's Comet get actually played out because it's an amazing story. So to talk about the next episode that's going to be coming out, which is going to be. November 3, is. Going to be the role of the GM with Zachariah and discussing what does that actually mean? What does it mean to take on the role of the GM when you're playing TTRPGs? What are your responsibilities, what are not your responsibilities? Stuff like that. So if that sounds like an awesome topic, that is going to be out next week again on November 3, which I think I'm switching the first of every month of the RPG Goblin to actually be kind of this like TTRPG topic type episode. So it's going to be talking about a topic, a cool thing, and then the rest of the month is going to be filled with games. So yeah. And finally we will get to our mid episode promo, which this week we have Roleplay Rejects. If you don't know who Roleplay Rejects is, where have you been? Because they are awesome. Roleplay Rejects is a TTRPG actual play. Podcast where they do many campaigns of different types of systems along with these side quests which I was actually a part of one, I was in the side quest of cottages and services which we actually covered on this show. And we have a fantastic time playing as a bunch of little mushroom people and maybe taking over the world with Mycelium, but it's fine. So we are going to get into their promo here, which again, they are an awesome group and let's see what they're all about. Hello. Hello. We are Roleplay Rejects, an actual play podcast that is all about new and unusual tabletop role playing games. Our show explores various roleplaying systems and their associated worlds while being guided by one of the Rejects as game Master. Each story is entirely separate and designed to be listened to in any order and comes complete with laughter. I'm going to take your lunch. And sadness never killed anything before. We struck Yukon Gold and whatever the hell this is. So what are you waiting for? Listen to roleplay rejects. Wherever you get podcasts, give them a game. Where do I start. Hold on, I'm losing it. I think character creation is a good point to start with because I always like covering character creation before getting really into a lot of the GM side. So we can go straight into that after talking about character creation because I've been very curious on how that works. Yeah, I did a session zero with the cast of Bella's Comet so that we could understand how character creation works. And this is a testament to how simple and easy this is. This was their first time ever looking at this book and they were able to create characters right then and there. No hesitation, no, give me a week to get a handle on this. No, nothing. So it's very intuitive, he says, while he saw us for time as he pulls up the book and clicks the character creation section. I mean, no one has to know. Yeah, we'll cut this part, right? Yeah. You'd never burn me, would you? Oh, never. So I mentioned this earlier. The first thing that you really do with character creation, which I think sets the tone for who your character is off the bat, is they start you off with the simple stuff, which is your approach score. So the creative, careful and concerted stuff that we talked about earlier and those three things are all very different from where mentally your character can be at. Because if I tell you your character is very creative, you have an idea of what you can build from there, but it doesn't tell you everything about them. Same thing. Like you have a very careful character that can give you maybe they're very anxious, maybe they've been burned by people before. You have a very concerted character, but they're big and tough. Maybe they're just filled with determination. Maybe they've also been kicked down a few times and want to push through with things. So off the bat, you get an idea of where you want your character to be at. The maximum number any of these can have is three. So it's kind of like how DND skill points work. If you need a frame of reference for the common man, you are given a certain number of approach points and you can plug them into each thing. I believe you start off with three and you can choose to give one score a two and another score of one and another score of zero. It's kind of the standard array, if you will. Yeah, makes sense. So you get something off the bat there, then. Same thing with your blood and guts. Is your character going to be more physical or are they going to be more social? You get six points and you can plug those into those two stats, respectively, and go from there. And then you have your skill ranks, which is the other stuff you were talking about earlier. So like I said, there's like five different categories, which I kind of like how this works a lot because a lot of this is like, you have this many points, spend them as you see fit. Some skills are going to be a zero. It's not going to be based on anything like a race or a class. You can be anything you want in that capacity. But how you apply your point systems is how all of these go to and there's like, listen, like 22, 27 stats. I think in this game, I won't go over all of them, but it's five different categories. They all have four skills within that category. And then you have this other category that just handles all of your magic stuff. So I'm top of the dome here. I'm pretty sure it's 22, unless I forgot a section, in which case it is 27, but I'm pretty sure it's 22. If you're familiar with DND Pathfinder, call it Cthulhu, and you're used to having a lot of stats that is there for you, but you don't have to fill every single stat out. You're going to have maybe like five skills off the bat that you have some kind of talent in and then the rest, as you level up, you can start filling in more. Yeah. And I feel like because it has so many options too, there's diversity in what people are good at, too, because absolutely it's going to be much harder if you're playing with playing with a group of three players for them to all be putting the same numbers in the same stamp. Yeah. Very difficult without coordination to build the same character in this game. And if you're not into the standard erase stuff, if you're more like, well, I prefer playing my games by rolling a certain number of dice and then going from there. There's a random skills table for you, too, so you can just do a first and a second dice, roll and plug whatever you like in there. You don't have to do things a certain way. I love that, actually. That's fantastic because I always think that randomly rolling for characters is the most chaotic and fun time because it's like, all right, what am I going to get? Not stuck with, but what is it going to give me that I then have to make work? Yes. I'm very much so into just taking something at random and then running away with it. So if you're a chaotic, start from nowhere type of person, we cater to you too. Yeah. The other fun things I like in this game is you can pick your own inventory and spells and again, completely different from any other way I've seen this done. So you get a point system for this as well, and certain things of a certain value. So you start off with 30 points to determine your inventory and your spell collection and everything that you could possibly want to take with you costs those points. You're not taking into account things like weight or capacity or things like that. It's like, what can I afford to bring with me? So you can pick up items that can do or prevent bad things from happening to you. The game gives you some examples that you can choose if you want to see fit, but you also have the option to homebrew your own. Like, I kind of did we kind of did, like, a half this game, half homebrew for our item selection. So you can weaponize things like a well rounded education or confidence are things you can purchase as, like, damage dealing things. You can also get a flaming sword. No limit here. I love the diversity. Yeah, they're like, we got you covered. If you want to do a delightful coming of age story or if you want a sword that's on fire, you can have either or both. They have a category RPGs where confidence is a skill that you can get. Listen, sometimes you're like, hey, I want my character to be confident, but only if I get, like, a plus boost of my defense. It's like okay, great. Well, then you're confident. Exactly. God forbid you find the confidence within you and present that as a performer. No, you got to make sure you have a sad advantage for it. Of course, there's also a lot of really cool, fun, random items that the game can give you to just randomly have. They don't do anything per se, but you can use them for your own benefit if a situation warrants or, like, if a player picks up something particularly OD and the GM wants to use it for later in the story, perhaps hypothetically. Hypothetically. Not saying I did that or anything. Yeah. No. Who, me? Never pay attention. These are divided into two categories called supplies and sundries and also oddities and valuables. Your supplies and sundries are going to be pretty, like, run of the mill level stuff. So maybe you have, like, a bedroll, maybe you have rations, maybe you have a backpack. My favorite one in this category is a stack of coated letters, a signet ring, and a wardrobe of noble clothes. That's all one item you can carry if you're willing to spend 17 points on it. I just think that's so specific and fun. Yeah, I mean, that's a whole story right there. Like, why do you have that? Why are you bringing a wardrobe everywhere you go? How do you do that? And then you have oddities and valuables, which is exactly as it says on the tin, they're strange and they're fantastical. That's an actual quote from the book. I can't take credit for that's. All tomatoes. But this is the weird stuff that you can also bring with you. But you can have plot things. They can just be, like, things that make your character seem weird. So just some early on examples. You can have the bottom half of a dead. Donkey. Yeah, naturally, of course. A pouch of human teeth. That's a thing you can have with you. And if you really want to be a high roller, the most expensive oddity you can collect is a telepathic yak. Just in case. Just in case. You never know. Always need that. Every single adventure that I've been on, I've always made sure to get a telepathic yak. Yeah, I hate it when I'm playing a Druid and I go, I left my Telepathic yak at home. I always forget that. Yeah, actually, now I want that in every single game I play. Give me a telephone. I'm going to find an excuse. Yeah, actually, how much does that cost? I need to know. That's an 18 point item. So you would be like, okay, I got the telepathic yak, and I can get maybe I have twelve points left here. What should I get? A snack, maybe a yak and a snack. Yeah, a yak and a snack. There you go. Get your yak and your rations are done. I am set for the apocalypse. Let's go. No point in a mess of me, baby. So good. Oh, my gosh. I love this game. It's great. I've been hyping it up this whole time. It's like a great game to use for drama. But listen, Arc is very funny. Arc has a sense of humor, for sure, and that's very apparent in the last two sections where you talk. You have your spells and your techniques. So you've all played a game before. Magic is a thing in Arc. And the spells have they're probably the most in depth part of character creation because each spell kind of does a digimon thing where they can evolve and be more powerful depending on what you sacrifice to use it. I like that, actually, a lot. Yeah, I'm going to try to not get too analytical here, given my whole vibe, but spells essentially have three versions of themselves you can do. You can use it as is, and you have as many instances of that spell that coordinates to a number. So there's a spell in here called Trick of the Light, where you can mold light like water, creating auras and illusions, and you can use that spell. And if you're feeling frisky, you can spend some blood or gut points to do what is called the extended version of that spell that is a more powerful version of it. And then if you really want to get frisky, you can do what's called a ritual that requires some very high level of sacrifice or having a specific thing that you need to do to make that happen. And it's its most powerful version of that spell. And listen, GMs out there, these aren't limited to district players. You can also give them to the villains they fight. Oh, I like that. I can even think of the story things now where there's just that perfect spell. That's the thing that will help defeat the cultists in the volcano that are shoveling in. Like that being the whole mission just to perform this ritual, getting the things you need for it and going through the entire process. Oh, I love that. That's really cool. And then on the GM side, you can try and ruin someone else's. Exactly. Yes. I'll give you a little teeny tiny spoiler of a thing. In Bella's comment, we did our character creation a little different. So there is a part where you can use your points to grab certain spells. I discouraged our players from doing it because we give them their spells in a more random way, in a storytelling way. So you're going to get to the end of episode one and the thing will happen. And then all of a sudden, these characters are going to be introduced to the concept of magic being real. And also you now have magic you can use, all of whom use their magics to brilliant and dramatic effect. Yeah, I'm really excited for you all to get a taste of that. So we did a little bit differently because there's about 20 spells that you can choose from in this game. So I just had them do the thing which we'll all learn about on October 4 because that happens in episode one. And then they roll the D 20 to get a randomly assigned spell, which I acknowledge was risky, because if they hit a 20, they would learn a spell called True Miracle, which means they could bring your wish to reality. Which means if they got that number and they were thinking about it for 2 seconds, I wish the comet was gone, and then the game would be over. So I'll just say this now, that didn't happen. And that's just fun to think about. The show did in fact go on and no one got the game breaking spell that makes them wish something away. That's actually an insane spell to put in into this game, though, given the situation with it being a catastrophic event, you could just wish for it not to happen. Is there a way for you to get that spell at the beginning or is it more something that you get through, like leveling up? Because I'm just curious on how that works. Yes, to both. So you get 30 points to build character creation, right? If you want to blow 24 of them on this spell and only have six to work with for the rest of the game, that's on you. But the spells are also worded in a way that gives both the player and the GM a lot of leeway in how they work. So, True Miracle, the only description you're going to get for it off the bat is bring your wish to reality. So what does that mean? Does that mean I can make the apocalypse go away? Well, your GM will have to work with you on that. And on top of everything else, you still will have to pass a check to use your spells. It's not like in D D, where you can say, I cast firebolt and your fingers on fire. I'm going to use true miracle. Your GM can say, okay, you're going to have to pass an arcana check to do that, and it might not work. True Miracle is also unique because the enhanced and ritual versions of it can get pretty insane and requires a lot to even use it. So there's like ones like, okay, you can use the enhanced version, but it's going to cost you seven gut points, which is a huge number in this game, and you have to make a successful arcana check. And then you just state a wish in Story and the Guide fulfills it, though they are not bound to follow its intent, is the way it's phrased. You can be like, I wish the asteroid would go away. We'll do a Jurassic Park thing here. I wish the thing that would kill all the dinosaurs is gone. The GM can say like, okay, the asteroid is no longer coming towards you. Didn'T say where you wanted it to go. You didn't tell me where you can really asshole genie the spell. So I know that spell sounds like I could end the game right now, but you could have a GM like me, who's like, I didn't hear a yes and. No. I think that's a great way to interpret it and that's probably why it's in the game, because I don't think they expect you to just like, oh, I wish for this not to happen, and you to do that because then there's no point in playing the game to begin with. Yeah, it's a great example the game gives where it's like, you can say, I wish everyone lived forever, but the Guide, which is what a GM in this game is called. I haven't mentioned that yet, but the Guide can grant immortality to all, but not eternal youth. So your body can just keep aging forever and it'll never die. It's like a face of bow from, like, Doctor Who and stuff. Exactly. It's going to be more miserable to be alive for that long. And then the ritual version of True Miracle is like, you have to obtain a tooth or a fingernail from seven rare and auspicious creatures. So the ritual versions of these spells are like, you have to get these really hyper specific things in Story in character for this to even happen. Yeah, no, that sounds insane because I would imagine that would take that's like an end game moment. It's like, we need to cast this ritual version of this spell. We need to be able to collect all these items. That is like, a big goal you're working towards, and that would be really fun to find and hunt down these different creatures. And we only get an hour and a half and four sessions to do it, so I better get hustling. I know, right? That's insane. Oh, man. The character creation in this game is a lot more wild than I remember it being when I looked at it before. It's so much fun because I feel like as you build a character, you can see the story unfold in front of you, too, because I prep stories ahead of time, but I'm very much so into the whole collaborative storytelling thing. Right. So if a player introduces something to me where they're like, hey, this is the story you're presenting here's the idea I'm kind of thinking of, does that even work? And if it's not something I previously considered, I'm not going to shoot them down. Unless it's like, just really out of left field and doesn't mesh well at all. Which has never happened to me because all my players are hella cool and they get the vibe around here. Of course. I mean, lucky. I know not everyone has been so fortunate. And I feel like especially people who are forever GMs love to jump into games and just do all the cockamamie shit they've ever thought about doing in their life. To the chagrin of the first time GM just trying to get through this, we we've been very fortunate, I will say. Jenny plays a character on the show and we'll release art and stories for her. Hopefully by now they've come out. If not, whatever free spoiler. Her name is Zara in the context of the game, and the city of Bella's Comet that we constructed has all these different rings and parts of town and areas. It's a city built inside of a comet crater, essentially. Thank you. Came to me in a way, and she was like, I like the idea of this one part of town. Can it be that she's from here, but she moved out of this area to go into a different part of town to do this? Vocation. I didn't hear you mention this job existing, but I think that would be fun. And I'm like, absolutely. Character creation can lead to cool things happening in the story, and Zara is pretty great. Exactly. I always love doing that, even with my own games of keeping the world, like, my one monster of the week. Like, we have some base locations and stuff, but I'm like, if you guys want stuff, my players will just invent something like, oh, yeah, the hospital is there, or we have a diner here. Or I invented a random bed and breakfast because I'm like, oh, that would be fun. It's just like, add in random things, it fits the world, it fits where they are. And it's just fun to not have everything set up beforehand and almost constrain what you can do in the story. Absolutely. The best piece of world building advice I ever got was from, ironically, a theater professor I had back in my college days, and they would talk about constructing settings and worlds and things like that for script writing purposes. And the advice was like, your world should be a living, breathing thing that can adapt and react to what's happening around it too. You can't let your thing be static. So if you have a player who's like, I really need this thing, is there one nearby? You get to make a judgment call it's cheesy and we all make fun of it in role playing, but yes and or no, but really do a lot of heavy lifting in world building. So you can say, Is there a hospital? And you can look at the extensive lore that you wrote and you're so brilliant. Good for you. Bully. And if you don't see a hospital and you tell that player no, then you just shut down a potential opportunity there. You can be like, no, but you are in a residential neighborhood, so you can start knocking on doors and see if someone can help you. Exactly. There's ways that you can still come up with fun opportunities, even if you don't want something very specific. I do really appreciate that. And now I just want to talk about world building, but next time, next. Time when you bring me on for making one shots, we'll talk about that. Perfect. Yeah. No, I absolutely love that. And I love that you because there is that balance of creating a story but still keeping it open. It can be very difficult to have them both be true. Be like, I still want to follow the space thing I created, but I do want to have it customizable to the players and what they want to do. The main thing if you're running Arc or anything, is to not it's that expression, kill your darlings. You have to be open to someone being smarter than you in any given moment or like thinking of something you didn't think of and being okay with that. And not just okay with it, but wanting to roll with it and be like, we are doing this together. This isn't the subject, my friends, to my brilliance session. This is a tabletop role playing game where we're trying to have fun together. And I think Arc gives a lot of power to the players and it gives a lot of power to the Guide. And they work together in tandem because ultimately, I think the Guide doesn't want the apocalypse to happen. You don't want your players to lose. But unlike any other TTRPG, arc is very much so a game you can lose because D and D, there's no clear ending point. The story ends either when you die or your adventure concludes. In Arc, it's like you can live through the apocalypse and that would be bad. You can play your way out of. That because it'll be terrible. But I think that's such a fun concept for games because that's why I like ten Candles a lot too. There is a clear end before we even play the game. We are all on the same page of this is going to happen in ten candles. We are all going to die at the end in Arc, the apocalypse is going to happen. What can we do in that time leading up to it, to change it, to affect the story and to try and prevent it from happening? I'm pretty sure the subheading, if you will, for Arc Doom, its big tagline is Defeat the Apocalypse. That is how you win Arc. And Arc even gives you as the Guide like, hey, here's what happens at the end based on what your players did. And it gives you endgame scenarios. It gives you after the game, what to do when that all happens. It talks to you about what happens if the Doomsday clock runs out before and you still have these sessions to play that you were planning on. I really just respect the amount of time and energy that Tomatoes put into this. To think about every possible thing to help both the Guide and the players to be like this game for as terrifying as it can be in its premise with like, there's a timer, there's an apocalypse, you have to beat it. It also takes care of you the whole way. It uses very reassuring words. Everything is easy to understand. It talks about safety tools. It talks about like, hey, if the apocalypse happens, here's what can happen afterwards. Here's some things you can read. And my favorite thing at the very tail end of the book proper is perfect. Games don't exist. Guiding a welcoming game where mistakes are okay, however, is a good target to aim for. And I'm like beautiful. You play D and D and the book ends when you talk about, I don't know, the monster appendix. This book ends telling you like, hey, it's okay if you fuck up. That's what this is for. This game is designed around fucking up. Yeah, and I love that freedom. And it's not even freedom. It helps set expectations because it can be so easy to be like, I'm ready to lead you through this grand story that I've created in my mind palace, and it's going to be on the level of critical role in the greatest novels and movies. But in actuality, we're just a bunch of dorks sitting around a table telling. The story as is true in anything. Don't take anything you do in the TTRPG space too seriously. You didn't study at the Upright Citizens Brigade. You haven't been a professional voice actor and writer and are paid to do that for 25 years. You are you bring you to the table, let you fuck up. Your mind palace is probably more like a mind Holiday Inn if it's anything like mine, so don't treat it too seriously. This is a fun game and to have fun with your friends and, know, simulate some good old fashioned stress. I'll tell you after session two of this game that we play for Bella's Comet, when the timer officially starts and the players have to run through that scenario, they got to the end of the episode with the thing they were trying to do being left unresolved. And I could feel it through the discord video. I could feel all of the assholes get so tight and then be told, like, that's the timer. And then all of them going, oh, God, it's so real. You feel every minute of it. And when you hit that timer and you know you still have the omens counting down, and you know you have only so many moments to stop it, and you know that you didn't quite make it on that one particular session. You feel it. Yeah. Oh, my gosh. And I can just imagine the buy in for the game as well. You need a good group that is ready to buy in and get invested because there is that stress, and there's the counting down. And I can even imagine trying to almost plan even between sessions, like, okay, this is what we need to do. We need to be quick about it. We need to make sure to keep stuff going because we only got an hour. That's also the appeal of it, because how many campaigns out there have ended after, like, what, session 8910, what have you, because a baby got sick or, oh, we're going out of town, so I can't make it this week. And then it's another week and another, and then you have no idea what happened to all your funny little elven friends. This game, you could bring it on a camping trip. You're going camping for three days, and you're with your nerd friends, bust out arc. Doom. You can do three sessions at an hour and a half each, still go on your hikes, play one session a day, and you've completed your journey. This mythical camping trip coming from me, the guy who last went camping for his 18th birthday, it could be anything. Camping trip, cabin in the woods. Your buddies are like, hey, I have, like, three or four weeks max that I can actually come on Saturdays, and then I got to go move to Portland or whatever. Yeah, bust out arc. Hey, I have this great game. It's designed to be played quickly. I literally can't have it go over because there's a mechanical reason for it. And at max, we can play, like, four sessions, maybe more, maybe less. It's minimal one. It's designed for it. Yeah. And it just helps with those time constraints. It really does, because it's so easy to be over ambitious when you're playing anything else. And it's not that you can't put those limits of, like, we're only doing four sessions of this because you can obviously do that, but having it in the game. It is kind of physically impossible to go over that if you're playing it how it's supposed to be played. You can't do that. Yeah, there's a literal number. Okay, guys, this is going to be a three session story. It has this number of moments in it. I literally can't if we have fun after session three, we can just do a new arc game basically, because after that, the number is over. Yeah. And it's almost I can even see the appeal of playing it. It has a lot of replayability because you can try different situations and you can manage your time differently. It's fun to even try just different things and just to see how the different techniques work and see if you can get better at it. Like better at the planning, better at the tactics, better at just getting into stuff. And there's so many fun. There's so many flavors. It's so play. It's fun. It's fun. As know curtain back here, audience. When Willow initially asked me to come on the show, we were going to talk about doing one shots. And I was like, well, I'm doing this other podcast that I might want to talk about a little bit, but I haven't played it yet. And it's about one system. And it's not really what I'm known for the whole one system thing. So I'll think about it. I wrapped the last episode of recording like two weeks ago at this point, I think, and I messaged Willow on Twitter and I have to talk about Arc Doom where it will explode. I remember that. I'm like, oh, yep, nope, I know it's going to be good. Like, just the immediate switch. Like. Listen, I love Game Master Monday. It is my child. It is my baby. Like, I'm so proud of the work we do there and everything we do to boost indie and minority and queer and people of color voices on that show. And also Bella's Comet is one of the sickest things I've ever done. So, like, listen, I'm really jazzed about it because once Bella's Comet is over, much like Arc, it's over. There's no season two. There's no episode one after the one. The series is over. Once it's done, I walk away from it and it belongs to the audience. I'm hyping up as much as I can before the literal timer on my time to promote this show runs out. I'm playing real life Arc Doom in the Apocalypse as well as Comet ends. I love that. But even just the mentality around that project, this is it. We are going up until this point. And I like that as well because I feel like there's so much media that will just continue to push forward when it's not necessary. Just leave it as it is. Leave it where it's perfect. This was supposed to be this one Arc and that's it. Well, I guess pun intended with it being Arc soon. I get it. But I love that so much. And I know that you did want to dive into some of the combat stuff, which we don't have to spend a whole bunch of time on, because then we can get to guide stuff, which I'm very excited for. The combat is super simple here. So Arc does initiative, but instead of rolling for it, it's based on who is doing what, where and when. And I can get a little bit more specific here with that. Definitely not talking to Stall or anything. Not me. Willow I was prepared as heck to talk about this. Okay, so they do initiative categories in this game, so there's five different things that you can do per round, essentially. So your initiative could always be shifting, basically based on what you want to do in the situation. I love shifting initiatives. So cool. The first thing you can ever do is stand your ground. So you get into a situation, someone's threatening you. If you just want to stand tall and tough and be there, then you get first dibs on what you do. The second is if you're planning on taking a non harmful action, you get second dibs. I remember reading about this. Yeah, sorry. Continue. Yeah. If you have the book, please open the page 77. That's what I'm reading from everyone. Please follow along. You will be quizzed afterwards by me and we'll see if I remember everything. The third thing you can do is you can attack or harm others. I like that. Attacking and harming are two separate things because you can harm people in different ways in this game. Remember, you can hurt their feelings and cause actual damage. The fourth thing a person can do is use a spell or a technique. And your last initiative, if your plan is to go far away, arc does have a distance system. I will tell you right now, we didn't use it for Bella's Comet because it's an audio format, and that was asinine for me. But that doesn't mean it's not a bad system. It just means it didn't personally work for our audio format because you're not going to visualize that sort of thing. It's kind of like how when you're watching or listening to Adventure Zone, for example, they never talk about movement speeds in that game because it's an audio format. We're just keep going. Yeah. Dimension 20 critical role. They do it, we don't. But in this game, distance is called heights. So you can move more than two heights in this game. And if you want to know what heights are, buy the game. That's my plug. Listen, I'm not going to tell you everything. Don't use this episode to be like, oh, I get the gist now. Just buy the game. It's $25, please. Supposed to buy if you want to know what a height is. And they also have a free quick start, I believe, as well. So even if you don't want to go right into buying the game, you want to test it out for yourself, get the quick start so that you can try it out with your friends, emotionally devastate them, and then get the. Game and then really fuck up their shit after you buy it. Exactly. But yeah, that's initiative order. And then from there, it's just using the stats you already have to do damage. You can have weapons in this game and they do have stats attached to them like a flaming sword. For example, we have a character in the game who is able to summon magical items as one of her skills. So you can do that. And I won't go too in depth into this because I'm not really known as a combat guy, but I will say me not being a combat guy and being very adverse to it, I hardly ever do combat in D and D, for example. But in this game, it's very fun, it's very easy, it's very intuitive. Every type of initiative has its own set of rules that you can look into. So a lot of flexibility in how you can hit someone. Yeah, I like that. And so I am curious, is it like so characters kind of just decide what, I guess, action, what approach they do want to take for the combat. And let's say there's two characters that decide to stand their ground. Do they both go at the same time then? Yeah. So essentially, ideally, you would like someone in the situation to be covering each initiative step. So one of the things that the rules can tell you is if someone else is already doing a step that precedes where you are at, then you can't do it. So like, for example, say someone's like, okay, I'm going to do Stand My Ground and they're the first person to say it. Right. That means you would have to pick something apart from that, but you can pick anything else from the list from that point. Now, that's a very loose rule and it's not something that we always adhere to. A big thing with Arc is that it will tell you that when the situation warrants, you're allowed to break rules around the game. A very good piece of advice I heard from this very podcast is if you're not always sure what the rule is, you can make a judgment call that makes the most sense for your players. You're not bogged down by reading rules. The entire time, especially in a time sensitive game, too. Yeah, and for recording purposes, I wanted to make sure that we were both honoring the source material because, again, I'm pretty sure we're the first actual play to use it. So I didn't want to misrepresent Momato's work, but I also was like, the story is going to be our primary focus, and if it doesn't make sense for three people to be in a. Situation where they're fighting for their life. They're all clearly going to pick step three. I'm not going to tell them. Well, you can't because the rules won't let you. We're not going to say only Zara can hit the guy and you other two have to figure something else out. No. And the game allows you to do that. Yeah, I like that a lot, actually. So it just gives that extra bit of flexibility so you can follow kind of the steps or do whatever is right in that situation, which I think is great. And I think it's also interesting, too, because I feel like you would have to be pretty fast with your decision making on what step you would even take. Because again, time sensitive. Yeah. Conflict is not designed to go for a long time. You've all seen Dimension 20. They have like two hour, two and a half hour episodes just dedicated to fighting Arc. No, you do not want to be in that situation for very long. We either got to get through this or get away from it. Yeah, actually, I just got done playing a game of cottages and services yesterday, and pretty much the entire time we were just role playing and doing a block party, making lemon sponge cake. And then we finally got to the combat, took like 2030 minutes. We were done, but we were can. I tell you ideal? No, it was great because it's like you get to experience the fun of combat, of it being a big show and dealing damage and all of that, but you don't get it. Being like DND combat can tend to be where it's just super drug out. It's like an hour. I play games that it's like 3 hours of combat. I'm like, no, I can't. I can't do this. It's so boring. Especially in big groups where your initiative turn doesn't even come around for like 20 minutes. Yeah, I could tell you horror stories about me completely checking out, blacking out, losing focus during a DND combat session, which is why I don't run them too terribly often. Anything that requires us to sit and do math and loosely describe physical actions is not my usual bag. But that being said, the combat in Arc Doom is so fun and intuitive and designed to go quick because you are on a you know, I'm not going to say how much combat's in Bella's Comet, but there is enough of it to get a good flavor of it. I love that. So very fun. Gosh, I'm excited. I really want to play this. Sweating. I hope they like me. Absolutely. Okay. But yeah, actually there is a question that I would like to ask because this whole thing is surrounded by the apocalypse and stuff like that. Would you say that players should expect character death or lethality within the game? They sure can. I would say expect is a strong word. Anticipate. I would say for sure because you can die in this game, but it's also so I like the way they do it in this game. So there are two situations in which your death can occur and they don't define death as in the loss of your life. They define death as in the loss of your ability to do things or your ability to be of use within the story of the game. So, for example, you could run out of blood, right? You get zero in blood. You got your teeth kicked out and you have zero blood. You're not dead yet, but any further damage, like blood damage you continue to take now starts affecting your approach scores so it can bleed into your actual statistical abilities. And if those all hit zero, then your character can't participate anymore. They don't have the functionality in store, so you can mechanically die, but your character can still be alive. And then it's up to you and your guide what that means. So you can say, I have no more approach scores. So either my character is going to be shell shocked, too nervous, physically damaged to the point where they can't do their things, but still around and have to be another thing that our party has to attend to and take care of, or you can die and you can make a new character. You can exit the story, whatever seems fit for that. But the game is very deliberate in saying this doesn't mean your character dies, because I think one of the big things talking about safety rules is like, maybe you're playing with someone where death really affects them and that's a hard thing for them to talk about. Or you can have a player who's like, I died, I can't play anymore. Like, well, you still can play. You're just going to have this big disadvantage compared to the rest of the team now. So they cover that. There's ways to recover from that. There's ways you can continue to play the game but at a severe disadvantage. So, yeah, anticipate it gauge correctly, you can expect that. But that is up to you and your guide. Yeah, okay. I like that a lot because I'm curious on how they did handle that aspect of the game since it can be goofy and it can be whatever you want, but it still is pretty high stakes given the kind of setting around it with the whole apocalypse and stuff, right? Exactly. Yes. Apocalypse too, can be just about anything. That could be a world ending cataclysmic event. It could be like, hey, we're playing a wedding game and we've got about an hour and a half until our insane aunt comes over and wrecks this thing. So now it's our job to make sure that doesn't happen. That would be so fun. And that's the beauty of systems like this, where it's like just the base game. That's what it's for. You're just trying to prevent something from happening. It can be anything. It really can. It could be something as goofy as, yeah, we're just trying to prevent our aunt from coming over and ruining it all. But she's racist and you know who she's marrying, and we just can't let her get you the so, like, whatever we got to do to keep her from attending this wedding. That's the impending doom, if you will. So it can be as serious as the premise of Bella's Comet, where a comet's coming to destroy the city, or it can be as light hearted as know. That's why I like running systems as opposed to modules, because a lot of people were like, here is the story that I want to be told, and that's great. And my sister is so much better at running those than I am. I like being given the skeleton and then putting the meat on it. Yes, same. I love doing that as well. It's just so fun. But I love that a lot. And so, I mean, kind of going into the guide stuff, did you find that Arc Doom had, like, good I guess. Did it provide good tools and support for you to be able to build the meat on that skeleton and be able to tell the story that you wanted to tell? Oh, swimmingly. I've been heralding this. It's like the best system I've ever encountered for an actual play format. And I very much so stand by that. So the origin of the story was me coming up with well, I actually shouldn't say that I had a setting in mind first because I wanted to challenge myself to make something I hadn't really done before. I am a more comedic writer. I'm more into relatability and things like that. I do a lot of modern settings if I've given the choice, or just like Monty Python caliber fantasy stuff. That's my usual wheelhouse. So when concocting this show, I was like, I don't do Sci-Fi. I don't do drama a lot. I'm kind of, for some reason, feeling a certain kind of cyberpunky vibe. So I start hunting systems like that. I initially think cyberpunk read, but I'm also like, I don't have a year to read this book. That's a big one. That's my white whale as an RPG system. I will get it one day, but it is not this day. Yeah. So I start looking around and then I find Arc Doom, and it talks about stopping the apocalypse. It talks about being on timer. And then I'm like, what kind of cool apocalypse could befall a Sci-Fi world? So I love space. I like reading nerdies. I'm the kind of guy reading the scientific journals that come out about new planets and other galaxies and stuff. So it's on my brain already anyway. And I just watched Oppenheimer as a movie, so I'm thinking about blowing shit up. And also space, of course. I find this game where there's an apocalypse and I start reading it and then the story was literally built out of the bones of this game. So I was very well supported. Like, every wild idea I could have had had a thing I could use inside of the story. This story has, I personally think, the scariest villain I've ever come up with. A genuinely spooky person to play who has a really devastating skill set. And this game gave me the power and the flexibility to role play, how I like to role play and also keep my characters and my players really happy and engaged. I love that so much. Again, I just have to say I'm so excited for this freaking to come out. Me too. Me listen. Me too. Can September be, like, over already? Please. Are you saying you would like me to wake you up when September ends? Yes, I would like I love that you just said that. I love Green Day. Thank you. Me too. Well, I like Green Day up until 2009. After that, I'm a little sketchy. No, but I love that it did support you so much. And again, I just find it really fun to hear you talk about the game and how it's like all the puzzle pieces just fit together. It's like yeah, it just built upon itself. You didn't even need to force anything to work. Yeah, and I've definitely forced things to work. For certain games. I've had a good experience of almost every system I've run, which I think is coming up close on, like, shit, 30 at this point. Through Game Master Monday, I've run a lot of systems and a lot of modules. Thanks. It's a lot of work. But I do find myself being like, I have an idea, but I don't know if this system supports that idea. And I did promise this creator we would do that. And I do want to highlight the system, but I think I'm going to have to come about it a different way. I didn't have that issue with Arc. Arc supported every Sci-Fi thing I could think of. The only thing I had to Jerry rig a little bit was a spell system. But I was so proud of the workaround for that and finding a story reason to do that and kind of supporting something we have planned inside of the story to make that even more fluid. So I was happy to do it that way, and it wasn't me being like, this system won't let me achieve my vision. It was like, oh, this is something that I can use, but I can turn the knob on it a little bit differently and tell a different story within Arc. No, I love that. And so in your opinion, how easy was it to do some modifications to some of the rules and mechanics, like the spells? I didn't have to do too much of it, which is always a good thing and finding the loopholes, we had to find again, the combat situation. We fixed up a little bit to make it more fluid for an audio format. And that was really easy because the game tells you you're allowed to do that. You're allowed to adjust what you need to adjust to make it work for your table. There were just some instances where I had to make a judgment call. Oh, you all want to hit the person who's trying to kill you? Okay, yeah, fair. You should be able to do that. I think that's a fair ask. Yeah. You all have fight, not flight. All right, let's go. So we were able to adjust to that and then we were able to adjust the spells thing to make it more dire and unique to this setting. Because I'm building a cyberpunk future. Sci-fi technology has advanced crazy far world, and I toyed around with the magic of that for a while. But I thought the most dramatic thing that could be was like, this world doesn't know magic exists because it's Earth. It's our actual real world here in the future. And as far as I check, as of right now, we don't have the ability to have wishes granted. Not yet. We're working on it. So I was like, okay, I want magic to exist, but I want it to exist in a really small way. And I want this to be the reason why this party is able to fight the apocalypse. So that's the story reason why we made an adjustment. Not because Ark was making me mad or anything, just I made this setting and I want it to work this way. I love that. And so I am curious just because I think this is a fair thing to ask, even if I know that people love their systems and games and stuff like that. Is there anything that you have, though, come across where it's like, I don't like that as much within the actual Arc Doom system? I'm going to say no. So nothing in this game drives me up a wall or anything. And most other big name systems I can think of something like the movement rules in D and D. Hate them, fuck them. I think character creation and pathfinder can be a little too complicated. I have my gripes with other systems, but with Arc, the challenge for me was adjusting how I thought about what players need to roll for and how to tell them to do those roles. Because there is a literal instance where I told a character, like episode one, I want to say and it's going to be cut from the episode, so you'll never hear me fucking up. But it was like, make an approach score. They didn't have had a zero in it and use this ability, which they did not have on their skill tree and they go, Cool. That is a zero. I can't roll anything and I was like, I'm doing this wrong. I have to be doing this wrong. So I had to go back and reread. So the judgment call there is like, okay, I'll change the role you have to make so you can fucking play. But then I was like, okay, wait. Is Arc designed in a way where there's going to be a wall where a character has to do something, or am I guiding them incorrectly? Spoilers. It was me guiding them incorrectly. They're supposed to be allowed how they approach a situation unless it's already been come clear, and they need some guidance based on the scenario. So I tell them, make an insight check. If they don't have insight, they can say, okay, can I approach this creatively so I can at least have a chance to succeed? And I go, yes. Yeah, I like that. That's a fun way to do it, too, because then that gives more agency on the players, too, to use things that they're good at and to just also just flavor, too. This is just a creative person that I'm playing. They're going to think of things in a creative way, and so that's where they're going to approach most of their things. Yeah. And if they're not sure and they've already described the action to you, they can say something to the effect of, like, I'm going to try to rob this guy just straight up by knocking him over, grabbing the hat, and leaving the place, and I'm going to go, okay. That's a concerted approach for sure, in case they weren't clear on if that was careful. But if it's more something to the effect of, like, I want to try to achieve this goal, then I can say, that sounds like this ability. How do you want to do this, Mercer? And then they choose the approach. Yeah, no, I like that a lot. Oh, man. And I love that even you even being able to come to that realization while you were playing, like, hold on, something is going wrong. Yeah. I'm not so precious where I'm like, no, this is how we play the game for sure. I feel like if you're ever playing a game and the game is telling you no, either it was designed poorly or you misinterpreted something. I cannot think of any system that flat out tells you, no, do not do that. I can't think of a design where a creator would give you stats and approaches and skills and spells, and then there would just be a wall where you can't use those. So I had to have been doing. It wrong, and I love that as well, because most people, when they're creating a game, they're creating options for you to use to then limit it feels counterproductive. Why would you limit the fact that they could use this? And some games do it on purpose to hype up the drama, but I can't think of any system where it's like, hello. These are all of your skills. You cannot use them if you do it this way. Yeah, you lose them. They're not yours. You imagine being like, Hello, Dean, I have a plus zero in my intimidation. Can I still use this? No, you cannot. It is zero. Like, what? No. You should at least give me a try. Please. Can I try? No, you cannot try. I will not let you. Fuck you. The game said no. Like, no game says no. Yeah, exactly. And I always love playing games, especially as well. I will full on role and do things that I'm not good at because I'm like, it makes sense for what my character wants to do. There's still a chance of success. It's not just end all, be all. Because I know there's one game that I played, the Witch is Dead, and I know that one of the players there just wouldn't roll with anything other than the top stat that they had. I'm like, where's the fun? Where's the risk? Love the witch's dead. Love everything. Grant has, again, a game that is absolutely never telling you no. Even if it seems impossible, this game is going to give you at least a 1% chance of getting out of this situation. Exactly. And that was what I was when I was a magpie grabbing a kitchen cleaver to fight a butcher. We've all been there. Yeah, exactly. And I think it was like a nine. I had to roll a nine or higher, and I rolled a ten. I'm like, I am the master of knives. I cannot be stopped. Exactly. I will engage in knife to hand combat with. If anyone needs me, I will be doing violence. Thank you. Exactly. No, but it's just more fun to just try things, at least for me. I know. Definitely. People have their own ways of playing games and what they're comfortable with doing. I just think it's more fun to just at least see if it works. Because if it does work, then it's awesome. If it doesn't, then now you know. But it wasn't necessarily that. No, you can't do it. It was at least a try. I like it a lot. And it's by design. Yes, exactly. It's by design. But I think, though, we're getting close to wrapping up the episode because I don't want to hold you on for too long. Oh, no. Listen, I think it's a good point to stop at. I think it's very clear. Arc is a cool, flexible, unique system. There were things we didn't get into which is completely fine, like how some things can take real time minutes to achieve, and that takes time off of your clock. But again, if you're curious at all about anything we talked about here today, I don't work for the RPGC. I just follow Momatoes on Twitter. I think they're only aware of my existence in that they have shared that bella's Comet is in fact so, like, when I when I come on the show and talk about this system, it's because I genuinely do love it, a whole bunch. And I genuinely think that it is worth every penny you can spend on it. They even created a beautiful Excel sheet to keep track of your characters. If you want, I could sing this game's praises for runtime of five episodes if you'd let know. I pick it up. It's so much fun. That's me saying this, the guy whose reputation is staked on playing as many systems as possible. For me to reach out to Willow to be like, I need to talk about just this one. Like, that should say something. It really should. And again, make get. I heavily encourage you to get Arc Doom, but if you don't have the money to do that again, they have a free quick start that you can at least try it out and see if you like it. And then make that decision later on if you're able to get the game which links for the quickstart and the actual game will be in the description of this episode so that you can be able to get it, go to it a lot easier. I did. I got the quickstart first. That's what got me hooked. That's how I checked it out. It's addictive, but no, absolutely. And so I think we are, though, at the end here. So I'm going to let Grant have one last shot of just promoing and saying all the things before we officially wrap up and then yeah, so I'll hand it over to Grant. Yeah. Thank you for having me, Willow. This was so much fun and delight talking with you. Yeah. Like I mentioned, I'm Grant Nordine. I run I guess I run two podcasts now. So I run Game Master Monday, which comes out every other Monday. Like we said, we play a new one shot in a new system every single episode and no two casts are ever the same around the time this is going out. I don't know the exact date, so let me just talk to you about October. October, I think ish I don't know. I'll figure it out. We'll figure it out. So here's what's happening. This month, October 2, we're playing a game by Rude Dickey called I Want Your Bite. It's a vampire dating game. Check that out if you want to hear more of me and Willow being goofballs for an hour and a half. Most likely, we are playing a game called the Ghost Storage Facility, played in the Paranormal Ink system that comes out on October 16 and October 30. We're doing a live stream on Twitch. We're playing parsley. I am subjecting my sister and Kay from Dudero's My Drift and Leah from the Sleighless Stars to an RPG game that is based off of old 80s text adventures. And they're going to be playing horror games in that system. That sounds so cool. It's going to be frustrating and cool. That's how it's designed, baby. And then of course, the other podcast which I've talked this whole episode about is Bella's Comet, played in this very system, the Arc Doom system. The first episode comes out October 4 and is going on a twelve episode run every single Wednesday. So check us out when that comes out. And of course, buy or download the free version of Arcdoom and become addicted and go on a camping trip. Exactly. Wise words to end us with. But yes, please get Arcdoom, get. The quick start again, will be in the description along with all of Grant's information for Twitter, where you can find his podcast, all of that good stuff, along with also Bella's comment. Comment. God damn, you got this. Bella's comment, there we go. Will also be in the description as well so that you can check it out when it comes out. Well, it will probably already be out, so check it out now because it's going to be amazing. If you aren't already convinced to listen, then I don't know why you wouldn't. Think it's cool if we didn't convince you here. We'll never convince you and I'm at peace. Exactly. But yes, thank you so much, Grant, for coming on and talking with me. And thank you everyone for listening. I hope you had a great time and just go and play more games, please. Craig. Craig. Craig.