Discontinuity: Uranium Butterflies 0.83 (Patreon)

Dear heroes,

Welcome to March. Even though it's late in the month.

Reality intervenes: a sombre note

I planned to have this update out much earlier, but then the Russian invasion of Ukraine happened and ... I was quite distraught and not ready to publish things.

I have some small personal connection with the region. I know people from the country, I've visited Kiev, and it has also played a role in my family's history. Seeing the atrocities taking place over the last month was very difficult.

It was also challenging because over the last decades, since the US invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq, it was difficult not to be mistrustful of the "intelligence briefings" with no sources shown that a Russian invasion was coming. Further, from my perspective (I have a university degree in international relations), it seemed obvious that an invasion offered little strategic benefit to Russia.

So, it was a combination of surprise and shock and horror and processing how the world would play out from here. And I thought of the words of the Delphic oracle to Croesus: "ἢν στρατεύηται ἐπὶ Πέρσας, μεγάλην ἀρχὴν μιν καταλύσειν"—if Croesus attacks the Persians, he will destroy a great empire.

Frankly, I don't have any crystal ball, but I continue to feel the world's axis shifting ponderously under me, as I have since covid hit.

I pray for peace and health for everyone out there, and for all of you here, with me, on this journey with the stratometaship.

On a less sombre note ...

Still, I am fortunate — creating games and art means I can avoid the news for a while, and hopefully bring some amusing distraction to you, as well.

There is nothing wrong with pleasure and aesthetics, for after all, they make the world better and provide the optimism to go on and do good.

I believe so, anyway.

And these days the big book, the Uranium Butterflies, are really getting very close to finished. I can feel it in my bones.

It's been a very long journey, and parts of the book bothered me a lot even as I wrote them and re-wrote them. One such part was the introduction. I vacillated and dithered on how to structure it.

Finally, last Wednesday, I decided to turn the rules of the game into a standalone free-cat booklet. I thought to myself, "this will make pretty good marketing."

Well, I spent 3 hours on it and realized my brain was far too fried to do so and that I needed to finish the big book before I made the little book and then the pamphlet. So I took 4 days off to play Elden Ring and watch the rain as Winter wept its way into Spring.

By Monday the first plum flowers bloomed and I had my answer.

Yes. I confess. It's pretentious. But there you go ... what can I do. The book now begins with a short story. I hope you will enjoy it. I think it encompasses the mythos of the Vastlands quite well.

And it introduces some humane characters, too.

Thank you for bearing with me as I write this tome, now at 278 pages.

New in this update 0.83:

• Bookmarks are still wonky (Affinity Publisher issue), but the ToC works at least.
• Many illustrations added and coloured: postmodern soldier, alien outsider, timelost interloper, veda biomechane, mule whisperer, survivor in the vast, break the weak, undying lecturer, futureproof, lifewind, topcat (twice), oracle, biomancer, biomancer bunny, 
• New rides and new gear: barca pantestudina, aerosled, acephalothere, lucent amphibian, airbell, energy funnel, amphibisuit, inspirogolem, levi-disc, PAC card, metrignome, marcher gate, limo, filter symbiote, sleep egg, golem autotool, telepathic drone, wireframe autogolem, steppenwagon, void coracle.
• Redid layouts for traits and rides
• Wrote introductory short story.
• Reintroduced: intro, principles, procedures, mechanics introducing the game.

I think this adds about 10 pages.

What's left? Spells mostly. Going to add a few more items and rides. And do some cleanup on the rules for clarity.

And once it's all done?

Probably a bit of rest and a merchandise shop. Oh, on that note:

Merchandise thoughts

Yes, I'll set up an online merch shop. Is there something you'd like to see first? Some logo or picture redone? Some kind of merch? I will read what you say and that will get made first.

Right.

This is long enough.

Please, I hope you'll enjoy the attachment!

Care and life to you all,

—Luka

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And here is a tomb from the Unified Silla period. About 1300 years ago.

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P.S. I noticed an error in the hero sheet output (appendix, p. 269) - not sure why the dots don't show. They're setup the same way as before, but .afpub is ... not showing them in the output. I'll fix it eventually.