We’ve now got first drafts for the play aids for Sons of Liberty in preparation for the beta playtest starting soon. Available in letter-sized 8.5×11 format, these play aids are freely downloadable.

Patriot Sheets

Break the rules Patriot style on this simple mad-libs style character sheet. List off your patriot’s favored circumstances, slot in specialty suits, and you are all set to kick ass and take names.

Then, when you’re shouting about how you smack General Thomas Gauge in the face with a giant gear, the sheet also lists the four suits of the game and their corresponding flavors of narration — is that a Patriotic action, or is it a Clever action?.

Available in letter-sized 8.5×11, two to a page.

Tory Sheets

When you play Tory, you’re not playing one villain, you’re playing five. What’s Howe’s Abuse? What’s Bloody Mary’s Usurpation? What’s the difference between playing a 3 and a 4? It’s all laid out here for quick reference, along with a slot for the Secret Objective of Campaign Mode.

Available in letter-sized 8.5×11.

Objectives Sheet

Start the game off right at the Grand Lodge of the Americas, plotting the ascendancy of the American Dream. Use this Objectives Sheet to decipher the Whist Code and identify the key priorities that will help the Sons of Liberty carry the day against the dastardly Tories.

Available in letter-sized 8.5×11.

I realized a couple days ago that I had hit the point in developing Sons of Liberty that I needed to see it in layout to keep developing the manuscript effectively. So last night I sat down and put together a ’starter’ layout, and flowed a little over 80 pages of the book. Since all of the art in the book is square (for eventual potential as art on a custom deck of cards), I just dropped 4×4, 2×2, and 1×1 frames into the pages to adjust flow.

Then I placed actual art into the frames, cause, hey, why not? They were on my hard drive anyway.

I was surprised by how quickly and easily all the disparate pieces came together to make a very good design draft. It’s always encouraging to find out you’re farther along than you thought you were.

I’m going to fiddle a bit, and then I may have some sample spreads to show off.

(Clicky for Larger)

The British are Coming! Help spread the news of the upcoming Sons of Liberty roleplaying game with this rugged teeshirt with art by the fantastic Jake Richmond. The tee sports one of the game’s teaser images: Paul Revere on a “midnight ride” ahead of a lumbering British war machine. It’s a great image for inspiring double-takes, which is always what I look for in a teeshirt. These tees are from the same folks that made us the Nerdly Beach Party tees, and are high quality shirts with some rock-solid screenprinting. Revenue from these shirt sales will go directly into the production of Sons of Liberty. Price: $20.00 Order your shirt here.

In short form, folks, this is a very cool looking tee-shirt that I’m shilling to defray overhead for the game. I figure, if I’ve got this excellent art, I might as well use it. So if you’re looking forward to Sons of Liberty and if you’d like a neat shirt, I’ve got a neat shirt for you. If you’re looking forward to the game but don’t need this fantastic shirt, well then, I’ll have a game for you in Election Year 2008!

At Gamex, I got interviewed for Have Games, Will Travel by the inestimable Paul Tevis. I would say that I sound funny and that I don’t normally sound like that, but I think it’s mostly just how you never sound like you think you do. So apparently I sound like a nebbish. Good thing to know.

Paul and I talk about Full Light, Full Steam, the Sons of Liberty playtest, NerdSoCal.com, and… a whole lot of other stuff.

So you’re sitting there at like, Taco Bell lunch or something, and all of a sudden you get this EUREKA lightning bolt of how to fix some piece of your under-development game. And you think it over, and you analyze it, and you work through the repercussions, and more and more you’re thinking, “Yes, this is the solution! This fixes three different problems at once! This is beautiful!”

And then you open the rules document, find the right place in the manuscript, and you change three words. Brilliant insight, change the entire experience of play, the only impact to the manuscript is this little tiny corner of the text. Kind of a letdown.

(But then you playtest it and it’s awesome.)

So last night we played the second installment of our Sons of Liberty playtest where we are trying out the Campaign Mode. We have cleared the Stamp Acts phase and we are now in Shot Heard Round the World.

Last night it was Mark, Judson, and I. Turo, who played in the first session where we cleared Stamp Acts, couldn’t make it, but the game continued undeterred, as it is meant to. It was rather gratifying how much this was not a problem; I don’t want to say that I was happy that Turo didn’t game with us, but I was happy to see that Turo not being able to play didn’t upset the game.

Mark wanted to give the Tory player a try this time around, so Judson and I picked Patriot figures. I played Tom Paine; Judson went with Thomas Jefferson, who Mark played in the prior session. Again, the repeat of characters was a great, big non-issue, and that made me happy. This was also the first time we played with the Tory figures prepared and “on-line” so Mark picked up Governor William Tryon to start with (although he switched to Dunmore later, see below).

We drew objectives and filled out the mad libs sheet, although this time we only bantered about the primary objective and left the three opportune objectives to be fleshed out in cut scenes. I really liked this change, as it led to more fluid play and a sense of possibility and unknown that hasn’t been part of the game since the first (single-objective, multiple-scene) playtest. Our primary objective was “The Sons of Liberty must disassemble an apprentice while the British smuggle an author.” Our interpretation was, of course, that General Howe’s aide-de-camp was a cunning clockwork boy who advised him on tactical matters. While Howe was distracted getting a pro-Tory anti-revolution author into the colonies, we could sabotage the aide-de-camp.

When I did up Thomas Paine’s favored circumstances, I nabbed “while flying his ornithopter” right quick. (I also took “when impersonating an officer,” “witnessing and reporting,” and “using pamphlets.”) So the opening travel scene saw the two Toms flying south to Savannah. Mark had us pursued by a “Flying Snake” British airship. We were outgunned, but the intervention of the Turtle evened the odds and we captured the airship. End of travel hand.

I got the cut scene, so I picked up the opportune objective “The Sons of Liberty must forge a customs house lest the British install a fleet.” The cut scene consisted of the two Toms enjoying the airship captain’s store of brandy and discovering plans to build an entire fleet of the things to crush the revolution. All the parts, however, were coming in through a customs house in Savannah, so we decided to subvert the customs house and divert the parts to Valley Forge. I really, really liked how the next objective was developed from within the progress of the game rather than before play began in earnest. It felt natural and created a less jerky story.

So the two Toms stormed the custom house and rather soundly trounced what little opposition there was. Mark’s chosen starter Tory figure could only lock down sets of 5s and 7s, and none of these came up in the course of that scene. This became the “big problem” of this playtest. The Tory figures were implemented, sure, but it turns out that their abilities are so narrowly defined that it is quite possible for the Tory player to be unable to actually exercise them. This was a problem, especially since the “value” of the hand is determined by how often those abilities are used. So while Judson and I won the hand, we didn’t actually win anything mechanical. Still, we kicked the redcoats out of Savannah and raised Betsy Ross’ new flag. Booyeah for us. It’s also important to note that that hollow victory was our last.

Tory partisans had scattered out into the hills surrounding Savannah; in the next cut scene we selected the objective “The Sons of Liberty must deliver a court before the British arm colonists.” The interpretation was, of course, that we had to set up a proper government in Savannah to find and disarm those Tory partisans before the British gave them enough guns that they could retake the city. It was here that Mark ditched Tryon and picked up Dunmore. Mark exercised his abuse (militia of ex-slaves) and usurpation (collusion with the Shawnee) three or four times, and this was a glory to behold. There was tons of setting color injected into the game on a pretty organic, natural basis. Backed up by his militia of freed slaves and Shawnee allies, Dunmore kicked us the hell out of Savannah. I didn’t mind very much because it felt so appropriate.

Judson took the next cut scene and directed us at the objective “The Sons of Liberty must destroy a brother mason lest the British rescue a heliograph station.” There was a destroyed heliograph station, Judson explained to us, and a fellow mason was being manipulated through his pride to help rebuild the tower bigger and grander than before. We had to stop this or else word would get to Howe about the insurrection in Savannah and he’d know something was afoot. The two Toms leapt to action… and totally ate it. Whether it was poor cards in our hands or Mark competently shutting us down, we got nowhere here, tried to infiltrate the mason’s manor and embarrass him but the British found us out and we had to run for the hills.

Round about here, we were looking at Mark’s stack of 12 Tyranny, and realized that only the Primary Objective was left and Judson and I would have to get 34 cards on the table before Mark collected his three face cards, which was a tall order. After a desperate cut scene in a rickety shack, the two Toms resolved to give it their best for the cause of liberty. We infiltrated (using connections with the staff attending to Howe’s camp), we pamphletted (silencing captives by stuffing their mouths with pamphlets), we loomed (Jefferson is 6′2″!)… we got into General Howe’s inner sanctum, loaded a wax cylinder of seditious lies into the clockwork aide-de-camp… and then Mark called the question. We had 33 cards on the table to his 34 points. We lost by ONE POINT.

The sabotage of the aide-de-camp was discovered, repaired, and the yellow-bellied monarchist author was smuggled into the colonies. The two Toms fled into the night, flew off in Paine’s ornithopter, defeated for the day but alive to fight another day.

This was a very positive playtest; I was somewhat concerned that the Tory player was sort of a chump source of adversity there to kind of challenge you but not really. The inclusion of the Tory figures really evens the playing field and makes the Tory player very competitive. We had more than a few currency issues, but they were plain and transparent currency issues, and the way forward is pretty clear, there.

Just in case you were wondering what yesterday’s post would look like in Sons of Liberty (I know I was), here’s the objectives sheet:

On this day, two hundred and thirty-two years ago, a column of British regulars approached Lexington. They had marched all night on a “secret” mission into Massachusetts, their objective the colonial weapons stores at Concord. They were to quietly remove the arms from colonial hands before the colonials knew what had happened. Their secret mission, however, had been made public knowledge thanks to the efforts of Paul Revere and a dozen other riders who had warned the countryside that “the Regulars are coming!” The column marched into Lexington, an overlookable hamlet at a crossroads on the way to Concord, and found the town’s militia waiting for them.

You know that much already. This is what you might not know, and the following is unvarnished, documented fact:

A few days before, General Gage had issued orders to the Regulars in Massachusetts to treat surrendering colonists gracefully… excepting if said colonists were John Hancock or Sam Adams, who were to be clapped in irons if found. Hancock and Adams were in hiding… in Lexington.

Paul Revere had galloped from Boston out to Lexington because his spy network had intercepted British battle plans. Most of the Regulars marching in the column, by contrast, did not know what their mission was even as they approached Lexington. Revere worked with other express riders, but he himself headed to Lexington because he knew that Hancock and Adams were staying there, directly in the path of the British battle plans.

Revere alerted Lexington, told Hancock and Adams to get out of town, and rode on to Concord, as well. Then he came back to Lexington. Why? Because he knew Hancock and Adams. When Revere returned, Hancock was oiling his gun and cursing that the Regulars wouldn’t run him out of town without a fight. Eventually, they convinced Hancock he was more valuable to the movement alive and active than dead and vindicated. Revere rode back towards Boston, towards the British column.

Revere was captured by a forward scouting party, along with two compatriots he’d picked up on the way. When questioned, Revere blithely answered with colonial pride, confounding the soldiers, and proceeded to pump the Regulars for information even as he spouted misinformation at them. He was buying time: the scouting party was dangerously close to Lexington, and more than capable of capturing a buggy with Hancock, Adams, and Hancock’s fiancee and future mother-in-law.

Meanwhile in Lexington, the militia had assembled on the town commons. Another rider rode up from the east. The countryside was full of wild rumors, and this rider reported with full confidence that the Regulars were not headed through Lexington. The militia began to disperse. Half of them headed for the tavern, since they were up, anyway. It was an old New England tradition not to carry loaded weapons into taverns, which seems pretty sensible. Before stepping inside, the lot of them discharged their rifles into the air.

Less than a mile away, the Regulars leading Revere and company towards Lexington heard the crack of rifles echo over the New England countryside. Revere nodded confidently and told the soldiers that the militia had assembled. Continuing through Lexington would be certain death. The scouting party, uncertain of what to do, released Revere. Taking his horse, they headed cross-country back towards the column. Revere walked back to Lexington.

The British column could now be seen in the distance in the weak morning light. Revere headed directly to where he had left Hancock and Adams. They were gone, but John Lowell, Hancock’s confidential clerk, came to Revere in a panic. He had seen Hancock and Adams off, but only afterwards remembered Hancock’s trunk, left behind in the rooms above the tavern. In the trunk were Hancock’s papers and correspondence, the lot of which would implicate every member of Hancock’s network if they fell into British hands.

Revere and Lowell hurried towards the tavern. They found the town commons deserted, of course, and the tavern full. Revere raised the alarm again, assuring the militiamen that the British were coming, and could even be seen from the common. The townsfolk headed outside; Revere and Lowell headed upstairs. The trunk was huge: six feet long, made of oak covered with leather, and full of paper. Heavy. The two of them put their backs into it and lugged the thing downstairs.

Outside, the minutemen had reformed their line. The forward portion of the British column had stamped right past the town church, its bell ringing the alarm, and to the other side of the green. The British officers, true to form, were not at the front of the column, so the Regulars stood, waiting anxiously for orders on how to deal with the handful of colonials with guns formed up in a ragged line. The colonials, for their part, waited to see what the Regulars did.

Then Paul Revere staggered backwards out the front door of the tavern and onto the town commons, lugging the gigantic trunk full of incriminating papers, with Lowell on the other end. The two of them proceed to carry the thing across the common, through the militia’s lines. One wonders what the British soldiers at the front of the column made of the situation; without orders, nobody stopped them.

Revere and Lowell carted the trunk into the woods just outside of town. Later, Revere would recall that he did not see the first shot fired, but he heard it, and looking back he saw the battle begin. He saw, in fact, the entire war begin. He saw the United States begin. Heavy trunk aside, that seems to be a pretty awesome place to be.

The following is a Tory Figure for Sons of Liberty. They’re the patriots’ opposition, and they’re just as colorful as Franklin, Revere, Washington, and the gang.

Colonel Mary Stuart, Baroness Mont Stuart, Commander of the 23rd Royal Welch Fusiliers

Despite the grandiose titles, the colonists in America more commonly know this figure as Bloody Mary, and her regiment as the feared Morrigan Corbie. She is the only child of John Stuart, Earl of Bute, a disgraced former prime minister, and the grand daughter of Lady Mary Wortley Montagu, a grand dame of London society still fondly remembered. Mary Stuart grew up immersed in the movements Britain’s ruling elite, yet she was always prevented from taking a place within it due to circumstances beyond her control – her sex.
Due to an oddity of British succession laws, however, she stands to inherit her father’s lands and titles – or at least, inherit them until she marries, at which point her husband would assume the Earldom and own the family lands. Her mother, embittered at her own sterility and blaming Mary for causing it, thrust an endless parade of suitors on her and pressed her to accept an early marriage. In order to avoid such a fate, Mary sold her silk dresses and purchased a commission in the 23rd Royal Welch Fusiliers, one of the few all-female regiments in the British army. She left for the colonies without even informing her parents.
The 23rd Royal Welch Fusiliers was a different world entirely. In an army dominated by men, the women of the 23rd had to be perfectly poised, flawlessly competent, and savagely ruthless to earn the least measure of respect. It was the application of these three traits in Ireland that earned them the nickname of the Morrigan Corbie, after the terrible phantom queen of Irish legend. Mary found the strict organization and admiration of excellence to her liking, and made herself at home, quickly becoming a skilled officer. Despite their brutal effectiveness, however, the army’s institutionalized disdain for the Corbie’s sex meant that they were often put on the front lines, ordered far afield, and poorly provisioned. The posting to the colonies in America is no different.
In 1765, Mary is promoted from Major to Colonel by General Gauge and takes command of the Royal Welch. Gauge’s use of her regiment for the worst abuses quickly earns Stuart her own nickname, which she does not hesitate to use herself when it serves her purposes. The Royal Welch acquit themselves well at Bunker Hill, making them a notable exception in that pyrrhic victory, and participate in many of the battles and skirmishes throughout the escalating war. Throughout, Bloody Mary serves with a vicious pragmatism that quickly becomes her signature.

Abuses and Usurpations: Whenever Bloody Mary dashes patriot plans with simple, violent action, the Tory player may spend one Tyranny to steal a Queen from the end of any straight. The Tory player then discards any other card.

Addendum: Do you have any idea how hard it is to find a Georgian woman with a historical record who wasn’t a liberal-leaning writer?

So this past OrcCon was a blast: I got to run FLFS (and sold three with hardly any effort applied), did another great Primetime Adventures, got to play in John Wick’s Houses of the Blooded preview (more on that later), and then turned the tables and got John to play the current version of Sons of Liberty. He’s going to be writing the introduction, and I figured it might be a good idea for him to actually play the damn thing before he ran off to Arizona.

I rounded up three players for the playtest late Sunday night; one dropped out and I first of all confirmed that the game plays better with three Patriots than with two Patriots. That said, we had Paul Revere (played by Arturo Rubio, who has zero web presence but is awesome) and Alexander Hamilton (played by the Wick). In about thirty seconds we realized that we were about to play Sons of Liberty: the Buddy Movie.

We pulled cards to determine the situation (for reference, play with the online version ). The primary objective was “The Sons of Liberty must monkeywrench spring boxes before the British can equip a street gang.” The opportune objectives had them replacing ship captains and helping out a mole among Tory supporters. As we played the Grandmasters of the Americas, deciphering the whist code objectives, John insisted that the spring boxes in question were not normal spring boxes, but something more sinister. We ran with it.

The first scene of any Sons of Liberty game must be one of three options: it must be a chase scene, a big fight scene, or something must explode. We went with a chase scene: Alexander Hamilton and Paul Revere pushing their horses to the limit ahead of pursuing redcoats. There’s witty banter, there’s evading pursuit, there’s tricking the British, and then they decide to switch from horses to a carriage to avoid being recognized when they roll into Salem, their destination. Patriot players have full control of all rebels and patriots in the game, while the Tory player controls all the loyalists. At the home of Paul’s friends with the carriage, John took the opportunity to narrate in Marie, the alderman’s daughter, who was secretly a supporter of the cause, despite her loyalist father. And right about then the game was on.

The redcoats beat Revere and Hamilton to the house; they confiscated the carriage. Marie tried to stop them, but the regulars laughed, threw her in the carriage, and headed out. The chasers became the chasees as the Sons of Liberty raced after the carriage, had a very satisfying fight scene as they thundered down the road – jumping from horse to carriage, knocking redcoats left and right – saved Marie, and headed on into town. End of opening scene.

Turo narrated a cut scene taking them into town and to the foggy Salem docks, positioning them to take on the opportune objective of replacing the ship’s captain. With a distraction provided by Marie, scandalously showing her ankles and drawing away the attention of the sailors, Hamilton grapple-gunned onto the ship and slipped below decks; Revere disguised himself as a sailor and mingled (drunkenly) with the leering men. Hamilton made contact with their mole on the ship, who showed him down to the special cargo – the spring box chained down in the middle of the hold. The mole turned out to be a triple agent, though, and shoved Hamilton towards the box, which opened its doors and began to suck him in. The patriot made clever use of his grapple gun, however, and the unbalanced mole fell into the box. Whirrs and clicks later, the box spat out two of him – one trussed up and the other murderous. One rapier duel later, Hamilton stood over the defeated man and concluded that the mysterious box split a man into his virtuous and villainous halves. Meanwhile, Paul Revere stumbled his way up close to the captain, dispatched him, and assumed his identity. When the constable came around the corner and was about to arrest poor Marie for indecent exposure, Revere swept in with a blustering distraction to buy her time. He then brought the carriage around; they loaded the spring box inside and cantered off into the Salem night with the mysterious spring box in tow.

However, the objective was not to steal the spring box, but to monkeywrench it. In order to do that, the Sons of Liberty had to find what purpose it was being put to. So with they decided to deliver it to the alderman, Marie’s father, and find out. No sooner had they stepped into the alderman’s parlour than Marie came downstairs to greet the late night “visitors.” The alderman laughed at the lot of them and thrust Marie towards the box, splitting her into good and gentle, freedom-loving Marie, and the villainous but oh so sexy Bloody Mary. Then there was fencing, rescues, and swinging from various bits of architecture. The alderman gloated that his now-loyal daughter would slaughter them and allow him to turn the street gangs into his villainous minions. However, one case of explosives and one overburdened grapple gun later, Revere, Hamilton, and Marie were whizzing out the mansion’s window inches ahead of the fireball. Which pretty much completed their primary objective.

The game ran a little short in just three meaty scenes – I’m still tinkering with the pacing mechanic, but it’s much better than the Valor nonsense I started with – but the game was damn satisfying. Both John and Turo (and Paul, who turned up towards the end) gave me tons of good notes which will be incorporated into the game, and one suggestion that I wasn’t too sure about: doing the game in explicit turns. As it stood, the patriot players and Tory player played cards willy-nilly when they could, lending support for the madcap adventure feel. To support the competitive aspect between Patriots and Tory, though, they suggested putting it into turns, which would focus the action and force discards when a Patriot couldn’t play. I was highly skeptical of the suggestion, but rather intrigued.

So we playtested it two days later. My good, longsuffering peeps at LAGames threw in for a turn-based rendition of Sons of Liberty the following Tuesday. The primary objective was “The Sons of Liberty must remove tea while the British equip a sailing ship.” Obviously, the British had stepped up their shipping schedule and the tea would arrive in Boston Harbor before Sam Adams and company were ready to have their tea party. The Sons of Liberty had to prevent the tea from arriving too soon. Opportune objectives involved bribing slaves, testing the mettle of an orator, and hiding Benedict Arnold’s militia before the British were able to send in a mistress to seduce him. Again it was two Patriots, this time Thomas Jefferson (Mark Vallianatos) and Ethan Allen (Judson Lester).

The game started with the patriots getting an emergency relay from a heliograph station, only to have the station explode halfway through the message. Then came the wing of British ornithopters dropping bombs and confiscating the mills up and down the Hudson River valley. Jefferson fought back, reasonably enough, by arguing the legal aspects of the situation. When that only went so far, he resorted to beating down redcoats with his cane (giving rise to a new tagline for the game, “Beat down redcoats with T.J. and his cane.”). Ethan Allen and his mooseriders mopped up the redcoats that were left. End of opening scene.

The turn-based thing hadn’t screwed up the entire game, so we decided to continue on. We gave the patriots hands of five cards instead of four to see if that was necessary since card play was constrained. The first opportune objective was an attempt to bribe the slaves working to supply the ship, but British security was tight – the Patriots lost out and had to make a strategic retreat. The next scene, however, involved a giant fight in a church. I mean, really, there isn’t much to say after that. The redcoats tried to break up the assembly, Ethan Allen threw a pew at them, and so on. It was pretty glorious, and certainly tested that orator, who was thereafter capable of exhorting his flock to resist British oppression. Then, accompanied by said flock, T.J. and Allen stormed the British cargo ships, “removed” the tea, and sent the British packing. A rollicking good time.

Then I was presented with a dilemma. The turn-based play was a lot simpler, easier to grasp, and allowed the players time to think, strategize, and plan. There was less performance anxiety, and in a lot of ways the game played better. However (yeah, you saw that “but” coming a mile away), while the turns brought along all this good stuff, it also subtly changed the flavor of the game. Sons of Liberty is a competitive game: not one in which a ‘winner’ is selected at the end, but one in which the players definitely compete with each other to have the coolest contributions to the game. Here’s the thing: when using turns, the competition was all about being clever. The game focused on putting together just the right combination of cards and narrating in just the right way to give you a continuing advantage later. Without the turns, the competition is right there, but it’s a different competition: it’s a competition all about being awesome. Without the time and reliable structure of taking turns, players are throwing cards on the table and shouting about how they, well, grapple-gun out of an exploding building. The feel was very different.

So I have this decision: clever, or awesome? This is a very difficult decision, especially for me. I love both of these something fierce. Choosing between them is tough! And then Mark, blessed Mark, offered these words of wisdom: “Of course, you could always put both in the book.” Of course! I could have both. And we discussed the difference between having a hand of four cards versus a hand of five cards… wait, that could also be player-selected. Then I dug down to the game’s roots… if it’s Dynasty Warriors in the American Revolution, I reasoned, shouldn’t it have an Options Screen? Players can select if they want the game to run Clever or Awesome, can decide if they want to set the difficulty to Easy (5 cards), Medium (4 cards), or Hard (3 cards). I just need to figure out how to implement Babalities and I’ll be set!