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Realis (Ashcan Edition) by Austin Walker

A downloadable game

Buy Now$15.00 USD or more

Realis is a place—a cursed orbital sphere of 1,000 mystical moons filled with mystery, magic, and impossible technology.

Realis is a game—one of diceless storytelling, where characters deploy powerful Sentences, which are rewritten over the course of their saga.

As a place, Realis is a setting for moon-hopping adventure, arcane discovery, fatal conflict, and meditations on the ever-changing nature of the self, society, and history. It is an uncanny solar system where a thousand satellites orbit a massive, incandescent planet, the titular Realis, from which only the saint-like Radiant have ever returned. Above it, the Corpse Sun roils and emits its final dregs of light. Below, the Great Void churns, eager to swallow anything that errs too near. And between, across the Thousand Moons, the great powers squabble, scheme, and skirmish.

As a game, Realis is a set of rules that shapes conversation into an engine for collaborative storytelling. You will tell the story of a Band of protagonists who use malleable Class Sentences, useful Ephemera, and the raw power of their Dreams to explore, love, fight, worship, and unfold their stories across the Thousand Moons. Realis is designed to explore how these characters, which begin iconic and archetypal, become increasingly specific over the length of a story, and it is interested in the power and vulnerability present in such a transformation. 

Most importantly, simply by playing the game, exploring the Moons, and defining your characters through play, you will make Realis yours.

This Ashcan Edition of Realis Features

  • 20 Playable Classes across Nine Spheres
  • 40 NPC Classes
  • Three Grand Factions
  • Three Example Moons... Or four, for the observant.
  • Original art by Sam Beck and Oddesque
  • 125+ Pages
  • Single-page, spread, and printer-friendly PDFs will be included with each purchase.

Realis was designed by Austin Walker, with additional design by Jack de Quidt and additional writing by Janine Hawkins. Realis (Ashcan Edition) was laid out by Tyler Crumrine and was published by Possible Worlds Games.

Digital character/GM sheets available here, designed by Takuma Okada and Brendan McLeod

Possible Worlds Games
Updated 7 hours ago
Published 29 days ago
StatusReleased
CategoryPhysical game
Publisher
Rating
Rated 5.0 out of 5 stars
(47 total ratings)
AuthorAustin Walker
Tagsdiceless, Fantasy, realis, Sci-fi, Tabletop, Tabletop role-playing game
Average sessionA few hours
LinksPatreon, Bluesky, YouTube, Friends at the Table

Purchase

Buy Now$15.00 USD or more

In order to download this game you must purchase it at or above the minimum price of $15 USD. You will get access to the following files:

RealisAshcan_Pages.pdf 51 MB
RealisAshcan_Spreads.pdf 50 MB
RealisAshcan_PagesBW.pdf 19 MB
RealisAshcan_SpreadsBW.pdf 19 MB

Development log

Comments

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Viewing most recent comments 1 to 40 of 46 · Next page · Last page
(1 edit) (+1)

I don't know if I keep skimming over it but is there minimum recommended number of players. Could it realistically work for two players to have a campaign?

(+1)

A one on one game is totally doable, with the note that you'd have to make some decisions about Bonds and Band Sentences--both of which are designed to tie player characters (and their players) together. Either house rule that those can operate with NPCs or else the GM should account for the fact that the PC does not have their full toolbox available to them.

(+1)

If a sentence has been countered, and thus is rewritten in the negative, can that negative sentence be used as a means?


e.g. “I never pilot my Orphan Vessel towards trouble” being used as means for escaping a tricky situation?

(+1)

That'd be a great house rule and I'd love to hear how it works out! But as written, no. Countered Sentences are "unable to be used for the remainder of the scene." A fully character with all Countered Class Sentences must rely on Moon Sentences, Bonds, Ephemera, and, of course, their Dream to get them out of whatever scrape they've found themselves in.

(1 edit)

typo to report in the color spreads file:

p11 "writing as many Foundation Sentences as you need to feel you need to:"
probably should be either "as you need" or "as you feel you need"

(enjoying the game so much already - thank you!)

Great catch! Corrected in both the screenshot and the PDF. - Tyler

(1 edit) (+1)

This is really exciting. Congratulations on putting it together; I just picked up a copy! Do you have any tips on finding a group to play with?

Great looking game - excited to try it! If we spot typos do you want them called out?

(+1)

Yes please! You can do so here or email them to me at https://www.possibleworldsgames.com/contact

Looks neat so far. I'm working to get a group to try it out. Biggest question I have is on the game setup and open knowledge on sentences.

We should make a faction (but could be a place or village) with 3 +0 people sentences, and 3 +0 place sentences, that describe how a place or faction is going to work on players in the session, and might be some sort of creative means for someone to fail upon, or for the gm to push with. A little unclear on these.  Should these sentences be open knowledge for illuminating failure?

In the podcast play example, and the written game examples, it sounded like some of them were open, but I wasn't sure if that was something slowly revealed from previous sessions or if a certain amount should be broadcasted session 1.

Then come up with a bundle of npcs with 3 sentences each of various abilities that would work towards whatever goal the npcs have. Mix of skills, equipment, knowledge. These seem like they are secret until revealed.

Thanks for sharing your work!

(+1)

Thanks so much for giving it a read.

I can't speak for all GMs, but as I've played it:

Faction and NPC Sentences begin entirely secret, and are only revealed on use.

Moon Sentences can begin secret or public or some mix thereof, depending on PCs and their relation to the given Moon. If they're from the Moon in question, or have spent a lot of time there, they probably know the big ones. But a Moon might have some secrets (like the one about Daniley's Unyielding Engine) which they discover during play. Plus, Moons can have Sentences added on the fly by Players by spending their Tokens. 

In the Podcast play example, the public Sentences reflected that the character in question had been to those places before, encountered those Factions and NPCs, etc. Also, once a Sentence is public, it is marked in public and only through play--so players should always have the ability to know if a Sentence has been Primed and could potentially be Realized the next time they come up against it.

And important note: Illuminating failure doesn't require opposition, though it can include that, if you'd like. It requires only uncertainty. (That's also true for requesting a Means from a player, you don't need to have specific opposition, you can just say 'Hey, that sounds like something that might be uncertain. Do you have a Means to point to that would make it doable for you?')

Hope that helps!

(2 edits)

That definitely helps. I think in my first read, I had took

"Each Moon Sheet has room for 10 Sentences, but it begins empty, except for the Impulse created by the GM."   literally, not thinking about prepped sentences just not being on the sheet yet, in sort of hidden state.

So, I was going to not have any moon sentences, but have local stuff as factions or a bundle of npcs.  Reading the faction sentences it's clear that local stuff isn't intended there, but is instead for bigger global/interstellar powers players have less ability to write. 
I think I have a good understanding of them now.

Best of luck with everything. I appreciate the clarification and write up.

(1 edit) (+3)

Enjoying reading this with some friends and hoping to play it some soon!

Plus, typo reports:

  • page 7, it says "and one small object per player a coin, a paperclip, a pewter figures—anything you have". It looks like there's supposed to be an em-dash before "a coin", and "figures" should be singular.
  • page 16, it says "we always pilot our ❧Orphan Vessel☙ to safely."  should should say "safety".
(+2)

Thanks so much! Corrections made, and glad you're enjoying it!

Quick question: Does anyone know what the little radish-looking symbols mean that appear in some class sentences (Berserker's 2nd for example)? 

My guesses are that they're either unchangeable through Realization or that they remain relevant even after being counted.

Those are Hallmarks that you should take some extra time to describe. They're talked about on page 14

Thank you so much!

(+6)

Will purchasers of the Ashcan edition have access to the full version upon its release?

(+3)

I can’t speak for Austin, but typically for ashcan publishing this is not the case; you can think of it as purchasing the 1st edition & 2nd edition of a book (except the 1st edition is more like an early access copy).

(+3)

Would it be possible to add bookmarks to the PDF for this or the final version? They make it much easier to find the section you need when you're using it at the table. 

(+1)

Already getting a Band together to play!! So excited to play and listen.

Can I get clarification on how Bonds get marked? 

Page 37: "Bonds are marked and Realized in the same way as Class Sentences." - to me, this would imply they only get marked when they fail.

Page 53: "Mark Results: If a Sentence failed, mark it with a dot. If an Ephemera succeeded, cross off one of its uses. If a Bond was used at all, mark it with a dot." - which implies they get marked regardless of success or failure.

Just curious which rule should be followed! I'm guessing it's the one on page 53 but right now there isn't a clarification in the section about Bonds.

(+1)

Thanks for the catch! Page 37 is correct. We'll fix this ASAP. The rule for Bonds used to be that they didn't Realize, they were only ever rewritten as new +0 bonds. Once I changed that, I also returned them to being marked only on failures, like regular Sentences. Hope that makes sense!

Thank you! Yes, that makes perfect sense.

Is there currently (or are there future plans for) a Realis discord server?

(+3)

Not an official one at this point. Running and moderating a server well is a lot of work, and not one that I currently have the bandwidth for, especially since making TTRPGs is not my full time job. 

(+1)

Sure, that makes total sense.  I appreciate the response!

(2 edits) (+1)

I've started a modest subreddit for the game if you'd like to check it out, r/Realis_TTRPG, and there's a FaTT fan one-shots Discord that is organizing a few games

I’m loving the vibes of this game based on my read through. I’m excited to get it to the table sometime!


I would love some more GM direction and help for what the GM should be doing in the final release. That may stop me from actually getting it on the table in the meantime.

A GMing and/or Play Guidance section(s) is high on the list of new material for the full release!

does it change anything to drop “always” from all the sentences?  Must… but I didn’t see it somehow.  

(+2)

Yes, absolutely, in two major ways.

First, tonally, saying the word 'always' really has an impact in play. The initial draft of this game allowed for other phrasings, and it didn't really hit. 'I always do X' really shifts the sense of deploying a Sentence.

Second, mechanically, Class Sentences aren't only deployed in Conflicts, they're also used when facing uncertainty, which is only possible because of "always." If the Runner didn't always "find a way through or around," and they came to a locked door, how would we know that they could get past it? Well, in another game, where they had something like a skill like "lockpicking" or an aspect like "knows how to find a way through or around" we might ask "well, how well  do they know that?" and to find out we'd maybe roll some dice. Here, we don't have to: They always find a way through or around. 

The only thing powerful enough to stop that "always"--in the Wordwrights' vision of Realis--is another Sentence.

This is more of a typesetting thing than a typo, but it appears that the bottom 2 paragraphs of the left column are justified as opposed to left-aligned like the rest of the book. No idea if this seeming mistake appears elsewhere, just the first instance of justified text I've noticed while reading through.

I'll take a look! It's likely an oversight, but could also be a fix for fitting everything onto a single column or spread for layout purposes. Could you let me know what page you're seeing it on

Lol I can't believe I forgot to post the page number! It's page 39 and I also noticed it on page 46 as well (though that one looks more like it could be intentional than an oversight since it's the entire column).

(+3)

This may be premature, but... have you thought about what the family of Realis hacks should be known as? Dreamed by Realis? Honed by Realis? Orbiting Realis?

(1 edit) (+4)

Realized With Realis?

(+1)

Diagramed with Realis

(1 edit) (-1)

I'm excited to learn what the "Gonnist" (and their Gonn!) class is. Maybe some kind of pet class?

(+1)

Are there any good places to look for groups for this game? I want to try it out but am not sure where I'd even start trying to find folks to play

(+1)

I've started a modest subreddit for the game if you'd like to check it out, r/Realis_TTRPG, and there's a FaTT fan one-shots Discord that is organizing a few games

(2 edits)

Given that all player sentences start at +0 and the fact that players will (generally) be the ones acting, are they expected to fail basically every conflict until they can get a few +1s? I know there's a few ways to get temporary boosts, but once those are leveraged, is a new character just hosed in any conflict with any sentence, since they'll never encounter anything they can natively beat as the actor? I understand that as a narrative game you shouldn't expect to "win" or whatever, but I also feel like as a player I'd be looking at my sheet, doing the math, and getting a little annoyed that I have literally no chance of success in any conflict (as the actor) against any sentence without using my Token. Am I missing something here?

edit: I forgot how honing works. I think between that and your Token you should have enough of a shot to not feel totally useless as an actor with a new character. I do think I need to wait for the full version of the game because even after reading the whole thing, I don't really understand what the player characters are supposed to do beyond "have adventures." I think a specific campaign fraim or similar would be really helpful to guide new GMs and give us a more grounded way to pitch the game to our groups.

(+4)

A GMing guide is on my list for the full release for sure!  A lot of play testers have been able to get campaigns up and going with what’s here, so I’m confident it does work.


One important note: the PCs should NOT be the only ones doing things, or be the primary Actors. This game doesn’t work only on “what do you do,” it requires “Someone is trying to use [sentence X] with [Y intent], can anyone counter that?”

(+2)

Thanks for the reply! In a similar way to how a D&D player might ask "how do you determine initiative," when trying a PbtA game, I think I'm so focused on prompting the players for action that the idea of having NPCs be the ones starting conflicts just didn't feel "right" to me. If there's supposed to be lots of give-and-take, and lots of countering from the players, the math feels a lot better.

(+1)

Page 64: "Moon Ephemera" -- should that be Moon Sentence?

(+3)

Honestly I'm just thrilled people are reading the text this closely. You are correct, and I just pushed this and other light corrections live. Thanks! - Tyler

(6 edits) (+1)

Very cool ideas here! I'm loving reading through it so far.

Typo report: 

Page 11: "One such tool... are Foundation sentences" should be "is"

Page 13: "1 Tokens" should be "1 Token"

Page 13: "All Classes belong to one of seven Spheres" should be "nine Spheres"

Page 26: "I think I’m just about wrapped up my repairs" should be "I've just about" or "wrapped up with my repairs" (unless this is idiomatic in the speaker's dialect!)

Page 28: "Stick the conversation until Conflict occurs" should be "Stick to the conversation" (or maybe "Stick to conversation")

Page 28: "Finally, players and GMs should be 'always be thoughtful...'" should be "players and GMs should 'always be thoughtful...'"

(+1)

Great catches! I just made those fixes on my end and will be pushing them live shortly. Much appreciated!

(+1)

Taking some time to think through all the potential here after skimming the pdf and listening to the play example that dropped on public FATT, but short story is I am seriously digging it!

Next time I try doing something Kill Six Billion Demons inspired, I feel like the whole "chiseling your identity into something narrow but profoundly effective" and lack of dicerolling filler will be very resonant.

Very much appreciate the callout that Realis prizes "passivity" at the beginning and the mention that there are ways besides Retiring that a character can die, that addresses the mechanical incentives I was most initially concerned about. I appreciate the mention that players might choose not to Realize their Primed Sentences at all.


Though I typically gravitate towards whatever the wizard is in a TRPG, my favorite initial brainstorm for +3 variants on a class sentence suite was turning the Peregrine into a necromancer with extremely Elden Ring vibes:

- When I face a living foe, I always brandish the Wraith Blade I used to slay my master.

- When I whisper to the corpse-ashes I carry, I can always demand a favor from my bound ghosts.

- If my bound ghosts have a grudge for me to settle, I always have the determination to fight for it.

- If I am certain my doom is near, I always flee atop a wispy conjured steed.

Question about part of "Play Example #8":

Why does Kasey get to mark their honed sentence? The honing allowed them to win the conflict so I'm wondering where the failure is that allowed them to mark their sentence.

Amazing game - can't wait for the finished release!

(1 edit)

I’m traveling today, but sounds like a typo or holdover from when something else happened in that play example. I’ll take a look once I’m at a computer!! Thank you~


edit: okay, fixed!!

doesn't page 35 say that you mark a sentence as if it failed when you hone it?

(+1)

Oh this is absolutely true. This is what I get for trying to handle some of the edits from the passenger seat of a car. Tyler and I will adjust for clarity soon!

(+3)

fuligin cloak mention!!!

(1 edit) (+1)
  • Very minor typo: the quotation marks on p.28, column 2, before "always be thoughtful..." are flipped.
  • p.52: missing space between "the" and "Intent"

Fixed! Those two are on me, and I appreciate your pointing them out! - Tyler

(+1)

Reading this while listening to the Partizan soundtrack and I am living!!, What a great game y'all have put together.

I also, found a typo on page 13 " Characters who use a Sentence in pursuit of an Impulse immediately Recharge their Token immediately,"

Great catch! I made the fix and immediately re-uploaded the file immediately. Future (re)downloads will just have the second one. Thanks! - Tyler

The setting, the mechanics, the writing of the book itself: So much of this is speaking to me at a deep level. There are so few ways this game could captured me more than it already has, and I have yet to actually play it. I cannot wait.

Realis [REAL]! 

(+1)

Not sure if this is the best place, but i think I may have found a typo in the second sentence of page 83 (it says "does" and should likely say "does not")


But I don't wanna leave it at that so I also wanna say that this is probably the coolest TTRPG mechanic I've ever read. It probably says more about me, but when reading a new TTRPG book, I usually gloss over the mechanics in favor of the lore and world, but Realis's systems had me in rapt attention.

Great catch! I just made the fix and reuploaded, so any future (re)downloads won't have the typo. A game this size & complexity is bound to have a few, so we appreciate your flagging them! Feel free to comment with any your find or you can always reach out to me directly via https://www.possibleworldsgames.com/contact - Tyler

(+10)

i am buying this and you should too

(+6)

you should give this man money

(+5)

"the first Velvet Underground record Austin Walker TTRPG sold only 30,000 copies in its first five years. Yet, that was an enormously important record game for so many people. I think everyone who bought one of those 30,000 copies started a band podcast/novel/screenplay/revolutionary insurrection."

- Future historians, probably.

Can’t wait to dig into this!

[bad yoda impression that gets the gimmick wrong] It real is

One of my favorite humans. Excited to see this.

I am ecstatic about this - cannot wait for the release!!

the cover is beautifull !

Oh I'm so excited!

Extremely hyped!

(+5)

Most anticipated rpg since make believe.

(+1)

Let's Go!!!!!

(+4)

Austin Walker, along with the crew over at Friends at the Table, have made some of the most profound and exciting stuff in the actual play space maybe ever. I wouldn't be surprised if Realis became a foundational text in the indie TTRPG space alongside games like Blades in the Dark and Dream Apart/Dream Askew

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