Five Years of Psi-Wars

 It's a new year, so time for a new retrospective!

Oh, and yes, I did get my Wordpress Blog unsuspended.  I'm debating whether it's worth leaving it there.  On the one hand, it's all already there.  On the other hand, eventually I'd want to pay for that.  And do I want to pay for it given the hiccups I've already seen? I'll keep my eye on it. As a friend suggested: given the various stresses in my life, it might be better to worry about what relaxes me (writing posts) and maintain my energy for what needs my attention most (my family, my work) and once that eases up, then I can focus on the proper migration. 

Four Years of Psi-Wars

 I began the blog as a way of driving myself to finish some of my setting material and to share my approaches with everyone else.  My intention with Psi-Wars was to finish in a year, and I did! But it proved sufficiently popular that I've continued plugging away since.  Where are we now?

The wiki has been a big hit, and it occurred to me recently that I have all the "core rules" for running Psi-Wars up and on the wiki.  I have a few more thing to add, mostly investigations and "Epic Psi-Wars" stuff, such as monster hunting elements, but other than that, I have everything I need to run a game.

Similarly, technology is in a good place.  We have three major suppliers detailed, and while some material is in my notes rather than on the wiki, I have pretty much all military hardware in place.  What I still have left to do are:

• Civilian vehicles (cars, bulk transports, etc)
• Police vehicles
• A few remaining suppliers
• Syntech (slick, advanced super-spy stuff; vehicles and robots)
• Wyrmwerks (mad-science tech; likely just their robots)
• Startrodder (classic, ww2 inspired stuff; Vehicles and robots)

I also want to touch on more local, proprietary technology, such as the technologies of the Umbral Rim and the Arkhaian Spiral.

I'm also quite deep into templates at this point, though sometimes I think I make it more complicated than it needs to be.  The only templates I have remaining are:

• Commando
• Spy
• Security Agent
• Assassin
• The Philosopher/Mystic (which will be a doozy)

I find myself considering a few more new templates, but some of that spawned the Sidekicks rules, which patrons and backers have already had a chance to see.

What I find myself increasingly drawn towards now are aliens, philosophies and cultural elements.  Psi-Wars is getting to the point where people can readily play a "human standard" game and are becoming more interested in the more exotic parts of the setting, which means I find I field more and more questions about them.  Thus, it seems likely that this year will see more work on aliens.

What drives most of my material at this point are actual games or preparation for games.  I have three I want to aim at.

• The Heist!  This is the next playtest I run, and I have quite some notes, but it's not coming together quite as fast as I had hoped.  Still, I should have it up and running in a few months, with luck.  It drives me towards infiltration rules (up), common gear, currencies, Eldothic tech (because everyone loves the Eldoth), Zathare, and the sort of aliens one might find on Kronos (the Ranathim, the Keleni, Traders, the Mogwai and the Menhiri)
• An Umbral Monster-Hunter Game: I've been trying to rekindle connections with my friends in the US, and I offered to run them a game, and everyone agreed that just playing Psi-Wars would be easiest for me, as it allows me to continue to just focus on Psi-Wars writing.  Given the PC ideas and themes, this will tip-toe towards Epic Psi-Wars, which a lot of Psi-Wars fans won't object to
• A hypothetical Empire vs Alliance game: The secret council presses me for "hotspot details," ready-to-go campaign settings that outline flashpoints.  The most obvious such one is between the Empire and the Alliance, as that's the sort of game that's painfully obvious to any Psi-Wars newbie, and thus a good place to start.

I suspect most of this year will be geared towards getting those three things off the ground.  If I can get them done, then it'll be on to expanding other flashpoints or pushing into Epic Psi-Wars.  Given my pace of development, I sense that we're cresting.  Most of the "heavy lifting" work is done, and I find I'm spending a lot of time polishing elements, which suggests we're nearing the finish line.  Thus, I need to focus less on broad strokes and more on the practicality of actual campaigns, as it will show me where I'm missing material.

This has also been a great year for both my Patreon and SubscribeStar.  Between the two, I've hit record levels of donations from you, and this during a really rotten year, so thank you for that!  I'm trying to collate an art book as a thank you, but it'll take some time.  In the meantime, I'm working on:

• More discussion of Battlesuits in Psi-Wars
• A preview of the Arkhaians
• A preview of the Mug
• A poll for a servile race in the Umbral Rim
• A poll for a lordly race in the Umbral Rim

Chances are, I'll have these out this month.

On the IT front, I'm looking into setting up my own server and hosting my own wordpress and wiki.  Discord has also invited me to become a public server, but my moderator and I are hashing out the details on my rules for Discord.

Thank you, everyone, for another great year of Psi-Wars.  Thank you and welcome to everyone joining me this year.  Here's to another great year of Psi-Wars.

Blog Roadmap: November 2019

Happy Halloween!

We had a very good month here on Mailanka's musing.  I've managed to beat all previous months for posts except for a very weird June (which I don't count) and the unbeatable cliff of May 2017.  So it's been a good month for views.

What did you read? Mostly the following:

1. Doubtlessly spurred on by the provocative title, the Psi-Wars Fallacy was the most read blogpost.
2. I should have done a second one, but alas, time.  Still, the Martial Arts Retrospective came in second. Don't neglect the other four martial arts, though!
3. A surprising number 3, given that I just posted it, was Robots Revisited.  You guys are going to like November, I can tell you.
4. Surprising only in that it didn't come in higher was the template a lot of you had been waiting for for a long time (and several of you seem to already have characters for): the Space Knight Template.
5. And the winner of "Which martial art do you guys want to read up on the most" is clearly Knightly Force Swordsmanship, though, man, all the styles were popular (the next three were the Simple, Swift and Destructive forms)

We added no new Patrons and we lost no Patrons, thus a steady month. EDIT: That's not true, we had one new patron; he just came on really early.  Welcome, Kevin!

Looking Forward

Normally around now I would announce the results of the poll, but I've put that on pause for a few reasons.  First, I promised a Communion revision, and I have it.  It's sitting right here in a great stack of glorious, digital paper, but I need to get it out.  Expect that over the next couple of weeks.

Second, I really need to finish the military technological framework of Psi-Wars, and that includes the oft-forgotten, but extremely important, robots.  They sit in your fighters, they polish your armor, they tend to your wounds.  And people want to play as them, so I need to get them done.

And lastly, I've been putting off a playtest of all these rules for awhile, mostly out of fear that I'll be unable to make the time commitment necessary, but I think I can make it happen.  Disciple Mavrick, and creator of the Orochi Belt, have been quietly working behind the scenes to lay some ground work for additional setting material for the Orochi Belt, and then I'll try to get some story material done.  In December, I've got 4 weeks of vaction (yes, four, not a typo), so I should be able to get some stuff, done, but I need to really focus on this. More details will be forthcoming.

Thank you, as always, for reading the blog, leaving your comments here or on the discord server, and for being a patron!  Hopefully I can get some nice things out for you this month. 

State of the Blog: The October Roadmap

It's that time again!

September Retrospective

Last month was, to my surprise given the volume of posts, a mediocre month for views. The big posts for this month were:

• The Conditional Injury Deep Dive
• Redjack Military Doctrine
• And my post answering Lord Buss's questions.

Of the vehicles, the Switchback seems the most popular, but the Nomad isn't far behind, and the Ranathim Mithanna get a special mention, likely because people like that picture.

I lost a Disciple Patron, which always hurts, but a I gained a new Companion patron, so overall Patreon is a wash.  I had a "drive-by" patron; some people really hate that, but I don't mind. I find most patrons stay for the long haul and join in with the community.  That said, I've seen a surge in comments and discord use, so I'm rather pleased with the direction of the Psi-Wars community.

The big wiki-updates this month have been:

• Psionic Powers
• The Aristocrat Background Lens (Which, as of this post, is still in progress).

An October Perspective

As always, I have a vote for what topics you guys would like me to cover.  The winners this month are:

For Rules Collation: Communion.  That'll be a big one.

For Template Collation: The Space Knight (with the Wanderer Background Lens in second place)

For General Topic: A tie between "What is magic, really?" and "Modular Robots Revisited."

Communion

Communion has been popular since I released it back in Iteration 3, and it's been largely uchanged since then except for Broken Communion, which keeps getting weirder.  We now have ghosts, and quite a treatise on them, and things like psychic diseases and loads of other problems that Broken Communion can cause.  I might also change how it's priced, as it seems increasingly reasonable to have True Communion miracles to break or override Broken Communion miracles (ie, you can use True Communion to purge Broken Communion sanctity) and perhaps you should be able to protect yourself from Broken Communion the same way you can protect yourself from ghosts.

The biggest change to Communion was introduced with the Divine Masks: occult communion and a greater role for Paths.  I had originally conceived of Paths as a way of specializing one's form of Communion, but I've been increasingly seeing it as a "road to Communion."  That is, a Templar or a Mystical Tyrant might command Communion, but most people who interact with it do so unwittingly by embodying archetypes.  This needs to be codified, and that means Paths need to be expanded, because normal communion gives you access to all of Communion, while a path gives you only a limited subset of Communion.

Finally, I've decided we need more paths.  I find three paths per form of communion a little constraining.  I'd like to add one more path per form of Communion, to better refine the concepts of the Paths, which means some things will get shifted around.  All names subject to change.

True Communion gets the Wounded Healer, who moves some of the gentle, self-sacrificing things from the Bound Princess, who becomes more of a self-sacrificing authority figure.  Domen Venalina (the Ranathim Sin Eaters) will shift from the Bound Princess to the Wounded Healer.

Dark Communion gets the Devourer, or the Hungry Beast.  This will focus on the "vice" of greed and gluttony, on self-preservation via base, animal means.  It'll have a strong resonance with wild animals and wild places, and take some of the bestial aspects of the Rebellious Beast and the hungry aspects of the Beautiful Fool for itself, making the Rebellious Beast more about thoughtless destruction and rage, and the Beautiful Fool more about lust and laziness.

Broken Communion gets the Void.  This will focus on thoughts of nothing of nothingness and emptiness, the inability to grasp both the infinite and the truly empty.  It'll touch on cosmic themes and, obviously, travel powers and higher dimensional powers.

The Space Knight

The Space Knight is a tricky one, easily on par with (or more difficult than) the Aristocrat.  It's not so much that we need a ton of setting information, because we have most of that.  We need to dive into force swordsmanship using my new approach, and I still need to work out a couple of styles.  Fortunately, you already know what "Martial Arts as Power-Ups" looks like, so that shouldn't be too bad.

The biggest problem with space knights is tackling their sheer variety.  One of my goals with Psi-Wars was to open up the "Jedi" template to a much broader range, and I think I've succeeded.  Templars feel like Jedi and the Tyrants like Sith, but Maradonian Space Knights feel like, well, knights, and the Satemo of the Umbral Rim feel more like vengeful ronin, and we have room for "Street Knights," like Dun Beltain.  We need to not only integrate all of these different cultural elements, but also their martial arts and their psionic powers or, in the case of House Kain, how one can be a space knight without psionic powers.

If that doesn't work, we'll shift to the Wanderer, which I suspect did as well as it did thanks to curiosity about Redjack, which seemed to be popular with the Discord community, and what sort of people might fly those ships.

Modular Robots? Magic?

Last but not least, we had quiet a discussion about robots recently, which led to some people criticizing my approach to ST.  I think it's well-founded... but it turns out there's an interesting counter-case to be made, which could lead to some different designs.  Using this approach could lead to new problems, and it might be worth discussing what works well with my old Modular Robots approach and how, possibly, we might be able to keep it.

If that doesn't pan out, I can rant about magic for a good 10k words.

Is that all?

If this isn't enough to keep me busy for the month, in theory the last part of the military doctrines series are robots.  We need to get stats on the robots that fill the tech-bot slot on most fighters, and we need to talk about the robots that tend to your wounds, or that Redjack pirates use to scout (or patrol) outposts.  This makes a revisit of Modular Robots quite timely.

It also means creating an entirely new set of rules to govern how they work as allies, how you can quickly design your allies, and how PC robots might interact with the system. This is a project on par with the Sidekicks supplement for Monster Hunters or Henchmen for Dungeon Fantasy, and so it might take a lot of work (though, compared to the ships, thus far, it's been pretty quick!).  With Communion and Space Knights on my plate, these might have to wait but, on the other hand, I have a week of vacation, some of which I might even be able to use to write.

If I find I still have time, I'd like to do a Patreon poll series wherein we build our own military doctrine and associated materiel.

Well, that's what I'd like to tackle for October, we'll see how it goes.  I'm glad to have you still with me and thanks, as always, for your patronage and your clicks.

August Roadmap

Summer is almost finished. Here in the Netherlands, we just cracked some heat records in a mind-blowing heat-wave with temperatures I've not felt since a stint I spent in the Mojave Desert.  I managed to get a few things done, but I hadn't the time to really promote my blog or do much chatting, so if it seemed quiet, that's why.

If you missed it, I had promised to deliver:

• The Giant Action Vehicular Playtest
• Abstract Wealth for Psi-Wars
• The Diplomat Template

I delivered those and a disease design system for my Patrons.

Once again, I've had a vote, and it was... interesting!  For my general blogpost, my Patrons would like a look at the current state of my vehicles system.  Expect a patreon post (or two) and some additional discussion of GURPS Spaceships vs Vehicles and why some choices were made and what I would change.  GURPS Cabal Dust-Off came in a close second, so future polls my contain some occult options.  I've tried to keep away from those because I figure part of my appeal is that I'm one of the few GURPS blogs that doesn't talk about fantasy stuff and there's a lot of support for the occult and fantasy in GURPS right now and less support for sci-fi things, but man, I'm a devoted acolyte of Kenneth Hite and I've been building a library, so I could talk about it for quite a bit.

For Psi-Wars, my patrons voted for a deeper discussion of space rules in general, and it wasn't close so expect that as well.  It'll be a wiki post, but I'll update you on the blog when it happens.  For templates, Smuggler just squeaked past the early favorite of the Frontier Marshal.  So, expect to see the Smuggler on the wiki this month, and a post discussing what I changed and why I wrote it the way I did.

I found the vote for the templates very interesting, as it was completely different from the first vote (1st Vote: Frontier Marshal 2, Scavenger 1. Second Vote: Frontier Marshal 6, Scavenger 4). I'm not sure what changed.  Whims might have something to do with it, or what people are thinking about playing, but I notice more support in general for Rim characters after the Diplomat, and I suspect that's because people are interested in seeing how I handle Rim characters differently from Core characters.

I lost a patron (My wife, who was rearranging our finances and decided it wasn't worth the surcharge from Patreon for the amusement of wrecking some of my polls), but gained a new disciple.  I always love it when someone slides in for $1, and after a month or two, realizes "What the heck!" and ups their pledge.  It tells me I'm creating interesting content.  Views were also high last month, and have been trending high in general, but I must admit I don't pay much attention to them after that surge of bots wrecked all of my stats (why am I still on blogger instead of Wordpress?).

To my patrons: Thank you!  I have another surprise in store for you this month as a thank you.  And for my readers, thanks for being here though this rough patch, and I hope you enjoy this month's posts.

The July Roadmap

Normally I post this before the month ends, but child-rearing (and wife-tending) got away from me.

As usual, we had the patreon vote and that's what I'll be focusing on this month.  Expect to see:

• A discussion of Gear in GURPS and how I'd like to tackle Abstract Wealth in Psi-Wars
• A Revised Diplomat Template, and a discussion of the Cultures of Psi-Wars.
• The Multi-Part Action Vehicular Combat system playtest. It's gonna be huge.

If I can get to it, I'd like to continue with:

• The Eldoth as Conspiratorial Menace
• The Vehicles of RedJack

Last month Patreon shows a surplus thanks to the elevation of one of our own into the Secret Council.  We lost one of my first patrons, though, a silent fellow who had bid more than anyone else until the Secret Council joined.  He never made us of his patreon benefits, which I always thought was a shame.  He'll be missed, but I'm also grateful he supported us for so long.

The blog also broke records when it came to views, but I'm pretty sure that 20,000 views over the space of a few hours is probably not coming from a single person.  I got spidered!  And it ruined my statistics.  Why am I still on Blogger?  I have no good answer for that.

In any case, thanks to everyone who voted and here's to the next month!

Blog Roadmap: June

Last month was an alright month for views.  It didn't help that I'm not really sure what to do with my vehicle posts when it comes to promotion.  I feel like I'm spamming people with vehicles they don't care about, so I think I'm just going to stop promoting them, though there's more to come of course. Instead, I'm going to promote more generic GURPS posts, or more broadly interesting things.

That said, it was a great month for Patreon.  I've added two new patrons, the Secret Council has a new member (Sir, if you wake to find your bed surrounded by dark-robed figures who offer you a code ring, be not afraid and accept the ring).  I've also lost one patron, a long time patron, which is always sad.  God speed, good sir, and I thank you for your support.

For the rest of the month, the patreon topic votes are in.  Our general topic will be:

• A new Ultra-Tech Setting

This will be a patreon special.  The intent will be to do a "worked example" of my "How to Build an Ultra-Tech framework" series from a few months ago. This is mostly done, it just needs a few touch-ups.

For Psi-Wars, I'll be continuing with my Alliance vehicles (4 capital ships remain) and over on Patreon, we voted on two things, and the results are:

• Details on the Eldoth (and the Deep Engine) as monsters/conspiracy
• Rule Collation: the Basics of Psi-Wars.

The Rule collation is already done and has been reviewed by the Secret Council.  It will go up as a post and on my Wiki.  The Eldoth, when they're done, will be a Patreon Preview, at least for now.

I'm looking forward to it, and I hope you are too!

Blog Roadmap: May 2019

April was not a bad month for the blog at all.  We've added three more patrons (a special shoutout to Shinanoki, if they don't mind), and while our views did not exceed last month's, they came close.  For a quiet month, it wasn't so bad.

Personally, the month was richly rewarding and also very difficult. I've been the sickest I've been in my life (and I'm still sick: this is the flu that never goes away), and I've been hard at work helping my wife with our new baby girl, and celebrating my son's second birthday!  April is a busy month.

I took my free time to play with a few ideas, especially the idea of a more explicit dive into a conspiratorial take on Psi-Wars.  It's always been there, but the more I look at it and the more I explore it, the more I think it's a necessary addition, or at least, a necessary clarification.  My patrons seem to agree, given how much weight the Elite Knight got in the poll.

The patreon polls for the topics of the month have a theme: Technology as Magic, so I'll touch on that in a broad post (or three) outlining Techno-magic: using ultra-tech as magic, the dangers, the pitfalls, some tips, musings on the themes and narrative options it creates and some specific examples.  The Psi-Wars request is essentially the same: the Deep Engine, the Eldothic "Techno-magic" element to the Psi-Wars setting.  I've got a lot of it worked out already for the full Patreon post I did some time ago, so it's a matter of cleaning it up and expanding a few elements.  Expect to see both of these this month.

Some men in black masks visited me in the night, and quietly pointed to GURPS Action 2, then to my Psi-Wars wiki, and nailed a note written in blood to my wall: "Campaigns begin."  I think the Secret Council's message couldn't be more clear: I need to collate the rules I've been working on for so long into a cohesive place so people can use them.  I've begun, but given the strain on my time, I don't know how much I'll get done.  We shall see. Hopefully the Secret Council will be pleased.

Our signature artist is almost finished with the Slavers portrait, and I think it's turned out quite well!  Expect to see at least a Patreon preview of the Slaver race soon, and with luck, a full blog post.

I haven't forgotten the vehicles we were working on.  The next set is the Alliance, and I currently have 4 ground vehicles and 2 starfighters.  I suspect I'll have them all done soon enough, and will begin to reveal them one by one on the blog soon.

That should be it for May.  I don't know how many of these priorities I'll manage, given that I go back to work, my son isn't going to get less rambunctious and my daughter is still quite young, so my wife will be tired and in desperate need of sleep and help, but in between moments, I'm sure I can get some things written.

See you then and again, to all of my patrons, thank you for your support.  You make this possible.

Blog Roadmap: April 2019

A princess is coming

This month has been a good month.  I haven't had this good a month when it comes to views since September of 2017, and I even managed to increased the number of Patrons (Hello Marko!). 

The last time I had better views than this, other than September, was May of 2017, after which we had a pretty precipitous drop-off. I was looking at that and my wife leans in and says "You know what happened around then? Your son was born."

Given that, we might be seeing another big drop-off soon, because our little girl is going to be born this month.  We expect her on the 12th, and this is going to be a trickier one than last time as we need to juggle our son as well during all of this, so while last time I could write or work while the boy was sleeping, now we have no such guarantee and my wife is certainly going to be very tired (she's very tired now!).

So, I've had a lot of people ask me "What next?" and the answer is "I dunno!" I can't really guarantee that I can post with any reliability, but we'll see what I can do.

The April Patreon Poll results asked for a history of Psi-Wars and there was a tie between a Cross Post with Worlds Beyond Earth, a collaboration I've wanted to do for awhile regarding deconstructing GURPS Spaceships, and a rant about flexible magic. The Patreons also voted for a follow up of the "Slaver" aliens.  I've also got a lot of material ready for the vehicles of the Alliance (the aristocratic houses specifically), and I'm hip deep in that context, so it might make sense to continue with it, but at the same time, it'd be a shame if I did a bunch of work on it and then was interrupted for a month and got back to it and couldn't remember anything.

So I think in the end, I'm going to use this month as a mulligan.  I want to focus on the Patreon requests out of gratitude for their support, and for the rest, if I have time, I might post on general topics, nothing like a series if I can avoid it (though the History of Psi-Wars will certainly turn into a series).  If I can't get everything done, I apologize and I hope you understand.  Hopefully we'll have a fun month one way or another.

There will be no group chat this month (I'll probably be there next weekend, but I can't guarantee it. If I'm there I'm there, if you're there you're there, and if we want to chat, we can chat).

Oh, and the Psi-Wars Wiki is still churning. I've added four new reader-created worlds: Richat, Cabala Scan, the Orochi Belt and Pelia, and I've added the races and the basics of the main philosophies of Psi-Wars. What I focus on next month will depend on what I can get figured out.  I've had requests for both technology and deeper dives into philosophies and organizations.

State of the Blog: March

Today is my birthday, hence the art

I resolved at the beginning of the year to more deeply involve my patrons and my readers in my process, and so far, it's working.  I haven't gained any new patrons, but I also haven't lost any, and my views do better month by month, so we're definitely making progress.  After the Psi-Wars Atlas post, I'm feeling bullish about rounding up Psi-Wars this year and moving on to new projects.  We'll have to see how it goes.

The Psi-Wars Wiki

The Psi-Wars Wiki began last month, and currently has:

• The Psi-Wars Galactic Atlas
• The Empire and its organizations
• The Alliance and its Noble Houses

This month, I'd like to transcribe philosophies, starting with True Communion.

I may re-organize the Wiki soon, as some elements of it displease me and I haven't decided how to handle some of the deeper detail, or the more generic elements.  I'll think on it.  If you'd like to contribute or have suggestions, let me know!

The Roadmap

This month, interested Patrons were able to add their own worlds, and have done so.  Later in the month, I'll update the blog with what new worlds have been added to Psi-Wars, and I will update the Atlas to include them.

For March, the Patreons have voted on a general topic and a Psi-Wars topic for me to focus on.  The general topic will be Buckets of Technology and discuss some ways to handle the discrepancy between cheap ultra-tech and expensive advantages.  The Psi-Wars topic will be a setting overview of the alien races.

I'm still at work on technology, so with luck, we'll also see some vehicles and starships which will almost round out the technology series (at least, on the military end of things; there's a lot of technology in a sci-fi setting!).

I hope you guys enjoy March, and I'll see you on the other side!

Patreon Update - the February Roadmap

January worked out really well, so I thought I'd try more of the same for February.  The following is available on my Patreon:

• The February Roadmap and Retrospective (Public)
• The February General Topic poll (all Patrons)
• The February Psi-Wars Topic (Fellow-Travelers and better)

State of the Patreon: May, and an Iteration 6 retrospective

I am behind, as usual. You'll find this becomes relatively common in the next year or so, because my day has become traveling on a train for 3 hours a day, working 8 hours a day, and then putting my boy to bed and going to bed myself.  Paradoxically, this means I'm writing more than ever, as I purchased the dinkiest laptop ever (a Lenovo Miix 320) and I've been typing away, but having the time to really sit down, do proper research and editing, never mind posting, requires sitting behind my computer, and that's going to be a rare thing.  So, fair warning!

So, what happened last month?  What are we doing this month?  And where do I see the blog going?

State of the Patreon: April

Happy Easter

Psi-Wars continues to chug along.  I've personally finished Iteration 6 and started on the next iteration, but you guys will have another month before you see that.  Between that and changing jobs, I've been quite busy (as you can see from the lateness of this post), but I'm still here!

This has been a weaker month for viewership, but not an especially bad one.  More people continue to express interest in Psi-Wars, but I think the current structure of it is causing problems, but hopefully the new structure I'm working on in Iteration 7 will fix that.  You won't see that next month, but it is in the works.

What will you see next month?  Three sample Chapters of the Space Templars aka the Knights of Communion, including:

• The Dark Vigil Chapter: the secret protectors of the Keleni Temple Worlds, the gaurdians of forbidden relics of the Cult of the Mystic Tyrant, and the secret moral enforcers of a thriving criminal empire.  Their chapter master, a mighty Tarvathim master, is slowly dying, and his successor was murdered in the canals of the bustling city of Maaon on the ocean world of Alhari.
• The Sentries of the Monolith: A lost chapter founded by the Traitor Revalis White, these Templars guard the Eldoth homeworld of Sepulcher, ensuring that dread race never rises again to terrorize the galaxy.  Their young new chapter master seeks to initiate a crusade against the Cybernetic Union to avenge her fallen master, but factions within the chapter fret about her use of forbidden technologies and her openly heretical brother.
• The Far Striders: These pilgrim-escorts already lurked on the rim of the Galaxy when the death throes of the Alexian Empire consumed that august order.  Now they lurk among the population, disguised as humble beggars, continuing their good work of protecting the religious from the depredations of bandits and villains, while their missing master has left them with a quest to seek the holy relics of Isa the Exile, while his presumptive heir and ally to Nova Sabine seeks to reunite the Templars and throw their strength against the Empire.

These chapters will be as detailed as the Houses of the Alliance, including major personalities, new relics, unique martial arts or styles, and details on what virtues and styles they make use of.

Last month, the most popular posts, setting aside the Primer, were:

1. The Heterodox Virtues of True Communion: One of my favorite posts as well: the Orthodox virtues ground True Communion, but these virtues make things interesting, and provide pretty neat bonuses as well!
2. Templar Martial Arts: You guys have been waiting for this, no doubt.  While I see the Templars as regularly using the same martial arts as the Alliance, they have their own, deeper, more powerful techniques too.  The Serene Form will likely change in the future, though.  I discovered the Reflective modifier for DR, which suggests that bolt deflection should be free, rather than requiring an action.  I'll look into that at a later time, though.
3. The Knights of Communion and their Chapters: This is really meant more as a means of understanding how to build your own chapters, similar to how my discussion of Alliance houses was meant as a way to build your own houses.  If you liked this, you'll love the three chapters.
4. Keleni Martial Arts: I'm not surprised that the Keleni aren't as popular as the Templars: after all, True Communion's big draw is that it lets you play not-Jedi.  The Keleni just offer a background explaining the origins of Communion and a natural, go-to group for your master atop a mountain.  Still, it's nice to see some of you exploring their kung fu.
5. Orthodox Virtues of True Communion: Similar to Keleni martial arts, I'm not surprised that these are less popular than the Heterodox Virtues, as they're less "interesting," but nonetheless still important, and thus I'm pleased to see that you guys like them too.

The State of the Patreon: March 2018

I find myself in a weird week, in that it's neither really February nor really March, so I think I'm going to just slink through it in confusion.  I'm also prepping to transition from one job to another, and this new job is quite demanding, so I'll have a little less time than before (I know, I already don't have much time, but we'll make this work!)

In any case, let's talk how the month went, and how I see the next month playing out.

February Retrospective

This month was all about True Communion, and it did very well.  I was on track for the best month in a long time, though readership dropped off quite a bit last week (Patreon week usually has less viewers, because a lot of readers aren't patrons and because quite a few patrons don't bother to hit this site first to log a view, because why would they?).  Still, viewer-wise, it was a very good month.  True Communion itself has been very popular; I doubt it's a surprise to learn it looks to be the most popular philosophy, but it's a not-Jedi philosophy that circles around Communion, which is a very popular concept for Psi-Wars.

The most popular posts (after the Psi-Wars primer, which always wins) were:

1. The Beliefs of True Communion
2. The Symbolism of True Communion
3. True Communion: an Introduction
4. True Communion as Esoteric Skill
5. The Cultural Context of True Communion

I find the views very interesting, as the introduction usually tops out the views and the After Action Reports tend to be popular, but people mostly looked at the Beliefs.  What does that say? Are people into the philosophy of True Communion? Are they using it in their games?  Are there Space Templars running around that I don't know about? Interesting to speculate.

State of the Patreon: February

Happy Valentines

January is behind us.  What do I have for you, patron and reader alike, in February?

The State of the Blog

The Cult of the Mystical Tyrant has, unsurprisingly, been popular.  I'm hitting new highs since I reduced the posting schedule to 2 posts a week.  I must say, that this new posting cycle suits me well: I can hit all of my goals and keep my pace up, but the schedule will look like this for the next few months:

• Post on Tuesday
• Post on Thursday
• Last week is "Patreon week"
• Scattered Patron posts as necessary.

This is a little slower, but it allows me to give Patrons the time they really deserve, rather than treating their posts as an afterthought.

The Popular Posts (other than the Primer) this month were:

1. The Iteration 1 Bonus Post: Evidently we have some new people digging through the old Psi-Wars material. I hope you guys enjoy it!
2. Transcendent Paths of the Mystical Tyrant: I honestly expected the Transcendent Principles to be a bigger hit, but you guys do love paths.  I suspect the Prodigal Knight (I was inspired by a very old comment made by Ivalero here; I've noticed people really like playing "the one unique redeemed dark horse character" and the Prodigal Knight is intended to be that) is more popular than the Slave, but there's no way to be sure!
3. TTRS Session 2: Everything Tinker Titan Rebel Spy is a hit; I suspect a lot of people like to see how Psi-Wars fits together, plus a lot of people just like reading "the story" of a session.
4. The Martial Arts of the Mystical Tyrant: The popularity of things like this lead me to believe that people are actually using this material for something.

Honorable Mentions: Space Ghosts Revisited is in the top 10 and eclipsed the Sample Space Ghosts, which I intended to direct traffic to the former.  Seems detailed rules for running ghosts is popular!  And the True Communion introduction, after one day is in the top 10.  Introductions tend to do well in general, but you guys really like your Jedi!  I suppose that makes sense, though: True Communion as a philosophy has been with us since Iteration 4.

The State of the Patreon

Last month I gained three new Patrons, and one Patron squeezed in just in time to vote on the Emperor poll!  Thanks to everyone who joined up this month, and to everyone who has been a long-term supporter.

This wasn't the best month for engagement (August beat it; that would be the Alexian poll, I think), but it was definitely one of the best month.

I readjusted my goals this month, and some of them seem really big: the next one is "art" at 205, because based on the previous goals, this is what the current artist I have on hire runs me for pictures, but when you see them, you'll understand why.  By the end of this month, I'll have art to show you, dear patron.

The patreon schedule this month will be:

• The Keleni: These aliens are to True Communion what the Ranathim were to the Divine Masks and the Cult of the Mystic Tyrant.  Once again, I have a conlang, a template and a cultural discussion.  This will be a preview available for $3+ patrons

• The Shaolin: I did some homework while working on the Knights of Communion, and while there's plenty of readily gameable information on, say, the Templars, there's surprisingly little on the Shaolin monks, so I compiled my research and turned it into a document that discusses the history, styles and personalities of the Shaolin monastery.  Includes a new martial art: White Eyebrow Boxing.  This will be available for $1+ patrons.

• (Tentative) The Cult of the Emperor Poll Results: I'm half-way finished with the poll results right now, and I've worked far enough ahead with my main posts that I'm confident I can have this finished by the last week of February (more honestly, I think I'll have it done this week, but let's manage expectations).  This will be available for $3+ patrons.

• Art Preview: the Ranathim: I should have a male and female portrait available for you by the end of the month, so you can see where your money is going (Yes, I know we haven't hit that goal, but I can tip some of my own money into this too ;) ).  This will be available to all $3+ patrons.

There will be no poll this month.  

I'm also going to pause the previews for a few reasons.  First, right now, I'm working about one month ahead, so it's not much of a preview, and I find my patrons don't really discuss it much, and often end up discussing the topic in greater detail when the post itself drops.  The best part of this was that it forced me to write documents, but I do that as a habit now, so there's little merit in releasing half of True Communion right now.  This is just a pause, though; I think it's highly relevant once I get to revisions of material, as I can see from the playtests that there is much call for revised material.

Well, there you have it guys.  That's what January looked like, and what February will look like.  As always, I want to thank my patrons for supporting me and I hope you will continue to do so.  If you're particularly enamored of the work I've done and you want to support me, just click the link and donate.  I'd be happy to have you.  If you want to join in the discussion, you can check out the Psi-Wars channel over at Discord.

State of the Patreon: December

Another month, another State of the Patreon.  Where are we as 2017 closes out?

November, for views, was a disaster.  I haven't been this low in views since I started Psi-Wars (perhaps the first couple of months were worse, but this is definitely the worst month of 2017).  Why was it so bad?  Well, I cut my posting rate from 4 a week to 2 a week, and for a few weeks in the middle, due to illness, I failed to promote my posts across various social media platforms, and with the Philosophy series I've been giving all of my material to my Patrons up front, which means they don't view it as much.  It might also be that Divine Masks was just a less interesting philosophy for most people, but I've heard some vocal interest in it, so I suspect it's more the first three.

Am I worried?  No.  My Patreon is up again, which suggests to me that interest hasn't dropped.  I've halved the posting schedule and thus halved my views, I think it follows pretty logically. Moreover, there's nothing I can really do about this right now.  Slowing my posting schedule means I can take up side projects and continue to produce material at a reasonable pace while being a responsible husband and father. If circumstances change, I may go back to my previous pace, but I think I have to accept that this is the new normal.

Nevertheless, my approach is already paying dividends.  In December, I have the Cult of the Mystic Tyrant almost complete.  By "almost complete" I mean that I have more than enough material to fill up the month, but that I keep thinking of new ideas that I'm not sure if they should be Patreon specials, or if I should keep going with the Cult of the Mystic Tyrant into January.  We will see!

So, for you faithful viewers, I have the Cult of the Mystic Tyrant this month, including a minimum of:

• An Introduction, including a discussion of the Sith, Thomas Hobbes, Friedrich Nietzsche and GURPS Cabal
• Cultural Context, including how the Cult went from a Ranathim imperial cult to a pan-galactic conspiracy.
• The Beliefs of the Cult of the Mystic Tyrant, which will dive into their moral and metaphysical nihilism as well as their views on the state.
• The Symbolism of the Cult of the Mystic Tyrant, including their initiation rites and their master/slave relationships
• The Cult and Conspiracy, a look at their global organization and their conspiratorial sub-organizations.
• The three schisms of the Cult, including the imperial cult of Anthara, the criminal conspiracy of Satra Temos, and the grey path of the former Knight of Communion, Revalis White

I have more, but I'll get back to you on how I intend to release it.

For you, my dear patrons, I already have one post up for you on a new expansion for Anti-Psi, Negative-Psi, which seeks to expand the utility of Anti-Psi from just screwing with psions and moving it into something broadly useful, more closely themed with Broken Communion, and with a more complex relationship with the rest of Psi.  It was inspired by a discussion on Discord and, in part, by Darth Nihilus as a "wound in the Force."  This is available now for all $1+ patrons! Check it out!

Soon (at the latest, when the Intro for the Cult of the Mystic Tyrant drops), I'll decide how I want to put together the Mystic Tyrant document and it will be available to all $3+ patrons.  It will either contain the additional material that I'm working on directly, as an addendum later (when it finishes), or they'll be stand-alone Patreon specials for all $3+ patrons.  One way or another, you'll have them.  They may (no promises!) include:

• Psionic Styles unique to the Cult
• Martial Styles unique to the Cult
• New Communion Paths carved out of Communion by the self-serving will of its Transcendent Masters
• Transcendent Powers available to the Transcendent Masters of the Cult (I already have a first draft of this document).

By the end of December, I will have a poll on the fourth schism of the Cult of the Mystic Tyrant: the current Galactic Emperor and the true power and philosophy behind his throne!  This will be available to all $5+ patrons!

So, I've been busy!  This month should be hopping! I hope you enjoy reading this stuff as much as I wrote it.  If you're a patron, my family and I want to thank you for supporting me while writing this blog, especially as the Christmas season comes up.  I hope you, all of you, enjoy what I have in store for you.

State of the Patreon: November

Another month has finished.  This would be yet another month where the blog continued it's rise if I hadn't drastically slowed my pace of posting, which I'll talk about shortly.  The most popular posts of the month, setting aside the Primer, are Tinker Titan Rebel Spy, which received a huge response (I want to thank everyone for that) and I'll have an after-action report up soon.  Then we have Akashic Ancestor Veneration followed by (surprise surprise) Grimshaw Ancestor Veneration (You guys like Grimshaw huh?) and then the Divine Masks cultural context.  I'm surprised to see the warm reception it's received.  I felt it was an important philosophy to tackle, but I assumed most of my readership would give it a collective shrug.  That seems not to be the case!

After a big talk with my wife about the stress of getting the posts out in time paired with my fatherly duties and my work, she made the wise suggestion of "Just don't post so much."  I used to write once a week.  So why do I post 4x a week now?  Because I want to get through this.  I wanted to finish by the end of the year.  That's not going to happen, and perhaps I should just acknowledge that I'm generating a lot of content, but a breakneck pace like I've been writing isn't really feasible and it's getting in the way of other projects that I really need to get back to.  So, expect to see 1-2 posts a week, rather than 4 posts a week like you have been seeing.  I would still like to get Patreon posts out at their regular schedule though.

Speaking of the Patron, it's going well, and I've hit my goal for sketch art, and I've paid for my first piece of art, a sketch of the Ranathim, for the Ranathim preview.  With luck I'll be able to land the first official artwork, and once I have the ball rolling on that, we should see quite a few more coming out.  At least, that's my hope.

In the coming month, for you, my dear Patrons, I have a $3 patron preview for the Tarvathim, the constructed race of the Ranathim, built out of synthetic flesh with forbidden arts to be their psionically vulnerable foot soldiers for their God-Emperor, but since the fall of that decadent Empire, they still proliferate throughout the galaxy, trying to find their place while their original purpose has faded away.  I also have a $5+ poll for the Death Cult of the Ranathim!   For $1+, I have something in the works, but I don't want to talk about it in case I am unable to finish it, in which case I don't want to make promises that I can't kee.

For everyone, this month will complete the Divine Masks, including Beliefs and Symbolism, a look at Ranathim Communion Cults (including three detailed cults), and then two "Sorcery" styles inspired by (space!) witchcraft and (space!) wizardry.  And of course, Tinker Titan Rebel Spy continues.

Thanks so much for supporting the blog this month, and I hope you continue your support in the coming month.  As usual, if you're not a patron, I'm glad you read my stuff, use my material, and chat with me on Discord!

State of the Patreon: October 2017

So, where are we as we finish off September, and where are we going in October?

September was a solid month.  The Patreon is basically flat, having lost some patrons, but also gained them . I keep brushing the next goal, but I haven't quite made it yet.  Nonetheless, interest in the blog remains high, and I've seen view gains for the second month in a row, and we've essentially recovered to pre-Orphan of the Stars views.

This month saw the kick-off of Philosophy, which seems well-received, except for some controversy around the facebook post for Neo-Rationalism (the smugness of Neo-Rationalism provokes a response in some, which is fair enough!).   We also saw the kick-off of Tinker Titan Rebel Spy, which currently has three players for sure, and two more in the works.  I'm both nervous about the game (I can never have too much preparation, but at the same time, I can see the gameplay pretty vividly, so it should make for an interesting game).  The characters look interesting, and I'm impressed by how much depth the players are giving their characters.  This almost certainly arises from the quality of players I have, but it's good that Psi-Wars supports that sort of depth.

Shhh. Go back to sleep.  Daddy's just distracting his
readers with a cute picture of you.

For October, first, I need to slow things down a little, because my parents visited to get their first look at my son (who just hit five months!), and he's also teething, which is an awful experience.  He's running a fever, whimpering, and sometimes has no appetite.  Needless to say it's been emotionally wracking and slowed down my productivity.  I had hoped to have a full month of 4 public posts per week and one patreon post per week, but it looks like I'm just going to miss that mark.  Instead, I'm going to run 12 public posts and 3 patreon posts, and give myself a week's break.  My wife complains that I went from 4 posts a month to 20, which is admittedly a break-neck pace, but I hope you guys don't mind.

For public posts, I'm going to wrap up the Akashic Mysteries, including a look at the esoteric style, unique martial arts associated with the Akashic Order, and the organization of the Order, including a look at the Shadow Council, and then a look at Akashic ancestor veneration, with a look at the important ancestors of each of the four Alliance houses.  Then we'll move on to the Divine Masks, and start with the basics.

For Patron posts, we'll start with a look at an in-depth look at Esoteric Medicine. While I have a focus on Psi-Wars, the ideas in the article can be used for any form of Esoteric Medicine (for example, Dungeon Fantasy, or your wuxia games).  This is available for all $1+ patrons.

Then I'll take a more in depth look at how non-psionic characters can access and benefit from the Paths of Communion.  I offer three new strategies.  This will be available to all $3+ patrons.

Finally, the Divine Masks is grounded in the culture of an alien race, the "Sexy Vampire Dark Elves," as they've been code-named up to now.  They now have a name: the Ranathim, and a preview draft will be released for all $3+ patrons.

Last but not least, the first Tinker Titan Rebel Spy game will be on the 21st.  I'll try to have a transcript and an after action report, though I don't know when I'll be able to get to it.

Thank you, everyone, for your support, and I hope you continue to support the blog!

State of the Patreon: September 2017; Philosophy and Playtests

I look forward to leaving the summer behind!

This was a very good month.  For the first time in the summer, I stopped my view freefall and recovered quite a bit back to a stable 8-9k, though the past few months I haven't had those weird, spammy spikes, and those are back, so I don't know how much I actually fell, and how much I improved.  In July, my Patreon was fairly stagnate, and I lost some Patrons this month but man, did I ever gain some more.  We've officially hit the art stretch goal, and I've already done some homework and had some people help me with sketches.

August marked the end of the Alliance which, along with the Empire, finishes off the core organizations of the main driver of the narrative of Psi-Wars.  We move on to the next deeper level in the coming month: Philosophy.

For my $1+ Patrons, I have an 8000 word treatise on Philosophy.  That comes out next week.  It takes GURPS Religion, and dives into how to create a philosophical movement using those rules, with a deeper look at beliefs, and a very superficial glance at some philosophical ideas you can mix and match to start working on your own philosophy.

For my $3+ Patrons, I have some treats. On the 15th, I discuss Faith in Psi-Wars, and offer a quick sample religion, Shepherdism, inspired by Shepherd Book from Firefly.  On the 22nd, I have Neo-Ratoinal Technology, a look at some sample TL 12 technologies that you can use for prototypes or gadgetry that should fit well enough into Psi-Wars.  Finally, on the 29th, I offer the Devils of Persephone: the Secrets of the Skairos, a look at a mythological element of the Akashic Mysteries, including several ideas on how to handle that mythology in your Psi-Wars game.

For $5+ Patrons, I'll offer a small poll on the 29th regarding the Devils of Persephone, mainly discussing how canonical they should be in the setting.  It's your choice!

For $3+ and $5+, of course, I still need to finish up the Alexian and Fifth House polls. Expect the poll results soon, and the actual write ups when I can get to them.

For the $7+, I have Tinker Titan Rebel Spy, the first Psi-Wars playtest session/mini-campaign.  It's still a work in progress at this moment, but I feel confident enough to open it up to sign-ups.

For everyone, next month we dive into the basics of philosophy next week, then spend two weeks looking at Neo-Rationalism, and then finish out the month with our first glimpse of the Akashic Mysteries.

I want to thank everyone for helping make this a great month, and I especially want to thank my Patrons for bringing me to my next stretch goal. You guys are wonderful!  Whether you're a patron or not, I hope you stick with Psi-Wars.

The State of the Patreon - August 2017

This has been a very up and down month.  At the start of it, I only had about half of the month worked out and while I had hope to get quite a lot of Patreon stuff done, I was only able to finish about half of it.  As a result, this has been one of my worst months for reviews and my pledges are down just a bit (but not much).

It's worked out well, though.  I've finally gained a full month of lead time on all fronts.  I have my blog scheduled all the way through August, which will finish the aristocracy and the Alliance, though there's a few little touch ups I might do before the end of August.  I'm already starting on September, which will be Philosophy.

What about Patreon?  Well, like I said, I had some good intentions last month, but didn't quite make them in July, so I've made extra effort to make sure I can deliver on my promises, and I've also got all the August Patreon posts scheduled already!  On the 11th, I have two Martial Arts posts, one a general one discussing problems with martial arts and Psi-Wars, and looking more deeply at how the martial arts of the Alliance were designed and how I see them interacting.  The second is for $3+ and looks at two concepts in GURPS Martial Arts: the Secret Technique and the Useless Technique.  I offer quite a few tricks that might improve a specific martial artists approach or give him a unique strategy, as well as a move or two that either outright doesn't work, is a questionable strategy, or is more cultural than martial.  This will coincide with a revisiting of the Graceful, Defensive, Swift and Destructive Force Sword forms on my blog, from the perspective of the Alliance.

On the 18th, coinciding with the release of the first two noble houses, I have my first ever $7+ patreon exclusive: the House of Alexus.  It will be a poll consisting of 7 questions that will allow you to decide how the vanished house that once ruled the "Eternal Empire" worked, what their character was, and what their ultimate fate was.

On the 25th, coinciding with the release of the last noble house, I have another poll for $5+ patrons: the Fifth Noble House.  I personally want to encourage all of my readers to realize that the four noble houses I outline aren't the totality of the aristocracy within the Psi-Wars galaxy, and by offering some inspiration, I hope to encourage you to make your own.  I've also wanted a fifth house since the beginning, and I thought this would be a good chance to have your voice in the setting.

That should cover all of August.  I do plan on doing more with Spaceships, but I want to make a priority of making sure I've got enough material going into September before I do that, so we don't see a repeat of June and July, at least not for awhile.  I also want to thank you again for your patience.  I wouldn't be here with you guys.