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I didn't see a thread for this yet, but on the latest episode of the D6 Generation they have a sneak peek of a new game from Wyrd with Mack Martin. It's called Ruined Planet and it is hard sci-fi in army scale. I don't have any more details than that right now because my iphone crashed whenever I tried to play the episode for some reason

http://www.thed6generation.com//premium/d6g-ep-142-wyrds-next-big-thing-wild-west-exodus

If anyone has had a chance to listen and can provide more details that would be awesome. Otherwise I'll try to see if I can sort out the issue and then post more.

Edit:

Breotan provided a good summary so I figured I should update this first post.

Ruined Planet is army sized miniatures game. 30-40 models for elite squad, maybe 100-150 models on the table depending on faction. Malifaux will never have an "army" scale. It's skirmish and will never change from that.

Very early in the development cycle. Just getting sketch work done and it is even possible that they never actually produce it. Mack essentially dropped everything to start working on it over Christmas break.

Six or seven factions. Two developed. One is the United Worlds of Sol - orbitals based on America. Radiation weapons, few bullets/projectiles because no mining. The second is the Pandemic. Related to the picture of the cube he's always had around. Alien super virus sort of thing. Spore cloud weapon? Requires higher brain functions so it can't use animals. Mexico built a wall to keep Americans out because America was hit hard by the outbreak.

Story is progressing, unlike 40k. Player actions at conventions and sanctioned tournaments will affect how the game narrative moves. Possible that tournament players will have their characters (captains and such) incorporated into the background somehow, should that player keep winning games and such.

Marines are short because they work and train in higher gravity (grav plates) and this reduces their height. Shorter is seen as military and taller is seen as lazy.

Dice, not cards. Too many cards to flip or models in the unit don't feel to be contributing in any meaningful way other than a "+1" bonus. Dice allow each model to feel like a contributor without weighing down gameplay with excessive flipping. If you have a unit with ten guys, you don't want to be flipping ten times.

Alternative actions, not turns. I do something then you do something. Reaction tokens.

As you lose dudes, your remaining dudes get stronger. You can resupply somehow, based on faction.

LoS is hard to do in a miniatures game. Ruined Planet will not use true LoS. Blocked = no shot. Exposed = bonus to shot. Otherwise all else is considered to have some sort of LoS but not entirely a clean shot. Game assumes that stuff is is the way unless exposed or blocked.

Every game has an attacker and a defender. Every location such as Dallas, Chicago, etc. has its own tables - one for the attacker and one for the defender. Attacker gets to choose major objective and the deployment. The defender gets to choose the minor objective and the conditions the battle will be fought under. The players get to move the other guy's pick up or down one place on the table. So, you make your choice, say number five, I get to move it to four or six. You get the same with my selection. Meta can involve either playing to win or playing to hose your opponent.

Wyrd believes there is plenty of room in the market. A game like this will have to be a big push on Wyrd's part, should they go with it because of the amount of figures to make and the price of the molds.

Too early to tell if vehicles are going to be in the system but he has them incorporated into the initial design. There are Independence and Constitution class dropships he's worked up but they currently just fly over and deploy, they don't land like currently in 40k.

Hard plastic like Malifaux?

That might be intriguing. Not like I need more sci-fi. Rumors are that the hard plastics for Malifaux are coming from WFG, and we know they can do good stuff with proper designs.

What scale? 28mm or smaller?

When I see models I may become interested. I admire the sculpting quality of Malifaux's stuff even if the aesthetics are too schizophrenic for me.

wow. very interested, though scale will likely be the breaking point for me... with the little time I have, painting full armies takes ages (and cash), and wyrd has complex rules to begin with

They ever end up delivering their RPG?

Why would you leak your new game so it can show up an hour into a podcast? At least when Mantic did this nonsense, they picked someone who uses video.

Discussion starts at 1:05:40.

Mack Martin from Wyrd was sharing about a project that are well into the future.

Rules and 2 faction books are written and ready for playtesting internally. Quite a bit of background is flushed out. But everything subject to be changed.

But artwork, concept art, miniatures and such is ways off yet. No ideas on timeline and other specifics.

Here are my notes:

Ruined Planet is army sized miniatures game. 30-40 models for elite squad, maybe 100-150 models on the table depending on faction. Malifaux will never have an "army" scale. It's skirmish and will never change from that.

Very early in the development cycle. Just getting sketch work done and it is even possible that they never actually produce it. Mack essentially dropped everything to start working on it over Christmas break.

Six or seven factions. Two developed. One is the United Worlds of Sol - orbitals based on America. Radiation weapons, few bullets/projectiles because no mining. The second is the Pandemic. Related to the picture of the cube he's always had around. Alien super virus sort of thing. Spore cloud weapon? Requires higher brain functions so it can't use animals. Mexico built a wall to keep Americans out because America was hit hard by the outbreak.

Story is progressing, unlike 40k. Player actions at conventions and sanctioned tournaments will affect how the game narrative moves. Possible that tournament players will have their characters (captains and such) incorporated into the background somehow, should that player keep winning games and such.

Marines are short because they work and train in higher gravity (grav plates) and this reduces their height. Shorter is seen as military and taller is seen as lazy.

Dice, not cards. Too many cards to flip or models in the unit don't feel to be contributing in any meaningful way other than a "+1" bonus. Dice allow each model to feel like a contributor without weighing down gameplay with excessive flipping. If you have a unit with ten guys, you don't want to be flipping ten times.

Alternative actions, not turns. I do something then you do something. Reaction tokens.

As you lose dudes, your remaining dudes get stronger. You can resupply somehow, based on faction.

LoS is hard to do in a miniatures game. Ruined Planet will not use true LoS. Blocked = no shot. Exposed = bonus to shot. Otherwise all else is considered to have some sort of LoS but not entirely a clean shot. Game assumes that stuff is is the way unless exposed or blocked.

Every game has an attacker and a defender. Every location such as Dallas, Chicago, etc. has its own tables - one for the attacker and one for the defender. Attacker gets to choose major objective and the deployment. The defender gets to choose the minor objective and the conditions the battle will be fought under. The players get to move the other guy's pick up or down one place on the table. So, you make your choice, say number five, I get to move it to four or six. You get the same with my selection. Meta can involve either playing to win or playing to hose your opponent.

Wyrd believes there is plenty of room in the market. A game like this will have to be a big push on Wyrd's part, should they go with it because of the amount of figures to make and the price of the molds.

Too early to tell if vehicles are going to be in the system but he has them incorporated into the initial design. There are Independence and Constitution class dropships he's worked up but they currently just fly over and deploy, they don't land like currently in 40k.

 Breotan wrote:
Six or seven factions. Two developed. One is the United Worlds of Sol - orbitals based on America. Radiation weapons, few bullets/projectiles because no mining. The second is the Pandemic. Related to the picture of the cube he's always had around. Alien super virus sort of thing. Spore cloud weapon? Requires higher brain functions so it can't use animals. Mexico built a wall to keep Americans out because America was hit hard by the outbreak.

Zombies. Yay.

Marines are short because they work and train in higher gravity (grav plates) and this reduces their height. Shorter is seen as military and taller is seen as lazy.

That sounds like a good way to cripple yourself. I'd expect to see a lot of knee and spinal injuries in any organisation that tried this.

I was interested up until the zombies and the competitive minigame of just setting up a game.

Sounds interesting, though I don't think you would shrink if you "only" start training in a higher-gravity environment upon joining the military (late teenage-years? early 20s)?

If you grow up, from birth, on a high-grav world, and especially over multiple-generations, it be different.

Than again, this doesn't sound nearly as hard-sci-fi as the labeling as such implies (Zombies!!), so I guess it doesn't matter. More a stab at Space Marines being grown-larger (in a blatant sci-fantasy setting) most-likely.

I was interested until it devolved into America vs Zombies.

The setting isn't exactly novel and I was hoping for a genuine army scale game (what is described is a company level game).

The mechanics sound interesting though so maybe this game could be worth getting into. Maybe.

Mack essentially dropped everything to start working on it over Christmas break.

They just keeping making me more glad I dropped my pledge on the RPG.

Mexico building a wall to keep out the flood of illegal American immigrants? Could be interesting

Squats v Zombies.... Lol

 Kroothawk wrote:
Mexico building a wall to keep out the flood of illegal American immigrants? Could be interesting

The Onion made that joke in 2009.

I think I also saw it in a game somewhere, maybe one of those post-apoc Risk variants.

 lord_blackfang wrote:

 Kroothawk wrote:
Mexico building a wall to keep out the flood of illegal American immigrants? Could be interesting

The Onion made that joke in 2009.

I think I also saw it in a game somewhere, maybe one of those post-apoc Risk variants.

The 2004 disaster-movie The Day After Tomorrow also ends with it

Breaking news from

the U.S. -Mexico border.

Just half an hour ago,

Mexican officials closed the border...

...in the light of so many U.S. refugees

who are fleeing south...

...in the wake of the approaching storm.

These people came in anticipation

of crossing into Mexico.

Instead, they've been met

with closed gates.

And now, in a dramatic reversal

of illegal immigration...

...thousands of people are crossing

the Rio Grande into Mexico.

The scene unfolding here behind me

is one of desperation and frustration.

People have abandoned their cars,

grabbed their belongings...

...and they are wading across the river

illegally into Mexico.

Thanks, Breotan! First post updated with your summary.

 Breotan wrote:
Very early in the development cycle. Just getting sketch work done and it is even possible that they never actually produce it. Mack essentially dropped everything to start working on it over Christmas break.

I think this is a bit damning. What's the point of speculating about a game that isn't even confirmed to get an actual release yet?

Eh, zombies.

If you're gonna do space undead, coming up with some good background is essential.

So far the AT-43 Therians are the only vaguely undead sci-fi faction I've seen that had excellent background (the remnants of the original humans from Terra, having developed immortality via a method of transferring their conciousness to machines, seeking to make that immortality permanent by embarking on a billion-year plan to prevent the heat death of the universe).


There's a lot of companies claiming to make hard sci-fi but falling short and instead making something that doesn't take into account a truly galactic scale.

Would be nice if a few more of them read up on their Asimov/ Herbert/ Clarke/ Banks first before trying to kludge something together.

Zond wrote:
I was interested until it devolved into America vs Zombies.

Agreed... hmmmmm.

Can't wait to fight over exciting scifi locations like 'Dallas' and 'Chicago'.
As I was putting together my Anvil Industries Grenadiers I was thinking "if only these guys were hobbits for some bs fluff reason".
To summarize: bleah.

 Breotan wrote:
Mexico built a wall to keep Americans out because America was hit hard by the outbreak.

Wow, I hope they will ditch this Onion humor and hire actual writers to come up with their backstory.

by the few info we have, this look like a disaster in the making. Nothing remotely interesting in the setting.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 scarletsquig wrote:
Eh, zombies.

If you're gonna do space undead, coming up with some good background is essential.

So far the AT-43 Therians are the only vaguely undead sci-fi faction I've seen that had excellent background (the remnants of the original humans from Terra, having developed immortality via a method of transferring their conciousness to machines, seeking to make that immortality permanent by embarking on a billion-year plan to prevent the heat death of the universe).


There's a lot of companies claiming to make hard sci-fi but falling short and instead making something that doesn't take into account a truly galactic scale.

Would be nice if a few more of them read up on their Asimov/ Herbert/ Clarke/ Banks first before trying to kludge something together.

the therians wasnt the undead faction in AT-43. It was the oni corp, which was a megacorp that created zombie to sell as mercenary.

http://www.figouz.net/AT-43/Army_Box_Oni.php#.UxNfYYWrHyU

 streetsamurai wrote:
by the few info we have, this look like a disaster in the making. Nothing remotely interesting in the setting.

Dunno. Depends on how many Zombie-themed Kickstarters are already scheduled for 2016. If the competition is numerous, they might end up with less than 2 Million. Bleak prospects indeed.

This is true. International zombie nerds only have 8-12 million dollars a year to spend on any damn thing with a zombie in it. Timing is everything.

hmm :/

not inspired. I'm sure Wyrd will have gorgeous minis, but they've also had skirmish prices and complexity. Dumbing down the models and rules to fit a large scale setting makes me skeptical.

The "stronger as you lose more guys" sounds like a good mechanic, but I think they should have waited longer before releasing anything, and 100 minis on the table is actually a bit daunting after so much skirmish.