Welcome back Delvers,

Today we are quite nearly at $10,000, which is fantastic! Reminder that our next stretch goal is at $12,500, which gets us special moves from all 6 classes added to the game!

But our poll tells us there are favorites among the character classes. Well, The Caged Wraith and the Organ Eater were both at the top, and they've both been talked about in the updates already. It's time to check third place.



The Aeon Caller

The Aeon Caller has aligned their soul with Aeons. They have a bell or harp that they play, along with their singing, to empower items and machines, or call on Aeons to aid the group in combat. They seek to find harmony with the world, and are good support characters. They can follow the path of The Song, imbuing their Soul into Tools and Relics/Artifacts, making them and their allies stronger, or they can follow the path of The Hum, becoming part machine themselves, imbuing their own bodies with artifacts and power, keeping Relics in their bodies.


Now, from the artist, Salty Water:

I really enjoy the choice of bat for this one, big ears pointing to the sky, actually thnking about the composition for this one could refer to The Hermit in tarot.  I'm kind of thinking that the focus on this one can be mainly on their back, instead of carrying harp hanging from their back, Im thinking of their spine replaced into mechanical structure that extend out to form a harp, and the back of their ribs opened up like that torture called blood eagle, so they store the relics from the back into their ribcage. Or the soul of them pouring out passing the string of the harp and bless the whole group with the song. Possibly good make them in a humble posture and raising the lantern high similar to that hermit style.  Some more details i will think deeper when doing the rough sketches. 
For the clothing definitely good to reference to Eastern Orthodoxy for its form and also the fancy decoration, need to consider how to form the runic system as a language they praise their god, also for the pattern on clothes and their rings. 

Overall I'd like to give them a loop/knot element on the overall design and add some key elements to the bell design and stuff design(as a lantern), and using broken wings as the structure of harp on the back. Will add some more accessories on them, thinking about let them hang like the clock pendulum.
I'm still figuring on the language/rune system for this religious, the idea I was thinking of is the engraving on the rings is like music score, when the worshipper singing along with the pattern on it, the spell and music charges the magic, and can work for their machine god. And inspired by the alchemy sign and noise interrupting pattern, both for marks and the design on their robes. ...
Also for the ring and oil design, I was thinking the draining of oil means the death of the Aeons, and the power contained in the rings, so the oil is contained inside the intersecting rings. Like a living creature that reacts to prayer and hymns, like music wave patterns, so the ring as the basic structure remains minimal but the oil more as some active and interactable element, although rings keep moving even partly broken.

Also back to work on The Aeon Caller, redesigned his bell+lantern again, mixed the style of orthodox candle stand design and Astrolabe design into which will make it more unique looking.

I know the other two are fan favorites already, but the Aeon Caller is fascinating design. Salty really dug into this and hit it out of the park. The Aeon angels have music waves scratched into their rings, screaming and singing as they turn, their oil is their life blood. Just in exploring the design I gave them, Salty Water crafted more of the world through visual exploration. This is my favorite kind of collaboration, when ideas are shared and malleable.

So now that you've seen the Aeon Caller and dived deeper into what it's about, what do you think? Has your vote on the poll changed? And who do you want to see next?

GOALS

The Organ Eater

For this one, I'd like to go with the aesthetic in combination of necromancer, medieval plague doctor, and the chinese/japanese doctors in the ancient time who wandered around with a big wooden case on the back.
Based on the description you given this time, I think it is neat to make them a surprisingly small character instead of something like Nurgle monsters. But need a unfitting big mouth for devouring could be nice. Above the things you described, Id like to make several portholes with metal doors usually shut, in the Alchemy furnace fashion to show that their interior system is reforged into a machine that is allowing for processing the organ and material eaten into the medical potions, salves, and other things they need. Also they can have more pipes that extend out of the body, connected to several containers or bottles with acid and other potions. Not only on the torso with belts holding the materials for the alchemy but also the  wooden case, with rows of drawers on the back, covered in vermin and also various hanging body parts outside of it (claws shells, scales anything can be used to make into medicine)

I have finished finalizing the organ eater, looked further into the grave robber kind of elements, and giving less mechanical looks, referring to the bronze ware shards forged into body and the shovel in this specific type which was invented for this purpose. The shelf on back, bit vague, but mostly wooden structure and adding the butcher hook on the side for holding materials. 

And, of course, Salty Water brought more incredible design ideas to the final version, thinking about particular old artifacts. Truly, the Organ Eater was inspired and brings such a unique design to the game.


My favorite part of the Organ Eater is that we made it a Hare. The Caged Wraith was a mole, but most of the remaining ones are all rats. I liked that these two were something different. I also like how different one of the original sketches was compared to this final art, and think if we reach a tier to include more art on the cards, finalizing that other sketch with more piping through the body would be fun. Different versions of the archetype.

So what do you think? Do you want to eat flesh and excrete salves for your allies as the alchemist, providing healing and support to your allies as you share messages from the entrails? Or will you become an organ fueled engine with spikes of power and personal boosts from your processing of the organs you consume, becoming a sporadic battle machine, rushed with internally made drugs?

And which of the Roads/classes would you like to hear more about next update?!

Talk shortly yet this week!

7DA
your pub gob

Hello my Dungeon Delvers!

We are a bit over 24 hours in now and 90% funded exactly. $6750/7500!
That is fantastic, and we have a lot more ahead. I want to point out our goals beyond our funding, including stretch goals to add more bosses, more cards, new classes, and more! There's also an achievement Boss we can unlock if we get the Pub Gob bluesky account to 1000 followers during the campaign, which will be more doable than you think!

So please, share the project to friends, family, and gaming friends! We, Salty Water (our artist) and I would both love to add even more art to this game, and that's what most of the stretch goals do.

But first, let's talk about the incredible art in this game.


Salty Water approached the Caged Wraith first, thinking deeply into the concept. From Salty Water themselves, (lightly amended for language differences)

"For this one, I'm looking into the aesthetic of ancient egypt, combined with the cold metal of the torturous equipment to emphasize on the weakness and suffering of the flesh... I really surprised with the choice of mole as this character, but it should work well with the contrast between the soul form as a mole and the actual physical body as a naked mole rat that is barely alive. Upper body with a cage in the fashion of an egyptian coffin+iron maiden forged into flesh and using metal/gold/iron (depend on the overall color scheme) as reinforcement to the body to hold it together with engraving and patterns on it, referring to the mask and prosthetics of those post-war soldiers. I believe this design is suited for a prisoner kind of feeling and showing the torture on the physical bodies as hint on the reason they have their soul trapped in the body, and maybe the ability to separate from the physical body is a form of punishment (or maybe a form of religious belief?)  For the soul form be in a glorious form with various accessories on body, can be good referring to the appearance of the ancient Egyptian priest and gods, such as Anubis."

"For the caged wraith, I turned the Egyptian motif more visible in soul form, but keep the cage and imprisoned vibe more in physical form, using the metal strips all over to form the cage and the contour of the character, like bandages to wrap part of the character. It’s almost skin-bone looking, and I also added the jester look to the physical form. Idea still bit rough, but I think using metal strips like it’s skeleton can be better than literally put a cage there... I got the caged wraith draft refined, thinking about using the visual image of steam train boiler explosion as how the wraith form when release from the cage, and the overall look of the physical form is using metal strips as the main element, both for cage and the contour of clothes, using it as the equivalent of bandage on mummies so that the physical form is all flesh and the cage fixed onto the flesh directly."

It was important to me in my early work on this game that the classes here were not the standard ones you might ask of an adventuring party. That they had more specific stories to them. I didn't want a general class you could interpret how you wanted, I wanted very specific entities that relate to the world, their culture, and their lived experiences. The Caged Wraith was an early contender from my list of potential roads, which goes beyond the ones you see below.


The Caged Wraith always struck me as a character who is tragic. Either a character whose soul wants free from their body, and who hates the wretched form they drag along with them; or one who has a wandering soul they are desperately trying to keep within their waning body. In both cases, the theme here is desperation. And in making use of this wandering soul, the mechanics associated with the Caged Wraith are innately about high risk moves, extreme frailty, and the ability, of course, to roam the world as a soul alone.

The Caged Wraith can sneak ahead without being detected, look through walls, pass through objects, and of course, damage souls directly-- a generally quite rare power. But the trade off is the way they leave their body unattended, either needing to be carried by allies or left undefended, easy prey for hungry creatures in the dark.

Yesterday, this class was winning in people's most interesting/favorite class poll. But now the Organ Eater has overtaken it! Go vote now, and help me pick which class we will take a closer look at next update!

Thanks for the amazing first day everyone, let's see how far we can get!

7DA
your pub gob