Thomas @koboldskeep Keene

@kobolds-keep.net

1500 Followers 1260 Following

he/him 🎮 #gamedev 🎲 #ttrpg ✍️ #noAI 🚫 Junk-o-Tron is out on Steam and Nintendo Switch! It's a score attack puzzle game with robots! 🟥🟩🟦🤖 https://store.steampowered.com/app/2514390/ Games - https://koboldskeep.itch.io/ RPGs - https://koboldsquest.itch.io/

A large dumpster-shaped robot running through a shower of colorful scrap metal and trash-like objects

A shiny gold robot with a spherical head covered with lenses and a dramatic red cape.

A shiny chrome robot girl with two upper bodies back-to-back. One has her hands together in a contemplative pose, while the other is smiling like she's talking animatedly.

A large yellow robot with a trash compactor at the top of its torso and green excavator shovel hands.

A one-eyed robot in a construction hat holding a cup of coffee. He is shrugging and rolling his eye.

Artwork of four robots standing in front of a crater full of trash while colored blocks rain down on either side of them.

A green capsule standing in a room surrounded by torches with hard-edged light pools

Sketch of a crab like creature holding a fast food cup and messily drinking from it.

Magic Wand: Ud6. Equal odds of an
evocation, enchantment, or conjuration.
Magic Potion: Not for healing. Equal odds of
utility, thieving, combat, or whimsy.
Gemstone: Valuable and slightly magical. Useful for magecraft and arcane rituals.
Runesteel Ingot: Glows under your fingertips. Perhaps a smith could do something with it?
"Bottomless" Coffer: This bulky locked chest takes up 2 Item Slots but contains 6. Its interior is 2 feet across, 1 foot wide, and 6 feet deep.
Black Pearl of Chaos: Ud6. Once per day it empowers a spellbook with one additional use, but the result is tainted with wild magic.
Jackrabbit Boots: Ud6. You may swap locations with a willing ally you can see once per Turn.
Werespider Silk Rope: Very strong. While you touch either end it obeys your verbal commands.
Ring of the Djinn: Summons and commands a genie, who has barely any magic, but feigns competence. Returns to the ring if defeated.
Amulet of Mind Reading: Hear the thoughts of others. You can try to get more information, but it risks broadcasting your thoughts instead.
Fairy Flute: Ud6. Has a beautiful sound. Playing slowly for a few minutes causes deep sleep.
Stasis Bottle: This glass bottle captures anything that fits inside. It currently contains red-hot lava.
Curved Elvish Blade: Attacks with this light melee weapon are criticals on a 1 or 7.
Mithral Dwarvish Helm: +2 Armor, dwarves will recognize the clan markings and offer to buy it.
Skullblade: Stabbing this heavy melee weapon into a corpse's chest turns it into an obedient undead servant until the sword is removed.
Adamantine Shield: Utterly indestructible. When you succeed on a Check to defend and roll a multiple of 3, your opponent's weapon shatters.
Razor Wit: This light melee rapier will absorb a spell cast at it, releasing the spell when it strikes.
Dragonhide Scale Mail: Grants immunity to fire, and you take half damage from falling.
Firefang Axe: Heating this heavy melee weapon in a forge doubles the damage of its next 3 hit…

A large yellow robot with shovel hands frolicking through a rain of falling multicolored junk objects

A screenshot of a Discord conversation. A hulking robot with shovel arms is posing. The conversation follows:
"How about that?"
"Gertrude is exuding 'level 2 mid boss" energy. Maybe goofier?"

A motorcycle driving down a highway populated by red boxes

Various sketches of aliens and robots

Laser Sword - Compact Edition v0.6.2 - by Thomas Keene @koboldskeep http://kobolds-keep.net
Tests: When you do something the Game Master deems Risky, you must roll a d20 and roll under the
relevant Ability. Favorable circumstances give Advantage, and your Ability gets a +5 bonus for that Test.
Hindrances like relevant Injuries give Disadvantage, a -5 penalty to the Ability.
Luck Points: Whenever you fail a Test, gain 1 Luck Point (track these with tokens). You may spend 1 LP after a
Test to reroll or substitute your LUK Ability. Unused LP are lost when the Mission ends.
Character Creation: Make your Character using the following steps:
1 Name your Character, come up with a brief description of their role on the Team, and answer this
Background question: "What did the Imperium take from you?" Add more details later as needed.
2 Assign the following numbers to your eight Abilities: 12 11 10 9 8 7 6 5
* Might (MGT): A warrior's brutality. Grab, throw, wrestle, restrain, smash, Attack/Defend in Melee.
* Perception (PER): A ranger's alertness. See, hear, smell, search, track, navigate, Attack/Defend at Range.
* Endurance (END): A soldier's grit. Labor, ignore pain, resist poisons. Gives more Gear Slots.
* Charisma (CHZ): A socialite's moxie. Persuade, appeal, bargain, deceive, intimidate, ride mounts.
* Agility (AGI): An acrobat's finesse. Run, leap, climb, swim, sneak, pilot vehicles, dodge tangible Attacks.
* Craft (CFT): An engineer's technical savvy. Build, repair, appraise, invent, sabotage, analyze.
* Spirit (SPR): A mystic's psionic insight. Identify exotic effects, Attack/Defend with Powers.
* Luck (LUK): A fool's good fortune.
3 Choose one Power, your supernatural talent. You may Heighten it fourfold, but it Risks working too well.
* Telekinesis: Strong as your arms* Mindlink: Touch forges a long-term telepathic link
* Witchfire: Green flame burns or ages organics* Comet Dust: Create/shape/throw handful of ice
* Life Transfer: Move an Injury to another person

Old School TTRPG Quick Start by Thomas Keene @koboldskeep
Checks: When you do something risky, roll a d20 and you must roll under (not equal to) the relevant ability. Circumstances may give your ability a +5 bonus or a -5 penalty. NPCs do not roll.
2 Your adventurer had two careers before they started adventuring. Consult the Careers And Starting Equipment table, choosing two careers or rolling d100 twice. Each career gives you three items (for a total of six). Your careers may give you bonuses to relevant checks.
3 Assign the following numbers to your six abilities:
13 12 11 10 9 8
(Alternately, roll 3d6 down the line, loudly announcing the rolls for the group's entertainment.)
* Strength: The Warrior ability. Used for melee attacks and checks like climbing and lifting.
* Dexterity: The Thief ability. Used for checks requiring agility and reflexes, like dodging, sneaking, picking pockets, sleight of hand, etc. (Dexterity is not used to attack.)
* Constitution: The Adventurer ability. Used for checks to resist poison, intoxication, cold, etc.
* Intelligence: The Magic-User ability. Used for checks requiring cunning, like crafting, lock picking, potion-making, etc. Scrolls and spellbooks typically affect Int minus 10 targets.
* Wisdom: The Ranger ability. Used for ranged attacks and checks like foraging and navigation.
* Charisma: The Cleric ability. Used for social and divine intervention checks.
You also have an Armor ability, rolled to defend against attacks. It starts at 10.
4 You have Item Slots equal to your Constitution. Fill your remaining Slots with any number of:
Light Weapon: wield 2 for +1 accuracy
Armor Piece: each gives you +1 Armor (max 18)
Heavy Weapon: +1 damage, 2 hands, 2 Slots
Shield: +2 Armor (max 18) when held in one hand
Bow or Crossbow: 2 hands, Ud8 ammo
Healing Potion: heals 2d6 damage
Flintlock: noisy, +1 damage, 2 hands, 2 Slots, Ud6
A Random Spellbook: usable once per day
Extra Ammo: same Usage Die as the weapon

A videogame prototype of several torches that render polygonal lights on the floors and walls in the style of The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker.

A videogame demo where a capsule runs past a bunch of white and yellow spheres.

A videogame prototype of two torches in a room casting hard-edged light pools on the floors and walls. One of the torches has its light pool cut off near the second torch which is in front of it.

Footage of a videogame prototype. A capsule runs around a room full of torches which render as hard-edged light pools.

A dark room with a torch in the corner. The torchlight makes a polygonal pool around it.

A hallway of a crumbling temple with a glowing orb at its center. Several priests in robes with conical hats are moving about. The closest holds a book and we can see a glowing void that has grown over one of their eyes.

A list of build folders numbered sequentially. The top ones are named "oops" and "doubleOpps". The bottom ones are named "saveSizing", "fixedSaveSize", and "pleaseWork".

The Conflux: Everything that falls between the cracks ends up here, stuck to the lumpy underside of space-time. Millions of fragments of your world's history are illuminated by dim light from the Timestream above. Forgotten things, lost things, magical mishaps, unfortunate science experiments, and you. A small village has congealed around the debris. Each inhabitant has some unique insight into the nature of time. Nothing ages here, and nothing changes. You could stay and find peace. But it doesn't have what you want.
The Unmoored: One fateful day, your anchor to reality was severed. Some accident set you adrift from the Timestream. You are able to dive back into the Timestream at any place or time of your choosing, a thrilling power! But a few days pass, the world turns slippery around you, and you slide right back into the Conflux.
What motivates you to make these journeys? Do you want to go home? Does some question haunt you? Do you need to set right what went wrong? Do you need to alter the very course of history?
The Mailbeast: A squat blue creature with a massive mouth, and a Squakbird perched atop its horns. It speaks in short sentences and is easily irritated until fed. If you address a letter to a Contact and feed it to the Mailbeast, it will immediately burp up a letter or package in response, as though hours or days passed for the Contact.
The Squakbird: A small red bird that constantly titters to itself in snippets of familiar-sounding conversations. It screeches loudly when interrupted. On close inspection, you see its eyes are tiny machine lenses with intricate parts. The bird can relay messages to any Contact in the Timestream you name, as long as they have a technological communication device. It doesn't matter if it's by telegraph, telephone, or telepresence.
The Oracle: A robed figure with a single massive eye. She is happy to tell you how any person, place, or thing in history met its eventual end. Your journeys greatly interest her.

A list of folders. Each starts with "Junk-o-Tron" followed by ascending numbers. The top ones are "debugSaveLogging" and "enableUser". The bottom ones are "initializingSavesProperly", "saveUnmountBugfix", "moreSaveFixes", "oops", and "doubleOops".

A character sheet for a sci-fi science fantasy tabletop role-playing game.

Features List: Let every player propose one or more Features, notable things about the town/business. Ask leading questions. Ask about bad things. You'll get a nice list quickly.

Events Table: Looking at the Features, make a d20 table of weekly events that is 1/3 good, 1/3 neutral, and 1/3 bad. Put your extra ideas on a reserve list. Keep this table secret.

PCs Modify Features: Every week players spend time improving or spending money on the town/business, either changing a Feature or adding a new one (or attempting to, depending on ability checks). Anything they change that could matter for an item on the d20 events table, modify that event on the table to reflect it. This could turn a bad event good, and that's fine.

Weekly Event: Every week have one player roll a d20 for the event table. If a PC is supervising/managing, they get to roll twice on that table and they are the first PC to react to the event. Have the event happen, then remove it from the list and replace it with a new one from the reserve list.

1/250 Weekly Profits: My rule of thumb for return on investment is that, as long as it makes sense, the town/business makes all of its money back in 5 years. That means each week you earn 1/250th of the invested money as profits. Weekly events can modify or obliterate this. You may want to adjust it to monthly, especially if the party is traveling. You may want to change payout to seasonal or yearly depending on the kind of business.

A partially completed character sheet for a TTRPG. The left side has entries like Character, Player, Appearance, Background, Origin, Species, Traits, Powers, and Perks. A column of Abilities are labeled Might, Perception, Endurance, Charisma, Agility, Craft, Spirit, and Luck. The right side is much sketchier in pink with entries like Class, Rank, Class Gear, Knacks, Contacts, Gear, Items, "creduts", and Injuries.

A capsule runs up a wall, jumps, then jumps off the wall and bounces in a high arc a couple of times.

QUEST NOW!
A letter from the King!
"The kingdom is in danger!
Now brave heroes are
needed for a quest.
Heroes like you!"

Abilities
Abilities are the things your
Hero is good at. A bigger die
means you are better at it.
Put these dice on your
four Abilities:
Roll an Ability die when the
Game Master asks you to.
If you have HELP, roll another
d6. Use the higher die.
If the Roll is DIFFICULT, roll
another d6. Use the lower die.

Might helps you to push, smash, grab, throw, fight. Is it your d10? You get 3 items... * a sharp axe * a sturdy shield * a bag of climbing gear

Junk-o-Tron running on the Nintendo Switch. A loading screen has several robots carrying the letters "LOADING" across the screen. #gamedev #indiegame

A capsule running around on triangles that form into hexagons as they move.

A capsule runs around on some triangles arranged into two hexagons. The hexagons reshape when the capsule is near the border between the two.

A capsule runs around a few boxes. It tries running up the sides of the boxes a couple of times, and succeeds in getting on top of one.

Six different iterations of a TTRPG character sheet, starting with a scrawled sheet of lined yellow notepad paper.

Two windows of a multiplayer videogame where players are placing blocks on a flat surface.

Various D&D tables with entries like,
d20 GenerIc event
1 Something almost destroys the business,
causing permanent damage. -100% profits
2 Someone gets hurt. -80% profits
3 A rival, a moneylender, a monster, or some
other NPC stirs up some trouble. -60% profits
4 Someone or something threatens to destroy
the business in the near future. The staff are
terrified. -50% profits
5 Something unlucky happens, possibly
supernatural. -30% profits
6 Something inconvenient disrupts normal
business this week. -20% profits
7 Something annoying happens. -10% profits
8 Something stupid happens.
9 Someone brings a magic item and then leaves
with it.
10 A new NPC does something odd.
11 An old friend comes by for a visit.
12 Something supernatural but harmless happens.
13 An omen appears.
14 Something nice happens. +10% profits
15 Something weird happens, but it worked out in
your favor. +25% profits
16 Everything works out well, business is quite
favorable this week. +50% profits
17 An important NPC does something that helps
your business. +60% profits
18 A really good thing happens, you were either
very lucky or it was a supernatural occurrence.
+80% profits
19 A massive windfall occurs. +100% profits
20 Someone wealthy gives you money because
they like the business so much. +50% profits,
+5% Investment Score
d20 Complication
1 A Resistance cell is in urgent need of aid, only you can do it in time
2 A rain of debris and meteors causes havoc
3 A holostar is doing a live broadcast on-site, security is on high alert
4 That’s no moon… an Imperial destroyer looms overhead
5 A large alien predator is awakened by the smell of blood
6 It’s a trap! 1d6 mercenaries are lying in wait!
7 A canister of gray goo shatters, you’re not sure what it eats
8 A storm strikes the site, visibility is bad and infrastructure deteriorates
9 Your intended escape route has been cut off
10 Someone is actually royalty in disguise, and they’re not happy with you
11 One of the guards uses an astral lure to summ…

A vortex of stars streaking past the viewer. In the center of the vortex is a murky rippling blue field of energy.

A hologram of a rotating planet floating above a tablet with starmap notes on it.

A presentation slide titled "What is Pokemon NOT about?"
An image on the side shows Ken Sugimori's concept art for Pokemon Red/Green with two Pokemon facing one another with HP meters over their heads.
"Interesting and engaging battle mechanics
PvE strategy is too simple
PvP strategy is too RNG-dependent
Creators don’t want to emphasize violence
Was an auto-battler until Nintendo complained (Pokedex - Shigeki Morimoto)
Themes of friendship (fight me)
Too vague
Very small number of features until Pokemon Yellow
Only supported by:
Nicknames
Effort values
Some dialogue lines from Professor Oak"

A 3d rendered scene of a table with a screen labeled "sector map" listing several locations, such as "Delphinus Gamma, marsh world" and "Asteroid Cluster Scutum Beta". A hologram of a planet composed of glowing dots floats to one side. The table has streaks of colored energy.

Building Missions 2: Sources of Drama

Who is getting hurt? Is a struggling colonist getting sold into slavery to settle their debts? Are space pirates holding the governor’s daughter hostage? Is a noble sympathetic to the Resistance about to be deposed? The source of the Mission should be a cry for help (and if your Team isn’t very heroic, the cry of help can be followed by an offer of payment).

This determines the Mission’s Objective, what the Team has to do to solve the problem. The Objective might not be readily apparent, or it might be complex, but the Team’s job is to gather intel on site and figure it out. Individual Contacts may give their Characters extra minor Objectives with gear rewards.

Pay close attention to Contacts at Character Creation. Players are automatically motivated to help their Contacts because they are part of their Characters. Contacts have friends and family, debts and setbacks, and rivals and enemies. Even if a Contact is a pet, you can prompt a Player to make a connection by asking, “who gave you your pet and how long has it been since you last heard from them?”

Dial up the heat and pile on problems, even if it feels cheap. It must be clear why heroes are needed. Don’t just say “there’s a space monster killing our colony’s livestock and our colony will starve.” Say, “it killed our livestock, then we filed an insurance claim, but we were accused of committing fraud, and then our first expedition to find it got our best hunters injured, so now they’re going to nuke our credit, and a local noble just sent an appraiser to determine which plots will be seized at auction, so we must catch or kill this creature to present it as proof, or else our colony will starve.”

Glitchy text appears on a screen....

Cerae Mk IV, S/N: 10711198-LD, 24MHz 8MB
Owner ID: [indecipherable]
This GravNet-traced device is property of the sovereign royal family and loyal Imperial vassal HOUSE ELQUIST
Unauthorized use of stolen DataTech is punishable by lifetime imprisonment, hard labor, or exile.
Scanning blocks...
ERROR: Checksum failed [indecipherable]

does your heart yearn for freedom? press here

A wooden octagonal dice tray filled with blue and green poker chips. Yellow post-it notes are affixed to the sides with labels like," fence is on fire," and, "pirate morale."

A yellow and orange and red sphere of fire spins, with the yellow layer fading in and out.

// xy - offset from nearest hex center
// zw - unique ID of hexagon
vec4 calcHexInfo(vec2 uv)
{
vec4 hexCenter = round(vec4(uv, uv - vec2(.5, 1.)) / s.xyxy);
vec4 offset = vec4(uv - hexCenter.xy * s, uv - (hexCenter.zw + .5) * s);
return dot(offset.xy, offset.xy) < dot(offset.zw, offset.zw)
? vec4(offset.xy, hexCenter.xy) : vec4(offset.zw, hexCenter.zw);
}

Gameplay trailer for Junk-o-Tron, a Tetris looking videogame with blocks you match together to score points. It has 3d pre-rendered robot characters made in Blender who react to the player's performance.

A screenshot of the Steamworks Release App dialog

Rotating models of bits of space junk, including a camera-like machine part, some tubing, a crate or case, and a glowing egg. Did you know Junk-o-Tron has robots?

A sketch of 3 different kinds of earth attacks. The first has cracks form in the ground as pressure builds, then a cone of dirt bursts upwards making large cracks in the raised surface. The second has some stone spikes emerge from the ground in a ring, then they burst out diagonally and are immediately followed by a larger pillar in the center. The third has five large chunks of earth slowly buckle and pop out of the ground, before they all burst upwards simultaneously as tall pillars.

Footage of a match-3/Tetris hybrid game with robot characters.

A block puzzle videogame where blocks are brought together and explode in a shower of particles. A caption reads, "match colors to score points".

A trailer showing a block puzzle game where blocks brought together explode in a shower of glowing square particles. All of the blocks are textured like machines. The corner of the screen shows a robot character reacting to the player's actions in the game.
#gamedev #indiegame #indiegamedev #scifi #sciencefiction #robots #space #puzzle