A streamlined fantasy rules system with an evocative setting that's both family-friendly and deep enough to create compelling stories.
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Hello Good Doggos!
We've done it again! Still in our first week of the campaign, and we've just unlocked our second Stretch Goal! This one adds a new Add On Reward, giving backers who are pledging for either the standard or deluxe hardcover an opportunity to add on a Realms of Pugmire Guide Screen for +$25.
ACHIEVED! - At $35,000 in Funding - NEW ADD ON: GUIDE SCREEN - A three-panel Guide Reference Screen with charts and information for running a Realms of Pugmire game will be created and offered as an Add On to the hardcover reward tiers for +$25.
I'll get that new Add On option set up in the system and flip the switch shortly. New backers will be able to select it as an Add On during the pledge process, or current backers can update their pledge to include it in their list of rewards. I'll be going over all of the pledge process and Add On options near the end of the campaign, so if you haven't quite figured it out yet, no worries, we'll cover all of that before the end.
With that achievement, we've covered the announced Stretch Goals so far, so it looks like it's time to fetch some more!
Our next stretch goal is a milestone marker and celebration that presents a slightly different take on our first stretch goal...
At $38,000 in Funding - REDBUBBLE PET DESIGNS – A Realms of Pugmire design will be hosted on Onyx Path’s Redbubble store and made available on pet merchandise, including pet mats, pet blankets, and pet bandanas. Backers will be notified when these options become available.
Of course! Why just show off your Realms of Pugmire support with a t-shirt when you can deck your pet out in some fun fashion and accessories!
At $40,000 in Funding - JUMPSTART PDF - An introductory scenario designed to introduce new players to the game, along with ready-made characters and a basic rules overview, will be created as a Jumpstart PDF supplement and added as a bonus to the rewards list of all backers receiving the Realms of Pugmire PDF.
And then some brand new content in the form of a jumpstart adventure supplement. Onyx Path's jumpstarts are the perfect way to introduce a new game to your group, or to launch a new ongoing campaign, and the perfect tool for new guides to get into this world.
So let's keep at it, good doggos! Please remember to share your excitement about this campaign in your social circles and on your social media. The word is getting out there, but there are still so many potential Pugmire barkers who haven't yet found us! Let's keep on spreading the word and see if we can't band together to unlock a bandana and then jump all the way to that jumpstart.
Hello Good Doggos,
We've had a bunch of bits talking about the evolution of the game, and how Realms of Pugmire sits alongside the earlier edition. Most of this talk has been aimed at existing fans and returning dogs. But let's pull back a bit and look at some of the Core Principles of the Realms of Pugmire, so that new backers and new friends might have a better idea about this game. For 1e fans, it'll also show how Eddy's thoughts have been refined over the years when it comes to this world.
This section comes from Chapter 6, which contains advice for the Guide in running this game. Backers will have the run "rules download" on Tuesday, when we share Chapters 3 (Playing the Game) and 6 (Guide Advice).
Our core principles underlie every assumption in this book: when we talk about magic, we always work with the assumption that magic is secretly advanced technology, for example.
Rather than a heavy fantasy universe, Realms of Pugmire takes place in our world, a very long time from now. The supposed “magic” utilized by its residents always comes from some sort of advanced technology. Characters may not understand this; if they come to this revelation over the course of your chronicle, that knowledge always comes with a price, and characters should achieve it over a long arc. Those rare beings who understand this deep mystery keep that knowledge very dear to their hearts. What might this wisdom mean about Man’s ultimate fate, after all?
Don’t restrain your chronicle’s magic to current technology, though! Your characters’ adventures happen far in the future, after all. What can you imagine technology might someday do, and how does it accomplish that? Frame any new mysteries and magic around that question and you’ll find yourself in good thematic standing.
Since Realms of Pugmire’s magic is secretly advanced technology, whatever might destroy advanced technology might interfere with magic. Don’t use this as a “gotcha” — always act with extreme thoughtfulness when disrupting player abilities and always have a narrative goal in mind when making the things your players treasure malfunction — use it instead as a guideline for crafting meaningful adventures which explore what it means when magic doesn’t work in a world where people truly and deeply believe in it.
…whatever being good means to them, whether as simple as “I’m loyal to my family and friends above all else” or as complicated as “I’ll do anything necessary to defeat our enemies, the cats.” Encourage your players, especially new players, to answer that question on their character sheet about being a good dog. Indeed, try sharing what being good means to each of your characters as you work on creation: this often leads to interesting interpersonal conflict and intragroup accords born from your characters’ internal conception of their best selves.
All Pugmire’s dogs unswervingly and unshakably aspire toward being good. While not every dog focuses on being good as their sole or even central purpose in life — you probably know a few dogs in real life who know the exact boundaries of the rules and how often they can break them without getting into too much trouble! — no dog within the Realms of Pugmire doesn’t, on some level, want to Be Good.
That doesn’t mean the world isn’t dangerous and weird inside the city walls, only that the characters will always encounter more frightening and riskier situations outside their bounds. City walls in Pugmire mark what’s known for most player characters, and even those who spend most of their lives outside the walls understand that safety happens within those confines.
Dogs love and understand what they comprehend and can control; while many dogs in our real lives love going on adventures with their people, they only really enjoy those escapades if, at the day’s end, they fall asleep somewhere they consider safe. The dogs (and other creatures) of Pugmire live lives of uncertainty and danger — the chronicle would be boring otherwise! — but they always know where to find relative safety.
You can make this division as stark or as subtle as you choose — things might happen just outside the gates of a given city — but it always exists. Nothing’s as strange inside the walls as what’s outside them.
The division between monster and enemy in Realms of Pugmire is explicit and immutable: an enemy — a pirate or bandit, for example — might “switch sides” and become a friend if the players manage to win him over, but the Undead will never become someone’s best buddy or turn into something other than a completely horrifying opponent. The Unseen fall firmly into the monster category, but their pawns don’t always, which may present player characters with fun and interesting moral dilemmas or choices.
The characters live in a world which often befuddles them, presenting them with difficulties to overcome and puzzles to solve. Whatever problems your characters solve, something always remains that they don’t know. If they understood their world perfectly, after all, what else remains for them to discover?
For many people, roleplaying games represent not just a fun way to pass a Sunday afternoon but a means of processing and understanding the world they inhabit. Much like any other form of media, a roleplaying game can hold up a mirror to our own lives, allowing us to better understand through fiction what we find hard to comprehend in the world around us. This makes Engagement Tools (p. XX) crucial for everyone’s enjoyment.
Stories live in the unknown. Embrace what your characters don’t know and don’t understand; that tells you just as much about them as the knowledge they mastered as pups.
At the end of the day, Pugmire is a game about dogs, cats, badgers, rats, and so many other animals acting like people. A certain level of silliness comes prepackaged with a game like that — on purpose. You can laugh at the hijinks your characters get up to and make things a little ridiculous (if everyone has fun with it).
However silly things get at the table or how many in-jokes about your own dogs (or cats, or…) you pepper into your chronicle, the characters are never in on the joke. Your character doesn’t know anything about the modern world and cannot understand the humor in the television or movie reference your Guide just made. To your characters, all the silliness, all the references, all the jokes you make between yourselves as players are all quite serious. Finding the balance isn’t always easy, but a table which achieves it is both fun and satisfying.
For those investigating Pugmire for the first time, or for those of us who are bringing this game to our regular group, I think these Core Principles are a great way to explain the setting and the world that our dogs inhabit.
I'll be back on Tuesday with the complete text for these chapters, along with a sneak peek covering Rival Species on Thursday and another piece of Pugmire fiction on Friday. Let's keep up the good work and see if we can't unlock another Stretch Goal before February!
Hello Good Dogs!
Did you know that TODAY is the seventh anniversary of the launch of the Kickstarter campaign for the original Pugmire RPG? Happy Seventh Anniversary, Pugmire! That was the first Onyx Path kickstarter campaign that I participated in - as a backer. Who knew seven years ago that I'd be helping the Onyx Path crew run their Realms of Pugmire campaign all of these years later?! What an odd and surprising journey it's been. And now I'm a dog!
I've got a big batch of Eddy's Design Diaries for you today! First, we're going to have a big video that a lot of people have been asking about - the evolution of Pugmire 1E to the new edition of Realms of Pugmire and how you'd convert characters from the original edition to the new one. And then all of the bits and bobs, including a website mention, and interview, and a handful of Eddy's quick Design Diary videos to check out.
Hey! Neato! Our campaign got a mention on Wargamer.com! It's great to see the word spreading about this game and our campaign.
Eddy talks about the new edition/evolution of the game with the Flames Rising website. Check it out for some insights into the game, and big thanks to Flames Rising for helping get the word out!
Leading up to the launch of the campaign, Eddy shared a series of quick (under three minute each) videos, discussing many of the bits and pieces around the creation of the game. Some of these topics were covered in the blogs he posted on the Onyx Path site, but this is another great way to get more info and it's always fun to see Eddy's passion and excitement about this game.
And... here are a few bits that deal with the whirlwind that was the 3 week OGL issue. The whole thing was like a massive storm that rolled in and is now gone, causing an amazing shakeup in public perception and then suddenly over. Even while the issue has now gone away (seriously... what a weird three weeks!), it was still a hot topic for a bit and hung like a dark cloud over many gaming projects. Here are a couple bits that dealt with the topic while it was ongoing, just to catch the flavor of the moment and will now be a snapshot of gaming in January 2023.
And covered on the latest episode of Onyx Path's weekly Onyx Pathcast. Episode 244: Realms of Pugmire and the OGL digs into 90s nostalgia before digging into the OGL issue and it's origins in the D20 movement and how that related to Pugmire 1e and the evolution to Onxy20 for Realms of Pugmire.
Oh yeah! We've unlocked our first Stretch Goal!
ACHIEVED! - At $32,000 in Funding - REDBUBBLE BARKER T-SHIRT – A Realms of Pugmire-themed Kickstarter Backer shirt will be hosted on Onyx Path’s Redbubble store for a limited time. Only backers will be notified when the shirt becomes available for purchase.
Great job, everyone! Let's keep it going! Please continue to spread the word on your social media and in your social circles, and let's see how many more doggos we can get to join us for this project over the next four weeks!
“Ghosts? Pah!” Satyrini Papillion spat on the ground outside Grannie Sue’s Roadhouse, one of many bars in Riverwall. “I am not afraid of any ghosts!”
His friend, Rex Pyrenees, towered over him, his white fur and polished armor glistening in the bar’s torchlight that kept the dark evening at bay. “Your courage is not in question, Satyrini. However, the locals here do claim to have a ghost problem, and we should help them.”
The smaller papillion threw his paws into the air in exasperation. “How can we help with a problem that does not exist?” At Rex’s confused expression, Satyrini added, “Ghosts are not real, my large and sometimes gullible friend. The rodents you spoke to have taken you for, as they say, a ride.”
Rex crossed his arms, which clanked against his breastplate. “Do you doubt the reality of the servitors of the Unseen?”
Satyrini looked nervous at the sudden change in topic to religion. “Well, no, not doubt as such….”
“Good, because I would hate for you think the ancient enemy of dogs is, as you say, not real.”
The smaller dog paced back and forth in front of his companion, unconsciously smoothing down his white and sable fur. “But demons are different from ghosts, no? Just because one set of monsters exists, it does not follow that every horror you heard of as a puppy is also real.”
The pyrenees shrugged. “Ghosts are invisible. Thus, they are literally unseen. That’s good enough for me.”
“Good enough?!” Satyrini spluttered. After a moment, he stopped, as a horrible notion came to him. “Please tell me you didn’t hand over any plastic coins during this conversation.”
Now it was Rex’s turn to look unsure. His rubbed the back of his neck with his massive paw. “There… may have been a small contribution to the local orphanage fund. Just to help the poor mice who were homeless after it burned down from the ghost attack….”
Satyrini sighed and put his face into his paw. “And how, my dear, dense friend, were you planning to prove to the poor widows and orphans that we had successfully killed this invisible and so far entirely fictional ghost?”
The pyrenees shrugged again. He had learned over his time with Satyrini that shrugging was more effective than arguing when the smaller dog was worked up about something. In response, the papillion growled and resumed pacing, now picking at the azure and gold doublet he wore over his white silk shirt. “Did you at least get a description of said ghost?”
“I did.” Rex pulled a roll of parchment from his tabard. Satyrini always struggled reading the ex-guard’s atrocious handwriting, so he just flapped a paw at Rex, who unrolled it and read. “A large, glowing canine stalks the streets. It has fire in its mouth and blazing eyes that can see through the sins of….”
“Less poetry, Rex. Less poetry.”
Disappointed, Rex rolled the parchment back up. “It’s a large canine with fire powers.”
“So, not invisible.”
“Not when it’s attacking people, no.”
“Great,” Satyrini sighed. “I suppose when it appears I will simply ask it politely to stop killing people.”
Rex pulled the greatsword from the scabbard strapped across his back. “That is, of course, unless I kill it first.”
Satyrini stared to make another acerbic comment, when suddenly the night air was split by a deep, booming howl. It echoed strangely through the cobblestone streets, like the howl itself was stalking the night, looking for victims. Doors and windows all over Riverwall suddenly slammed shut at the noise, as the residents cowered in their homes, steadfastly ignoring anything happening outside. In the alley across from them, Rex could just make out a strange, ethereal glow.
The large dog smiled down at his friend. “Shall we dispatch this no longer fictional ghost?”
The papillion gulped loudly and slid the rapier out of his scabbard. “Why not? It’s for the good of the children, after all.”
