Play Mothership module
The Apotheosis Engine's itch.io pageResults
| Criteria | Rank | Score* | Raw Score |
| THEME — How well is the jam theme used? | #3 | 4.208 | 4.208 |
| LAYOUT — How well does the module get across information? | #3 | 4.083 | 4.083 |
| ART — How good is the art/graphic design? | #11 | 4.250 | 4.250 |
| Overall | #14 | 3.696 | 3.696 |
| FAVORABILITY — how much do you personally like the submission? | #18 | 3.458 | 3.458 |
| UTILITY — Does complexity inspire game prep? Or Is it very "Pick-up-n-Play"? | #30 | 3.292 | 3.292 |
| WRITING — How does this read? does it emanate with horror, humor, drama...? | #31 | 3.458 | 3.458 |
| GAME DESIGN — How good is the game balance or concepts there in? | #36 | 3.125 | 3.125 |
Ranked from 24 ratings. Score is adjusted from raw score by the median number of ratings per game in the jam.
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Comments
Excellent art and layout, solid use of theme. Good stuff!
(There's an extra bullet on Baba Yaga's Savant entry.)
Thank you for the feedback! It's definitely not as scary and grim as other modules, but I wanted to do something with a different tone.
Since terraforming specifically means to make a place more habitable for humans, I decided to use the sci fi term . I had S4vant use terraforming though, to hedge my bets. Another reviewer suggested I provide a definition, which I plan to do.
Genetic Memory is a real psychological theory, but it deals more with things that are scary or traumatic. Not specifically stories, but I guess a scary story could count. It's really just a sci fi way to use a bunch of myths. If I flesh out the module, I plan to include environmental changes for each myth as well, but I ran out of space.
There is no active myth at the beginning just for gameplay reasons, but the first reset happens after players talk to S4vant. At that point it would be a random roll. I thought about having a myth already be happening, but I wanted to give players a bit of time to get their bearings first.
Another good point! When you're fighting the Curator, it is immune to all damage. There is no clear way to know that attacking the pillars stops it, but I tried to hint at it by having the pillars all rise just before the Curator appears. In playtesting, attacking the pillars was the first thing they tried after a direct attack had no effect. Definitely an area that could use a bigger hint.
The Curator is just the intelligence running the system and it's been around so long that it's no longer working correctly. I say in the intro that "it worked as intended for a time," but it's only implied that its malfunctioning is why the planet is barren.
Art: Very good and an impressive amount of it for the amount of time we had.
Writing: Also very good. The "Will Help If/Hiding" format is a clever way of presenting NPC motivations in a compact format. The concept is really creative.
Game Design: There's an impressive amount of game here. I suspect Mothership's ruleset isn't a perfect fit for what you're doing with this scenario, in that its defining mechanic involves mortal terror, which starts to make less sense when, after a few loops, the characters realize that death isn't permanent. The endgame is maybe a little unsatisfying in comparison to the everything up to that point, and it's not clear how the players are meant to deduce that they need to destroy the pillars. I guess maybe one could get accidentally destroyed in the battle and the Curator's reaction could tip his hand.
Theme: You'd get a seven out of five if I could do that. A turducken of myths, integrated throughout and in a creative way.
Layout: Really good. Does exactly enough to be visually interesting, but otherwise keeps it simple and easy to use.
Utility: I feel like the literally epic nature of the myths isn't going to come through if they're dealt with in a perfunctory way in the game. I could see an argument for giving full marks for Utility if one was just going to run it exactly as it's written, but then gameplay would suffer because nothing would feel really mythical if it's just a few rounds and then on to the next one. So I'd probably end up doing a bunch of work to flesh out each myth into its own mini-scenario.
Favorability: Love it. Likely to be in my top five, but I think I've already said that about maybe four things and I've only reviewed half the modules, so competition is looking tight.
I really appreciate your feedback! It's true that deaths causing resets really causes some issues with mood and stakes. I've been thinking about ways to compensate for that, but I might just have to allow people to die. The main reason I didn't is just because I felt that I'd have to put a content warning about child death on the module. Lots of tweaking to do!
Thank you!
You could rework it, but I think die-and-reset is totally fine on its own. For me it's that the Stress and Panic mechanics make less sense in combination with that.
However, maybe the answer is that when you do reset after dying or witnessing a death, it's like waking from a nightmare. And you're not sure if you're actually in a time loop, just imagining things, or having prophetic visions of impending doom. So then the resets are actually provoking Stress and Panic, and become much more Mothershippy.
Ooh, great idea!
Absolutely love the artwork and layout of this. NPC and Myths illustration a particular highlight. The parallels with current real world AI and hallucinated slopware and the consequences that can come from that is an extremely cool concept for a story (at least how I've read the premise).
It can be a bit tricky to follow the thread from the reveal, especially if you read it as a folded tri-fold. Could probably move S4vant to the top of the Characters panel to make them easier to find - there were times I had to read a lot further to get information that clarified earlier story which was a little confusing.
This has so much potential for chaos I know my group would jump at playing it, but it seems there is a lot of warden prep to get the story straight, especially how the resetting mechanic is dealt with regarding players vs people already there.
Overall, would play but needs good prep (which is fine!)
Thank you for your feedback! These are great points. You're the second person who suggested moving S4vant to the top of the NPCs. I think Warden notes could include an explicit explanation of what happened with the polyhedron. Is that what you meant? Or, what information was hard to find/what threads were hard to follow?
Very cool concept that is executed well. Descriptions are clear and the reality reset rules are a great touch. Great use of the theme. Biggest critiques are:
Overall, clearly communicates a complex concept with good targeted guidance. Could use a bit more dialing in in terms of usability, but fantastic work on the whole.
Thank you for your comments! Is it the rules for the Apotheosis Engine that require close reading? I wonder if it needs more plain language, if that's the case.
It does take a bit to parse through it, I personally had fun with the more program-esc language but that could help. The biggest stumbling block for me was how to deal with the first resest and why it occurs after meeting S4vant for the first time. Everything made pretty good sense besides that but I am not clear on how that interact causes the Apotheosis Engine to reset.
Oh interesting! That didn't even occur to me. There is actually no in-universe reason for the first reset happening after talking to S4vant, I just thought it would be good to give players a little time before things went crazy and maybe get a bit of guidance first. Maybe the first reset could just occur within a certain amount of time. Do you have any suggestions?
Having some sort of prompt that leads them to S4vant is a good call I think, but in terms of when the first reset happens, I would have it happen organically. From just reading it, the Apotheosis Engine seems to cover its bases well so I would let it do its thing: If the defeat a myth, that triggers the first reset aand they will reset to where every they were when that happened. If they are going to be killed, the reset triggers and they respawn thier for the rest of the adventure. If someone else is going to be killed, where ever they are when that happens becomes their reset point.
It could get a little complicated so maybe having some guidance on it for the GM on the first loop would be good. Its extra but you could also have a little check box beside each location for the GM to physically fill out when they set it as a reminder.
Does that make sense? It is totally possible I am missing something
Really nice application of mythological monsters into a SF context. Excellent visual design with endearing illustrations for the NPCs, creatures, and map. The resetting concept is ambitious, which I respect, but might fall into a stale condition for the players. I would be interested in hearing about how this resolves in play testing.
Overall, lovely stuff.
Thank you! Someone else mentioned that as well. Do you have any suggestions for how to make groundhog day scenarios less frustrating for players?
Not off the top of my head, and to be clear I don't think it's automatically a bad thing. Maybe some way of escalating the stakes each time or making the frustration deliberate and part of the fun?
I think the ideal situation is when the players are highly entertained by the disastrous nightmare they have gotten themselves into, so don't be afraid of embracing "hahah you will suffer!" so long as it's fun and solveable.
Thank you for your comments! I have some ideas to work on the resetting being frustrating that I'll be implementing.
In response to your request for more comments from the Discord, I'll go a bit heavier on the nitty gritty:
Design/Typography:
- Bullet points: Try to keep them a bit more aligned, and keep the second line of text starting where text on the first line begins.
- Capitalization after a colon: Prefer the capitalized version, but ask yourself if you need the colon. Also watch out for double colon use and avoid if possible.
- Bold text: Be a bit more judicious, perhaps keep it to nouns (simplify longer ones). You have color coded characters so you could also use that, though it's already at risk of getting too busy.
Game design:
- As I understand it, the resets would happen a bit too early once characters die - you could put in a delay there, to be after the second H.O. dies? There's also no possibility of NPCs dying in front of players as that also causes a reset. But then the Baba Yaga hunts youngest remaining? Didn't quite follow here, but playtesting should produce an answer.
- Groundhog day scenarios can be frustrating, how have you prevented that?
Theme and setting: It's implied, but I think the environment would also transform to match the current myth. There's not much space left in the locations section, so telling the warden to get creative about that could be a neat solution.
Cool stuff: NPC ages! I don't see many pamphlets with this in, and while not necessarily essential, it's a good anchor to have at your disposal.
The offset print effect: Nicely executed, good color choices
Myths: Nice collection, I would want to give enough time for each to shine if I ran this.
Thank you! This is exactly what I'm looking for. I really appreciate it.
Regarding the deaths, I was thinking that it would be better to have a delay so that the resets occur just after a death, and in fact that's how I ran it when I playtested it, but this creates a problem where I need to have a content warning for child death, which i think would turn off a lot of people. I would remove children from the module, but the youngest being the only remaining conscious colonists is important for the explanation of the "illness," that it's caused by forming too many memories and that children have more space to form them.
I think my wording for Baba Yaga might be confusing. It just means that of the PCs and colonists that remain conscious, she goes after the youngest. Most likely that will be the 12-year-old, but you never know who people will play as.
I don't know if I've prevented the groundhog day scenario frustration, but I've tried to put in multiple ways to solve problems. For example to get into the lava tube, you can disable the power (it's a power-locked door), have the Bulgasari eat its way in, (it's metal), or convince Kwame to let you in. I was going to also give Jedda a key to the door, that she presumably got from the mayor, her dad, but didn't have room.
For getting up to the greenhouse, I did a worse job. You can use the fabrication machines to build something, which is what my players did. I also thought you may be able to have the Sluagh pick you up and drop you there, but they're going the wrong way. You couldn't just get the repair tech to fix it, since I described the cabling as snapped and coiled on the ground and they'd have to climb up to replace it. And because the polyhedron is in the greenhouse, you can't yet combine myths to have the rain cool the lava flow enough to climb it, say.
Anyway, thank you so much for taking the time! Lots to work on and tweak after the jam.
Oh, and I was curious if you had any suggestions for making the resets less frustrating for players, if that's even possible given the nature of them.
There's hard and soft resets, but your scenario is on the extreme hard end. The core of the issue is that resets delete player agency and the feeling that what they did mattered. This is also distributed unevenly across both players and crew - some people will engage more, and some of the crew members will have got more done, or have more suited skills for the situation, exacerbating certain players getting more spotlight.
The most successful modules turn the reset into a feature rather than an inconvenience, as well as making it a clear part of the puzzle that can be a positive.
In terms of solutions... I think dialing down the hardness is one option. At the moment the reset works like magic, but it could also be an absolutely horrific physical process. If the process is flawed, limited or messed up (or gradually getting worse) then that allows more actions to be retained across realities, and consequences to slip through and persist. The other key source of continuity is puzzle pieces - knowledge is another means of crossing the reset boundary (the main means in fact), so you could make figuring stuff out a more central mechanic.
Great suggestions, thank you!
Heyyo, I really like this one! It’s a huge improvement over the initial draft, so props for taking it so far. The first thing that really stands out to me is the art. The use of color splashes really brings the page to life in a way I’ve not seen done often and I adore it. The layout is also nicely done -it’s clean and easy to read, which is no small task with the amount of information included in this trifold.
A few notes on things that could be improved:
Overall, this is a really neat module with some big ideas and beautiful art. Very impressive!
This is great feedback. Thank you so much. I agree that S4vant may be doing too much work. I originally had a Warden note that his lines can be given to any other characters, but I decided to cut it for space. Sounds like I should re-add it.
Interesting point about the health. In my playtest, players killed the Bulgasari after it ate the lava tube door away, but killing it caused a reset, putting the door back, so maybe I shouldn't have reality reset if a myth is destroyed. Or I could just simplify it, get rid of stats, and make it clear to players that they're not going to kill any of them.
The myths do take up too much space! This is honestly due to d10s being the standard die lol. I really didn't want to remove the flavor text for the myths, but maybe that is necessary to free up some space for the actual adventure.
Thank you for taking the time and providing thoughtful criticism!
Hm, if you wanted a shorter myth list or just to trim space, you could consider using a d10 with ranges. So it would be 5 myth entries, each as detailed as what you originally included, but with a result range of 1-2, 3-4, etc. Just something to consider!
That's very true. I felt like a d5 (d10/2) was too few. I then thought about doing 1-8 for each of 8 myths and then 1-2 for reroll or something else, but it felt inelegant. Maybe I should just do 5 myths and really flesh them out and make them multifaceted.
This looks amazing. It feels like it's almost bigger than Mothership because of it's ability to keep throwing the players into a new scenario within this one. I guess I would like a little bit more explicitly laid out, a scenario hook and some end states, but there's so much here that it's totally legitimate to ask a GM to do a little work to cobble this into a campaign. Really innovative and beautiful, fantastic work!
Thank you! Yes, I used up a lot of room on the myths, which was really because the standard die is a d10 lol. Previous drafts had hooks and more guidance. It makes me think I should expand it after the jam.
I love this one a lot! Unreal layout and artistic flair, the variety of myths and the novelty of their collision with the weird alien sci-fi stuff is just sublime. The aesthetic flair of the Apotheosis Engine reset procedure is the most baller shit of all time - I love little crunchy pixels. And all of the different creatures? Love it. Amaze amaze amaze.
My main point of confusion is in establishing the initial reset point (sometime after meeting S4vant but not during?) and what the still-lucid colonists think of the looping. If the AE was discovered three weeks ago, what have they been doing since then (since resetting would presumably not let them progress forward in time?) Based on everything here I assume there is an intended explanation/process, I'm just not inferring it after a couple read throughs!
One of my absolute favourites I've read so far. Well done, I may have to run this one day!!
Thank you so much for your kind words. You've made my day.
I should have said "the first reset occurs immediately after meeting S4vant." I'll have to fix that. Or, I'll just change it to "while" as you suggested, since I don't have the space.
It was my intention that it wasn't time that's being reset, just how reality is currently structured. In my head, the remaining colonists are just resigned to their fate (except for Phin) and have kind of just shut down. They've all seen hundreds of bizarre and horrifying things happen and they've even been hurt and may have even 'died' before. But, now that you mention it, I think 3 weeks is probably too long, so I will shorten it.
Thank you again!
Oh I took "after they meet S4vant" to mean that it became possible for a reset to occur after talking to him, since the triggers for a reset seemed not to be met just by talking to him! I'll need to give it another read, I think I may have been too caught up in assuming there is a full time loop vs. a reality reset.