I'm a Game Designer, deeply in love with creating worlds and their cultures. In games, I aim to immerse players in the narrative through their actions.
I have experience working in C#, Unity and blueprinting in Unreal Engine. As well as in modeling and texturing.
The Children of the Comet
ABOUT THE PROJECT
This document is on construction. Right now it contains the first session of a campaign I created to play with my friends. I also added some of the subclasses, enemies, and backgrounds I created.
In this campaign the players will start out as children, living through the event that many years later will change their lives and shake the foundations of their society. The players will grow up in Iasg Mor, the land of gifts. Where magic is being dominated by industrial advancement.
You can see the whole campaign document 📜here📜
WHAT I DID
I focused in creating a experience that felt unique and linked to the players. Creating a story, environment, subclasses and monster that felt different and gave my players new ways of playing.
For the story I created a world in which magic was limited and industrilized.
For the environment I created a salt desert.
For the subclasses I developed concepts with features that are typically not found in the main class.
For the monster I created tactics and weakness.
TEAM
Solo project.
DESIGN KEY POINTS
Level Design Breakdown
In all my level designs, I follow the method showed by Steve Lee. Setting first goals, elements, gameplay beats and possible paths/sequences. To then move to a block out in paper.
The Cliff
Description
The Cliff is located north of the village. It has a drop of more feet than the players can count and it collides with the Salt Desert.
The views from the cliff are stunning, in the distance, salt storms ravage the horizon. These storms are often accompanied by the song of the whales of the Salt Desert, which float through the winds.
The Cliff is the predetermined scenario for the most important event of the session, The Comet (Manual, page 21). The players will come to this place looking for a group of teenagers that tried (and maybe succeeded) to steal their belongings. During the fight or negotiation to retrieve their objects, a comet will fall from the sky and impact the cliff.
Goals
Allow different play styles (direct approach, exploring, sneaky, planner,... ).
Present a location used in the future. The Salt Desert, the floating port, the hidden cave and the hidden passage to the mines.
Present the players with the posibilites to express their characters identity, specially related to their enemies.
Map legend
0- Players' entry point.
1- Fallen tree, it will allow the players to access the higher ground on the right. They will have to maintain the balance with DC 12 dexterity roll.
2- Fairly tall natural wall, it seems easily climbable (DC 12 dexterity). At the top there is a large rock and a handful of smaller rocks. Under the largest rock there is a porcelain seed. If the plant is carefully raised, a porcelain flower will grow from it. This flower can be sold for a high price. The pollen from this plant can synthesize a drug that can be used as a paralyzing poison or painkiller.
3- Bushes with hard, thorny branches, falling on them causes 1 point of damage.
Behind this specific bush is a crevice that leads to the bowels of the cliff. In the crevice, you will find a small cave about 20 feet deep. In it will be a metal door, with waving engravings they have never seen before. The door is impossible to open and will be important later in the story.
4- A bridge made of ropes, it functions as a playground for children. The bridge connects the middle “island” to the rest. A large dead tree stands on the island.
5-This area is very close to the cliff, a push could end anyone's life. Allowing players to decide the fate of their enemies during a fight or when the comet falls.
6- Traces of a feathered hound entering the cliff. Easy to see when close (DC 11 perception) but detectable at distance (DC 13 perception). The bird will defend the entrance to the cave fiercely. It is malnourished and has only 6HP. The interior of the cave continues to an alternative entrance to the coal mines. Allowing players to try to set up the beast against the teenagers or the mine guards.
If a fights start in the entrance of the cave, the feather hound will come out and attack the closer target.
7- What remains of an old floating port. With room for only a small boat. The port is only used by smugglers. This is where the children will gather to go to the Salt Desert. The boxes contain the supplies of the families going to the salt desert. This is where the teenagers will be. If they were not followed at once when leaving with the stolen goods, they will be searching into the boxes next to the port. Spoiling part of the supplies. If they were running away from the children, they will stop here, seeing themselves cornered. They will pick up thorny branches and stones and prepare to fight.
8- The boxes have trawl nets with grappling hooks and a fishing harpoon. Next to the boxes are the ropes of a bridge that used to connect to the area on the left.
9- The Salt Desert
Paths diagram
Path A
This path allow players to use their dexterity to climb the fallen tree. Once there, the characters will be able to scout ahead (wisdom roll) and effectively detect the teenagers and the beast footprints.
It also allow the players to set a trap for the teenagers near in the bottom right elevated area. Where they can try to push the rocks over the teenagers (strength roll).
Laying a clear and elevated trail through the bridges to ambush the teenagers at the end of the path.
Path B
This path represents a more direct approach to the conflict, but it also show the players the marks of the beast on the ground (wisdom roll both perception and animal handling). Alerting them from the danger and possible strategies. This trail also diverge into Path C.
Path C
The third path starts diverging from Path B. Climbing the natural rock steps give access to the player to loot and possible weapons. As well as the perfect spot for an ambush and using the new weapons.
This path also give the chance to the players to find out about the beast. And to easily attract the teenagers to the beast or viceversa. Or to close the cave entrance pushing a big rock.
Path D
A straight path to the conflict, with a lot of thorny branches from dead trees to use as weapons. This path avoid the danger of the beast's cave but doesn't provide other advantages.
Path E
An alternative path to avoid the danger of the cave but giving the players the option to collect branches and obtain a higher ground for advantage. It converge with Path A at the end.
Connection
Allow players to switch from path A to B or C and viceversa.
Iterations
The map has changed both after running the campaign for the first time and after receiving feedback from a professional level designer. Adding new paths, changing the location of the enemies and more.
You can see the first iteration fo this map recreated in 3D in the Divinity Original Sin 2 engine.
Catching Flakes
Content being added.
Adventure Summary
The main antagonist is the human Regime that has controlled the region for the last 100 years. A Regime in which the remaining magic has been industrialized and militarized. Players must hide their powers to avoid being discovered. While the forces of the Regime threaten everything they have built.
In the first game, players will start as children in their hometown, creating the relationships that will years later affect their lives. Having to flee their home due to imminent danger.
In the second game there will be a jump in time, the players will have grown up and built a life during the last 10 years. Now the Regime has found them and wants something that they have.
In the third game, the characters will have to decide whether to face the forces of the Regime and risk what they have built or try to lose track of them through the Salt Desert. Allowing them to explore different locations related to them.
Subclasses
Barbarian: Path of the Underground
“If anger blinds, it is because one must be completely blinded to reach its fullness. Your only sense must be anger, it will guide you to your enemies.”
Many barbarians of the Salt Desert worship one of the great beasts of the region, the Topota. Huge moles that dig under the dunes, without eyes that the salt can affect. Able to sense a footstep hundreds of meters away.
The barbarians of the Path of the Underground follow the teachings of these blind hunters. They sleep in burrows dug by themselves, creating shelters anywhere in the desert. They imitate the tactics of the Topota, diving underground and capturing their enemies from below. And after years of hunting the same creatures and digging with their bare hands, their fists are as hard as metal and their senses as sharp as those of the moles.
Ranger: Storm Seeker
The whales of the Salt Desert fly with the salt storms, using them for protection. That's why whalers are called Storm Seekers. But there are some who go one step further, those who have become one with their prey. It is said that if you drink the nauseating oil of the whales for years, some of their powers are granted to you.
There are whalers who hunt greedily and without control, after all, the hunt for one whale can feed a family for a decade. They reduce the numbers of the species without mercy and hunt adults and babies alike.
But there are others who come from nomadic peoples. They consider the flying whales as their spirit animal and with whom they live in a symbiotic relationship. They respect them and hunt when they are older, only hunting out of necessity. They use everything from their bones to weapons, skin to clothing, meat to eat, or oil to sell and trade for other products. Never for sport or greed.
Warrior: Steel Hair
The Steel Hair school emerged years after the years of civil war in Iasg Mor. When there was no food and many soups were filled with stones or minerals to give them some flavor or nutrients. Some children began to develop coarse, hard hair, impossible to cut, barely able to shape. Many found a weapon that the Regime could not confiscate from them, their hair. Braided or turned into dreadlocks with the heat of a forge, the steel hairs could be turned into weapons or chains to hang a sledgehammer. It is even said that the most veteran began to be able to control their hair strands at will.Paladin: Oath of the Entombment
Paladin: Oath of the Entombment
There is only one thing common to all mortals, they all die, but not all go away. Even the dead cling to life. There are spirits without burial left to wander the lands of the Great Fish. If no one said goodbye to them, how can they go?
A Oath of the Entombment paladin gives peace to these unfortunate souls, giving them an ending according to the ways of the dead. In return, the soul swears to assist the paladin in times of need. Though some souls need more than a grave to rest in.
Perhaps you always saw spirits, or perhaps the Tideweaver made a deal with you, so that no soul would end up like her son, the Drowned God. Now you bury all who did not have the burial rites of their kind. Especially those drowned in the seas.
Rogue: Of Steam
Some industry adepts have transmuted their bodies (out of necessity or desire) with mechanical parts. Trading an arm or leg of flesh for one of steel and coal is not pleasant. But having steam legs can help you escape death and misery. Perhaps you were a subject of experiments by the Regime or perhaps you bought one on the black market. But now you have learned to create them yourself, experimenting with the innovations of the growing industry and your body. Trying to reach out to those with magical gifts or showing the world your capabilities.
Steam rogues often come from deprived backgrounds, no one amputates an arm unless it is out of sheer necessity. For those born with deformities or who lost a limb, it is a simpler path, at least at first.
However, you may also have become obsessed with industry and its possibilities. And dedicated your mind and body to proving how far it can go. Perhaps too far…
You can see more about the subclasses 📜here📜
Bestiary and mechanics
DnD combat is fun. But sometimes enemies lack complexity or weaknesses beyond damage types. Players don't have many opportunities to make tactics based on their enemies, to discover a weak point or anticipate a combat tactic.
That's why the encounters and monsters I present in this campaign add a level of complexity to combat. For the player who wants to lay down blows left and right, nothing will change. But the more tactical players will have a new way to enjoy the game.