Design Notes - Campaign and the Open World
over 2 years ago – Wed, Jul 28, 2021 at 08:39:31 PM

Hi Everyone,

I’m Andrew Fischer, one of the designers working on Earthborne Rangers. Since we gave a brief intro to the game’s round-to-round mechanics in this video, I wanted our first game design update to be about the narrative campaign and open world exploration. I’ll also write a bit about what you’ll actually be trying to accomplish during the game, and how the design was informed by two of our core themes: exploration and caretaking the environment.

Exploration and the Open World

Early in development of Earthborne Rangers, as we were working on the interactions of Path and Ranger cards and the core mechanics, the game was played using distinct, stand-alone missions set in small regions of the Valley. These arenas provided us with controlled mechanical environments, but as we got deeper into development, we realized that they were standing in the way of the feeling of exploration we were hoping to get from the play experience. To accomplish that sense of exploration, we needed to give more agency to the player and allow them to forge their own path.

This realization led to the creation of the open world you see in the game today. We started by dividing our existing regions and stringing  them together to create a sprawling map of the Valley. The game takes a lot of inspiration from hiking around the rocky mountains. I wanted to evoke that same feeling of mapping out your route on the trail map, setting out for a specific destination, and then discovering sights along the way that you might not have expected to see.

Each location on the map draws from a specific set of cards that contains named people and specific places and wildlife from that location for you to seek out and discover. These cards have numbers on them that prompt you to read journal entries both when they enter play and when you accomplish certain things with them in the game. The journal entries check against and react to your past choices and accomplishments, and offer you new options and objectives to discover.

For example, at the beginning of a session, you might set out towards Lone Tree Station intending to catch a ride on the Swift, the Ranger’s airship (a card that allows you to travel nearly anywhere in the Valley), but as you pass through the town of White Sky, you might encounter a unique NPC who offers you a side-mission that you just can’t turn down.

These “side-missions” are activities that you will discover all over the Valley as you play. Perhaps you find a previously undiscovered ruin to investigate, another Ranger may need your help, or a local predator may be threatening the people of a nearby settlement, and they need your help to soothe its fury. Side-missions offer objectives of a smaller scope that you must complete before the end of the day in order to get their reward, and your group will have to decide if you have the capacity to take them on or allow the opportunity to pass. You must maintain a constant balance of deciding where to go, who you have the capacity to help before your day runs out, and how you want to help them.

The Story and Campaign

While I’m very excited about the opportunities for emergent narrative  in our open world, we also want to present a story that can provide you with direction, make you think critically about the themes of the game, and create a meaningful connection between you and  the denizens of the open world.

Without getting into spoilers, your story in the Valley starts with you joining the Rangers. As you get acclimated to your role, you will have to contend with larger and larger questions and challenges facing the Valley. Deciding what to do when helping with natural disasters or a missing person  is one thing, but deciding what the “right” way to handle problems born from an environment shaped by over 2000 years of human intervention is another thing entirely.

To tell this more wide-reaching and deliberate story, we use story missions. Each story mission is given to you by a journal entry in the campaign guide. You will record each mission  on your campaign tracking sheet, and at the start of each game, you will put a card into play for each uncompleted mission you currently have. These missions are all larger, more difficult objectives that require deliberate effort and coordination to complete in a single play session. Upon completing each mission, you’ll read another journal entry in the campaign guide, potentially making decisions about how to proceed, and are granted new missions based on that. The outcomes of some missions may be impacted by how many days you took to complete them, others may be impacted by how you chose to go about them. These missions chain together to tell the broader story of your time spent in the Valley.

Everything in Balance

As you can see from the “State of Development” section in the campaign, we are currently working on designing and iterating the full breadth of the campaign. As we do this, one thing we are very conscious of is how we strike the balance between the open-world exploration and structured missions. The story is designed to have spaces between urgent objectives to enable exploration and some missions that require and enable exploration. In the end, you will have to balance freeform exploration with your missions to be the best Ranger you can be.

That’s it for today! You’ll get a chance to see a bit more of how these systems work in the livestream next Monday onTeam Covenant’s YouTube Channel. And as always, don’t hesitate to ask questions in the comments section.

It's a beautiful day in the Valley
almost 3 years ago – Tue, Jul 27, 2021 at 08:35:43 PM

Hi everyone!

Thank you so much for getting us to our funding goal in just under five hours. What a day! We ended up launching four hours later than I had hoped. During that time,  I was sitting at my computer, desperately clicking the "launch" button. I went from anxious, to calm, to irritated, to (finally) relieved as Kickstarter tech support solved the issue, and the project suddenly went live. It was an experience that I will never forget. Thank you all for making an emotionally exhausting day into a delightfully exhausting night.

Now that we've reached our funding goal, the next goal on the horizon is that of regional manufacturing. Once we reach 2,500 backers (at the $80 pledge level or higher), we'll start tallying everyone by region, and we'll see if we can produce the game as close to everyone's home as possible, and keep overseas shipping of product and materials to an absolute minimum.

It’s been an amazing first day. Here’s to twenty more!

Much love,

Andrew

Your Card Content Questions Answered

Does the core set come with a full playset of player cards?

Yes.

Do I need to buy the Ranger Card Doubler to have a full playset of player cards?

No.

Does the Ranger Card Doubler include cards from the campaign expansion?

No.

What's the point of the Ranger Card Doubler?

The Ranger Card Doubler exists for players who want to double-up on their card sets (aspect cards, personality cards, specialties, and backgrounds). For example, if you want to play a campaign with two Rangers who have the same background, or two who have the same specialty, or even the same role, you'll need to pick up the Ranger Card Doubler.

It's also good for groups of 3 to 4 players if--as that third and fourth player--you'd like more options than whatever the first two players haven't chosen. It's by no means necessary, however. The core set fully supports up to 4 players.

As a solo player, is there any benefit to buying a Ranger Card Doubler?

No. If you like to build decks and not disassemble them, or if you like to play two-fisted and want to play around with doubling up sets, then sure. Otherwise, you can skip it.

Does the Legacy of the Ancestors campaign expansion contain a full playset of player cards?

Yes.

Do I need to buy a second campaign expansion to maximize my experience?

No. One is all you need. Please don't buy two campaign expansions (unless you're buying one for a friend).

Does the core set have enough room to accommodate the cards from the doubler and the campaign expansion?

Our intent is for the core set box to be a storage solution for all of the card content offered during this campaign.

Will the core set box accommodate all of those products if I've sleeved my cards?

Yes.

Adding Add-Ons to Your Pledge

As noted in the add-on section, add-ons will be available to purchase in the pledge manager (Gamefound) after the campaign concludes. However, If you know that you’d like a specific add-on and would like to increase your pledge in advance, you are welcome to do so.

Since our stretch goals are tied to backer counts as opposed to a total dollar amount, whether or not you increase your pledge now means less than it does for campaigns that feature monetary stretch goals.

Whether you increase your pledge now, or wait until the campaign concludes, we greatly appreciate the additional support!

Gameplay Livestreams Coming Soon

Beginning next Monday (August 2nd), and each Monday thereafter, Team Covenant will be streaming gameplay of Earthborne Rangers on their YouTube channel: cov.link/yt

They’ll be playing a “vertical slice” of the game. That is, a small segment that will give you a great idea of what to expect from the final product. The slice has been tailored for the livestream, so you can watch without worrying about spoiling the campaign.

If you can’t make it for the livestream, we’ll embed each of them on the main KS page, under the “media” header.

More to Come

We have a full slate of meaningful updates planned for the campaign where we’ll dive into great depth concerning the rules, deckbuilding, the lore, and the art. We’ll have something fun for you each and every day (excluding Sundays). Tomorrow, you can look forward to more information about the design and development of the open world and of campaign progression in the game.

Until then!