Hey all! This one took longer than I would have liked, but the Rainy Ruins are finally ready for release! This one is meant to be pretty Fallout-esque, invoking the feeling of wandering a wasteland filled with hope and violence and weirdness. I think Seattle is a really interesting location for this kind of game, as it's got industrial areas, sprawling suburbs, military bases, and mountains all stretching around a large sound (which, as I learned, is defined as "a smaller body of water usually connected to a sea or an ocean"). While putting this setting together, I spent a lot of time thinking about what makes post-apocalyptic material so cool, and the answer I found is people, and how they adapt to their new surroundings. Because of that, there's a lot of focus on the different factions and groups that are each dealing with the apocalypse in their own way, which should allow for engaging and immersive gameplay.

The Rainy Ruins contain:

• An alternate look at Seattle in the post-apocalypse, torn apart by flooding, scavengers, and a nuclear bomb,
• A diverse city that offers opportunities for interesting characters and stories,
• Rules for gear-based combat, invoking tense and desperate combat encounters,
• Rules for radiation that can permanently help or harm your characters,
• Rules for creating and upgrading settlements filled with survivors,
• Six unique factions, each with their own goals and values, along with tables to generate custom factions,
• A list of interesting NPC's and a bestiary filled with raiders, ghouls, and mutated Seattle animals,
• And rules for underwater combat, gear upgrading, looting, and random weather!

And once again, I'm learning as I go through this process, and found a new way to make each setting more visually interesting through custom header fonts. It's a small change, but it adds to the vibe of each setting, and I'm happy with the effect that it's given.

Here's the official changelist:

Rainy Ruins:

• Released!

Norrvei, Mongolian Plains, Starbound, Bordeaux, Shining Seas, Steel March:

• Added different fonts for the headers.

Viator-RainyRuins-Release.zip:

• Renamed to show the latest release, for clarity.
• Bundled the printer-friendly documents into this file.

That's it for now! With this release, we have taken a peek at all five of the main worlds that I've crafted. The next release is going to tie them all together and create an overarching lore that you can choose to integrate into your games. But more than just a lore dump, the next release is going to be a classic dungeon crawler in the Viator system that can stand on its own for one-shots or monster-of-the-week style games. I'm excited to get it out there, hopefully I won't take as long for this one!

Thanks for reading, and happy playing!