COVID-19 Update and Bonus Content

Hello everyone Austin here again, thank you all for your well-wishes and understanding as we navigate the COVID-19 crisis. We have some great news on our end, as well as an early release of some fun bonus content as an additional thanks for your understanding during this difficult time.

First, I’ve received an offer for a position which will eliminate the immediate funding crisis. I expect it will take a bit of time to fully ramp back up (especially since I’m running into issues getting my Unemployment due to the strain on the system and my Valor operations being incorrectly classified as income), but my hope is that by mid-May or early June we should be back on track. Additionally, since we did have some distribution earnings, I have resumed production on Best in Class, the distribution earnings aren’t enough to complete the project but they’ve got us working again so hopefully we’ll be able to return to the project in full soon and get this finished.

As a reminder, our Valor store sale is continuing through the rest of the month, if you’re looking for a Hardcover book at $10 off or an eBook for justt $5, now is a great time to grab it!

Finally, one of the things I am looking at is ways to get content I’ve been working on out to the general public earlier – while having it written is all well and good if I’m not able to get it released fully due to expense (such as with the entirety of the Foes book), it’s not really doing any good. I’m looking into a Patreon-based model to keep moving these larger book projects that require a massive amount of investment to complete, while I don’t have a full view of how it will look this is an example of content you might generally expect were you to back us – regular micro-updates of new skills and abilities. The abilities presented below are some of my favorite introductions in Villains, Creatures and Foes – the Personal Domain Ultimate Core and some related mods (as well as the Effect Lock standard mod). This Core allows you to create a domain of influence around the area and gives a lot of interesting and unique abilities, it’s especially handy for big, threatening bosses but can also be effective in the hands of PCs. Just make sure to come up with a dramatic chant about bones and swords so you can get that extra Valor from your GM!

Ultimate Cores

Personal Domain

You exert your influence over a part of the battlefield, generating a personal domain that empowers your allies and hampers your enemies.

Action: Support

Cost: 3 per Technique level

Effect: This Technique creates a broad zone that aids your allies and hinders your enemies, targeting every space within 1 space of the user per Season (2 spaces at Season 2, 3 spaces at Season 3, and 4 spaces at Season 4). When creating a Personal Domain Technique, select a combination of Flaws and Skills. Each point of Core Power for this Technique counts as 1 SP for flaws, or 2 SP for Skills, and the combination of Flaws and Skills cannot exceed the Core Power. Personal Domain may use Boost and Weaken-only Skills and Flaws. All Skills are automatically applied to the user and any allies within the Domain. When you use this Technique, make an opposed roll of any Active Attribute, chosen at the time of the technique’s creation, against all targets in the affected area. At the start of your turn, roll again against any unaffected enemies still in the Domain. A successful roll applies all Flaws to the character until they leave the Domain, at which point the Flaws expire at the beginning of your next turn. The defender may substitute an Active Attribute as if the Personal Domain were a Weaken Technique. The Domain persists until the end of the scene, or until the character who created it is Incapacitated. 

Special: A Personal Domain Technique gets 2 levels of Modifiers at no cost. Each level of a Personal Domain Technique that is not used for a Core Power counts as two levels for the purpose of non-Ultimate Modifiers. Ultimate Modifiers are exchanged at a rate of 1 Core Power for 1 Modifier Level, as with Ultimate Damage Core. A Personal Domain Technique is eligible for all Modifiers that can be attached to either a Boost or a Weaken Core. Skills attached to a Personal Domain may be up to one Season higher than your current Season. Modifiers attached to Personal Domain which typically have a single effect, such as Reposition, initiate at the beginning of each turn, but you must make an Attack Roll against all enemies as normal.

Alteration Modifiers

Effect Lock

Your field effects stay trained on you no matter where you move.

Applicable to: Personal Domain, Technique with Persistent Effect and Blast Radius

Season: 2nd

Level: +2

Effect: If this Technique is centered on a target, it will stick to them for the duration of the effect, moving as they do. If the target is an enemy, it only sticks to them if technique hits. If it misses on a later turn, it stops sticking to the target.

Special: If this Technique is a Mind Technique, the level is reduced to +1

Ultimate Modifiers

Astral Form

Even when outside your Domain, you can still influence it directly.

Applicable to: Personal Domain

Season: 2nd  

Level: +2

Effect: If you are not within your Personal Domain, you project an Astral Form inside of it which occupies the center of the Domain and creates a Zone of Control. You may attack through your Astral Form as if it were you. The Astral Form does not block movement.

 

Astral Mobility

Your Astral Form can move within the bounds of your Domain.

Applicable to: Personal Domain with the Astral Form modifier

Season: 3rd 

Level: +2

Effect: You may move your Astral Form within your Personal Domain in addition to yourself when you use a Move Action.

 

Influential Control

Within your Domain, you exert a greater Zone of Control

Applicable to: Personal Domain

Season: 1st 

Level: +3/+3

Effect: While inside your Personal Domain, your Zone of Control extends 1 additional space.

Level Up: Extend your Zone of Control by 1 additional space. 

Special: Bonuses from Influential Control do not extend outside of your Personal Domain; if your Zone of Control reaches the edge of the Personal Domain, the bonus does not apply to any spaces outside of the Domain.

 

Locked Domain

People cannot enter or leave your Domain without your approval.

Applicable to: Personal Domain

Season: 2nd 

Level: +2

Effect: If a character attempts to move out of your Domain, they must make an opposed Attribute Roll based on the Attribute assigned to the Domain. If successful, they may leave the Domain. If not, their movement stops at the edge. Techniques being used on an area inside the Zone from outside the Domain or vice-versa suffer a -2 penalty to their Attack Roll if applicable. This includes techniques used by allies, unless you apply the Smart Area of Effect modifier to your Personal Domain. If the Technique is one which requires no roll, it instead costs 4 additional Stamina per Season of the User.

COVID-19 Update

Hello everyone, this is Austin MacKenzie, owner and lead designer of Valorous Games. I wanted to speak directly today to talk about the current situation, how it’s impacted us, and how we’re working through this. These kinds of updates are unfortunately common at this point in time, so I wanted to make sure to provide as much transparency as possible.
Some of our regular convention attendees are probably aware of this but others may not be – Valorous Games is a tiny studio and labor of love managed by myself and funded by my day job as a Procurement professional. I insist on a certain degree of professional production and design because that is the kind of product I want to make and deliver. In mid-February, just as the COVID-19 situation was starting to ramp up, I lost my job and haven’t been able to secure a new one at this point in time. This, combined with the cancellation of Sakura con which has always generated a great deal of revenue for us, has forced me to place development on a temporary hold. It’s important to note that I never ask for the full amount of money that I need for development, I always expect to fund at least half, often more of a product out of my own pocket and base my projects and available money around my monthly contributions so while the Kickstarter money has given me the ability to continue development a bit beyond the initial job loss, those funds have dried up and I have nothing available to replenish them with.
Fortunately, the state of Washington does have some money available for small businesses like ourselves who were impacted by COVID-19. The cancellation of Sakura con was by direct order of our Governor in response so we should qualify. I am working through an adviser with the Small Business Association to work to secure these funds, if we are able to do so it should theoretically cover the last bit of development (we have about 18 pictures left to complete and the final printing and import, so we’re very close). I don’t at this time have a time-frame as to when this will be completed as the state is, understandably, seeing a large amount of requests for this level of support.
With all this uncertainty, I am also exploring other options. I am working with the SBA to refine our business plan with the intent to court investors. It’s always been my dream to eventually work on Valor full time, and while we are still at the small startup phase today there are a number of actions I am looking into that could exponentially expand our reach and profitability – so long as I can receive the funding to carry it out. Beyond that I am, of course, still searching for a new day job, postings and interview requests are starting to pick back up and we are somewhat fortunate in that Washington State’s social distancing initiatives seem to have blunted the effect of the virus in our region which leaves me hopeful that securing a new day job soon isn’t out of the question.
In the interim, I am doing whatever I can to secure funding. That is why for the entire month of April, we will be offering a $10 convention-level discount on all hardcover and hardcover+ebook bundles on our store, as well as a $20 discount on the base Valor ebook – if you’ve been interested in Valor but on the fence, you can now obtain a digital copy from us for $5. Please allow up to 24 hours to receive it – our process for sending ebooks is at this time still 100% manual (our web infrastructure being about as good as I can afford through self-funding, which isn’t saying much). You can find the sales active now on our Storefront. The bottom line is I will get this book out come hell or high water, and I am working all of these paths simultaneously in hopes that at least one of them will pay off. Best in Class has hit me with so many unexpected production issues at this point I suspect it is driven by some kind of malicious spirit to thwart me, but said spirit underestimates my stubbornness. I WILL get this book out, one way or another.
And for those looking to try out a new system and taking advantage of this deal? I recommend Roll20. Roll20 is a great, free program for tabletop RPGs in general, and Valor co-creator Quinn Gordon has created a character sheet on it that will do most of the math and calculations for you, it makes creating characters and running the game so much easier and the online grid and voice features let you run RPGs even if Social Distancing has you housebound. We’re currently testing new content through this platform ourselves using this exact character sheet, it works great.
Finally, there are a few things I am looking into, as this situation has, if nothing else, given me an abundance of time. With the help of my lovely, talented and all-around wonderful wife we’re looking into an official Discord channel for Valor as a place for people to congregate and set up games together. Our primary concern is if a combination of bots and available people are able to properly mod it – if we were to host an official Discord it is imperative to us that all players feel welcome and included no matter their race, creed, sexual orientation or gender identity. Every Valor fan we’ve met thus far has been wonderful, and I want to make sure if we create this space you will feel valued and protected. The other thing I am looking at is, potentially, an early content release, perhaps through Patreon or some other platform, to get some of the finished material out sooner. The text from Valor: Villains, Creatures and Foes remains more or less complete although I am retooling the story text to make it more in-line with our setting as it comes together, so this would be a great way to release less polished but fully playable rules for people to test. I am also sitting on a fair few new mechanics for Valor: Tools of the Trade, the major book release I am working on for after Villains Creatures and Foes with expanded skills and abilities that I’d love to release to people sooner. I’m working on a few potential ways to release this and some of the content will likely be made available for free on our website either way, so there will be more information on that as we work on it.
If you are interested in any of what we’ve talked about, I’d love to hear from you! I’m opening up our info@valorousgames.com email to receive feedback, if you want to send some thoughts, wishes, or critiques please feel free to send it to that email. I understand folks are likely rightfully frustrated at the continued delay, as I am, and I want to make sure to give you the opportunity to be heard. It’s tough right now, but I am confident we will get through this, and I am doing everything in my power to deliver on what I’ve promised. Thank you to everyone for being amazing, and I’ll keep you all posted as things develop.
Note: This is cross-posted with our Kickstarter, there is no difference between the two posts.