New Subclasses, Weapon Mastery, and More! Ryoko's Guide Update!
over 2 years ago – Wed, Jan 31, 2024 at 03:35:03 PM

BETA TEST ROUND 2, BABY!

What's up fellow Ryokids! The updated Ryoko's Guide to the Yokai Realms and Wrath of the Kaiju BETA-releases are out now on Backerkit! (Note: these are updated files for the existing downloads, you will not see a new item listed on Backerkit. So All you need to do is download them again and it'll pull the updated BETA.) They include a TON more stuff (including stretch goals unlocked over the campaign) for you to explore and give feedback on! As before, this is the BETA-version, so some art may be missing or unfinalised, but the core material is ready for you to sink your teeth into! Let's talk about what's new....

The Weapon Mastery System

The much awaited Weapon Mastery System is now out in Ryoko's Guide! This massive expansion to the core rules brings incredible customisation to all martial characters, and makes weapon choices matter! Every weapon now plays a huge part in your character's story and gameplay, with progressive Technique Trees to explore as you progress in levels, unlocking new, incredible abilities that represent your growth and skill as a warrior. Exciting combos and creative gameplay aren't just for spellcasters anymore!
 

New Subclasses

They're finally here! You can now imbue your adorable familiars with powerful martial techniques as a Sensei Tamer, blow stuff up with pyrotechnics as a College of Hanabi Bard, and create devestating combinations of elemental forces as the Disciple of Fusion Bender! These subclasses have been added to the Classes chapter in Ryoko's Guide to the Yokai Realms, alongside the core rules of the Tamer class (which first appeared in Heliana's Guide). 

New Spells, Stat Blocks, Feats, and Familiars

But wait, there's more!! The following bonus stuff has made its way into the updated BETA for you to check out! 

• The final round of familiars have been added to Wrath of the Kaiju
• Several new Yokai stat blocks have been added, introducing many more forms for the Circle of Yokai Druid to adopt at lower levels, like the Kasha, Narigama, and Ushi-Oni!
• See Future Death was a spell we forgot to include in the first BETA-release, but it appears here to round off the spells in the Shinigami Warlock spell list, alongside some other new spells like Extract Shirikodama, and Lifesap Aura!
• Two new feats have been added that interact with the Weapon Mastery system: Dedicated Combatant and Martial Initiate.

Feedback Progress

We're hard at work going through the feedback y'all have been sharing post-BETA release! Your response has been incredible, and we're acting on suggestions and tweaking bits and bobs to ensure the final book is 100% perfect. Most feedback inspired changes haven't made it into this new BETA-release because we're still collecting feedback (including any thoughts you might have on material introduced in this update), but we have already started implementing your suggestions and are loving how everything is coming together. 

All in, everything is going amazingly and we're right on schedule! It's been incredible to see so many people come together and enjoy Ryoko's already, as well as lending your voices and ideas to make it even better! As a reminder, the feedback forms can be found here:

Ryoko's Guide Feedback

Wrath of the Kaiju Feedback

If you've got any questions, or want to join the party and discuss Ryoko's with others, head on over to the #ryokos-guide channels of the Loot Tavern Discord Server.

- Will and the Team

Ryoko's Guide + Wrath of the Kaiju BETA-PDFs are Launched!
over 2 years ago – Thu, Dec 21, 2023 at 12:12:03 PM

Wrath of the Kaiju Unleashed!

That's right! Both Ryoko's Guide to the Yokai Realms and the Wrath of the Kaiju adventure book BETA-PDFs are out now on Backerkit. The response has been amazing, we're so happy people are loving these first-wave PDFs and we've gathered some great feedback already. If you've yet to complete your survey on Backerkit, when you do your order will be locked the following Monday and you'll be able to download the PDFs and get playtesting.

Remember, these are BETA-tests, so some art is missing, Stretch Goals are going to be added in a later update, and other things will be touched up and added based on your feedback. There's still over 550 pages of content to dive into already though, plenty to enjoy over the holidays, plus the Koi Dragon STL both supported and unsupported for anyone looking forward to printing their own!

A Holiday Slumber

For most of the team, creating Ryoko's has been a nonstop adventure for over a year, during which they've also been handling other responsibilities too! Wrangling kaiju and stuffing them into books is fun, but it's also exhausting work. Everyone on the team is going to take a well deserved rest over the holidays. Officially, DnD Shorts and Loot Tavern are on break until January 4th. We'll be back right after to start collating feedback and prepping the January update to the playtest documents, but our presence will be smaller over these next two weeks. We might pop in and answer questions on occassion, but if a member of a team does so over the break, that's them going above and beyond because they're a legend. Really, this is the part where you take over for a while and explore the Yokai Realms! Let us know what you're thinking as you go via the feedback forms, linked here and also in the PDFs themselves.

• Ryoko's Guide to the Yokai Realms Feedback Form
• Wrath of the Kaiju Feedback Form

Seeing the community celebrate and enjoy Ryoko's together has been incredible. If you've got any questions, or want to join the party and discuss Ryoko's with others, head on over to the #ryokos-guide channels of the Loot Tavern Discord Server. We're going to enjoy a rest, but we're already excited to bring you the rest of the content and polish up everything based on your playtest experience.

Happy holidays!

- Will and the Team

P.S. Low Price Last Chance! You've seen the Harvesting and Crafting rules, as well as the familiars and Tamer class. Those came from Heliana's Guide to Monster Hunting. With fulfilment of that campaign around the corner, Heliana's pre-orders will be closing soon—now is your last chance to get the pre-order price. That's $25 for a 600-page PDF that will add to your Ryoko experience!

48 Hours Until Ryoko's Guide BETA-PDF Launch!
over 2 years ago – Mon, Dec 18, 2023 at 10:38:29 AM

Ryoko's Guide to the Yokai Realms: Beta Playtest Release

You read that right, within the next 48 hours we're going to be releasing the BETA-PDF of Ryoko's Guide! As detailed in the last update, it's a document similar to the Unearthed Arcana released by other publishers, formatted and ready for you to explore, playtest, and give feedback which we can act on. You'll be able to download it from Backerkit if you have paid, and will be notified upon its launch.

Beta Test. Although this is a beta playtest document, it will contain art. Some art is still in progress so please expect a few gaps.

In addition, some of the stretch goal content will not be included in the first iteration of the beta test PDFs. The whole team is taking a break over Xmas but plans to incoporate that content into an updated beta test PDFs, in January. That includes:

• Weapon mastery system (Ryoko's)
• College of hanabi bard subclass (Ryoko's)
• Disciple of fusion bender subclass (Ryoko's)
• Sensei tamer subclass (Ryoko's)
• Five kaiju familiars (Wrath)
• Kaiju feats (Wrath)

Locking Orders and Payment Information

At the moment, everyone's orders are getting locked in, which means this is the last chance to upgrade or make changes before the card details you provided will be charged (including any tax and shipping costs). This charge will happen at some point over the next 24 hours. If you haven't filled out your survey, or don't have sufficient funds in your account, you have until shipping begins (in the Summer of 2024) to resolve it, but you won't be able to access your digital downloads until your survey is filled and the balance is paid. If you've still got to fill out the survey, now is the time (it takes about 5 minutes). Here's the link if you still need to do it!

Moving forward, we'll lock in orders every Monday. So, if you complete your survey on a Wednesday, your card will be charged the following Monday, and you'll recieve any digital assets at that time too!

Future Changes

Are you concerned your order or shipping address might change? Don't worry! Although orders are locked, you can still change your shipping info on backerkit, and if you'd like to ammend your order or pick up some more add-ons, we're here to help. Just hop on the Loot Tavern Discord Server and we'll guide you through the process and be able to answer any questions you might have.

Wrath of the Kaiju

The Wrath of the Kaiju BETA Playtest is also coming out later this week! As with Ryoko's Guide, it is a BETA document designed to give you everything you need to playtest and enjoy the adventures for playtest purposes. It'll include the adventures, the kaiju stat block variations, and a load of NPCs, factions, locations, and a whole bunch more stat blocks!

 Playtest

We can't wait for you to enjoy the playtest and hear your feedback on how we can improve!  We're talking HUNDREDS of pages here, so doubltess there'll be a spelling error or two. Put on your most meticulous reading glasses and tell us what you want to see! You can find more information on the BETA-releases in the previous update, and Ryoko's Guide includes an introductory chapter on providing actionable feedback for us to dive into. 

Feedback Forms. Each BETA-PDF will include a link to a feedback form, which is how we'll collect your thoughts. If you'd like to bookmark the links to the forms early, here they are.

• Ryoko's Guide to the Yokai Realms Feedback Form
• Wrath of the Kaiju Feedback Form

If you've got any questions, head on over to the #ryokos-guide-questions channel of the Loot Tavern Discord Server for the fastest response. We're excited to share the BETA-documents so you can start playtesting, it's won't be long now!

Happy holidays!

- Will and the Team

December Update! The Beta-Test Preamble
over 2 years ago – Wed, Dec 06, 2023 at 01:42:56 AM

Happy December y'all, I hope you're doing well in these chilly times. Everything is going great on our end; we're finishing page layout for the Ryoko's Guide to the Yokai Realms BETA-test document right now, and the Wrath of the Kaiju adventure book is pretty much finished in terms of writing and is in the process of being edited and formatted. More on that in a moment though, because first...

The Free Dice Glitch - A Reminder

Here's a reminder to those of you who experienced the free dice glitch after changing tiers post-launch we discussed in the last update: you can now go onto Backerkit and add them to your order. You can always hop on the Loot Tavern Discord Server if you need guidance or support on anything, whether it pertains to this glitch or something else.

BETA Playtest Document: Coming This December!

The Ryoko's Guide to the Yokai Realms playtest document is dropping in the second half of this month! Stretch Goals unlocked over the campaign will be added at a later date, most likely in a January update. We're in the process of finalising the Weapon Mastery system stretch goal, which just keeps growing with new skill trees, and now with a few new weapon properties too. Other stretch goals, like the Fusionist Element Bender, Tamer subclass, and NPC stat blocks, are going to appear in the January update. Some stretch goals, like the Ryōkido, are already completed so we can release those in the first version of the playtest document.

We've also recieved great feedback from you all, even at this early stage. One common request was for a guide on creating your own kaiju, or adapting existing stat-blocks into kaiju stat-blocks. That's something I'll definitely add in the stretch-goal update to the playtest! Other requests, like a deeper dive into lore and locations, we've worked into the adventure settings and history within Wrath of the Kaiju.

And speaking of Wrath of the Kaiju, we're in the final stages of writing and arrangement, and we'll get the playtest document of that book out to you two weeks after Ryoko's Guide. Of course, as a playtest document, not all art will be finalised in these documents, but we will include notes on what to expect in places where we're waiting on artists. Mainly, this is all about getting your feedback and playtest experience to ensure everything is as balanced, understandbale, and fun as possible.

A Kaiju-Sized Project

As we've been making Ryoko's, we've found areas to enhance and expand as we go. The number of feats has shot up from 40 to 75, for example, because we kept having great ideas while ideating on what feats to include Last week we just finished creating four, awesome backgrounds to jumpstart your character creation with close ties to the setting, and we've already mentioned the expanded Weapon Mastery system. Your support is inspiring, and allows us to focus on making the greatest book ever! Everyone on the team is kicking butt and firing on all cylinders as we close in on the BETA release; they are literally the greatest creators and fantasy artists in the world on the planet, after all. Can't wait for your feedback so we can take it to the next level!

If you've got any questions, head on over to the #ryokos-guide-questions channel of the Loot Tavern Discord Server for the fastest response! We're excited to share the BETA-documents so you can start playtesting, it's not far off now!

- Will and the Team

Mini-Update: Backerkit Bug Fix
over 2 years ago – Fri, Nov 17, 2023 at 12:53:43 PM

Backerkit Bugs (And The Fix)

Hey everyone! Thanks to everyone who has completed their surveys so far. Things are going great with Ryoko's, and we can't wait to get to Beta-PDFs out to you for playtesting next month! 

Unfortunately, we've heard from Backerkit that there is a slight bug with the system regarding free dice on some orders. Don't worry, no matter what, if you are entitled to free dice we will make sure you will recieve them! It will just require one extra step to correct the backerkit order (explained below). Most of you are uneffected, the bugs only effect the free dice on two types of backers:

Type 1: Digital Deluxe Backers. This applies to you if you were a Kickstarter backer and ended up with the Digital Deluxe Tier (it doesn't matter if you chose on Kickstarter initially, or picked something else and switched to it on Backerkit). Your bug concerns an error on the displayed shipping price, and a failure for Backerkit to promt you to enter your shipping details upon getting the free dice. The information on how to how to fix these glitches are below (time required to fix: ~3 minutes).

Type 2: Early Bird Backers who changed tiers. This applies to you if you were a Kickstarter backer in the first 72 hours (backer # 10830 or lower) and you changed your pledge level on Backerkit. The bug removed your free, early bird dice option from your cart. The information on fixing this glitch is below (time required to fix: ~2 minutes).

If you are neither a Digital Deluxe backer, or an early bird backer who changed their tier, the bug doesn't effect you and you can ignore the rest of this update! If one or both of these apply to you, here is how to fix each bug.

Type 1: Digital Deluxe Backers - The Shipping Glitch

If you're a digital deluxe backer, when you claim your free dice, the Backerkit software tells you the shipping costs $38. This happens because Backerkit doesn't have your shipping address and it defaults to the most expensive option on earth. Don't worry though, if you simply proceed to the next page and enter your country, the shipping price will update. Here's a step by step in pictures:

Bug: The incorrect shipping price is shown.

Solution: Add your shipping address.

Ta-da! It's fixed, the correct shipping price is shown!

Type 1: Digital Deluxe Backers - Shipping Glitch Part 2: Revenge of the Shipping Address

For all Digital Deluxe backers, Backerkit never prompted you to enter shipping information when you said 'yes' to your free 1d20 and 2d6. This happened because Backerkit incorrectly read your order as digital only, even with the physical, free dice. Don't worry though, the fix is simple! 

The fix: For everyone who has already completed the survey and wants the free dice, if you log into Backerkit, you will be prompted to fill in your shipping details (see the above breakdown on entering shipping information). WARNING: Do not change your pledge level, it will remove the addon.

For all the Digital Deluxe tier backers who have not yet completed their surveys, you will have the option to add on one free copy of the d20 and d6 addon for a cost of $0, as shown in this image:

Type 2: Early Bird Backers - The Tier Change Glitch

This bug effects people who backed the Kickstarter in the first 72 hours (backers #10830 or lower), but changed their tier in Backerkit's survey. Backerkit's software removed the 'Dice Set - Yokai Dawn Resin (Free Early Backer Choice!)' from your cart. 

The fix: On the 30th of November, Backerkit customer services will manually add this addon back into your baskets. From the 1st of December, you will be able to log back into your Backerkit account and simply choose whether you want them or not. (We will remind you to do this in an update around that time).

Note: If you change your pledge level after November 30th, you can contact Smood on our Discord server and they'll sort it to ensure you still recieve the free dice! But honestly, it's probably best to ensure you're in the right tier before November 30th if you can. You can still add any addons you like and it won't affect the free dice!

 If you're confused, we're here to help!

If you think you are missing the Dice Mini Set, contact Smood on Discord in the #ryokos-guide-questions channel. If, after December 1st, you think you are missing the Free Full Set do the following:

1. Check your backer number on Kickstarter is #10830 or lower. If it's 10831 or higher, you are not missing it.

2. Get in touch with Smood on Discord in the #ryokos-guide-questions channel.

Thanks so much for your patience and understanding. Backerkit are doing everything they can, and we're working with them closely to ensure nobody misses out on their free dice. Once again, if you've any questions, head on over to the #ryokos-guide-questions channel of the Loot Tavern Discord Server for the fastest response!

We can't wait for you all to get the Ryoko's Beta PDFs next month and start playing!

- Will and the Team