New Software and Approach
By Dean
- 4 minutes read - 833 wordsIt’s been a little while since my last blog post, but that’s only because life has been full of exciting changes. While writing had to wait, I’ve been busy building tools and exploring new RPG projects. Today, I’m excited to share what I’ve been working on, give you some links to try them out, and even talk a bit about a possible rebrand for Null Sheen. Let’s dive in.
Shadowrun 2e Foundry Prototype
As with all things 2e, it is lacking a lot of great tools and platforms to make life easier for player and GMs a like due to when it came out and where software was at the time. I’ve made it one of my life goals to ensure that barrier is removed. To this end I have been working with some folks to create a foundry module for Shadowrun 2e. This is still VERY early in its dev cycle. It needs some dedicated player testers to continue to hammer on it and ensure it has everything one would need to call it a functioning module.
👉 Shadowrun 2e Foundry Prototype
👉 Manifest file (for quick updates)
If this is something you would be interested in play testing or experimenting with to get closer to completion or at least more usable, please reach out to me at dean@nullsheen.com and we can get you setup to do some tickets on github as we all make this the best tool we possibly can.
Hex Crawler
I joined a hackathon recently in order to test some new tools that AWS is producing. I needed a good show case of the tool and something that would be very visually appealing. I decided after a long run of doing a hex crawl I’d love a tool where you can use a projector to run hex crawl style adventures. I think this is a very under utilized approach to exploration and I hope this tool will help people make more exciting exploration games.
Heart RPG Planner
Shadowrun has always been my first love, but it isn’t to say that I don’t love other RPGs. I actually tend to juggle something like 4 or so different system games for my month to month gaming hobby. This has lead me to create tools whenever I see a need and a niche that I might be able to fill in order to make it easier for someone to run their favorite game. One such game has become a bit of a obessession of mine, which is Heart: The City Beneath. This incredible game got stuck in my mind and I haven’t shaken loose of it (or do I really want too!). So I decided to sit down and attempted to make an RPG planner for those who want to run their first heart games. This is also still in pretty early stages and I will some day go back to it in order to polish it a bit more and make it everything I had hoped it would be. You will be hard pressed to find a more interesting setting or such creative approaches to classes/professions out there.
👉 Check out the Heart RPG Planner
Traveller Character Generator (Mongoose 2nd Edition)
I can’t seem to stop myself from wanting to make character generators. I feel like the biggest hurdle for most people trying to get into a new game is the daunting task of making a character for a system that are new too. I wanted to make a guided experience for those who are new to a game to help them find their feet and get started. This is a massive task (bigger than even the SR2/3 character generators) due to how interconnected the steps are for character generation for Traveller. Every character creation is an adventure in itself that creates a person forged in fire, with triumpts and regrets. It’s one of the most fun character creation processes out there.
I haven’t hosted it yet (still reviewing terms to avoid stepping on Mongoose’s toes), but if you’re curious and web-savvy, you can explore the current build here:
👉 Traveller Character Generator (GitHub Repo)
As you can see I’ve been pretty busy building new worlds and new tools for RPGs across the spectrum. This has lead me to a question I wanted to pose to everyone. Is Null Sheen a place where you would come for all kinds of RPG tools? There is obviously more I can do outside of Shadowrun and I think it might be time for me to start expanding the walled garden I have curated so carefully. What are you thoughts on it? I’d still hold onto the Shadowrun first, but I am quite a collector of RPGs across the board. Maybe there is room in this world for one more person who is trying to make a difference in the TTRPG space.
I look forward to hearing from everyone and seeing where the future of Null Sheen leads us.
-D