Hi there! At long last, ACES HIGH is out! In it you’ll find:

• 6 Experimental Armaments, 6 Experimental Modular Systems, and 3 Experimental Frames (which include new Integral Systems, Integral Traits, and Build Traits).
• Some notes on running APOCALYPSE FRAME as a campaign, including Crisis Advances (making your enemies stronger over time, including 3 new standard enemies) and Ace Advances (new benefits and functionality to improve your Aces over time).
• Tyrants! These are dangerous prey for a Strike Team - they’re nasty boss enemies you can use for special occasions that are meant to be treated as equals. 10 Tyrants are included, as well as advice on making your own.

Best of all, it’s free to anyone who has APOCALYPSE FRAME. You’ll see it in your downloads: if you have the base game you should have ACES HIGH. This is because these are all things I wanted to be part of the core experience but would clutter up the game significantly if you’re not already at least a little familiar with it. It didn’t feel like a complete experience in the way I’d envisioned it without their inclusion. That said, each of those 3 sections is also largely independent/modular, so you can pick and choose what you’d prefer to use or not use to your satisfaction.

Hi there! Some minor changes prior to ACES HIGH releasing.

Look and Feel

• Everything has been revamped a bit visually. I have a real bold font now!
• Fixed a few typos/similar.

Armaments

• Grenade Launcher swapped Splash for Close. Splash only operates on a 6 now so it’s not nearly as helpful on a Grenade Launcher. Close/Near with Incendiary, however, is situationally very useful.
• Default loadout switch: Gatling on H1-VANGUARD was switched with Electrolaser on L3-GLADIATOR. Gatling didn’t make much sense on the VANGUARD because Focused+Spin Up really wants something with decent Tension. This switch also makes VANGUARD more Far oriented and GLADIATOR more Close/Near oriented, which both make a lot of sense.

Tags

• Distracting now does something else and is consistent between Armaments and Systems.
• Burst’s enemy version is now improved (it activates on any attack-as-consequence as sort of an opposite Deliberate).

Systems

• Afterburner no longer has Efficient. It was a little too obvious of a choice.
• Pulse Laser can optionally hit Far for 1. It needed something to distinguish itself from Plasma Cannon.

Please let me know if I missed anything. ACES HIGH is coming soon! I’m testing a few things still. In the meantime I’ve been churning on NOVA: BURNOUT, so keep an eye out for that - it’s right around the corner.

Hi there! This time, I’m talking about Druid and Necromancer! Two weird 13 True Ways classes that I did weird things to. Both are (in my opinion) way more interesting than their initial incarnations.

The Original Druid

The original druid is almost certainly the least functional class in 13th Age. It’s hard to summarize the ways in which it’s a mess, but in short: tons of spells, separated spell lists/progressions, no class features/default spell list but it used two-tier Talents. I liked the general thrust of each set of Talents - it really did its best to try to pull together the million different things Druids are associated with in fantasy games - but the end result was deeply incoherent and you could easily make a useless character.

Hi there!

So as you’ve noticed, it’s been awhile since expansion chat. Mostly I just hadn’t been touching it since the v0.3 update - it was content-complete, but it needed testing - also I was releasing 36th Way and launching my site which took up a lot of my time and brainpower. And it turned out that a little distance from it did it some good. So let’s talk about it.

Hi there!

Last time, I wrapped up the original 13th Age core classes. Now I’ll be talking about my Commander and Monk refreshes. Both of them had seeds of the Power dynamic I took to other classes, but both were changed drastically!

The Original Commander

The original Commander is interesting. It’s very clearly 13th Age’s answer to Warlord, which is cool because Warlord was cool and it’s an idea worth exploring. It has command points, which operates similarly to the standard Power that I gave everything in the sense that it powers Commands. You can gain Command through Fight from the Front (attack, if it hits gain) or Weigh the Odds (no-roll gain). It shares that Commands list with Tactics, though, which are (mostly quick/interrupt action) Daily/Recharge abilities. So most of the Commanders I ever saw were actually multiclasses with classes that rarely used their quick action, like offense Paladins. Oops.

Hi there! Here to talk about two more classes, Sorcerer and Bard. This’ll round out the original 13th Age core classes (I think).

The Original Sorcerer

13th Age Sorcerer has a few interesting things going on. Breath Weapon/Chain are types of spells, and class feature-wise the main thing that isn’t just a type of spell is Gather Power, which lets you waste an action this turn to double damage the next turn (which lets you stretch out dailies). Most of its talents tie back to the heritage idea. Ultimately, though, it’s a fairly standard casting class.

Hi there! Based on my feedback from 0.3.0 I released a balance, metagame, and accessiblity update.

Integral Traits

A few Integral Traits received minor tweaks:

• Hairpin Controls (L1-RECON) now only works on the first 4 rolled in a turn.
  • It was a little too consistent with high-dice attacks.
• CQC Plating (L3-GLADIATOR) is now Riot Shielding and does the opposite - it grants +1 Armor vs Near/Far attacks.
  • This is a more useful bonus overall and makes more sense given L3’s Big Shield characteristic.
• Long-Range Optics (M2-ARCHER) now allows them to extend their Far range to 3 hexes with a die/Harm penalty when no enemies are in Close/Near.
  • This makes their Trait more distinct from the Scoped add-on and lets them have something no other Frame has.

Integral and Modular Systems

I made a few changes to Systems based on two observations: longer-range Systems are more powerful/useful than shorter-range Systems and Near/Far range area-attack Systems are very powerful.

Hi there!

In addition to the PDFs, I added a separate character sheet and card sheet. The former is self-explanatory, the latter provides a template for condition cards and ability cards. (They’re both already in the core book, this is mostly for convenience/having them as a separate smaller file).

Enjoy!

It’s out! Go get it!

At long last, after just under two years of development, 36th Way is live! You can either get it here on itch for PDF/ePub or you can read the entire SRD online at my new site.

Next steps

I’m going to be taking feedback as to minor changes - probably typos/term update errors at this point but who knows - while making APOCALYPSE FRAME updates/the expansion release.

Hi there!  I'm going to talk about some of the simplest classes in the original 13th Age - Barbarian, Ranger, and Paladin - and how they changed.

The Original Barbarian

Barbarian was one of the most dirt-simple classes possible in the original. You had Rage, which was a Recharge 16+ ability, and aside from that you mostly just did basic attacks. The unique thing it had was tiered talents, which was just that some unlocked at high tiers. It was kind of effective when it popped off, but boring most of the time. So my goal was to make it more interesting on average.