Page Design, Maps, and Terminology

This isn’t final text in the v2 image by any means, but we’re walking down the path of making new master pages for layout.

A refreshed color palette

The background color is lightened up, and the vibrancy is increased just a little bit for further contrast. We played around with changing the palette completely, but after a couple of hours of going back and forth, we decided to tweak the existing one because it feels unique and iconic to BG now.

New and more fonts

We stuck with Oil Can as the header and title font after looking at a ton of different options. This is a special font for me because it is no longer available from Lost Type co-op and hasn’t been for almost a decade now. Back when we started this project, I emailed them to get reconfirmation of a commercial use. I covet and backup the .otf file religiously. That certainly increases the likelihood this will remain a unique look.

But for the body text, we’ve swapped out Courier Prime with three fonts, two of them are on display here. The Paragraph is Bitter from Google Fonts, while the in-game handwriting is KH Sober Draftsman from Kern + Hide.

The callout boxes (post-it notes) in the game will use Ultra-Classified by Kern + Hide - this wonderfully jaunty typewriter/newsprint type of font.

We will be working with columns where it makes sense, but there will be a mix.

This is all to give the book a cleaner, easily readable interior. Previously, I was using different colored callout boxes to differentiate between “in world” notes from Ranger Murie, and game text. Now, however, we can represent that by font styles, which keeps the pages a bit more tidy.

The rectangle and pink triangle in the header is an anchor design and be used throughout everything to tie things together.

Maps, Mapping, and Hexes

We’ve been working the last few days on the mapping system in Banda’s Grove. Please note, things are still influx, and may change more.

Mapping in Banda’s Grove has been tedious at best from the very beginning. It originally had a tetris-style chunk of hexes you could lay down on a massive hex grid. That was replaced with a simpler 19 hex flower, and you started by building out 7 of them to start. But each individual hex also had its detail map of another 7 hexes to track little details. This was a lot to manage, to say the least, and made online games dang near impossible.

I had a big conversation today with another designer on the purpose of a hex on a map, and Banda’s Grove does not have any travel or time mechanics tied to traversing a hex. It is not a hex crawl or point crawl. The purpose of the map is to draw, sketch, and laugh together when you talk about the worlds you’re building.

So, we are getting rid of hex grid and detail maps entirely.

Instead, we are working on implementing a single free form map, plus a shared notebook. We’ll still provide a themed map, but players can also just use the biggest piece of paper they can get their hands on to draw the twisting, winding, Planes converging at the Grove. Use Jamboard, Figjam, or Miro for online games, or ignore the map aspect completely.

We’ll provide tips on how to setup your shared notebook or gdoc and offer optional templates in PDF and .gdoc formats. We’re investigating other online worldbuilding tools to build templates for them as well.

This change has an additional upside: We can remove an entire technical term from the game, reducing jargon and confusion.

Before, we used the word “Fragment” to denote we were talking about a hex tile in general, and “Plane” to talk about the biome and culture on that Fragment. The word Fragment has now been completely removed from the game, and we only have Planes.

As an example, Maps in Banda’s Grove will become more free form like this, rather than the more bounded hex grid style. And no, I cannot draw. This is why I hire artists!

And this actually opens up some interesting possibilities for using mechanics to add limits, encouraging players to use the Convergence Event move, which also risks adding blips to the map, which in turn causes more narrative friction.

I’m playing with limiting the number of facilities you can build on a single Plane - we have to make sure we don’t overcrowd the environment! However, now a Convergence Event can add a new Plane you come up with yourself, or expand an existing Plane (you still need to roll to see which Plane is extended). Extending a Plane doesn’t add any new overhead to your note-taking now. You just continue adding details and notes under the “Cluthar” section.

When blips occur, you still roll a pebble over the map, and the Plane it lands on becomes shrouded in primordial darkness and is unavailable until mended.

Actions, Phases, & Quantum Events

First, let’s discuss a quick term rename I did. We mistakenly used the name “Action” to represent the special abilities of a playbook, facility, or downtime phase that cost a pebble to use. These are now called Moves. This will free up the word “action” for another mechanic to reduce confusion further.

The other piece I’ve been working on is how Phases work. Phases were always meant to represent the passage of a week, but their naming and how I implemented them muddled that, and it was… confusing at best.

• I’ve always had this idea that the “Downtime” phase was the weekday, that’s why you have 5 actions to take. One for each day of the week.
• The Update Phase was supposed to represent Sunday Evening, when you’re settling in and taking a moment to prepare for the weekday.
• And the Quantum Event phase, was meant to be the weekend, a time of adventure, and shenanigans around the campgrounds.

The phases and quantum events have been renamed to reinforce that weekly cycle concept fully:

• The Weekday - You take 5 Weekday Actions. You can spend pebbles to perform Weekday, Playbook or Facility moves, or have slice of life roleplay scenes to gain pebbles.
• The Weekend - This is when you go on Weekend Adventures! Time to get into and out of trouble, help peoples, and discover hidden mysteries.
• Sunday Night - This is the time to settle in after your big adventures, take stock, reduce your dice, and prepare for the Weekday.

Even though these are just terminology changes, they help reinforce the concepts of the gameplay loop, what it means, and connect the mechanical concepts together better.

And speaking of the Weekday Phase, we have simplified the “Downtime Actions” (now called Weekday Moves). Before, you had Downtime Actions. Some were nestled under a “Grove Projects” action, which itself was several possible actions. Wow, that’s confusing. That is all rewritten and organized, so there’s no nesting. Just a list of comprehensive Weekday Moves now.

Because The Weekend is a cleanly defined phase of free form adventuring and roleplay, but with the limitation of not being able to use Weekday or Facility moves, I can also organize gameplay better.

The biggest one here is Events (previously “Festivals” & “Special Events”, also simplified). They were always a free form adventure. They were designed as roleplay heavy, low stress, celebratory “Quantum Events” with boons and bonuses for your efforts - they have an introduction, complications, and your reward for participating.

But, they didn’t really fit in the Weekday phase’s gameplay, where they currently take place. But that’s where they had to live because The Quantum Event Phase was for Quantum Event. As written, it didn’t leave room for anything else.

Now the Weekend is a phase of adventuring where you just can’t use Weekday or Facility Moves, only your Playbook Moves, inventory, and wit. By default, a Weekend Adventure takes place - either one we wrote, or one you create.

However, now an Event can replace that Weekend’s Adventure. There are some Facility Moves that also initiate Events, like putting on a play at the Stage. That will take place during the Weekend in lieu of a Weekend Adventure now as well.

All these little tweaks and changes are to streamline and organize play, reduce jargon and drastically increase clarity.

Until next time! -Andy