Welcome everyone to a broader, public, debut of my latest project, the Wastewalker Roleplaying Game!
Wastewalker is a 10-level system and setting hack for the Starfinder Roleplaying Game developed by myself, Nate Petersen, over the last 9 years (!!). I am a big fan of the Fallout computer and console game franchise, along with a lot of the aesthetics that make the title’s alternate universe up. As a longtime role player, game writer, and tinkerer I set out to build out my own sandbox to play in. Its taken a long time; when I began the work in 2013, I was adapting and overhauling the original Paizo Pathfinder Roleplaying Game. In the years since, we have seen multiple entries now to the Fallout franchise, an explosion of post-apocalyptic genre releases including the return of the Wasteland franchise, and the expansion of Paizo’s offerings to include the sci-fi system Starfinder!
Ultimately, I consider myself a developer and editor on Wastewalker; over time, some fantastic authors have developed systems and rules through Starfinder and other open source channels that, taken together and tweaked, produced a great deal of the vision I wanted when Wastewalker’s development began. It is my hope to finish the refinement I began with the assistance of fellow players and to share these author’s works with more players!
What makes Wastewalker unique, one might ask, that I’d not just publish a blog post about the parts and pieces? My own unique contribution to the mix, aside from the tweaking and filing off a few pop culture serial numbers, lies in programming. As a developer and perpetual or “forever” game master, I frequently find myself in a love/hate relationship with tabletop gaming. I spend enough time working on, revising, re-revising, re-re-revising, material I get lost in the fog myself. It loses some “fun” being so familiar, and sometimes too I lose track of where I might even be. Developing adventures can especially be frustrating or disappointing because I’m not surprised; I’m reading the same novel, over and over. Playing with new groups is always great, it brings new eyes to old work, but even that is good for so much. So, as it pertains to Wastewalker, I’ve focused on developing systems and not just content. Adapting the various rules, subsystems, and other ideas has all been toward the end of producing an engine that spits out interesting possibilities, and allows me to explore them at the table with fellow players being equally surprised.
When I started work on Wastewalker, my daughter had not yet even been born; she would come along the following fall. For the last two years, she has actually been instrumental in further development of this material! At 7 years old, she loves the idea of role-playing and exploring, elements I want Wastewalker to put at the forefront, and has helped test rules and patience, but has contributed a great amount of insight and energy! With her input, we have a series of systems now that allow us to rapidly explore sites, hunt down technological treasures, and deal with dangerous raiders and deadly creatures alike.
Today, I’ve posted one of the most complete collections of Wastewalker’s “Player’s Guide” to date. This is a collection and adaptation of player rules and basic gameplay will allow folks to put together Wastewalker-oriented characters and start playing around their own apocalypse! As more play, feedback, and input rolls in these rules will be expanded and updated! Coming up behind the player’s guide as well will be some of those subsystem rules as we assemble the “Game Master’s Guide” chapters; we’re expanding open content hex crawl exploration systems, settlement development, as well as randomized adventure generation, abstract site exploration and adventuring, and more!
So check out the Download Wastewalker page to get the first draft, join us on Facebook and share your thoughts, and lets see what the new world holds together!
