Thread by @VafeR

This Gen Con, I set out to try a strange thing: a mashup of #SunlessSea by @failbettergames and #InvisibleSunRPG by @MonteCookGames.

Let me tell you all a bit about Invisible Sunless Sea.

1/

Sunless Sea is a literary survival horror computer game by Failbetter.

Like Invisible Sun, it’s surreal fantasy, though Victorian in flavor rather than Art Nouveau-era. The two are a wonderful aesthetic match.

Images, concepts, writing flow easily between the two worlds.

2/

Eamon Mulholland (@v01dlight) was my co-GM on this, and ran 100% of the actual storytelling. We chatted about how to weave the lore of the two worlds together, and let@me tell you: IT WORKS.

For now, I’ll just say that the Undersling is larger than you thought. 🤫

3/

I focused on, I guess, the “user interface” of the game.

How do you bring a computer game to life in a physical, analog space?

Sunless Sea involves sailing (excuse me, “zailing”!) among islands in the Unterzee. A fog of war covers the entire map at first: exploration is key.
4/

I wanted to replicate this Fog of War experience.

I enlarged a printed poster map of the Unterzee, and fit it into a poster frame with a plastic cover — then painted the entire thing with opaque paint that easily flakes off when dry.

(The exposed starry bits are lighthouses)
5/

Zailing is risky in Sunless Sea. You might run out of fuel, or run out of supplies, or encounter a monster, or go insane from all the darkness and horror you take on.

I wanted zailing to be a *bit* unpredictable for my vislae zailors.

So: I bought a box of wind-up toys.

/6

Each “boat” was ranked according to whether it was a) inefficient b) unreliable c) both inefficient AND unreliable, or d) a decent ship to zail.

/7

The crew each took on a different role as a zailor:

- The STOKER was in charge of learning the craft and applying the right amount of fuel, for example. (Each bucket of coal = one twist of the spring). Then, a handoff to the NAVIGATOR, who would aim.

/8

The LIGHTGUARD, who operates the ship’s lamps, would then dutifully trace the toy’s path and scrub the darkness away using a kitchen sponge.

In the end, we saw a lot of the Zee, but left much still to explore:

/9

The map wasn’t the only digital-to-analog conversion, though.

In Sunless Sea, players need to keep track of Fuel, Supplies, and Horror, which constantly digitally tick away in the background. We’ve already talked a bit about Fuel; let’s talk about Horror.

10/

@The_ClosetGamer spent a whole evening with me playtesting this mechanic. I purchased several barrels of weird black goop from the Internet.

At first, I thought maybe we could clock the advancement of Horror as the goop slid down an incline.

/11

The final solution ended up being MUCH better: a spaghetti scoop, mounted in a boom microphone stand.

This allows the quivering, gelatinous mass to hover literally over the heads of the players as they zail.

12/

The effect is HORRIFIC — but it’s not just aesthetic. Every time a blob of goo falls to the table beneath, Horror increases by one. Zailors must take shore leave (or similar) to reduce it. If players are in a horrible situation, I can shake the mic stand & increase the rate. /13

Of course, goo falling on a table is not *quite* evocative enough, so @The_ClosetGamer painted up this delicious plaster skull:

/15

I had a mechanic planned for tracking hunger as well, but couldn’t get it working this year. Next time!

Finally: island maps.

Sunless Sea is filled with /lovely/ artwork, including its island maps.

/17

I prepared a slideshow with flavor text and artwork for each island in the game, so when vislae arrived for each island’s adventure, they could see the island and map their progress across it.

We projected from my iPad to an Apple TV, so everyone could see.

/16

The truly great thing is that this allows the person playing the CARTOGRAPHER to make sketches or notes on the map as the players explore, in real-time.

Here’s @LadyCartoonist , doing what she does best:

/18

And here’s a map, during one of our explorations:

You can see our ship at the bottom, and rose petals blowing on the wind at Irem. By the end, we had mapped out and labeled the various structures on the island. /19

It wasn’t all smooth. We were in a different location across all three nights, and it always took longer than expected to get going. And, you know, wandering parties would appear and distract us — not that that’s a bad thing. Shore leave reduces horror.

But it was GREAT.

/20

Thanks to my players for being patient & willing to try this weird experiment.

I’ll close with a photo of my favorite detail, which sprang entirely from my players’ delightful minds.

@v01dlight wrote up CHYTRID, a Blemmigan NPC, played by @AudreyArcana — cosplayed by her sloth.

Through the entire campaign, we kept a single candle burning. When it finally ended, so did the campaign:

Good night.

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