# Post the Apocalypse - Machine Gods of the Noxian Expanse tags: #thoughts #game/rpg/machine-gods Have you ever gotten into a situation where you hear about a product that a creator has made and you get excited? It scratches an itch that you know you have personally, something that you add to your collection without really thinking about it too hard. Or you would if they would sell it to you. Yeah, that's where we are today.  *[Ithaqua's Bane](https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCfid-d_qoig4NM5a4POI1Fg)* does a *ton* of really good reviews and gameplays for a ton of games that scratch a lot of my itches. He plays a lot of **solo** RPGs, which anyone who has been following the garden here for any time knows I'm really into. Those inherently often are **GM-less**, which I've been into for longer than many people have been into the hobby. Not as many of the games that he has talked about are as deep in the **sci-fi** niche as I prefer, but that's just a characteristic of games that have been released in the last ever. On many occasions, I've already had a game he's covered in my not inconsiderable collection because it touches on elements of the Cthulhu Mythos or modern horror, and we just happened to get to the same place about the same time. When he's talking about the more crunchy, map-centric, grounded mechanical games that I'm also into, then I know I've picked up some good stuff. Which brings us to **[Machine Gods of the Noxian Expanse](https://blackoathgames.com/machine-gods-of-the-noxian-expanse)**—and the fact that I can't have it for love or money. That's not entirely technically true, but go watch the 46-minute video where *Ithaqa's Bane* talks about the setup, mechanics, and some of the structure of the game that's currently available from **[Blackoath Entertainment](https://blackoathgames.com)**. That should get your mind right in the correct spot for the rest of the thoughts I'm about to lay on you. ![[Machine Gods of the Noxian Expanse (cover).jpg|300]] Before we set in on this, let me point out that I do own other *Blackoath Entertainment* pieces. For instance, I picked up **[[Broken Shores]]** specifically for access to its rather lightweight OSR-adjacent mechanics that promised a bit more capability with GM-less running and a truly hard metal ethos. While I did end up with some excellent random generation tables for dealing with troubles at sea and troubles with piracy, the mechanics seemed a little too crunchy to satisfy my taste for the fiction. Still, it's in the collection. Likewise, I picked up **[[Over War|Over War: The Night Comes Down]]**, which was a reboot of an older tactical wargame with RPG elements. It can very easily be played GM-less and solo, which leans right into my particular obsessions. It also is happy to be played as a form of a point crawl, with most of the focus of what you do from day to day focusing on working out how to do combat fights and how to come ahead together, acquiring resources, finding people to recruit who will join up against the enemy. It's a strangely complex game, which pretends to be a very lightweight game and reminds me nothing of so much of a JRPG in the vein of **[Final Fantasy Tactics Advance](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Final_Fantasy_Tactics_Advance)** and **[Tactics Ogre](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tactics_Ogre:_The_Knight_of_Lodis)**.[^1] So, to sum up what *Ithaqua's Bane* was saying about **[Machine Gods of the Noxian Expanse](https://blackoathgames.com/machine-gods-of-the-noxian-expanse)**, it's very cool, and the mechanics have been simplified from the straight-up D100 mechanics that have been seen in *Blackoath* games before, but instead now generally hinge on D20 operations. The entire panoply of the multi-faced die sets are in play. I'm down for that. Anything that reduces the sheer number of things you have to deal with, the possibility of coming along, dropping from hundreds to merely dozens is always a step forward.[^2] We need to get to talking about the setting itself. I am an absolute sucker for a game you can play with a modernist mindset and have it be challenged by a very alien environment in which you find yourself. *Short version:* It's a post-apocalyptic nightmare which was inhabiting a planet with technology largely informed by nanotechnology. Then, something terrible happened, as it always seems to. Technology fell, and the new Dark Ages descended on mankind. That didn't end technology, but it did end mankind's general understanding of it. Now, thousands of years later, mankind sees technology as magic and lives in feudal enclaves. The remnants still exist and are still critical. Artificial Intelligences vie with the noble elite to command kingdoms. The dead claw their way out of their graves, corrupted by nanotech, which has a thirst to live in a stolen body. Knights pour from the front gates of castles to do battle with an unruly horde who found a cache of plasma bolt rifles and a handful of batteries to run them. *Shorter version:* It's cool, apocalyptic, hyper-tech cloaked in mysticism and ritual, and I'm here for it. I can think of many other games which came before, which hopefully had some influence over this particular game. In particular, **[[Tekumel|Tékumel]]** . While **Tékumel** embraces its technophilic history has real mysticism going on simultaneously with the hypertech, they do have surprising amounts of similarity. Frankly, I'm generally a sucker for this sort of setup. If it were possible, I would have given *Blackoath* money right out of the gate after hearing about it. It combines a lot of things that I want to reward in the marketplace: solo and co-op play options, relatively lightweight mechanics, a fascinating setting which leverages a conflict between the old and new… I am *actively turned off* by any references to OSR, but aside from the core character stats, it doesn't really look like there's a whole lot of that other than a name to hype with. But it turns out they won't take my money. The only way to get access to the game (currently) is to [support them on Patreon](https://www.patreon.com/blackoathgames), and like Ithaqua, I haven't had entirely positive experiences with Patreon as a platform. Sure, I could figure out how much I need to give them and do it for a single month, and then cancel, but I don't like that and I don't particularly care for Patreon as a mechanism for deciding who gets access to a full game product. If it was announced that it's a temporary state of affairs and Patreon supporters get access for three months before it goes up on the store in general, I'd be down for that. That'd be fine. I don't care if they get preview access, but I'm sitting here with money in my hand ready to hand it over for a product that I would buy like the *rest* of the products I have access to. Sell it to me like a product. It's a kind of thinking I'm not very happy with when it comes to business. All that on the table. Do I really need the product in order to play a game that has most of the qualities that I've mentioned? Well, *no*, I have plenty of games that can do that particular sort of play. It would be near trivial to use the **Ironsworn** setting and the **Starforged** character options to play characters with access and understanding of a pre-extant hypertech civilization. I'm not even sure it would require much in the way of tweaking or changing setting expectations either. Essentially, I think this is a really cool product, and what I wish is that they would take my money and give me the thing in return. Maybe they will. Maybe this is just a preview period for their patrons, and it'll go up for availability on the store at some point, even though it very explicitly says that it won't. If you're looking for something in this vein, and you don't mind dealing with Patreon, please go and give them money for it. Enjoy playing it. It's a project that deserves your attention. Until then, I have one more thing to tinker around with and maybe write an article or two about. [^1]: When I say "remind me," I mean it feels very much like a physical manifestation of those game design tropes and very nearly their interfaces, particularly when it comes to tactics; not so much the freeform grid of **Tactics Advance**, but a more traditional two-line layout that JRPGs love so much. [^2]: I will maintain until my dying day that the D100 is far too much fiddly for the level of useful outcome you can squeeze out of it after much effort.