Not the End: interview with the author Claudio Pustorino

Not the End: interview with the author Claudio Pustorino

We have been saying this for some time now and the facts have proved us right: the world of role-playing games is more active than ever, and you can figure it out from multiple factors, including aexponential growth of realities that propose new titles and that allow you to try them. Of course, the period doesn't help, but there are several tools that - more or less - help recreate it spirit that is lived at the table. You are spoiled for choice, given the amount of products that are coming out, but we have the answer for you. Not the End, does it tell you something? After writing a preview of the title in question, we decided that it was appropriate to investigate this product released for Fumble RPG. How? Speaking with the author, of course. Claudio Pustorino has devised an RPG capable of leaving extreme freedom to the players and the master in terms of plot and setting. Through the various choices that will be made, we will witness the growth and evolution of the character, for better or for worse. "Every end is a new beginning", this is the common thread, a sort of rule that guides the adventure. Without waiting too long, let's leave the floor to him.



Not the End: interview with the author Claudio Pustorino

Let's start immediately with Not the End. What was its story? What did you start writing from?

The intention to write Not the End was born in 2017 and, before putting the first game concepts on paper, Fabio and I spent a few months meeting in my home tavern to outline ideas, collect inspirations and work together on the blackboard. . We alternated with the conversations game tests, to explore the implications of our reasoning and without ever letting the ideas settle too much. The actual drafting began a year later, towards the middle of 2018. By then the key ideas of the game's design were already settled and there was a lot to write in one go.



From the initial project to the final product: what has changed? Did the game transform during the development phase?

Nothing of the cardinal principles and all of the solutions. Initially our intentions had taken forms far from the desired result and we threw at least a couple of functioning game systems because they were not centered on our objectives. Subsequently, the open playtest phase led to the reduction and removal of a lot of content that we had taken for granted.

What were the most difficult / delicate moments you encountered in writing NtE?

The biggest obstacle was "breaking your breath" on the hive of hexagons. One of the basic assumptions I wanted to develop was that the arrangement of elements on the board was an area not sufficiently explored in the field of RPGs, but initially I tried to replace the players, wanting to offer a specific form of correlation. I iterated at least 40 versions of the board in which I continually schematized differently before realizing that the value was not in proposing a solution, but in offering the player the possibility to apply his mental schemes freely.

The choice of tokens to replace the "classic" dice was very interesting. Was it in the plans from the start?

Yes and no. I wanted the test result to be immediate and light in terms of cognitive load. Right from the start I excluded numerical results to be added, subtracted or interpreted. I liked the GeneSys dice very much, but I didn't like they were difficult to read and required processing downstream of the die roll (in GeneSys you have to "subtract" the opposite symbols and tell based on what remains). We initially thought of custom d12s with different assortments of black and white dots on their faces, but then we realized we could further reduce the complexity by using tokens. We had come up with the idea of ​​using the bag as a sort of meta-nut, representing the state of the character. In the first prototypes of NtE, therefore, the bag did not fill and empty with each test but represented the state of the PCs, which created beautiful opportunities but as many complications. Then I read the beautiful Omen, which in its elegance convinced me to abandon the idea of ​​matching the bag to the character's condition. We were therefore able to modulate the logics of composition and draft of the bag, as well as the logic of spending of the tokens, in a way that complies with the purposes of NtE.



Not the End: interview with the author Claudio Pustorino

I want to remember an impression I got from reading Not the End. The manual looks more like a script manual than a simple rulebook. You have provided a real guide to storytelling in those pages. How important is it to know storytelling so well in an RPG?

I believe that it is not necessarily those who play who have to know shared storytelling techniques. Instead, I think that a good game must offer the right tools to allow those who play to do it effortlessly. In a game where you will use your wits to solve puzzles and explore dungeons, the game must offer the tools to create interesting dungeons and all the rules to be able to explore them. In a game that features tactical combat, the player must have what it takes to feel the weight of their choices on a battlefield. A game that proposes to explore a historical period must offer a synthesis of the themes, facts and customs of that period, as well as opportunities to explore it. Not the End urges players to expose themselves to negative consequences in order to explore the inner nature of the character and urges the Storyteller not to prepare in advance, but to grasp the stimuli of the players in a fluid way. By choice, it does not offer an explicit dialogue economy between narrator and player like FATE does, nor does it synthesize narrative suggestions in a series of coded moves as happens in PbtA. The way we wrote NtE was meant to favor a very specific balance of immediacy and depth, without driving too much. It seemed necessary to offer examples and suggestions of shared narration to experience this freedom in line with the assumptions of the game.


Not the End was awarded at “Role Playing Game of the Year 2020”. Would you ever have expected it?

My journey on NtE has been studded with doubts, not certainties. When I started writing Not the End I was wondering if anyone would ever consider it. When we structured the kickstarter I wondered if, despite the playtest telling me otherwise, a rarefied idea like “playing heroes willing to risk everything for what they consider important” would not have been too generalist and too little understandable. During the lockdown, while many people were playing NtE, I allowed myself to hope… Then I saw the list of candidates for the prize and I stopped hoping, despite my surroundings telling me that we had real possibilities. The news came as a wonderful surprise.


Is there any role-playing game in particular that formed you, both as a player / master and as a game designer?

What formed me the most was the richness and diversity of games I have experienced over the years through Fumble. During the podcast we were completely omnivorous, experimenting with a multitude of completely different games and systems. This storm of stimuli, even if I didn't realize it at the time, was the main stimulus to my current vision of game design.

It seems that the RPG market is in better shape than ever. How are you experiencing it, as an enthusiast and as an author?

There are windows of time when, if you have a passion for a topic, everything works out in your favor. For example, being a passionate science fiction author during the golden years of the American Science Fiction Society. I believe that we are living in the middle of one of these windows and that, if we have a passion for RPGs, we should consider ourselves incredibly lucky. Personally I feel that way.

When a door is closed, a door opens, they say. Are you already working on something new?

Yes, and I think this is the first time I've talked about it publicly. The project is entitled PRYSM, but for now I do not say more. My creative processes are leeeeeeeenti. Fumble has a lot in store, but you will probably see the first reliable results on PRYSM in 2022 ?

There are two things to do: buy the manual and go on an adventure. Simple, isn't it?

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