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Sickened by the enduring conflict, the Twilight Council hosts assemblies to end the war, bringing together all the Woodland from the lowliest mouse-in-a-sack to the mightiest hawk with a royal claim. The assemblies emphasize political connections over pure numbers of warriors, pushing the factions away from bloody battle and toward heated debate. As the Council progresses in their mission, they can declare edicts to change how the assemblies work, manipulating their enemies’ incentives and actions.
Throughout history, diasporas have played a critical role in societies and their politics. Because of their precarious position, they have been used and abused by monarchs, empires, and hegemonic cultures, whether through labor exploitation, use as a political wedge, or scapegoating. So it’s about time that they got their due in Root, in the form of the Lilypad Diaspora. In case you’re not familiar with them yet, here’s how I pitch them:
I started to ponder the expansion: what part of Root was I interested in exploring? Here’s what: Root is a living, breathing ecosystem because of the Woodland. The factions are not self-contained—they rely on the creatures of the Woodland to accomplish their goals. The Marquise works (and Overworks) the Woodfolk, the Eyrie enact their Decree through Woodfolk advisors and notables, and so on. You, as the faction leadership, are nothing without the Woodfolk. So, I first wanted to focus on this multiple, fractious nature of the factions.
In the first diary I wrote for New Foundations, I described how many ideas for this expansion came out of the process of making Arcs. In the same way that Oath’s development had seeded Arcs’s design both thematically and mechanically, the development of Arcs had done likewise with New Foundations. This virtuous circle is pretty rare for me. Mostly I feel like I work against myself. Each game tends to be a reaction against the project I just completed. Oath and Arcs are perhaps the lone exceptions to this rule. The designs sometimes seem like they are speaking to one another. They don’t agree about everything, but they also haven’t resorted to shouting at each other, yet.
The early development of Oath was a very frustrating, protracted experience, and not something I’ve written much about. Partly, there’s not much to say. While the origins of the design go back very far, I only started working on the game that would become Oath (originally called Saga) during the year after Root’s release. For months, it bore hardly any fruit. With Root, I had benefited from a very clear design prompt from Patrick. Oath could be anything and was, consistently, amounting to very little. Thankfully, I was able to earn my keep during these months by helping out on Vast: the Mysterious Manor and the wave of new Root expansions that came with Underworld.
It won’t seem like it during this campaign, but Richard Wilkins (aka Ricky Royal) and I have been working on Oath in one way or another for almost a year. I first got a text from Cole in late June 2023, just as summer school was winding down, asking if I would like to work with Ricky to co-design a new solo/co-op mode for Oath. I am fairly certain my response was “Hell yeah!”
Tomorrow, we’ll be launching the Kickstarter campaign for the next Oath expansion. Today, I want to talk a little bit about how we think about our crowdfunding campaigns and how they have shaped the identity of our studio. I’m also going to write a little about an element of the Oath expansion which I think illustrates our approach.
When we were first pitching Oath during the first Kickstarter, I would often describe it as “a game that remembered how you played it.” This was less of a pure description than a kind of aspiration. My main task in those days was to find ways to quickly sum up what made the project special and to communicate its ambitions.