Greetings, Dan Here!

This week we'll be taking a look at a new player option that is designed to encourage roleplay based around a player's mech. Machine Tulpas as a concept were built around the concept of machines having personalities. Anyone who has worked with a single machine for long enough, whether that be a car, plane, computer or power tool, can attest that over a long enough time they get a feel for that machine's personality. That is especially the case for those who work closely with said machine, becoming intricately familiar with its workings and performance. Now whether those personalities are real manifestations or a psychological effect is up to the individual. Either way, for Dragoons that spend as much time customizing their mech as they do piloting it in life threatening situations, it is natural that they would form a bond with it. This is manifested in the Machine Tulpa. Beneath Twisted Earth: Overdrive will feature 20 different Tulpas for varied mech personalities. These can range widely in how they could play, but as with machine personalities in our world, so too are they in the arks. Because of this each Tulpa provides a description of the mech's behaviors that could affect the pilot, but do not list hard mechanical effects as they are meant more as quirks to drive roleplay. Below are listed thee example Tulpas that players can choose or roll for their mech during character creation:

• Chatty: At times the mech operates in odd ways such as its lights flickering, the comms kicking on, or hatches suddenly popping open. While these often seem to have no correlation, pilots and mechanics may interpret these as the machine’s attempts to communicate its feelings.

• Haunted: Regardless of if the pilot knows better, they never feel like they’re alone in the cockpit or they get the sense someone has been in it before them. The mech also casts an unnatural shadow.

• Possessive: The mech never seems to work properly for anyone other than the registered pilot, but will always operate beautifully when the pilot is in control.

Some players who have been reading through these preview devlogs may notice a thematic similarity between Machine Tulpas and Pilot Talismans, only that Talismans carry hard, mechanical effects. The general idea for both was to help deepen a player pilot's bond with with mech, while also continuing the theme of supernatural elements being added to campaigns of BTE. Between these two player options, the general philosophy was that a Talisman is something that a pilot would swear by their usefulness on the battlefield, while the Tulpa is more nebulous, and could be entirely in the pilot's head.

With this we come to the end of the preview of new player options in the coming expansion of BTE. Now I think it's only fair that we take a look at new GM options! As featured in BTE: Overdrive, GMs will have 8 new factions with a full set of faction contract roll tables, 3 new paradigm clocks, 27 new Adversaries, and 2 new starter missions to work with. While we will not be taking a look at all of this new content, for the purposes of this preview series we will be taking a look at two of the new factions and three of the new adversaries. Next time, we'll be meeting The Nephilim Foundation and The Venusian Vanguard Fleet.

Until then, thank you for your interest, and I look forward to seeing you at the launch of the premium versions of Beneath Twisted Earth, and Beneath Twisted Earth: Overdrive!