shadow / giant
a duet game of jaded guardians and magical children in need
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Mechanics
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Content
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Accessibility
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Details
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Description
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a duet game of jaded guardians and magical children in need
It don't matter how you got here. Don't matter what the destination is. At some point, somehow, against the odds … Shadow felt safe with the Giant. And the Giant, though they mighta sworn off it before … cares for the Shadow. There'll be threats. Always will be. But, maybe, you can get through. Find safety. Together. As long as it takes to get there.
And through those long days, cold nights … the tears, the fears, the fighting … someone, somewhere … might just mistake you for a family.
Well. Wouldn't that be somethin.
About Shadow/Giant
Shadow / Giant is a duet roleplaying game about finding care, safety, and family amidst a malicious and unaccepting world. In it, one player will play as the Giant a gruff and jaded adult who thought their care for the world was long gone and the other will play the Shadow 'a child with magical abilities who now relies on them for protection.
The game is asymmetrical: both child and guardian have different rules they play by, and different ways of interacting with the world. They must work together to rise to the challenges of living in a world that doesn't seem to want them in it. But both can push their mission to the breaking point. All you want to do is find somewhere safe to go.
In Shadow/Giant you'll ...
- work together to tell the story, trading off who narrates scenes
- explore themes of care, duty, marginalization, harm, and chosen family
- handle miscommunications that come between the characters
- balance taking necessary risks with consequences that could end the game
- build a world and characters together to tell a story that matters
- follow your characters over one session or many - as long as you want to keep telling their story
The rulebook contains ...
- the core rules and mechanics of how to play, based on the Badger + Coyote SRD by Pandion Games
- tips on how to build your characters
- questions the characters can ask each other for pre-session reflection
- four examples of genres and worlds you can slot the game into
- a combination of narrated flavor text and plain language rules
- 19 pages with a unique layout on each one
- Three plaintext documents (one B&W, one color, one dyslexia-friendly)
You'll need ...
- A writing implement
- A token
- Five 6-sided dice
- Time to spin a yarn ...
Credits
This work is based on Badger + Coyote, product of Pandion Games (https://pandiongames.com/), developed and authored by Andrew Boyd. This product is licensed under the ORC License available online at various locations including www.azoralaw.com/orclicense. All warranties are disclaimed as set forth therein.
The game was inspired by games like The Last of Us, the Bioshock series, the Guardian playbook from Wanderhome, movies like Logan, and the character titles were taken from the song Little Shadow by the Yeah Yeah Yeahs and Personal Giants by Radical Face
Release Date
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- Dec. 9, 2023
Languages
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- English
Age Rating
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- Teen (13+)
Formats
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Campaign Types
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- Single Session
- Campaign
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