iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Effekt Publishing @effektpodcast.org · 25/09/2026

Our favourite? That’s like asking us to choose between our children! Oh… our children? That makes the answer a whole lot easier: #TalesoftheOldWest from, ummm, us!

A copy of the standard edition of Tales of the Old West, the cover featuring a Struzen style illustration of diverse old west characters and horse stampeding through a western town.

Next to it is a Perspex hexagonal award from UK Games Expo, declaring Tales of the Old West “Best Roleplaying Game”

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Effekt Publishing @effektpodcast.org · 06/09/2026

My family kind of collect Matkas from each restaurant, and as this was my first visit to Edinburgh’s Dishoom, I asked for the branch’s Matka. It’s in the form of a d6! With six pips on five of the sides! And amazingly appropriate end to my @tabletopscot.bsky.social this year.

A copper coloured keyring in the form of a six-sided die, with six pips on five of the sides and D, fir Dishoom on one side.

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Effekt Publishing @effektpodcast.org · 02/09/2026

Car is loaded up with stock for the Free League stand at @tabletopscot.bsky.social but there is enough space for my wife, who I am dropping off at Hadrian’s Wall on the way.

A blue car, with the estate style boot (trunk) open, revealing interior stacked high with cardboard cartons.

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Effekt Publishing @effektpodcast.org · 19/08/2026

Already done, back in the late 80’s when I was a teenager. And looking back on it recently I was pleasantly surprised at how modern (or “before its time”) it was. Just two stats, Action and Ego

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Effekt Publishing @effektpodcast.org · 10/08/2026

I have no idea, but I do have this. Give me a mo…

A book a paper samples from British wholesaler GF white

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Effekt Publishing @effektpodcast.org · 03/08/2026

OK OK, here is a character creation, from our new solo rules, Lone Rider. Which is new for sale today via @drivethrurpg.com heer is the link www.drivethrurpg.com//product/578...

EXAMPLE: CREATING A CHARACTER
Lets start by creating a character using the lifepath generator starting on page 274 of the core
book. Our character is born of members of a bandit gang, in the continental northwest. Rolls a
2 for Family Background, which means their family are all dead. I am pretty much decided on
two livings. The first is Ranch Hand. They were involved in a range war adding one each to
FIGHTIN’ and SHOOTIN’ and a choice of talents. I will decide which after rolling for my second
living, which I must do with a -1 modifier. 6-1 means my second living is Grifter, which might
round out my skills. But they don’t! A stint as a bounty hunter, with an extra point on HAWKEYE
and SHOOTIN.’ Thats four points in SHOOTIN’ already. I choose the Flying Blade talent and,
from my previous Living, I chose Sharpshooter. I need to lose a point off one of my attributes for
the second living, and given that my Quick abilities are pretty well developed I chose to reduce that
to four. I have two more ability points to add and given my lack of social abilities I decided to add
them both onto INSIGHT. All this makes me pretty much the Man with No Name, but since Clint
already took that role in the movies I will be a Woman with No Name. I did not roll any compadres
but I know I can have three. Lets start by creating one, a fast talking con-man, like Maverick, that
I will call Rockford. He might be useful in social situations.

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Effekt Publishing @effektpodcast.org · 01/08/2026

I need a physical attack power, and Strike seems to fit the bill. Adding +1 to my slugfest damage. I also like Guidance which is not much cop for a solo hero but allows me to give teammates bonus actions. And of course the big one for my Dominatrix themed character is Mind Control. 8/?

Test describe the mind control power
“ As a full action, you can attempt to take control of a sentient creature within your zone or an adjacent zone. Make an opposed PRESENCE roll against the target (no action for the target). If you win, the target immediately takes a full turn (even if they have already had their turn in the round) with a full and a quick action (or two quick actions), on your command. The target then loses their next ordinary turn, and cannot
perform interrupt actions before then. Outside of combat, you can control a target's actions for a few minutes. During this time, the target may make a straight PRESENCE roll to break your control any time you force them to take an action that they wouldn't ordinarily
perform. This power cannot be used against huge creatures. • Boost: Area Control. You can attempt to take control of multiple targets in your zone or an adjacent zone by taking 1 point of stress for each target beyond the first. You roll once for PRESENCE while each target
rolls separately to resist. • Limit: Hypnosis. You need to go through the process of hypnosis to control someone's mind, so you can only use your MIND CoNTroL power outside of
combat. Limit: Requires Touch. You can only use your MIND CONTROL power while touching the target, requiring you to perform a successful slugfest attack (that
causes no damage) as part of the power's use.”

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Effekt Publishing @effektpodcast.org · 01/08/2026

So I am “extraordinary“ in my four favoured attributes, and have “great” agility - but I have to say in an attribute roll that does not add additional dice, “extraordinary “ does not feel very competent. My health is 7 and my resolve 6. I need some powers. Street Defenders get three. 6/?

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Effekt Publishing @effektpodcast.org · 01/08/2026

Archetype, but that might be too easy, so instead, the next step is to decide my role in the team. Of these, striker, controller, and leader appeal. Were I in a group, obviously I would discuss this with the other players. But as I am not, and this role has no mechanical effect, I will move on. 4/?

Image of the oars of the book that describes roles
“ Blaster: You excel at dealing devastating attacks
from a distance.
Brains: You adapt to any situation by using cunning
and strategy to outsmart your opponents.
Brawn: You are a physical force that relishes
surviving and delivering damage.
* Controller: You are a master of hindering enemies,
assisting allies, and managing the battlefield.
* Defender: You are a protector that safeguards allies
and engages enemies on the front lines.
* Leader: You guide and support your allies with
coordination, tactics, will, or inspiration.
* Striker: You are a relentless force in close combat
that balances strength and mobility.
* Wildcard: You are adaptable and unpredictable,
overcoming challenges with your versatility.”

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Effekt Publishing @effektpodcast.org · 01/08/2026

Let’s us not mindlessly celebrate the US’s assumed role as the world’s policeman, especially in these times. Our Corporal Discipline will be a sex worker and defender of the down-trodden, or as we call it in this game “Street Defender.” Now part of me wants to simply the process by choosing an … 3/?

Image of a page in the rulebook that says “ * Street Defender: You are the first line of defense for your home city, confronting street-level dangers such as crime lords, gangsters, drug traffickers, ninja factions, mobsters, and other criminals. You're not afraid to get your hands dirty and to work alone on the streets, but you've found that it's always nice to
have allies in your crusade.”

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Effekt Publishing @effektpodcast.org · 01/08/2026

I may regret this, I wasn’t going to do #RPGaDay this year, but @autocratik.bsky.social has inspired me with his first contribution. Can I create a character for a new (or new to me) game each day this month? The first attempt is #Invincible and today‘s prompt is Discipline! Oooh Mother! 1/?

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Effekt Publishing @effektpodcast.org · 30/07/2026

Lone Rider solo rules layout coming along

A table of contents in Indesign reading:
WHAT IS "LONE RIDER"?
HOW TO PLAY SOLO
RECORDING YOUR TALE
HOW LONG SHOULD THE TALE LAST?
YOUR CARDS ARE THE GM
USING TOOLS FROM THE CORE RULES.
START YOUR TALE ......
CREATE YOUR CHARACTER
CREATING SETTLEMENTS
CREATING FACTIONS
THE STRUCTURE OF AN ADVENTURE
I. SETTLING INTO THE SETTING
II. AN INCITING INCIDENT
III. CALL TO ACTION.
IV. TESTS, ALLIES AND ENEMIES
V. THE CENTRAL THREAT
VI. RESPITE
VII CLIMAX..
VIII. IS THERE A FINAL TWIST?

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Effekt Publishing @effektpodcast.org · 04/07/2026

Happy Independence Day on this semi-quincentennial to all our US GMs and players

The cover of Tales of the Old West, altered to read 250 years young

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Effekt Publishing @effektpodcast.org · 31/05/2026

It’s the last few hours of voting for the People’s Choice award at #UKGamesExpo. We are the David against @chaosium.bsky.social’s Goliath. Please vote for us if you can. You will find Voting Touchscreens in Hall 1.

An illustration from Tales of the Old West featuring a young but determined woman punching a ruffian. The legend reads “Land the knockout blow! Make your People’s Choice vote count”

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Effekt Publishing @effektpodcast.org · 30/05/2026

We are up against a Call of Cthulhu adventure from Chaosium for the RPG People’s choice award at #UKGamesExpo26. That’s a company with a huge fanbase, please cast your vote for the little guy on the #UKGE app or in hall 1

An image from our vote book featuring Native Americans watching a settler wagon cross the plains. A storm is brewing in the distance. The caption reads “Vote for us in the People’s Choice”

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Effekt Publishing @effektpodcast.org · 27/05/2026

Oh and while we have your attention, our game, Tales of the Old West, won the judges award for best Roleplaying game this year❤️. May we please, humbly, ask you to consider voting for us in the RPG category when the People’s choice goes live?

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Effekt Publishing @effektpodcast.org · 27/05/2026

This is where to find us, not too far at all from the @uktin.bsky.social stand

An isometric map of UK Games Expo as a euro-medieval (with a remarkably modern grid layout) fantasy city, arrows mark the way to stand 3-601

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Effekt Publishing @effektpodcast.org · 27/05/2026

We are eager to stamp your cards!

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Effekt Publishing @effektpodcast.org · 26/05/2026

To you want to find your way to the awarded #BestRoleplayingGame at #UKGE? Here is a handy-dandy map to where we have set out our stall. 3-601 With thanks to @jogbrogzin.bsky.social

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Effekt Publishing @effektpodcast.org · 12/05/2026

We are very, very, VERY pleased to announce that Tales of the Old West, created by Matthew Tyler-Jones and Dave Semark and built on Free League Publishing’s #YearZeroEngine just won the 2026 Judges Award for Best Roleplaying Game in the UK Games Expo awards

A grid of six awards winners, with bottom and centre Tales of the Old West claimed Best Roleplaying Game

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Effekt Publishing @effektpodcast.org · 12/05/2026

Today’s the day 🤞 I feel like we should have put “For your consideration” posters across Birmingham

A listing of three shortlisted candidates for Best Roleplaying Game, including Tales of the Old West, The Laundrey, and Totem.

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Effekt Publishing @effektpodcast.org · 28/04/2026

One of my eye opening PBTA games is from the same stable though

The front cover of “the warren a roleplaying game by marshall miller” features a torn paper stylized rabbit

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Effekt Publishing @effektpodcast.org · 21/04/2026

Enjoyed the Hook Jaw story in the recent special

The front cover of the Action 50th anniversary special comic (not to be confused with Action Comics!) The cover highlights two stories the excellent Hook Jaw and the ok Dredger. Sadly no Kids Rule OK story inside…

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Effekt Publishing @effektpodcast.org · 16/04/2026

We make Tales of the Old West, a gritty Year Zero Engine game of building a life and making enemies in the 1870s. You can buy it on DriveThru in stores or from our shop buytotow.square.site

The cover of Tales of the Old West, depicting a Mexican American, and African American, a Native American a woman holding two pistols frozen style over spaced horses stampeding through a town. With an additional “seal” overlaid declaring it as one of Tabletop Gaming magazine’s Must Play games

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Effekt Publishing @effektpodcast.org · 02/04/2026

Good news for our US fans. We now have warehouse stock of Tales from the Old West core book in the US! Shipping prices reduced for US customers. Call to action: please lobby your friendly local gaming stores to get stock in. (Useful addresses in the alt text.) Move 'em out, head 'em up, Rawhide!

Four horsemen silhouetted against a rising sun, with the text "It's time. Tales of the Old West back in stock in the US. Buy it now at https://buytotow.square.site Stores: contact distribution@effektpublishing.com

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Effekt Publishing @effektpodcast.org · 10/03/2026

And then there are the maps! Charts for adventures battle maps for fights and sea battles, ship cross sections and deck plans. And what good are battle-maps without counters? No good at all! So there are counters too, for characters NPCs, chickens, the direction of the wind, the watch of the day 8/?

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Effekt Publishing @effektpodcast.org · 10/03/2026

7/? That rule book is 80 pages by the way which I think is pretty much all the rules in the core book, missing only more ships more monsters and more random adventure and encounter tables. And the box includes a second book with a new 60 pages long adventure, unavailable elsewhere. So much value!

A four colour style cover illustration featuring undead conquistadors, natives and pirates. What more does a Pirate Borg adventure need?

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Effekt Publishing @effektpodcast.org · 10/03/2026

Traditionalists, and poor fools who think it’s worth getting attached to their character, will find a pad of paper character sheets in the box too. Perhaps better used *post mortis* to make of permanent record of a dead character for posterity. The rule book is of course a cut down one, but not much

A Morg Borg style character sheet but for Pirate Borg.

The cover of the Pirate Borg start set rules book features a skeletal pirate with cutlass and hook.

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Effekt Publishing @effektpodcast.org · 10/03/2026

There is a small pack of cards, featuring creatures, NPCs, ship types and … the Tongue of Thoth ? These are beautifully illustrated, but maybe less exciting than the dry erase markers, because those markers come are for reusable character sheets! Which are incredibly useful given a Borg lifespan 5/?

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Effekt Publishing @effektpodcast.org · 10/03/2026

The polyhedral dice are elegantly piratical. The fact that each number is simply made “big enough to fill the face of the die” leads to clarity, but also a jumble of sizes, which are BEAUTFULLY chaotic. Just like a crew of pirates. There is even a (skull)heads or tails coin included. 4/?

A set of white on black polyhedral dice with large and clear Arabic numerals.

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Effekt Publishing @effektpodcast.org · 10/03/2026

Why? Let me count the ways. First of all the thing I didn’t even notice until I was packing it away. The box is, in the Borg tradition, textured. The characters are embossed, but not only that, there is a little bit of gloss varnish on the blood red tongue and the entrails the creature holds 3/?

The touchy-feely embossed box top of the Pirate Borg starter set.

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Effekt Publishing @effektpodcast.org · 14/02/2026

Drop an album that was important to you when you were nineteen.

Cover of Rum Sodomy and the Lash by the Pogues, an altered version of The Raft of the Medusa, a Romantic-era painting by Theodore Géricault, with the band members' heads, replacing those of various figures on the raft.

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Effekt Publishing @effektpodcast.org · 13/02/2026

Yes here is where we will be #tabletopgaminglive tomorrow. Stand number 7 just between @ Uhrwerk Spiele on stand 9 and Phil's 3D Prints on stand … 17!?!

A floorplan for Tabletop Gaming Live 2026 at Doncaster Racecourse.

The map zoomed in and centred on stand 7

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Effekt Publishing @effektpodcast.org · 09/02/2026

And for gaming work just starting this

Cover of ROARING CAMP
THE SOCIAL WORLD OF THE CALIFORNIA GOLD RUSH
SUSAN LEE JOHNSON

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Effekt Publishing @effektpodcast.org · 09/02/2026

For pleasure just finished this:

Cover of There is No Anti Memetics Division by qntm

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Effekt Publishing @effektpodcast.org · 31/01/2026

Shock! Horror!! Probe! The .... what was ... it? "...favourite implementation of the Year Zero engine" is out of stock!? 😉 Drop GMS as line and they will sort you....

Screenshot of a portion of a webstore with a placeholder image and the words "Tales of the the Old West OUT OF STOCK|"

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Effekt Publishing @effektpodcast.org · 15/01/2026

The bibliography for our game is mostly history books, and focused on diversity. We did not include the media (Deadwood, Tombstone, Lonesome Dove, et al) that inspired us. That all went in marketing. No other games either though we do credit the authors if the Year Zero engine we use.

Image of the bibliography in our book, listing:

1491 by Charles C. Mann
Impressions of an Indian Childhood by Zitkala Sa
The Earth is Weeping by Peter Cozzens
Black Elk Speaks as told through John Neiharat by
Nicholas Black Elk
The Rediscovery of America by Ned Blackhawk And Still The Waters Run by Angie Debo
The Mammoth Book of Native Americans edited by
Jon E. Lewis
New Mexico, A History by Sanchez, Spude and Gomez
The Historical Atlas of Native Americans by Dr. lan
Barnes
River of Blood edited by Richard Cahan & Michael
Williams
American Slavery by Peter Kolchin
Uncle Tom's Story of His Life-An Autobiography of Reverend Josiah Henson by Josiah Henson
Black Cowboys in the American West edited by Glas-rud and Searles
The Wild West by Frederick Nolan the Bold
Cult of Glory-the Bold and Brutal History of the Texas Rangers by Doug J. Swanson
Mexicanos by Manuel G Gonzalez
The Cherokee Nation Youtube: https://www.
youtube.com/channel/UCRX-8MCNvhzPMe-

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Effekt Publishing @effektpodcast.org · 26/12/2025

We know some of you got #TalesoftheOldWest for Christmas. If you did, congratulations! If you are getting to “break” this new horse might want to know about this thread community on Discord discord.com/channels/398... and/or this Facebook group facebook.com/groups/30836...

Digital illustration on a cowboy riding a bucking horse while three others look on.

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Effekt Publishing @effektpodcast.org · 20/12/2025

Andrew Turner, ‘middle aged Dad’ keeps a visual journal of each game he plays (and according to his Patreon, www.patreon.com/inkchronicles other aspects of his life). Currently he is playing Tales of the Old West

Ink sketch by Andrew Turner, a horse and rider (with bedroll and broad-brimmed hat) from above, leaving hoof-prints in the snow.

Ink sketch by Andrew Turner, a silhouette of a masculine figure in a hat walking towards an Old West Church

Ink sketch by Andrew Turner, a horse and rider (with bedroll, broad-brimmed hat, and shoulder-slung rifle) from behind, the rider looking over his shoulder.

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Effekt Publishing @effektpodcast.org · 29/11/2025

And that’s not all! Silver award for BEST RPG at #Dragonmeet

A certificate proclaiming Tales of the Old West willing silver prize (or first among the losers 😉) at Dragonmeet.

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Effekt Publishing @effektpodcast.org · 28/11/2025

Driving into London today to set up our stand(s!) for #Dragonmeet. We will working the FreeLeague stand and, for the first time at Dragonmeet, the Effekt Publishing stand! 🍾🎉 And where can you find these founts of ludic joy? @jogbrogzin.bsky.social‘s map shows the way!

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