Elthos RPG
Mythos Machine

Newsletter

Hello Elthos World Weavers!

We Are Live!

Happy Birthday Elthos RPG

Most of you don't know, but Elthos RPG was actually created Feb 6th 1978, which was my 15th birthday. And that's the day I began working on the Elthos RPG Rules System and World. Well, Elthos just turned 40 years old! To celebrate the occasion our Live Version of the Elthos RPG Mythos Machine was Launched Feb 6, 2018. So this officially concludes our Free Open Beta. And so, after 24 years of hobby-tinkering starting with my original Elthos Gamemaster's Toolbox Windows application in Visual Basic, and then ASP.Net development, the Phase I operation is finally complete. Wow!! I'm a super slow-poke! Don't rush me! And now, on to Phase II. :)

Thank you to everyone who participated, and provided feedback! Your efforts helped to make Elthos a more complete and polished service for whomever in the RPG Community will enjoy it in the years ahead. Especially me! I'm very grateful!

The Benefits Of The Elthos RPG Mythos Machine

The Mythos Machine helps GMs to create and maintain their own Worlds by providing a consistent structure in which to build them online where they can be accessible anywhere through a modern web browser. I'd like to bullet list some of the primary benefits...

Enhancing your ability to Create your own RPG Worlds that are ready to play using the Elthos RPG
Create your own Races, Classes, Weapons, Armors, etc with World-Specific Rules for each of them.
Players can Generate their Characters in your World, Online, for Free.
Search your Worlds easily by keywords for Things you want to work on
Auto-Generate NPC Groups of fully equipped Characters in seconds.
Share Worlds with Co-GMs under the Mutual Collaboration Society Rules which is a Share and Share-Alike system that allows for participants to create derivative works freely with no strings attached.
Package your Worlds for Sale in the Worlds Marketplace
Free up your Precious Time by letting the Mythos Machine do the Number Crunching, so you can focus on the Creative Aspects of GMing.

And of course, more benefits will be coming online as we move forward with Phase II. I will be outlining our plans for future development in the next News Letter. For now, let's review where we are.

What's New In Production Version of The Mythos Machine

First, we will be going live with the Subscription System, which will allow you to sign on as

Player (Free)
- Players can log into the Mythos Machine, find their Gamemaster, and create & maintain their Characters in their Worlds via their Web Browsers. For free. Sweeeeet.
Basic GM
- Personal World
  - You can create one Personal World without limitations for your own use as GM.
- Purchased Worlds
  - You can purchase as many Worlds that are created by your fellow Premium GMs to use privately for your own personal games.
- Player Character Generation
  - Your Players can log onto the Mythos Machine for free to Generate and Maintain their Characters in your World(s) via their web browsers.
Premium GM
- Multiple Worlds
  - Premium GMs can create as many Personal Worlds as they wish, as well as purchase Worlds from the Worlds Marketplace.
- Shared Worlds
  - Premium GMs can send out Invitations to other Premium GMs to share places in their Worlds, making them Shared Worlds which they can build cooperatively together. Co-GMs will own their own places and be able to create places below them, including Campaigns and Adventures... but the whole group of GMs will utilize the same Things, such as weapons, armors, classes, and races, etc. It's a way to allow GMs to collaborate on World building directly through the Mythos Machine.
- Packaged Worlds for Publication (make $$ creating your own Worlds)
  - Premium GMs can create Packaged Worlds for sale to other GMs on the Mythos Machine at a price they set, and Elthos will get a small commission (12%). The GM Authors will set up a Stripe Account in which will identify their banking information so that when your Worlds get sold, Stripe will automatically update your bank account with the money. No waiting. For this service the GM Authors will pay the stripe fee (2.9% + $0.30 per sale). So, for example, if you sell a World for $6.00, you will make 80% of that, or $4.81 per sale. You may note that the higher your price the higher percent of the total you will wind up with. The minimum price for Worlds on the Marketplace will be $3.00 to cover transaction costs as well as prevent the PWYW standard race to the bottom that seems to be occurring around that system everwhere else. I don't want our authors to get trapped in that downward spiral, so hence, the minimum price.

At this juncture I have rolled out all of the features to our Production site. We will be in Stabilization Mode for about two weeks before turning on the payment system while I check everything and make sure everything is working correctly after the migration. Given all of the benefits and features listed above, I'd like to ask you a question, which you can answer by replying to this email.

What do you think the right price for each Tier should be?

The Ongoing Beta on the Test System

While the Official Free Open Beta has now concluded, you may still log into the test system and try new features out as I produce them. Just go to https://Test.MM.Elthos.com and create a free Beta Test account. It is the test system so it will not take any actual Credit Card information. You can use the Stripe Test Credit Card to upgrade to Basic or Premium GM. That number is 4242 4242 4242 4242 and you can use any valid mm/yy after the current date, and any 3 digits for the CVC security number. Easy peasy. Of course, I will be looking forward to your feedback as new features get rolled through the Test system. Thanks in advance!

Interview on Comically Gaming

I got interviewed by the good crew at Comically Gaming and they just put out their video interview. I'm going to link to the spot where the interview begins, but please do check out the whole show. The guys are fun and interesting!

Interview with Comically Gaming! (46:12)

Mythos Machine GM Tip: Printing Your World

And now for a quick tip on how to use the Mythos Machine's "Print World" feature. Once you've created your World, and you've populated it with as many Places, Campaigns and Adventures you want, you can use the Print World feature to get a concise printout of your World, and include or exclude many of the elements you'd like to have in your Print.

After a few moments of compiling and numbers crunching and stuff, you get a nice concise printout of whatever you've selected for your print. This way, you can create your World with as many Places, Campaigns and Adventures as you want, and only Print exactly what you need for the specific game your running at that time. This really helps in keeping the World easy to manage for game play.

~~~

Lastly, and as always, thank you all very much for your thoughts, recommendations, and support. Please keep using the Feedback button in the Mythos Machine, or email me anytime. And, of course, if you have friends who you think would find the Elthos RPG and Mythos Machine useful for their gaming, please do share our link with them:

https://Elthos.com

Great gaming to you all!

Sincerely,
Mark Abrams of Elthos