About Fated Seas
Master fate, seize your destiny and embark on a journey to find the greatest discovery in a world of mystery, opportunity and adventure!
Fated Seas combines elements of traditional role-playing games with the easy-to-learn mechanics of table-top card games. Fused together with a tight and fast-paced combat system, it aims to give players flexibility, freedom of expression and agency in a world of high adventure and exploration.
Players create their characters from a variety of choices based on their Class, their Origin species and their Background. After making these decisions, players craft a custom deck of cards representing their character’s various skills, attacks and abilities. Players are encouraged to tell their own stories by crafting a heroic destiny for their character and guiding their fate throughout the experience. As they fulfill their goals and aspirations, complete milestones and advance the story, they have the opportunity to add additional cards to their deck, further expanding their character’s roles and capabilities.
By using cards as a fundamental element in the gameplay, players spend less time flipping through rulebooks and more time chucking dice on the table. While this makes things easy to learn, it also makes it difficult to master by encouraging players to experiment with various card combinations to find unique and powerful synergies. No two decks are alike.
Setting
Fated Seas takes place in a fantasy, far-off-future world reminiscent of our own. Earth has been transformed into an uninhabitable ruin from centuries of overpopulation, pollution, war and famine. In order to survive, those that live here must do so by embracing a life reliant on, or more like under, the oceans. They developed technology to adapt to this new environment by fully enclosing themselves in deep underwater cities, called Solitaries.
Central to each solitary is the Solar Core, an enormous solar projector capable of providing the deep cities with enough light, power and warmth to sustain them indefinitely. The residential, social and cultural centers of each city encircle these ‘miniature suns’ and must be continually powered by a special fuel called phlogiston to ensure that they are never extinguished.
Various other species besides humans exist in this fictional world - the origins of their uplifting or emergence lost to time. Suffice to say, every species introduced in the book has existed for centuries and have played a major part in the development or advances made since the beginning of the ages.
As Above, So Below
While land masses are present on the surface, the majority of the world is covered by vast oceans due to climate change and risen sea levels. An eternal twilight has settled above, turning the islands and continents into windswept, barren ruins. Unable to sustain life in the traditional sense, nature always finds a way and many powerful and deadly creatures prowl the surface, making it a treacherous place to explore by those living in the solitaries. However, those brave souls that have managed to do so return with knowledge and riches beyond anyone's wildest imaginations.
Seek the Dreamlands
Although the majority of the population lives within the deep cities, rumors exist of a utopia on the surface, an enduring place of happiness and sustenance, isolated from the rest of the world. Called the “Dreamlands” by most, it is rumored to be the last remnant of an ancient civilization known only as the Antediluvians. Various factions arose within the society, eager to discover the location of the Dreamlands and to claim the secrets within.
All have different goals or aspirations: some just want to conquer and plunder it’s riches, while others hope to enlightenment upon ancient knowledge hidden within. Some believe the Antediluvians still exist in a utopia within the Dreamlands and wish to join them. Others believe the Dreamlands exists beyond the corporeal realm and the only way to find it is by shattering dimensional time and space. The truth is that no one really knows what is inside or that it even truly exists, but for these groups, finding the Dreamlands would profoundly change the lives of everyone forever.
Out of the various factions of the past, all that remain today are seven major Guilds, which compete vigorously to find the location of the Dreamlands before the others. The players will collectively choose one of these guilds during character creation - each one providing its own benefits, goals and aspirations. As agents of this guild, their characters will undertake various missions for the organization such as surveying lost ruins, exploring the surface world or battling with ancient enemies which claim dominion over the surface. However, their ultimate goal is to discover the location of the Dreamlands, find out how to get inside and claim whatever treasures lie within.
A Solarpunk World
While the setting appears to be superficially post-apocalyptic, it is more similar to a “post” post apocalypse; in essence, the world has recovered from the calamities of the past and moved on into this new state of existence. It aims to be a “science-fantasy” setting based around the ideals and tenets of Solarpunk: an optimistic vision for the future of renewable energy with the countercultural, post-capitalist, and decolonial enthusiasm for creating such a future. While society moves forward bravely into this new world, the wild and untamed exists outside — areas full of twisted nightmares, strange dominating forces and bizarre, horrifying creatures.
The players, of course, are free to take it whichever direction they desire. If they want to experience a horror-centric game, go for it. Or maybe they’d rather have a game of high-adventure and hunting for valuable treasure? This all goes into the core pillars of the game, which are accessibility and freedom of expression.
Play It
Currently play-testing weekly with an in development version available on Tabletop Simulator
Physical prototype coming soon on the Game Crafter
Files & Resources
Print & Play Cards (coming soon)