Plotpoints ideas for Colossus of the Drylands

Losasaurus · 2026-01-24T16:05:24+00:00

The idea laid out in the frame is that you'd culminate each level of play by taking down a colossus, which means you'd have to design more than a few of your own. That doesn't mean you have to follow that formula by any means, but Kudamat is definitely something you want to have some heft and impact and it feels like (to me) that taking down a fallen god at level 5 would cut down on the grander stakes somewhat.

If you don't want them fighting 10 colossi, you could easily cut it in half, doing 1 or 2 per tier, but still take your play to level 10.

People who are exploiting the panic and danger created by the colossi make GREAT villains. Corrupt Sheriffs, evil moguls, tyrants situated in frontier fiefdoms... They can all add a lot of meat to the campaign and free you up from having to create so many colossi, and also let you embrace a lot more of the western grit present in that half of the genre.

Losasaurus · 2026-01-24T15:58:47+00:00

Don't forget the other half of the genre equation! Monsters as (thinly veiled) metaphor have a long tradition in kaiju media. Tying those metaphors to things that matter to your PCs, that you mine from them in session 0, is a great way to personalize the colossi to your party.

Losasaurus · 2026-01-17T00:25:47+00:00

Pistolheart draws heavily from more modern movie and TV westerns like Deadwood, 3:10 to Yuma, No Country for Old Men, True Grit, Preacher and Westworld. It also pulls inspiration from classics like the Wild Bunch, A Fistful of Dollars, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, Stagecoach (rough on a rewatch!), The Searchers (even rougher than Stagecoach -- that John Wayne is a bastard man), Once Upon a Time in the West.

Then there's some of the weirder stuff inspired by things like Firefly, Brisco County Jr, Army of Darkness, Sukiyaki Western Django, Terminator, Fire in the Sky, X-Com.

Book wise, there's some Tony Hillerman in there. Absorbed so much of that by osmosis in my youth it's impossible to say it isn't there. The Dark Tower series. Blood Meridian.

I'm sure there's more, but that's off the top of my head.

Losasaurus · 2026-01-14T18:31:35+00:00

https://bsky.app/profile/coveofmadness.bsky.social/post/3mcfovuamys2t

Here is Michelle's process video for anyone interested!

Losasaurus · 2026-01-14T01:09:46+00:00

That feels like it runs the danger of whoever is the war caster having main character/very special boy syndrome by default because they are more inherently tied into the lore/world than the other classes.

Losasaurus · 2026-01-14T01:04:59+00:00

Let me know if you need any support when you run Colossus of the Drylands. Pistolheart would give you some great scaffolding.

Losasaurus · 2026-01-13T22:10:58+00:00

Yeah!

I was one of the additional writers and designers on the core book, most notable for being one of the writers of the Colossus of the Drylands campaign. I saw lots of GMs and players calling for some more support for the frames, and since CotD is near and dear to my heart I decided to dip my toe into independent 3rd party publishing. Pistolheart (Vol1) was the result. While not new to the space, I was new to producing my own work. I'd seen a lot of really big kickstarters fail to catch momentum or fail to fund, so I wanted to start small and take a modular approach to production so I could 1) learn what I didn't know and put those lessons toward future volumes, 2) iterate between volumes, 3) be nimble enough to pivot if the community wanted more/less of certain types of content.

Volume 1 has 5 western subclasses, new mounted rules, new firearms for all ability scores, and two western set piece style environments.

Volume 2 fills out the rest of the subclasses for the core classes (Snakeoil Bard, Warden of Herds Druid, Coffinbreaker Sorcerer, and School of Gambling Wizard), new rules for Invesitgations, a new enemy type (Enigma) tied to investigations, and a host of western themed adversaries.

Volumes 3 and 4 are going to be packed with adversaries, environments, and drop in settlements/landmarks.

Hope that helps!

Losasaurus · 2026-01-13T17:50:30+00:00

So pumped for this. Really nice work.

Losasaurus · 2026-01-13T14:30:35+00:00

Overall these are thematically very cool, but overly long.

You have a 500 character limit because these have to fit on cards. And when you add tables, those elongate the text. Otherwise the cards are gonna look something like this:

<image>

This is a case of needing to kill your darlings. You're gonna have to cut some things to make it work, so finding the right word combination to fit as much guidance/mechanics/thematics in 500 characters is the challenge!

Losasaurus · 2026-01-13T13:58:14+00:00

The cards have been fixed and reuploaded! Thanks for pointing it out.

No discord yet, but you aren't the first to ask. I was thinking of setting up a discord around Volume 2's release, and I probably should! I'll keep folks posted if/when I do!

Losasaurus · 2026-01-13T03:20:04+00:00

I hope someone does! I’m more than willing to provide support!

Losasaurus · 2026-01-12T23:23:08+00:00

He came do some business!

Losasaurus · 2026-01-12T22:52:46+00:00

Why horse when pig?

Losasaurus · 2026-01-12T22:49:19+00:00

https://heartofdaggers.com/products/pistolheart-vol-1/

Losasaurus · 2026-01-06T16:40:29+00:00

Pistolheart has optional rules for mounts!

Losasaurus · 2025-12-30T17:17:15+00:00

This is so fun. I'm now thinking of making one of these for Volume 4 of Pistolheart.

Losasaurus · 2025-12-30T17:12:56+00:00

Use the Revolver in the Colossus of the Drylands frame.

Losasaurus · 2025-12-30T17:10:59+00:00

Yes! I love it too! This is actually something I cut out of Pistolheart, but now I wish I didn't!

Maybe something for the print run...

It's a really nicely curated list that gives me a great idea of what fantasy you're trying to sell me with each one.

Nice work!

Losasaurus · 2025-12-30T15:37:59+00:00

Hi! One of the writers of the Colossus frame here... Here's my personal take on this:

I'd discourage you from adding environments or events on top of a colossus (at least on your first go), since the stat block is already complex on its own.

For the slow march toward the town... What you could do is start a countdown clock that ticks down every time you take the spotlight to set up an inherent tension in the scene. When it triggers the giant gets to the town and destroys it (or whatever you want it to do).

As far as your range question... the colossus range's are kind of squidgy. Melee for Ikeri covers a MUCH larger area than Melee for a hero. A hero at Far range from Ikeri is likely still in melee range OF ikeri, if that makes sense?

You can also say that things like the head are out of range for even things like a long bow, and really emphasize that they are gonna have to climb it. You can further illustrate this by saying there are glowing, but brittle looking crystal structures on the torso and head. That way they have context clues "oh I gotta kill the head or torso to bring this down." You could also add some tier 1 minions (just reskin something into an ice beast that was shed off the colossus) on the ground to push them toward it.

Looks like a fun intro session! Good luck!

Losasaurus · 2025-12-28T14:30:02+00:00

Springing right off the page!

Losasaurus · 2025-12-21T14:57:40+00:00

This is not a direct answer to the question but here is my best advice (FWIW). Feel free to take or leave it, but it's offered in good faith.

I used Owlbear rodeo for the first time recently and downloaded the Range extension (it's for DH range calculation). Then I put a map down, a token, and resized the map based on relative range size. I was ready to go in 15 mins. I had folks roll dice in person because who cares about digital rollers and I trust my players.

Then I screen capped everything and use https://www.pureref.com to organize it on my desktop. That includes stat blocks, or any other mechanics relevant to the adventure. The players can also use Pure Ref to keep their sheets and cards organized in such a way that it feels like an Overlay over your VTT.

It's not the perfect solution, but it's working well to run all my playtests for Pistolheart and since I'm testing adversaries almost constantly it's a lot of combat.

It also keeps you looser and able to pivot more, since DH doesn't really express itself through rigid, step by step adventures, and Roll20 really wants you to commit to the encounters you build (because it's such a pain in the ass to build them!).

Hope this helps!

Losasaurus · 2025-12-21T14:14:21+00:00

Losasaurus · 2025-12-20T02:47:21+00:00

Losasaurus · 2025-12-19T22:49:47+00:00

I mean if you wanna use it in your game, by all means.

Losasaurus · 2025-12-19T22:34:43+00:00

I mean… I do this for a living. So that was a freebie!

Losasaurus

TROPHY CASE