It is the 1st of January, 1700. During the New Year's revelry, the imperial family disappeared. In the capital, rumours abound: some speak of poison, others of fell magic. Others still think it divine retribution for a life of iniquity and sin. However it happened, the fact remains the Eternal Emperor is gone along with their family. There is no heir. The Imperial Senate convened in the early hours of the morning and devolved into a drunken brawl killing five senators and wounding dozens. News is spreading up and down the Sinhogi. Unrest brews across the continent.

You, though, are something like an ambitious noble, maybe a merchant, or perhaps even a particularly charismatic commoner and you see opportunity.

Onwards! is a play-by-poast multiplayer role-playing war game that takes place across the continent of Onwards “in real time”. You play a character in charge of an army/warband/fleet during a civil war in the Eternal Empire, and so do the other players. Because the smartphone hasn't been invented yet, unless you are in the same room as another player, you will have to send your messages/orders/insults by horse, and that means they will take time to arrive (there is one exception, though). By the same token, you can't be in two places at once, and if you need to split your forces, that means another player needs to control that force.

Think Mount & Blade or Heroes of Might & Magic III, but played very slowly.

So as an example, Sir Generic Example, Duke of Exemplia, is currently camped at Fort Example with their Example Corps, when they are reached by rumours that large enemy forces (curse the Countess of Counterexample!) have been sighted outside both the city of Nearby and the town of Negrava. They know the local garrison in Nearby is too small to handle the size of the enemy force, but Commandant d'Imaginaire should be in the area. So the player playing Sir Generic decides to write a message to the effect that the Commandant needs to decamp for Nearby and, if possible, engage with the Countess of Counterexample's forces. Moreover, Generic decides to march themselves towards Negrava. The messenger leaves immediately, but will take a few days to arrive. Likewise, it is a three day march to Negrava from Fort Example. Two real-life days later, the messenger rides up to the Commandant, handing them their new orders, and the player playing the Commandant now needs to decide whether to follow the orders, or, given the state of their forces, write back to inform the good Duke of their folly, and go off to do their own thing.

The idea is that the required commitment should be relatively low, but the possible commitment is as high as you'd like. I expect Big Things to Happen about once a month. The other Things Happening are dependent on how prolific a letter writer you are, I suppose.

Think 18th century to early 19th. Muskets, fancy uniforms, magnificent hats, that sort of thing. Sharpe's Rifles, Master & Commander, Napoleon.

Check out the Mood Board for inspiration.

What is a wizard but a very squishy cannon? Certainly there can be catpeople, orcs or other non-humans too. The only hard & fast rule I have here is they have to die when stabbed with a pointy stick or hit with a 30 gram ball of lead going twice the speed of sound. And look, elves train for a thousand years to wield their spears with grace but unfortunately 24-pound cannon go boom.

The rules can be found here.

First, decide if you’d like to set off on your own or join an existing faction.

Either way you’re going to want to join the discord/fluxer/forum here (link).

If you’re ambitious enough to want to start your own faction, just let me know and I’ll figure out how to best integrate you.

If you’d like to join an existing faction all you really need to do is talk to people in that faction to see whose retinue you’re getting split off from and what forces you get.

Generally speaking this is a game about making stuff up, and if you don’t want to make stuff up, you should probably find another game to play. To clarify what that word salad means: generative AI use is banned with prejudice.

Guys, capital G, is assumed to be gender neutral. It means someone who is full of convictions and ready to do violence, after Guy Fawkes. You play as a Guy & you have a bunch of Guys under your command.