Summary
Actual Play has grown since it first began with creators like Connie Chang carving out their own space inthe TTRPG worldwithTransplanar. This series tells non-colonial, anti-orientalist stories with transgender players of color who can bring to life worlds and stories that are not seen often enough on screen. Nearly four years ago, during the pandemic, Chang recognized the lack of representation in this space specifically stories, characters, and creators, that represented stories they could connect to. In order to fill this void, they launchedTransplanar.
Unlike many other popular Actual Play seriesTransplanarhighlights indie game systems with each season even including a miniseries that utilizesGodkillera system created by Chang. The current campaign,The Chaos Protocol, takes inspiration fromLokiwith its own TVA-style agency. It also explores questions of what it means to be “the chosen one,” the control of fate, and the complexities of grief.
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Screen Rantinterviewed Connie Chang aboutTransplanar. They discussed how they have grown as a Game Master which is reflected in the current campaign, and how they wereinfluenced by the TVAinLokiwhen developing the agency inThe Chaos Protocol. Chang also shared why they build the worlds that they do and how it felt to playGodkiller, a game they created, onTransplanar.
“Where Are The Trans Chinese-American Diasporic Queer Stories?”
Chang shared what inspired them to createTransplanarand tell unique stories that represent them. Chang expressed a desire to"be the one making the work, but also to tell the kinds of stories that will embrace radical imagination as a way of building out worlds that don’t yet exist, but that we would like to see in our day-to-day.“They also break down the specificity of describing the world they’ve crafted as,“non-colonial, anti orientalist.”
Connie Chang: I started Transplanar in 2020. We’re coming up on our four-year channelversary, actually. This June, because we launched in Pride Month. It was really important to me to start an all-transgender people of color led TTRPG actual play channel, because at the time, and this is still fairly true, less true thankfully, but still fairly true, not a lot of trans-led, specifically trans people of color-led actual play work.
When I launched Transplanar, I was a big fan of a lot of APs that were already out at the time. I was a big fan of D20, big fan of CR, big fan specifically of TAZ as well. That’s kind of what got me into APs in the first place. As much as I enjoyed all the stories and all the characters and all of the rich world building that all of these incredible creatives and creators were doing, there’s a part of me that was like, “Oh, all right, but where are the trans Chinese-American diasporic queer stories?” Right?
Where are the stories that speak to me as a person and that explore similar themes, but from a completely new perspective, a perspective that I and all my friends embody and have lived experience about?” That was really the impetus. It was both to see myself represented, and be the one making the work, but also to tell the kinds of stories that will embrace radical imagination as a way of building out worlds that don’t yet exist, but that we would like to see in our day-to-day, and play and embodied improv, right? Acting in role play as a way of building toward that together.
It offers a lot of liberating possibilities, which is also why it’s so important to me to build out non-colonial, anti-orientalist worlds. I use these terms very intentionally, right? There’s a reason why I call the work we do non-colonial anti-orientalist as opposed to decolonizing or anti-colonial or non-orientalist. Every segment of that phrase means something, right? Non-colonial, as the fictional worlds we create, never have been, are not, and won’t ever play into colonialist logic or physically literally be fantasy colonized, right? There’s not ever going to be a plot line where an invading country comes in and takes over.
On a literal level, and also on a philosophical ideological level, we’re divesting from colonialist creative logic. On the anti-orientalist side, as a Chinese person, as someone who I think is affected by orientalism and is affected by xenophobia specifically, it was important to me to center my culture and center my upbringing and center my lived experience as a Chinese diasporic person in the worlds I was creating.
When drawing a medieval fantasy, for instance, if we were doing a medieval fantasy season, not having that immediately just be a Eurocentric way of thinking about medieval fantasy, like drawing on tropes from xianxia or wuxia instead of Edwardian or English romantic tropes or anything like that. Ultimately, it comes down to, these are the kinds of stories I’m passionate about telling, the kinds of stories I am skilled at telling, and the kinds of stories that I think have plenty of rich material to mine, probably for the rest of my artistic career drilling in deep.
Chang also explained how they have improved as a Game Master and howTransplanarhas evolved from the first campaign,The Second Stragner, to the second,The Chaos Protocol. They also discussed elements ofThe Chaos Protocolincluding how Fate fits into the story and TRANS.
Connie Chang: Chaos Protocol stays a lot more streamlined and every episode counts, every scene ideally matters. We’re able to hit these beats that we want a lot more intensely and with the intention that we imbue them with. We’ve actually gotten really positive feedback from our audience. A lot of people have joined our Discord server, joined our communities. I see a lot of comments being like, “Wow, I found your stuff through YouTube shorts or through TikTok, your TikToks. I tried watching The Second Stranger, but I kind of bounced off of that because it’s super long. It’s like 120 episodes.”
It was four years ago, when I started out, I’ve definitely grown as a GM, but they’re like, “And then I tried The Chaos Protocol,” or, “Then I caught Godkiller, and wow, I immediately got sucked in. It was just really focused, really strong, really sharp.” I think that’s the main craft-based change, but our values have stayed, have always remained even from the beginning.
I could talk about our main three PCs. They are all agents of the Transplanar Reification and Nourishment Syndicate, or TRANS is the abbreviation. Which is basically a secret transplanar or interplanar agency syndicate that carries out Fate’s will.
Fate is an actual NPC in the show as a character is what’s known as a precept, or a literal law of the universe, so of a power grade, Gods are here. If this is written, you can’t see what I’m doing with my hand, but imagine I’m holding it up to my shoulder and precepts are out of the camera frame, right? It’s the difference between a character in a tabletop game and the player controlling the character.
There are metanarratives here about Fate being a dungeon master of some kind, but we don’t have to get into the weeds about that. Basically, each of the three main player characters takes on a different role in their strike team. They kind of hop from plane to plane answering distress calls, which are called mayday calls. Because they hop from plane to plane with every new arc of the show, we also changed tabletop game systems every arc.
For our first arc, we played The Wildsea role play game, published by Mythworks, and for the second arc we are playing City of Mist, a kind of hacked version that I’ve done that I’m calling City of Heaven using the core rules of City of Mist, which is published by Son of Oak Game Studios. I always like to shout out more indie publishers. The character designs, like their physical appearance, changes when they hop from arc to arc. We get new artists to do new art for each season, even though the characters themselves remain the same, which I think is really cool.
Chang shared insight into each of the main characters inThe Chaos Protocoland how they fit into this ragtag family. They explain how Seir plays with the idea of the chosen one, the secrets that Lumira protects, and why Xainan falls into the role of the party’s reluctant dad.
Connie Chang: One of the PCs is a character called Seir. They/he pronouns, is the twin brother of the chosen one, the literal, actual chosen one by Fate. She’s the popular girl, super cheerful, very charismatic. Everyone at TRANS loves her. She seems to have it all together, right? He’s always been in her shadow.
There’s this line about Seir, Fate made Singh and Fate doesn’t make mistakes, but Seir was the closest thing to one, because after Singh was created, Seir kind of just stepped into being out of her shadow. Even Fate was like, “Um, what is that thing? Okay, I don’t want to make mistakes, but that was kind of unintentional.” Seir is this kind of weird, never really fits in, a bit moody, really has this intense power inside of him that can rival the power that Singh has, as the chosen one, but he doesn’t know how to control it. People kind of scorn him. He’s a bit of an outcast in some ways.
Another player character is our party’s healer, called Lumira. She’s also a secret time mage because chronomancy is specifically forbidden at TRANS. The syndicate says it’s because it’s really dangerous and unstable, and it can rewrite the laws of the universe, which makes it really volatile and just dangerous. But there’s some kind of metanarrative there about how Fate doesn’t like time mages because they get to change what she’s decided. There’s something there about agency, choice, and destiny with Lumira.
Then we haveXainanwho is the reluctant party dad. He’s the oldest figure here. He’s kind of a mentor figure. He is the lone survivor of a dead world, doomed by oblivion essentially, or that’s what we know about it so far. He is a sharpshooter, gunslinger, a real cool alien cowboy kind of vibe. He ends up serving as a mentor-like, almost father-like figure to the rest of the characters, as part of the strike team. Then a major tragedy happens at the end of arc one that will define the entire rest of their character arcs and the trajectory of the campaign until our very last season of the Chaos Protocol, which is related to Singh.
How Transplanar Was Inspired By The TVA In Loki: “I Was Taking Cues”
If TRANS sounds familiar to Marvel fans Chang saw the connection as well. Although the idea was already percolatingwhenLokifirst came out, the TVA was definitely something they looked at as inspiration when building out TRANS and how it would work in the world ofThe Chaos Protocol. However, Chang also explained how TRANS sets itself apart from TVA.
Connie Chang: [Loki] came out after I had incepted the original idea for TRANS. We watched the Loki series while Second Stranger was wrapping up, which is our first main campaign. I was taking cues. I was like, “Oh, that’s interesting. That could be a fun thing for me to also maybe draw inspiration from. Oh, I would like to make different choices there and deviate from what secret interplanar time agency might look like here and there.”
There’s definite parallels, but also it was important for me that TRANS itself, the syndicate itself, was in some ways a gender utopia. In this place, everyone’s trans. Everyone’s trans, everyone’s queer, polyamory is the norm. It’s not cisnormative, it’s not heteronormative at all. The syndicate takes care of its people. It’s kind of like you never have to work for food, right?
There are questions of corruption because Fate is in charge here. There’s questions about that, but it’s not playing into the idea of exploited workers or homophobic management, or anything like that. It was important for me that the PCs do feel loyalty and do feel gratitude, and most importantly, community with the other members of the syndicate because the day-to-day workers at the syndicate are their family. Chosen and blood in a lot of ways, and their closest friends.
That was important for me to play up as well, because I think a lot of media that features big agencies, it can just be really easy to be like, the agency’s evil, bam, right? But I am always striving toward complicating even villainous or antagonistic entities, factions, and characters.
Transplanaris built with the idea of new viewers being able to jump in. The podcast miniseries,Godkiller, is the perfect way to check outTransplanar’sstorytelling style. They also cultivate lore documents and detailed recaps so fans can jump into a new season or catch up if they missed a few episodes and be able to understand where the story has taken the players without feel lost or overwhelmed.
Connie Chang: It’s really important to us to be able to give any viewer of any level of familiarity with our work multiple entry points into our work, which is also why the recap documents are first and foremost on our website. We also present our different series as, The Second Stranger is done, its 120 episodes. It’s our first season. If you want that experience, you’re able to watch it starting here. Chaos Protocol is our ongoing campaign. It streams weekly, so you can join us. Here’s where you can watch up until this point. Here are all the recap docs.
Godkiller, here’s a contained miniseries. If you just want a sampler platter of what this is all about, and you don’t want to have to invest hundreds of hours into watching or listening to our content, 16 hours, bam. It’s an hour per episode, 16 episodes, go watch. That’s a great primer to our vibe as a channel, our vibe as a collective. Recap documents are really important to us.
Godkilleris unique not only because it is one player with the Game Master, but because Chang created the game. Chang fully understands it like no other GM could because they crafted it and know how to utilize the system for the best storytelling. Chang also revealed that they are hoping to experiment more with contained stories like theGodkillerminiseries.
Connie Chang: We currently have a podcast only [for Godkiller], though we did a live recording of the first two podcast episodes on stream with video, but the rest of it is audio only. It’s a podcast only miniseries, 16 episodes, that utilizes the rules of Godkiller: First Blood, which is the Godkiller TTRPG system, which is an original duet game that I wrote for one player, the Godkiller, and one game master, God.
It’s kind of like Mad Max Fury Road meets The Raven Tower, like dark fantasy. It’s set in a world where gods eat other gods for survival, for power, for pleasure, and mortals toil under the yoke of divinity and can never truly decide their own destiny until the Godkiller arises in a baptism of fire and blood. The Godkiller is the only mortal in the entire world. In the game, it’s known as the cradle, who has the power to kill a god. It’s about which gods will you kill to change the cradle, which gods will you spare to change the cradle, and what are the consequences of all of those actions?
I released the Godkiller: First Blood miniseries on Transplanar with myself as a GM and Sea Thomas as my player as also a promotional thing for the release of the Godkiller aschan, which came out in late March of last year. It’s been about a year since this miniseries has come out, and now the full game has been picked up by publisher Evil Hat Productions, which we’re trying to gun for a Q1 2025 crowdfunding release for that. There will be more AP projects that are related to Godkiller coming out very, very soon.
The miniseries was kind of an experiment on our end. It was contained. There were just two performers. It was just one GM and one player, and it was received really well by our audience. It brought in new viewers, new listeners. People really enjoyed the content, so I think that’s a really good sign. We would love to do more kinds of experimental and contained AP works, but still at the level of production, polish, and story rigor that we hold ourselves to.
Chang broke down the experience of GMing a game using a system they created. They are able to use the system to it’s fullest potential exploring the ideas and themes that they were playing with as a game designer when they created the system through the role-playing element.
Connie Chang: Well, for me as a GM, I think I’m in, I don’t want to say unique position, as in I’m the only one who’s ever been in this position, but I think I’m in a rather unusual position compared to other game designers in the space. Where I am not only a game designer, I’m also a professional GM, and not just a professional GM, but an Actual Play GM. The kind of lens I bring to my own work when I’m GMing it very much feels like I put on a pair of broken in well-worn boots that are very sturdy, that I know can get me anywhere.
I know how to patch up the holes if there are any holes. I know the journey I want to tread, and I know how to invite people onto that journey with me. It very much feels like if I were a chef making my favorite dish that I also like to eat the most and serving that to a customer. I feel very confident when GMing Godkiller because it’s kind of like I’m in my element, quite literally. I feel very excited when GMing it as well, because I know what I’m trying to say with this game, and I know what this game is trying to do.
No matter if the mechanics or the rules are where I ideally want them to be, which ideally they would be there, regardless of whoever’s GMing it, I know how to get myself there. I know how to get the most out of my mileage, which is, I think, a really exciting and fun place to be when GMing, versus playing someone else’s game, especially if it’s a game I’ve never played before or a game built on an engine I’m not familiar with, or a game that uses design principles that I’m not familiar with.
Sometimes there can be a bit of friction where the GM has to translate the rules to fit the table at hand, and not just the table, but also the specific encounter that’s happening, the specific scene and the demands of their own story. Sometimes there can be friction between what the GM wants to do and what the game wants you to do, but for Godkiller and me GMing it, we’re kind of flowing the same direction all the time.
Exploring Grief Through Chaos Protocol Arc: “It’s About Grief And Love”
Chang shared howThe Chaos Protocolis an exploration of grief with the first arc focusing on death, arc two on denial and soon arc three will dive into rage or anger. When asked about following the stages of grief, they teased that it was not an accident, but there are more seasons planned than the five stages of grief will cover, offering a few surprises with the arcs to come.
Connie Chang: We do know what we want the theme of arc three to be because the overarching theme for arc two was denial and the overarching theme for arc one is really interesting because it’s kind of a prologue, even though we call it the first arc of our show, it ends with the inciting incident of the entire campaign that sets everyone off.
In some ways, it’s a prologue. Arc one was just an intro. There was no particular specific theme for that. We were just kind of getting to know our characters, settling in. I guess you could call the theme death. I suppose that was the main theme of arc one. I guess you could call it death.
That’s a tagline for Chaos. Arc three, I know, and I’m excited about this, my dramaturg’s excited about this. We’ve talked about this preliminarily with our players, and they’re all super excited about it. It’s likely going to be about rage in some way, anger, anger and rage and violence. We want the system we pick to explore that and to be able to explore that, which I’m excited about.
Screen Rant: It sounds like you’re going through the five stages of grief.
Connie Chang: How interesting that you’re bringing that up. It’s both a yes and a no. Insofar as the show is about grief. That is one of the overarching campaign themes about grief and love. That’s if I had to boil Chaos down to two words, it’s about grief and love. All the PCs have just suffered an immense loss at the end of arc one, a deeply felt tragic death, and now for the entire rest of the campaign they’re going to have to deal with the fallout of that.
In some ways, it does model the five stages of grief. There’s denial and there’s rage, and you’re like, “Oh, this feels kind of similar. We’re going to try to get all the way to the apotheosis at the end, like the acceptance,” but it’s also troubled by the fact that we have eight planned arcs, so there’s only five stages. Interesting that there are three arcs remaining. That’s kind of ominous. What does that mean? I don’t want to give too much away for that, or nail down things too hard right now, but also thinking of that five stage model of grief not as prescriptive, which I think it kind of has become in some ways, in some modern discourses, and more as a descriptive and nonlinear mode of how we as humans cope with loss, death, and grief in general, right?
One, it’s not like we just work neatly through the stages, and then we’re done, and we have let go of it completely. It’s a push and pull. It’s an up and down. A lot of people say that grief doesn’t get easier. You just kind of grow around it. Some days it’s easier, some days it’s harder. Some days you’re really angry, and some days you just feel empty, and some days you forget about it completely, and you feel terrible and guilty and ashamed about having forgotten, right?
It’s really complicated and prickly and thorny. I am interested in honoring all dimensions of that. Yes, we will definitely be talking about denial and grief and bargaining. All of these things will come up because these are normal human reactions to suffering loss. Regardless of whatever model we decide to prescribe to it. Also, yes, our viewers have also been picking up on that. I think most of our viewers are like, “Hmm, that’s really interesting. I’m reading the notes on your Patreon, and I’m making connections.” I also love it when people scheme and pick up on the things we’re putting down.
Transplanar’sThe Chaos Protocolis available to stream onYoutubeandTwitch. Catch up on Arc 2 before 3 comes out!
