Progress and Dragoncon-related surprises

I haven’t blogged in a while.

I’ve been busy playing a lot of Elder Dragon Highlander and putting RPG books together. The Chthonic Codex continues its development and should be out sometimes soon, really and Burgs & Bailiffs is inching toward completion as I wait for the last feedback. Progress on Adventure Sailing Game slowed down as Carlo (the main designer) is getting through a very busy period, but since we’ll spend some time together in January there might be an explosion of activity there. or at least some progress. Corsica, written with Richard Guy, is proceeding albeit very slowly. I must admit I have too much on my plate, but most of the above are close to completion so, as they get done, speed on the other projects will go up.

At least in theory.

This week I’ll be in London for work and then Dragonmeet, where I’ll play in Roger the GS‘s game using Gnaro, my gnome of the garden variety. We’ll also show off something a bit special there, a little surprise. I’m a bit scared but everything should go smooth. Pictures will be posted.

And there, just beyond the horizon, there is Secret Project Lantern. If Lantern starts the next couple of years is going to be terrible but exciting.

One last bit: I’m almost out of copies of Adventure Fantasy Game (details here). I still have a few to sell (clicky clicky here to buy one) and it comes on bundle with the PDF. The PDF is also available separately (clicky clicky).

Burgs & Bailiffs: Grimness in Process

Work on Burgs & Bailiffs continues. Typesetting is done and the articles has been sent around for what passes as peer review. It’s not peer review, but I’d rather have more negative feedback on those articles rather than publishing utter BS.

The size should be around 40 pages, depending on the final layout. The table of content at the moment looks like this:

• Medieval Tournaments: The Real Melees – Rich Wilson
• Settling Disputes: Ordeals and Trials – Mike Monaco
• Bowmen, Class & War – Shorty Monster
• Medieval Cooking, or, What’s in that Pie? – Steve Sigety
• Recipe: Gruel, a la mode of My Mother – myself
• Pestilence & Putrescence – Jeremy Whalen
• Leeches, Clysters, and a Hole in the Head: Old School Medicine for Grimmer Games – Mike Monaco
• On Food Surplus: Cities & Armies – myself
• The Night Watch – Mike Monaco

I know it seems that Mike Monaco wrote most of it. Mike is, in fact, the author of almost half of the page count.

Burgs & Bailiffs should be done before the end of November and released as a free PDF, a softcover available at cost through POD.

[New Spell] Little Star from the Sky – from the Chthonic Codex

Little Star from the Sky

Level 6 [12 in AFG]

Range: 1 mile.

Radius: 100′

The caster will bring down on a target within range a little start from the sky. If the caster owns a tiny star the spell can throw that instead. The star will enter the atmosphere on a ballistic trajectory, hit the target unerringly and explode for 8d6 impact & star-cradle-level-fusion-powered radioactivity damage, no save. The radioactive explosion will damage everything within the radius of the spell, scattering debris and dealing 8d6 damage. Damage can be halved if both a death ray and magic save are successful, reduced to 3/4 if only one is successful.

Making stars fall can anger gods, especially if the caster does not own the star and casts it more than once a year or in the same calendar day in different years.