ThinkingSkull.com

Okay, before you start asking questions about what console they’re for, I’m talking about a tabletop role-playing game. Celebrating its one-year release, here’s the skinny.

October 7, 2008
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Get Your Roleplay Free

Talisman Studios is celebrating the anniversary of Suzerain, our Origins Award Nominee RPG. And we’re celebrating in style, with a couple of great bits of news for roleplay fans everywhere:

Suzerain is now free from our online shop! That’s $0.00 for the Suzerain rule book. The economy’s getting tougher and none of us has much money to play with, but from now on you won’t need any money to play with Suzerain. Enjoy the game at www.suzerain.info by clicking on the ‘Treasure’ tab at the top of the page and browsing through all our free goodies.

We’re also launching a new web application on our site, specifically for Suzerain. Click on the ‘Vault’ tab to see our new feat database, fully searchable. Suzerain characters are all about their feats, and this is a great way to have a browse through all the options, helping you build your favorite characters. In fact, we’re even developing an update to the vault that allows you to create characters right on the web site at any power level, downloading them as PDFs for your game.

And that’ll be free too.

Happy birthday to Suzerain, and to all the fans of roleplaying. Drop us a ‘hello’ in the forums when you come for your free goodies!

Just got back from GenCon 2008 (on the nickel of Talisman Studios) to help friends get their game stuff going. I also have a bunch of pictures for all to see.

That said, I’ve learned a few things that I think others would like to know for next year.

1. 20-oz sodas are $1.80 at the store inside the Hyatt rather than $3.00 everywhere else.
2. The CVS Pharmacies within walking distance of the con run out of stuff quick, so load up early.
3. “The Alcatraz” restaurant has potato salad that will make you say, “Wow!”
4. It’s perfectly safe to walk around downtown Indianapolis at 4:00am, but you won’t find anything to do at the con unless there’s a hotel or bar party someplace.
5. The airport sucks, but the all-new airport should be open by next year.
6. There’s a $7 shuttle called “The Green Line” that runs from the airport to the convention center every 15-20 minutes, which is cheaper than a $25 one-way cab ride.
7. The three hotels directly connected to the convention center by skyways are the Hyatt, the Marriott, and the Westin, which keeps you out of any bad weather and makes it infinitely easier to move things to and from your room.
8. Finally, I have it on the best authority that the convention center coffee tastes like ass.

Hope this helps future GenCon attendees!

I love Diablo. Diablo has always been like Guantlet but takes itself way more seriously. It’s a personal dungeon crawl filled with undead things in an immersive atmosphere.

I’ve tried World of Warcraft, but the game play flexibility and options just don’t seem as important with so many non-linear, time-filling… well, bullsh*t quests. Seriously, I have to fight a pig? No, wait, kill twelve spider monkeys? Like any good adventurer, I want to start where it’s dangerous and deadly, not tromping through mud because “the local guard” needs help when they’re not watching a bridge. Don’t get me started on the auctions.

Now Blizzard has announced Diablo III is officially in the pipeline. The official site already has what I want to see and a twenty-minute featurette with sample intended game play. Like anything Blizzard does, there’s no street date yet, but if they’ve got this much going on already, we should be within a year undead-stomping, demon-slaying, cinematic-reward happiness.

“Dungeons & Dragons” co-creator and celebrated d20-wielder Gary Gygax has passed away (for you die-hard tabletop players out there, after rolling a ‘1′ on a critical saving throw, the Big Dungeon Master upstairs opted to retire his character). More over at CNN.com, but I’ll post whatever else I can find here as soon as I get it.

• John Kovalic honors Mr. Gygax.
• Dueling Analogs is thinking kinda what we were.
• Penny Arcade weighs in.
• Order of the Stick makes its tribute.
• Joystiq.com gets it right with Death and Gary.

Apparently, attendees of GenCon 2007 is getting quite the scoop this year: another system to “rules” them all. But the buzz isn’t bad… sounds like someone might have been paying attention to everything that went horribly bad in 3rd edition (even though they did manage to fix a few 2nd edition problems). For more on what’s being promised, check out Jonathan Drain’s D20 Source and GenCon 2007 updates.

Alignment:
Neutral Evil characters believe in Number One. Their personal gain takes precedance over all else, and they will work with whomever necessary and whatever institutions necessary to further their own goals.

Race:
Elves are the eldest of all races, although they are generally a bit smaller than humans. They are generally well-cultured, artistic, easy-going, and because of their long lives, unconcerned with day-to-day activities that other races frequently concern themselves with. Elves are, effectively, immortal, although they can be killed. After a thousand years or so, they simply pass on to the next plane of existance.

Primary Class:
Mages harness the magical energies for their own use. Spells, spell books, and long hours in the library are their loves. While often not physically strong, their mental talents can make up for this.

Secondary Class:
Clerics are the voices of their God/desses on Earth. They perform the work of their deity, but this doesn’t mean that they preach to a congregation all their lives. If their deity needs something done, they will do it, and can call upon that deity’s power to accomplish their goals.

Deity:
Velsharoon is the Neutral Evil god of necromancy, liches, and undeath. He is also known as the Vaunted, the Archmage of Necromancy, and the Lord of the Forgotten Crypt. His followers practice the necromantic arts, and raise the dead to do their bidding. His symbol is a crowned skull.

Find out What D&D Character Are You?, courtesy of NeppyMan (e-mail) It’s fun!

While it’s no secret we were proud of our 108-page version of Kindling Moon, it’s always nice to have an improved look. So, while the original content hasn’t changed (except where it needed corrected ), the art we promised ourselves is in there. Four full-page plates (by yours truly) and over twenty quarter-page art bits by two of Talisman’s up and coming illustrators. In addition, we decided to add a three-part wrap around story to book, just to give an example of the kinds of stories we’re looking to tell. Don’t worry if you already have a copy; the fiction will be posted on Kindling Moon as well. Next up, Kindling Moon, the novel (more on this later!)

Yes, the original concept was intended to be web only, but you can’t keep a good idea down. Check out the press release over at Talisman Studios for the skinny; we’re so happy!!!

20 years in the making, 10 years in the planning, and 3 years in the writing and test playing. Ready or not, Kindling Moon: Rulebook & Realmbook went on sale online and at this year’s GrailQuest at the World Golf Village just south of Jacksonville, Florida. We even brought a few nice color maps from the website to show (the same maps also appear in the game book, just in black & white and MUCH smaller).

We played a few games, sold some books, met all kinds of people, and had a lot of fun! People both watching and playing had plenty of questions about how we came up with the rules and setting; more than a few who initially doubted the rules were suprised at how quickly they were using them and how effective they were. We can’t wait till next year when the game will be a three-part tourney with YOUR CHARACTER (pending game master approval); pre-gens wil be available, but wouldn’t it be fun to have your own character playing?

In other news, some lady named J.K. Rowling made $36 million on Saturday selling HER new book, but WE didn’t charge extra for a signed copy of ours.

Over at Wired.com news, there’s an interesting article concerning the rise and fall of civilizations. As the title Guns, Germs, & Steel implies, the article concerns itself with things that kill people as well as tools used to conquer other people. The author, Jared Diamond, touts the phrase “Location, location, location” as to one one people have the tools and opportunity while others do not. As far as racial factors go, those geographical opportunities, of course, must be recognized and siezed.

While finishing the re-write and expansion of Kindling Moon, this article reminded me of one of the things we’ve been trying to do with many of the factors in our updated history and breed descriptions. Even with providing a rich world full of opportunities lost, made, and taken, not everyone with an opportunity knows to take it while those who would may never have one to take. With the storylines for players starting at the cusp of a world barely renewed and still emerging, it’s nice to see a bit of theoretical fact backing up the fiction.

I am holding a copy of the Preview Edition, still warm from CafePress… and it’s actually better quality than I imagined they’d do. Ah, opening that first shipping crate and smelling that “new book” smell! All of this, the entire idea since CafePress said they’d start beta testing print-on-demand (pod) creation of books, all of it has come to fruition! Happy me, happy me, happy me…! I go now.

So while putting the finishing touches on the manuscript for the Preview Edition of Kindling Moon, I attempt to compile the final version into a *pdf only to discover… it won’t work. Half the pages came out blank, as if the compiler just decided not to use them. Oh well, the program was old, but it’s what I had, so on to Plan “B.” The text and pictures are still finished and intact, after all.

Plan “B” consisted of using Microsoft Word and using a distiller/compiler to turn the original text document into a publishable file. I found a recommended one by 8848Soft.com, loaded it, purchased the shareware key, pushed the button and… it still didn’t work! On to Plan “C”: load the software on a different computer and see if anything changes. It didn’t; apparently, it just doesn’t work.

Plan “D” consisted of a free Adobe.com feature that will let you compile documents, but after 5 of them the charge you (or hope you’ll buy their software). And it worked! Unfortunately, the last page’s graphic seemed to find its way into the second-to-last page text, so I adjusted and did it again. Same problem, but now I became suspicious. Could it be that the final page graphic somehow exceeded a preset limit, border, or something else? I reduce the graphic size again; it compiled perfectly.

Back to Plan “B.” It worked! 8848Soft’s MS Word compiler did the trick (after fixing the mystery margins). So for anyone needing to turn their *docs into *pdfs, here’s a low-cost solution as long as you accept the limitations. Kindling Moon’s Rulebook & Realmbook Preview Edition is finished and ready for inspection.

Another feature (or lack thereof) of Kindling Moon is lack of class; there are no manditorily enforced skill groupings. The reasoning behind this (other than player frustration) is as follows.

In an older version of Dungeons & Dragons (back when the word “Advanced” preceded it), there was once a description of two ways a game master could look at the game. One was that player characters were somehow exceptional, that just being what they were (stats over 10, etc.) dictated who they were; all other non-adventurer non-hero types were simply not able to train up or match skills against enemies. Essentially, you were either born a vigilante or you weren’t, and everyone else was a victim you had to avenge or save from certain doom.

The second made more sense. Everyone had the potential to excell and train; all you needed was the dispostion (or the right backstory) to adventure. The world view was that everyone was different but each had something to make them special. For Kindling Moon, we decided this was a better way to go; the only real limitation is a characteristic that allows the use of magic, which is a rare and wonderous thing (kinda like having a witch secretly advising wayward Puritans, but that’s another story).

Otherwise, the only thing that limits a character’s growth and knowledge is time. Want to learn how to steal? Fine, but learn not to get caught, too. Tasks are organized into archetype groups that in no way limit what you can group you can learn from or how skilled you can become. Just remember, when you strike down your arch nemesis and spare his innocent daughter, it may be best to expect her to come knocking once she grows up and still feels raw about it (didn’t Kill Bill just rock?)

As the Preview Release of Kindling Moon draws near, it was suggested to me that we needed something to not only show that we’re serious but to firmly point the finger at our intended competition. Not that it’s any big secret, but that would be anything ‘D’ followed by the number ‘twenty’. Since our system is designed to utilize one single set of polyhedral dice (and not to just take up room in the bag), the idea grew into “You’re going to need more than just this…” followed by a picture of a twenty-sider. So we did!

This isn’t to say that role-playing games using single-die mechanics are bad, it’s just that, as a factor of randomization, isn’t that a little stagnate? The time-tested option of adding or removing modifiers to either change the target number needed to roll or change the total number rolled is okay, but the randomness is still 1 out of 20 or 5%. Other systems use a single die type (ten-sider or six-sider) or multiples of the same dice to increase this fixed randomness, but you shouldn’t have to dump a barrel over and spend fifteen minutes counting pips.

Kindling Moon’s dynamic dice pool was designed to be the best of both worlds. More dice are fun to roll when you’ve earned them, but too many take too long to count and keep track of. With just a few easy rules, one set of dice can generate randomness of 1-100, but the chance of rolling higher decreases as the total goes up. We’re still waiting for someone to roll that perfect 100 and tell us the story of what their characters were doing when it happened.

The clock is ticking, the dice are being rolled, and the gauntlet has been thrown down.

How about four pages of names? That’s how many I wound up with for Kindling Moon. Of course, this begs the question: why? For a roleplaying game, why do you need four pages of, well, just names?

First of all, one of the most frustrating things about a genre-specific game (like Arabian fantasy) is a lack of support. “Here’s a few examples” is what usually comes with a new but non-imersive game, but a great name isn’t just for player characters. Game masters can use them, too, as a resource and as a quick reference. As a bonus, each name also comes with an origin, such as “one who serves” or “she that rules.” Instant personalities!

I don’t want Kindling Moon to be a “Here’s an idea, now go do your own research” kind of game. I want it to be played on the fly with one volume, one set of dice, and all the imagination you can bring to the table.

In the movie The NeverEnding Story, the hero Atreyu must seek a human child which can only be found beyond the borders of his world, Fantasia. Unfortunately, he is about to be killed by his enemy, the G’mork, when he learns (spoiler to follow) Fantasia is the world of human fantasy; it has no boundaries, so Atreyu can never get beyond them.

As some of my acquaintances know (and for those who do not), I not only write here and for MovieCrypt.com but I also lend my time to the role-playing game industry. No one enjoys telling people that your ‘hobby’ is writing when they darn well intend to make some money at it, yet the truth is that very few purists can make livable quantities of money on a constant (and regular) basis in a nich industry. As proof of role-playing’s ever-ellusive quest to become taken seriously, consider than whenever people with colorful books running an adventure while rolling dice, any such game is “just like Dungeons & Dragons” while the term ‘gamer’ has been stolen away to describe anyone with a game console who spends their nights happily killing weed rats so they can buy a proper sword and load their next graphical mission.

So, aside from a day job that ensures I cannot live too far beyond my means, I have also been developing Kindling Moon, an Arabian fantasy with elements of altered reality. Like anyone else who has migrated from running a character to presiding over an entire game can tell you, all game masters aspire to see their personal game world or idea published. I myself have been kicking around ideas for years, but most systems (including every incarnation of D&D) simply don’t fit the way I like to play.

This is where many say, “Oooh! I can make my own game just like [favorite game here] except for [cool rule] and make hundreds of dollars… TENS of hundreds!” Somewhere, Charles Bronson is holding a harmonica and saying, “They call them ‘thousands.’”

No, if it were a rule or two, maybe. I realized I didn’t want to change one thing or just create just another setting; I needed something that worked with the way I enjoy running a game. If nothing more, it’s an exercise in applying my thought processes to the interworkings of such a system from the ground up: what dice to use, how they work, what the rolls mean and when not to use them. Deciding how random numbers can be translated into affecting the reality of your own private universe can be frustrating when it fails and intoxicating when it succeeds.

This past weekend at a convention called Grail Quest, I no longer felt the need for frustration. Check it out; I’ll wait.

I’ve always had plenty of plots and characters, but creating the rules upon which others can quickly and easily share in my ‘Fantasia’ was always the goal. This was the third year I’d ran a demo of the system, but it was the first year that no major breakdowns of the system occured; it performed as intended. The ‘fantasy physics’ rules that determine how reality functions are now in place.

This isn’t just important in terms of running or playing the game. In fact, it isn’t important to the sale of the game itself. What makes it important is that everything I write from that moment on has a tangible boundary that keeps everything believable even when the fantastic occurs. It doesn’t matter if it’s another realmbook, a novel, a short story, or a movie script; the boundaries of this portion of my imagination has been defined and can be explained to others willing to learn.

Ask anyone who’s favorite comic book has been ruined by a new writer that never read their favorite character’s background and history, doing things they wouldn’t or have no ability to do. Ask any moviewatcher how dull their big summer action flick is when the director blew $150 million but none of it makes any sense because every whim is up on the screen instead of a coherant story and character development.

All creativity needs rules and boundaries. Once you reach them, of course, there’s no one to say you can bend the rules or push the boundaries back a bit; after all, you set the limits.

Kindling Moon: my world; my rules.