Levitate

Now up for grabs is BtS: Levitate: http://www.rpgnow.com/product_info.php?products_id=6580

I'll be working on acid arrow tonight. It'll be the first pdf that tackles a spell which has a proper name attached to it in the PHB. Of course, for legal reasons I can't mention the name Melf in the pdf so what will happen? Maxolt may have a surprisingly funny reason for names such as this being falsely attributed to the spells.

Another Sunday

As much as I love gaming, I love having a Sunday off. I'm attempting to catch up on some fun reading. Just bought the new Timothy Zahn Star Wars book...ah, the name escapes me and I'm too lazy to go over to the desk and look. It takes place in the midst of the first trilogy, before the Clone Wars erupt I believe. In any case, it's the first appearance of Thrawn, one of my favorite characters from the Heir to the Empire trilogy Zahn wrote in the '90s. It'll be nice to take a break from fantasy. Currently I'm reading on Richard Baker's Forsaken House. It's better than when I started it and then stopped it a month or two back.

BtS: Levitate has been handed in and Phil says he'll get it up for sale today. Next up is an offensive spell but I don't know which yet. Yeah, yeah, I'll try and write it before week's end and get back on schedule. In other news, with the postponement of Invasion: Freeport I decided to pick up a side project with Reality Deviant Publications. They release work under the Ronin Arts banner for better marketing and the writing people include a few folks I'm already familiar with. Axel and Mark comment here and David Jarvis was responsible for the cartography in my 11th Hour pdf. I enjoy working with new companies (new to me at least) and the project I'll likely help with is cool. The royalty percentage on net sales ain't bad either. ;)

It's a balmy freezing temp here in Hamburg but the sun is shining brightly so it's high time I get my lazy ass out for a hike.

Oh the Humanity

So today at work this woman comes in for pain meds for her daughter (or was it granddaughter?). Apparently, as this family line progresses its half-midgit qualities become more pronounced. You read that right: half-midgit. Seems a short man married a tall woman and the result is this odd progeny. I found the situation more pitiful than amusing as the woman recounted the maldies being suffered by the current generation: long/short body halves, oddly growing teeth, etc. Pretty strange but I couldn't help but think what an interesting D&D race it might make. I need help.

Tonight I'm scribbling BtS: Levitate. "But didn't you just write reverse gravity," you're saying? Those spells are too similar for consecutive release. Eh, bite me. Here's an Invasion: Freeport update as well. It's been put on hold until GR's new Freeport city supplement is closer release. I'd like to have more updated material and hopefully get it early enough to coincide the adventure's release with GR's own.

Back to BtS, I asked Phil this morning about the possibility of adding Castles & Crusades mechanics to the new rules mix. Sure, C&C isn't mechanics-heavy but it could be an interesting experiment. I'd like to tap into C&C's apparently solid fan base and increase the marketability of the series. We'll see what happens.

New Car!

After some thought, I decided that I needed to get rid of my 2004 Jeep Grand Cherokee. It's not that I don't love my Jeep (because I do) but the thing is quite the gas guzzler. When I purchased it, the gas prices were not at the ungodly levels they're at now. Since it seems there's no going back to those idyllic days of yore when gas was under $2.00/gal. I've gone and traded the Jeep in for a sleek, more fuel-efficient, new Fusion SE. Payments are a bit lower than the Jeep's but I figure the savings in mileage should make up for the inconvenience of essentially resetting my 6 years worth of financing. The color is titanium green (first vehicle that's not silver for me), she's got a paltry 50 miles on her, handles like a dream, and her 200+ horsepower really has get up and go! Pickup time is 3pm.

The only thing making my day bad is a morning trip to the eye doctor which I'm certain will result in new glasses. My 3-year-old prescription just isn't doing it anymore. I can tell my eyes are weaker; driving is straining on them especially at night and by the end of the day I'm unnaturally tired. Guess since I'm spending $2,400 later today I might as well not complain about giving some dollars for healthy eyes.

Reverse Gravity

Now up for sale is this week's Behind the Spells release--Reverse Gravity! Grab it here: http://www.rpgnow.com/product_info.php?products_id=6525

I've been thinking, off and on, about doing a series similar to BtS in that I take an area of the core rules and expand on them with fluff and variant crunch. And while there are a number of things to choose from, the problem lies in making such a pdf series accessible to both DMs and players. In theory, more players that are consumers in the marketplace than DMs although I'm not sure if that holds true for the pdf market. With the undenied success of BtS (at least in my opinion), I'm wondering if I can capitalize on the same type of business angle. Ronin Arts has already done a good job of this in publishing pdfs for mundane items, magical components, etc. but I think there's still something that can be exploited. The question is, will I want to write it if I can think of a topic? Not weekly, certainly, but monthly perhaps.

Cover Art

Wow, no posts in almost a week?! I've fallen a bit behind, primarily due to lack of motivation this week. Ever get those days? Here's some great news; a look at the cover art for Temporality. Let me know what you think. Although, to be honest, it really doesn't matter at this stage of the game. Link here: http://www.enworld.org/showthread.php?t=167902

For you people still keeping up with the Behind the Spells series, the next release is Reverse Gravity and should be completed this evening (um, yeah, sure it will).

EDIT: There's another thread about the time travel cover going on over at rpg.net as well: http://forum.rpg.net/showthread.php?t=246506

New Review

New review up at rpg.net for BtS: Fireball: http://www.rpg.net/reviews/archive/11/11953.phtml

Also, you can see some art for A Matter of Faith. You might have forgotten that this is my adventure for Highmoon Media in conjunction with Green Ronin's Medieval Player's Manual. See the art here: http://forum.rpg.net/showpost.php?p=5278952

Almost Time

Neal Levin has now publicly stated that he'd like to have Temporality out in pdf and print next month. Apparently, a convention he's headed to will have a time travel theme and, naturally, my book is the perfect fit. I hope the goal can be met. I'm very excited!! So much so, that I've posted some info about the book in this thread over at ENWorld: http://www.enworld.org/showthread.php?t=166828

Stop by and give it some support!

Burning Hands & Burnout

The next Behind the Spells issue you've waited patiently for is out! Grab Burning Hands here: http://www.rpgnow.com/product_info.php?products_id=6473 Trying a little experiment this time--will more crunch equal more sales? Sure, you still get the usual stuff but for this issue there's 3 spell secrets, a new magical poison, new magic item, and a new special attack for troglodytes!

Despite the above title, I'm not suffering from burnout. However, I'm worried about suffering from it as the BtS series plows forward. Can I honestly come up with new and interesting stories for every spell in the PHB? So far, so good. I'm happy they don't take a lot of time to write. Well, for some reason cone of cold took longer than normal but I think that was too much agonizing over the creator story. It shouldn't cause me stress especially since if someone doesn't like the pdf I can just shrug my shoulders and say, "What do you want for a dollar?" :p Thankfully, that's not been the case.

Review

About time! Someone has finally reviewed my short adventure The 11th Hour: http://www.enworld.org/reviews.php?do=review&reviewid=2898552

I'm watching Judge Judy as I type this. I love her. These people deserve her rage. Why, when they're so utterly stupid, would they agree to be on national television? At least they're good entertainment.

Purchases

Back from my trip which yielded two more rpg books for the pile: Holy Orders of the Stars (the Dragonlance book from Soveriegn Press) and Player's Guide to Eberron (WotC). The latter is laid out like an encyclopedia with the many topics alphabetized. I have to concur with Brad (Chilled Monkey Brains) so said that's a great way to go about organization. Wonderful stuff and I can see getting a lot of use out of it if we ever get more into playing Eberron (hint, hint, Brad). Haven't gotten around to perusing Holy Orders yet, but I'm a sucker for DL stuff and religion stuff which means I should love this book.

Moving

After 16 years, my mom's store--The Happy Sewing Room--is moving out of the home and into an actual storefront downtown. The bulk of her inventory was moved yesterday. After work, I changed and went to help however I could. Most of the time was spent scraping the previous store's logo off of a window. Still not done, but she's closed for the coming week to set everything up. The interior is pretty big, with a kitchen area and a separate "reading room." I hope she does well since the rent is not what I would call a bargain. Ever since the Western Auto moved out of the building some years ago, no other business has survived for long in it. Here's hoping my mom breaks that curse.

This is my first Sunday of no church! I'm celebrating by taking a long overdue trip down to Bryn Mawr's Showcase Comics (near Philadelphia). The drive there is via highways but the route back is on backroads which I enjoy greatly, especially on lazy Sunday early afternoons. I haven't seriously looked at buying game books since before Christmas so it's about time I treat myself to something. Hmm, I also have a couple coupons and a $5 gift card for Borders I may have to use. Writing can wait until tonight.

Sci-Fi Friday

With the loss of new Trek on tv, I only have the Stargates and Battlestar Galactica to look forward to for new sci-fi goodness. And, happily, I've been pleasantly surprised with them all. BG didn't have me really hooked until this season. As for SG-1 and Atlantis, both shows have a great "feel" about them. The sets are lush, the special f/x great, and the writers generally know what they're doing. I was really impressed when *SPOILER* the ship Prometheus was destroyed on this evening's SG-1 */SPOILER*. Nice to be given some surprises. It probably helps that I don't go snooping for news like I did with Star Trek: Enterprise.

In RPG news, I've decided to do Burning Hands for the next BtS issue. Well, OK, it was requested by Phil Reed. When the person that pays you suggests something, it's generally a good idea to follow up on it. ;) Also, I've been asked to assist in some projects from Inner Circle Games. I nearly backed out but the quality of work from them is too good to not have my name associated with. If you haven't checked it out yet, their full-color hardcover monster book Denizens of Avadnu is one great accessory!

In the Heat of Battle

When I'm DMing, I tend to forget special qualities of my bad guys. When you're in the "DM fog" you just are too in the moment to remember every little detail. I'm talking about stuff that you've even written down. When the combat is on, I tend to take note of two things--AC and hit points. If my baddie is going to attack, then I look at the weapon/spells/special attacks. But the SQ is almost always an after thoughts especially when dealing with multiple NPCs. The PCs might launch a spell at my guy and I forget all about spell resistance. The same can be said of damage reduction. I wonder if they make robot DM secretaries?

Soundtracks & Temporal Stasis

After perusing this week's new soundtracks (via email from Intrada) and seeing Brad do his own review of one over on Chilled Monkey Brains, I thought I'd do my own salute. Personally, I can't DM an adventure without some kind of music. My soundtrack collection isn't "vast" but it serves its purpose. Favorite module cds are anything by the three "J"s--Jerry Goldsmith, John Williams, and James Horner. As I think of them, I'll post my some of my most-used soundtracks (maybe you'll discover something new for your collection!). Here's a few to get you going...

Goldsmith: I may not be much for watching the trilogy, but the Rambo movies produced some fantastic music by this recently-deceased composer. Rambo III is especially good considering that the soundtrack was not even used in the movie! According to the liner notes, if memory serves me, the executives instead used tracks spliced from Rambo II. I don't know what they were thinking. Rambo III has some of the best cues for action you can find. Link: http://shopping.netsuite.com/s.nl/c.ACCT67745/sc.2/category.2003/it.A/id.774/.f

Williams: You can go with the classic Indiana Jones trilogy here but let's try to get off the beaten path. Williams' recent offerings have left me a bit cold. I'd have to recommend something like Jurassic Park (the first over the second, although #2 does have one hell of a great action cue) or Superman. Like many of the composer's pre-2000 stuff, melodies are key and action is admirably handled. Link: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000002OOY/qid=1138841927/sr=1-1/ref=sr_1_1/102-6376094-1377722?s=music&v=glance&n=5174

Horner: Like Goldsmith, I'm a big fan of this guy's work. If you keep an ear to the soundtrack community, you know Horner is considered a hack in some circles, accused of repeating melodies and/or rythmic structures. Even if it's true (and it is in some cases), the man can still write damned good music. For a great sampling, try this Essential disc set: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000009Q0I/qid=1138842098/sr=1-2/ref=sr_1_2/102-6376094-1377722?s=music&v=glance&n=5174

As for RPG news, this week's Behind the Spells release is now up for sale. Grab Temporal Stasis here: http://www.rpgnow.com/product_info.php?products_id=6438