February
27
February
27
Kickstarter – The Thunderbirds Co-operative Board Game
Back in December at Dragonmeet I had the chance to play an early prototype of the The Thunderbirds Co-operative Board Game and the Kickstarter is now live.
Join International Rescue, avert disasters, and foil the Hood’s evil scheme in THUNDERBIRDS, the new co-op game from Matt Leacock
The funding period ends on the 29th March so you have plenty of time to back it; however one of the pledge levels reaches £70,000 it becomes locked and no longer available for selecting. At the time of writing the amount pledged was nearly halfway there.
February
27
Chopping Maul
One of my guilty pleasures is watching B movies and I’ve had a lot of enjoyment from them and I can’t help sometimes thinking if I could use the film as an inspiration for a game.
Recently I got hold of Chopping Mall a film about a mall that employs robots as night time security. This sparked my creative urge and I wondered what a mall patrolled by robots would look like in a zombie apocalypse scenario.
Adventure seeds.
Empty and patrolled.
In this scenario the mall is controlled by a small group of individuals who have overcome the malls defences before being able to reprogram the massive mainframe computer that governs everything. The security doors are permanently locked and the robots patrol their designated areas but leave the survivors alone while they have their lanyards and identity cards on them.
This means the building is very much abandoned with only the robots moving at night.
The dead walk
The lower level still has the exterior doors locked against intrusion but there are a few dozen zombies wandering the lower level, the upper levels have the robots constantly on patrol; they are able to go down in the lifts when required and the dead leave them along since they aren’t a source of food. There are still humans living here but they don’t go down to the ground level unless it is an emergency.
Everything is under control
In this scenario the outer doors are left unlocked during the day and the robots bring zombies up to the top floor which has been converted into a lab. Here experiments are performed on the dead, including implanting them and turning them into cyberzombies and hooked directly into the mainframe.
These cyberzombies are free to patrol the mall and also venture outside as a robotic drone to gather whatever the controller needs from them.
Posted from WordPress for Android
February
26
Kickstarter – Masks of Nyarlathotep Companion for Call of Cthulhu
One game I have enjoyed over the years is the Call of Cthulhu, partly because it is a game of investigation but mainly the era of the roaring 20s. It even made number in my top ten game list.
Over the years Chaosium have released numerous adventures and globe trotting campaigns including the spectacular Masks of Nyarlathotep. The adventure is very well written with all the important clues indexed and referenced for ease of play by the busy GM, the only downside is that there appears to be material missing; perhaps things man was not meant to know that didn’t make the cut.
A number of years ago, I saw that there was going to be a companion written for this game and released as one of the Monograph line that Chaosium were printing; for one reason or another it never appeared until the unfinished edition was released over at the Yog-Sothoth forums. Now they plan on finally polishing the document and releasing it to the general public (no relation 🙂 ) .
Masks of Nyarlathotep Companion for Call of Cthulhu
An essential reference to a great RPG campaign-The Masks of Nyarlathotep Companion. Information, advice & adventures in 1 huge volume!
The project runs until 10th March so you still have time to get in on it.
February
25
Kickstarter – Scavengers
I’ve always enjoyed games about space exploration and I was pleased to hear about Scavengers by Andreas Walters a game of:
A quick, easy, humorous RPG about exploring derelict space ships and getting rich off the loot!
The project has funded and the closing date is Sunday 15th March .
I may have to back this one 🙂
February
24
Kickstarter – Laser Etched Miniatures for Table Top Games and RPGs
One thing I have always liked when playing games is to have a physical representation of a character and the monsters on the board. I guess this stems from the ill fated Cyborg Commando game where my perception of things didn’t match the players perception of the situation.
Even though I do love miniatures I’m a terrible painter and I just don’t have the skill or patience to do them justice. Playing online is a different matter as I can make use of tokens and I discussed that in this post.
Which brings me to this Kickstarter by Daft Concepts: Laser Etched Miniatures for Table Top Games and RPGs .
These sets of laser cut, laser etched, wooden miniatures are the perfect blend of detail and affordability.
The images they have certainly look good and the bases have a slot into which status tokens can be inserted. What puts me off is the shipping costs, so perhaps I’ll stick with my current method of play, paper tokens stuck to coins so they don’t blow away. 🙂
The funding period ends on the 10th of March, so you have time to decide if they’re right for you.
February
23
Kickstarter – Shadowstar Corsairs
The first boardgame from Ryan Wolfe called Shadowstar Corsairs has just launched with the tagline:
With space ship miniatures & ground troops; commerce, politics, & combat. Only one corsair can rule the Shadow Star Expanse!
It looks like an interesting game but like I said before about getting boardgames for the group I think I shall give this one a pass as I don’t want to shell out the money for a game we’ll never play or we’ll play once before it gets forgotten about.
The funding period runs until the 25th of March and the creator’s website can be found here: http://0-hr.com/
February
22
RPG Blog Carnival February 2015 – How and Where I Write
This month the Blog Carnival is being hosted by Leicester’s Ramble.
I’ve always loved to write and have done so every since I could pick up a pen and scribble down my thoughts; . growing up I ensured I kept a pen and paper in my possession in case an idea or inspiration strikes me and I can quickly capture these thoughts before they escape.
One thing I have always needed is a creative streak to get going and I find I’m at my most creative when I’m sick; something that has caused me to write about new campaign settings including the discussion on prisons as settings.
As I’ve got older and the technology has matured I’ve moved on from giving myself writers cramp and I remember getting the first typewriter to help me get things down on paper. From a typewriter I moved onto primitive word processing software on the computers I owned or had access to.
For a brief period I carried around a portable cassette recorder as I was convinced that this would help me become more productive; alas it didn’t but I did learn a valuable lesson about using tape, only record somewhere quiet and free from distractions, lest you get people trying to shout near you and ruin your recording.
These days I use my phone to jot notes down or compose blog posts while on the move and this method finally works for me since I now have something readily to hand to enable me to note stuff down.
At home I use a word processor to do my writing and my writing space is cluttered but mostly distraction free; I have a number of game books on my shelves I can reference if I need to and have pdf copies of other books for inspiration.
When it comes to writing I tend to note down a lot; during games as a player I always keep a journal and can be found updating it when the time comes. As a GM I still create but all the extra stuff I don’t need tends to get filed away until opportunity comes knocking at my door and I have something really special I can pull out and polish before using it. I tend to discover the gems while looking through notebooks and folders in a drawer but most of the time I seem to discover the same old stuff I had written and forgotten about.
A case in point was the Colony campaign idea which was a group of text files and I hated to let something that good go to waste.
I started this blog as a way of dealing with the death of a player, someone who was very dear to me and I wish we had had the chance to play more; he would have become one heck of a player if he had been given the chance to do so. Plus the act of writing has helped me deal with his loss, even though he won’t read what I write, I do this blog for my benefit and not his.
Time for me to go back to the word processor and think about the next blog article I want to tackle 🙂
February
21
Kickstarter – Don’t Turn Your Back
The latest Kickstarter from Evil Hat is Don’t Turn Your Back described as
A worker placement/deck-builder board game set in a city of Nightmares. Play. Betray. Survive. Build your deck. Escape the city.
As I’ve mentioned before I have backed Evil Hat’s projects and they have always delivered on time and with quality products, I expect that this game will do very well indeed.
I’m not going to back this game though, getting boardgames for the group is a tricky thing and the last game I got wasn’t well received by them. In fact it never got played and I gave it away to a good friend as he was going to be able to get more use out of it than I was.
February
20
Kickstarter – The Monster Alphabet, with GM Gems
Goodman Games is Kicstarting another project, this time for a pair of system neutral books The Monster Alphabet, with GM Gems described as:
Designing monsters is as easy as A, B, C! Illustrated systems-neutral RPG supplements for creature creation and GM idea generation.
I already own PC Pearls and the Dungeon Alphabet so I’m sure that these two projects will both be first rate.
I’ve backed Goodman Games before and they delivered the goods before so I’m confident that they will make this happen. As usual, all Kickstarter risks apply so don’t blame me if it doesn’t work 🙂
The deadline for the Kickstarter is 11 March so you have plenty of time to go and become a backer.