Right now, I'm gathering research and putting the initial outline for Outcast America together, but since I know it's going to be a big, lengthy project, I've been working on shorter, easier to put together mini-splats and short PDFs. I want to have a good release cushion while I work on Outcast America, especially since the Pathfinder release is imminent, and I want to have some products to release this August.
So amid some other projects, I've finally dug out the manuscript for Black Tokyo II and have begun working on it in earnest. Black Tokyo has been my best seller by a wide, wide margin, so it deserves some support, plus, it's just a fun thing to work on.
So let me just say this: Black Tokyo II is coming soon!
CHRIS
Sunday, July 5, 2009
Friday, June 26, 2009
Random Fun Release
In between Otherverse America releases, I like to work on random fun projects. Apolitical, mass-market, goofy stuff. Fantasy, less serious sci-fi.... anime girls being violated by hentai tentacles. Whatever, you know?
I just put the finishing touches on Galaxy Command- a 90 pager minisourcebook about 70s style cheesy sci-fi TV. It was a project I was smiling the whole way through. Part of the reason I got it out so fast is the fact I decided to look at it artistically from the point of view of a lame 70s TV producer. They reused props, built things on the cheep, did whatever it took to put the TV shows out quickly and cheaply, and I thought I'd do the same. So instead of writing first, and than finding stock art that sorta fits, I decided to pick my stock art first and write around that. The cover peice from LPJ's Image Portfolio: Mixed Genre, a badass Tron-esque android made of glowing red light became the setting's central villian. I found a great Ronin Arts sci-fi clip art pack, which I'd been first introduced to a few years back through the purchase of another sci fi project. This stuff is fucking incredible. It looks just like old Dave Cockrum stuff, and is perfect for what I'm going for.
Here, let me show you some of the art.....
These pretty mofos come from the Ronin Art's stock pack, and as you can probally guess from my previous work are another Legion of Superheros riff- they're the "Dawnstar" type race. Low tech, Amerindian-flavored, winged humanoids. The sheer quality of the art I found let me really get into this project. As cheesy as it is, and as cheesy as I wrote everything, all the injokes and oddities, I really had fun with Galaxy Command.
I mean, this is pure old-school Cockrum here!
I'm still a little giddy about that. Anyway, I wrote it with the original Star Trek and Battlestar Galactica in mind, not to mention 70s era Legion and Cockrum's X-Men... and the Omega Men, and Alien Legion, and the Futurians and a whole load of comics even more obscure and niche than that. Hopefully, if you like old space-opera type sci-fi, you'll get a kick out of this book.
Laying out Galaxy Command was pretty fun. I kept the layout as clean and simple as I could, in the spirit of old 70s RPGS. I was considering doing the book entirely in black and white with spot color, like the original DC RPG, but that would of looked far too ugly, even for retro-kitcsh. Still, I enjoyed it, the red, white and blue pageborders, which really look 70s were almost a direct lift from the box of the DVD collection of old 70s shows which inspired this sourcebook!
One thing that I noticed I was doing about half way through coloring the art was making everyone either Caucasian or alien-colored. It's a pretty white-boy future in Galaxy Command, but once I realized I was doing it, I actually decided to keep it up. It's not the most inclusive thing out there, but for this project, based on media from a specific time period, it felt right. Anyway, it's an odd thing to admit, especially as racially integrated as most of my Othervere Stuff is. Not a big personal revalation, or some major contraversy, I hope, just something odd I noticed about the art. Speaking of art....
That's a few Sade stock images right there, cropped together and backed with some PD images from NASA. Looks frickin' amazing. I really love her stuff. I wish she'd do more males and monstrous figures, but her T&A heroines are amazing.
Along with Galaxy Command, expect a Free20 product that gives you another player race for the setting. they'll be releasing simultaniously. Let me just tell you the title: Free20: Threeway. That should get your lavicious minds working over time.....
Okay, let me stop you before you all get too out of hand. For a few years now, ever since Guide to the Known Galaxy, I've been trying and trying to find a way to create a Carrgite-inspired race for D20 Future. Carrgites are the species of Triad of the Legion- a perky little brunette ninja who's power is that she can split into 3 perky little brunette ninjas. Anyway, as a D20 power, her ability is unbelievably BROKEN, but I finally figured out a way to do her justice... as a +0 ECL player species! Anyway, pick 'em both up (especially the free stuff!) and let me know what you think.
Anyway, after a day or two of vacaton, I'm going to start seriously working on Outcast America. It will probally be the darkest thing I've ever written. More on that later.
CHRIS
CHRIS
Sunday, June 7, 2009
Still in shock....
It's been a week since Dr. George Tiller was murdered and I'm still processing it.
I've been writing about- obsessing about- a coming conflict between pro-choice and anti-choice activists for years now, since high school. I've studied the subject, read every thing I could get my hands on about the killings in Pensacola and Brookline back in the mid-90s, and while I had all the knowledge about the subject in my head, a decade of relative peace (or at least Cold War) had eroded some of the emotional response. I was thinking of those events in terms of history and literature, in terms of what those killings meant in terms of the real future of America and the fictional future of America I'm inventing.
Now, it seems very, very deeply weird to be writing a sourcebook about a fictionalized military sci-fi version of this conflict as a real soldier in the real war is laid to rest. On one hand I feel like The Goddamned Batman- I've got files and photoes on my hard drive at home, I know the psychology and tactics of the badguys and have a pretty good guess what will happen next. On the other hand, I feel like a fucking vulture.
What you may not know about me is I've never had any signifigant personal contact with abortion. I've never had a girlfriend get pregnant, though I do know alot of women who have confessed their own abortions to me. (which is sorta understandable if they knew what I wrote about, what kind of reference books I've got on my shelf.... I'm a pro-choice guy who isn't a Christian, and isn't likely to judge and knows enough about the subject not to make an ass of myself. But alot of these women, I've never told about my writing, or my bookshelf, or really about my politics or faith. It's just like I've got some kind of comforting pro-choice pheremones....) In EVERY single case, these women feel guilty which is a testament to both their innate goodness and the sheer virulence of the pro-life mindset.
A few weeks before this, I was watching the movie Knocked Up with my friends, and I commented to one of them that when a main character seriously starts considering abortion, it ceases to be a comedy. I still stand by that, but what got me thinging is that even I as a pro-choicer have sorta bought into the pro-life meme. The ideology is like spiritual Sarin gas- it does nothing but spread death and misery, and you can't escape it. I started asking myself why do even we pro-choicers view abortion as this monumentous, life altering event? Why do we allow the pro-life cause to make us feel guilty about what is basically the first choice a parent- a good parent- makes? I got to thinking about it more and more, and I realized that part of being a good parent is knowing when the circumstances aren't right for you to be a parent, and taking action to prevent a lifetime of misery for your child to be. So why exactly is abortion any more signifigant than sitting through a spectacularly boring PTA meeting, another mundane (and often lampooned in sitcomedies) part of good parenting?
On a Lighter Note
That's why I can't watch Labryinth today, by the way. You know the one, David Bowie, muppets, Jennifer Connelly? I can't watch it as an adult, even if I loved it as a kid, because of the stident and obvious anti-abortion metaphor. Seriously, if any kid who grew up watching that movie has an abortion as an adult and feels even the tensiest bit guilty about it, about doing the right thing for herself and her family, every copy o' that peice of shit should be pulled off the shelves and shoved right up Jim Henson's dead asshole. And don't get me started on Bill Mantlo's run on Alpha Flight and Goblyn... sure that run gave the comic book world Jim Lee's penciling debut, but it also gave us the world's first aborted fetus superhero.
Anyway, about two years ago I was working at a call center for American Express, replacing lost and stolen credit cards for overprivledged yuppies who were put out by the fact that I couldn't get 'em a card TODAY, but I'd be happy to get 'em a card tomorrow. 99% of my customers, I would of cheerfully shot in the face, the entitled, spoilt, hedonistic rich fuckers.... bastards, the lot of them. But one day, I got a call from a woman who had lost her credit card last week, and we'd already UPSed her a replacement. She called, practically in tears, because the card hadn't arrived yet, and was promised to arrive by 5 pm. At first I thought she was just another damn prima donna, but I started to talk to her, calm her down and I said that I'd send out another replacement to her tomorrow, and I'd send it to her work place.
She explained she couldn't get packages at work. 100% non-negotiable, and it wasn't just a matter of her boss being a jerk, it was an ironclad security policy. I immediately woke up a bit, because very few workplaces have that strict of security requirements. Military bases, especially intel bases have that level of security. So do some really skeezy strip clubs/whorehouses and most crack houses, but those kind of folks usually don't have a gold AMEX. And one other place of work....
She explained the situation. She is an abortion doc, whose home address was in Kansas somewhere. I don't remember where. And she's crying on the phone with me, because the bad guys know where she lives, and they may have taken the package UPS left in her mailbox. And she's afraid that politically motivated credit card fraud is the least of her worries, because if they (she capitalizes the words as she says them) murder might be next.
Okay, no question about it. She's not a spoiled rich fuck at all, and I'm about to pull out all the stops, the Spoilt Millionaire option for Titanium cardholders only to get her a card tonight by private courier. Fuck policy. Fuck the fact she doesn't spend enough to get the shit-bag billionaire treatment of having a card deployed to her by helicopoter-piloting mercenaries, like some kind of really stupid Shadowrun game.
This woman is a fucking hero, putting her life and financies and reputation on the line to save women when they are at their most desperate and needy, and getting called 'babykiller' for her trouble. She's a cop on the beat, a soldier in Iraq, she's a member of the motherfucking Justice Leauge of America. She's getting the card, and I tell her this, and I'm thanking the Goddess that I took her call, and not the Evangelical Christian guy over to the cubilce on the right, because even though he's a good guy, everything the right to life movement would ever need to fuck this woman's life completely was on my screen.
And that was that. I helped her. Felt good about it for days, about the only time in that whole job full of babysitting rich bastards and dipshit debutantes that I actually felt I accomplished something postive for the world. And remeber, this poor lady was terrified three years before Tiller's death. I don't know if she worked at Tiller's clinic, or even knew him, or not, and I honestly don't even remember her name, not that I'd say it here even if I did, but that doesn't matter. Where ever she is I hope she's safe. And I hope she still has the credit card I sent her.
Anyway, enough of my rambling, incoherant rage. I'm still working on APEX, and just finishing up the art. I'll start layout on APEX either this week or next, and should have a draft up on RPGnow for purchase by July. I'm already starting work on Outcast America, which deals with kids, cults and criminals in the setting, a sourcebook on the Bastian Chocier faction, and setting books for 2107's San Fransisco and Solomon Station, the Lifer-flagged spacestation out in Jupiter orbit.
Finally, I'm worring about future violence. I'm glad that the pro-choice blogger circuit is calling FOX news and that dipshit O'Riely to account for his ideological imeptus to violence. he's like America's Osama Bin Laden, but only more dangerous, because alot of Americans actually LISTEN to him. I'm hoping that after all the dust settles, Operation Rescue is at the center of the nastiest FBI/Dept of Homeland Security fuck-fest ever devised by man or beast, and that Randall Terry is in prision as a co-conspirator.
However, short term, I have a feeling both organizations are going to emerge stronger and even meaner, like a dying coyote with rabies, even if the long-term survival of Op Rescue and FOX News are in question. I also have a feeling that more violence is in the offering- I'd place the the next anti-abortion shooting in one of the Dakotas, either north or south, because both states have recently been ideological battlegrounds, and are dramatically underserved in terms of abortion access. Killing a doctor there will seriously hinder abortion access, and garner media attention, and will provide a concrete tactical 'victory' for the extremist art of the anti-choice movement. The clinic on the Ogalada-Souix reservation land in South Dakota, the one I mention on page one of the Otherverse America setting is a Real Place (TM) (C), (though I changed the name in the game) and I really, really hope they're tightening their security. Having Federal marshalls in palce to protect the clinic wouldn't be untoward, and I hope President Obama does so.
It would also be a memetic/propaganda victory for the pro-choice side- if the media runs photoes of US Marshalls escorting young women into the clinic, it calls to mind the Marshalls escorting the Little Rock Seven to school during the segreation era, and reminds people that the government occasionally takes Big Risks to protect the rights of its citizens, and visually/historically reframes the debate as a matter of civil rights.
I'm hoping Tiller's clinic opens soon, but if I were the staff there I"d be bracing for more violence, as well as more semi-violent and non-violent protests and harassment, everything from sit ins in procedure rooms, 'lock and glue rescues' that destroy the doors or block access to the clinic, to harassment from lifer infiltrators within the local government, beauracracy and regulatory agencies. I have a feeling that one of Operation Rescue's tactics will be to discourage, harass and eventually try and bankrupt which ever doctor assume's Dr. Tiller's practice.
Anyway, it's been a long post with little central theme, and I'll let you go now. Be safe.
Blessed be,
CHRIS A FIELD
I've been writing about- obsessing about- a coming conflict between pro-choice and anti-choice activists for years now, since high school. I've studied the subject, read every thing I could get my hands on about the killings in Pensacola and Brookline back in the mid-90s, and while I had all the knowledge about the subject in my head, a decade of relative peace (or at least Cold War) had eroded some of the emotional response. I was thinking of those events in terms of history and literature, in terms of what those killings meant in terms of the real future of America and the fictional future of America I'm inventing.
Now, it seems very, very deeply weird to be writing a sourcebook about a fictionalized military sci-fi version of this conflict as a real soldier in the real war is laid to rest. On one hand I feel like The Goddamned Batman- I've got files and photoes on my hard drive at home, I know the psychology and tactics of the badguys and have a pretty good guess what will happen next. On the other hand, I feel like a fucking vulture.
What you may not know about me is I've never had any signifigant personal contact with abortion. I've never had a girlfriend get pregnant, though I do know alot of women who have confessed their own abortions to me. (which is sorta understandable if they knew what I wrote about, what kind of reference books I've got on my shelf.... I'm a pro-choice guy who isn't a Christian, and isn't likely to judge and knows enough about the subject not to make an ass of myself. But alot of these women, I've never told about my writing, or my bookshelf, or really about my politics or faith. It's just like I've got some kind of comforting pro-choice pheremones....) In EVERY single case, these women feel guilty which is a testament to both their innate goodness and the sheer virulence of the pro-life mindset.
A few weeks before this, I was watching the movie Knocked Up with my friends, and I commented to one of them that when a main character seriously starts considering abortion, it ceases to be a comedy. I still stand by that, but what got me thinging is that even I as a pro-choicer have sorta bought into the pro-life meme. The ideology is like spiritual Sarin gas- it does nothing but spread death and misery, and you can't escape it. I started asking myself why do even we pro-choicers view abortion as this monumentous, life altering event? Why do we allow the pro-life cause to make us feel guilty about what is basically the first choice a parent- a good parent- makes? I got to thinking about it more and more, and I realized that part of being a good parent is knowing when the circumstances aren't right for you to be a parent, and taking action to prevent a lifetime of misery for your child to be. So why exactly is abortion any more signifigant than sitting through a spectacularly boring PTA meeting, another mundane (and often lampooned in sitcomedies) part of good parenting?
On a Lighter Note
That's why I can't watch Labryinth today, by the way. You know the one, David Bowie, muppets, Jennifer Connelly? I can't watch it as an adult, even if I loved it as a kid, because of the stident and obvious anti-abortion metaphor. Seriously, if any kid who grew up watching that movie has an abortion as an adult and feels even the tensiest bit guilty about it, about doing the right thing for herself and her family, every copy o' that peice of shit should be pulled off the shelves and shoved right up Jim Henson's dead asshole. And don't get me started on Bill Mantlo's run on Alpha Flight and Goblyn... sure that run gave the comic book world Jim Lee's penciling debut, but it also gave us the world's first aborted fetus superhero.
Anyway, about two years ago I was working at a call center for American Express, replacing lost and stolen credit cards for overprivledged yuppies who were put out by the fact that I couldn't get 'em a card TODAY, but I'd be happy to get 'em a card tomorrow. 99% of my customers, I would of cheerfully shot in the face, the entitled, spoilt, hedonistic rich fuckers.... bastards, the lot of them. But one day, I got a call from a woman who had lost her credit card last week, and we'd already UPSed her a replacement. She called, practically in tears, because the card hadn't arrived yet, and was promised to arrive by 5 pm. At first I thought she was just another damn prima donna, but I started to talk to her, calm her down and I said that I'd send out another replacement to her tomorrow, and I'd send it to her work place.
She explained she couldn't get packages at work. 100% non-negotiable, and it wasn't just a matter of her boss being a jerk, it was an ironclad security policy. I immediately woke up a bit, because very few workplaces have that strict of security requirements. Military bases, especially intel bases have that level of security. So do some really skeezy strip clubs/whorehouses and most crack houses, but those kind of folks usually don't have a gold AMEX. And one other place of work....
She explained the situation. She is an abortion doc, whose home address was in Kansas somewhere. I don't remember where. And she's crying on the phone with me, because the bad guys know where she lives, and they may have taken the package UPS left in her mailbox. And she's afraid that politically motivated credit card fraud is the least of her worries, because if they (she capitalizes the words as she says them) murder might be next.
Okay, no question about it. She's not a spoiled rich fuck at all, and I'm about to pull out all the stops, the Spoilt Millionaire option for Titanium cardholders only to get her a card tonight by private courier. Fuck policy. Fuck the fact she doesn't spend enough to get the shit-bag billionaire treatment of having a card deployed to her by helicopoter-piloting mercenaries, like some kind of really stupid Shadowrun game.
This woman is a fucking hero, putting her life and financies and reputation on the line to save women when they are at their most desperate and needy, and getting called 'babykiller' for her trouble. She's a cop on the beat, a soldier in Iraq, she's a member of the motherfucking Justice Leauge of America. She's getting the card, and I tell her this, and I'm thanking the Goddess that I took her call, and not the Evangelical Christian guy over to the cubilce on the right, because even though he's a good guy, everything the right to life movement would ever need to fuck this woman's life completely was on my screen.
And that was that. I helped her. Felt good about it for days, about the only time in that whole job full of babysitting rich bastards and dipshit debutantes that I actually felt I accomplished something postive for the world. And remeber, this poor lady was terrified three years before Tiller's death. I don't know if she worked at Tiller's clinic, or even knew him, or not, and I honestly don't even remember her name, not that I'd say it here even if I did, but that doesn't matter. Where ever she is I hope she's safe. And I hope she still has the credit card I sent her.
Anyway, enough of my rambling, incoherant rage. I'm still working on APEX, and just finishing up the art. I'll start layout on APEX either this week or next, and should have a draft up on RPGnow for purchase by July. I'm already starting work on Outcast America, which deals with kids, cults and criminals in the setting, a sourcebook on the Bastian Chocier faction, and setting books for 2107's San Fransisco and Solomon Station, the Lifer-flagged spacestation out in Jupiter orbit.
Finally, I'm worring about future violence. I'm glad that the pro-choice blogger circuit is calling FOX news and that dipshit O'Riely to account for his ideological imeptus to violence. he's like America's Osama Bin Laden, but only more dangerous, because alot of Americans actually LISTEN to him. I'm hoping that after all the dust settles, Operation Rescue is at the center of the nastiest FBI/Dept of Homeland Security fuck-fest ever devised by man or beast, and that Randall Terry is in prision as a co-conspirator.
However, short term, I have a feeling both organizations are going to emerge stronger and even meaner, like a dying coyote with rabies, even if the long-term survival of Op Rescue and FOX News are in question. I also have a feeling that more violence is in the offering- I'd place the the next anti-abortion shooting in one of the Dakotas, either north or south, because both states have recently been ideological battlegrounds, and are dramatically underserved in terms of abortion access. Killing a doctor there will seriously hinder abortion access, and garner media attention, and will provide a concrete tactical 'victory' for the extremist art of the anti-choice movement. The clinic on the Ogalada-Souix reservation land in South Dakota, the one I mention on page one of the Otherverse America setting is a Real Place (TM) (C), (though I changed the name in the game) and I really, really hope they're tightening their security. Having Federal marshalls in palce to protect the clinic wouldn't be untoward, and I hope President Obama does so.
It would also be a memetic/propaganda victory for the pro-choice side- if the media runs photoes of US Marshalls escorting young women into the clinic, it calls to mind the Marshalls escorting the Little Rock Seven to school during the segreation era, and reminds people that the government occasionally takes Big Risks to protect the rights of its citizens, and visually/historically reframes the debate as a matter of civil rights.
I'm hoping Tiller's clinic opens soon, but if I were the staff there I"d be bracing for more violence, as well as more semi-violent and non-violent protests and harassment, everything from sit ins in procedure rooms, 'lock and glue rescues' that destroy the doors or block access to the clinic, to harassment from lifer infiltrators within the local government, beauracracy and regulatory agencies. I have a feeling that one of Operation Rescue's tactics will be to discourage, harass and eventually try and bankrupt which ever doctor assume's Dr. Tiller's practice.
Anyway, it's been a long post with little central theme, and I'll let you go now. Be safe.
Blessed be,
CHRIS A FIELD
Wednesday, June 3, 2009
This is why the pro-lifers are the BAD GUYS in my fiction
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/06/02/olbermann-fox-news-compli_n_210188.html
Ever wonder why I write the pro-life side as the bad guys?
This Sunday morning you had your answer.
CHRIS
Ever wonder why I write the pro-life side as the bad guys?
This Sunday morning you had your answer.
CHRIS
Friday, May 1, 2009
Things I Would Like Other Publishers to Use...
I've been working on D20 Modern for over 5 years now, and at this point, simply because I'm one of the few authors publishing under that ruleset, and not under the more profitable D20 Fantasy / D&D Engine, I consider myself an expert on D20 Modern. I've done some interesting stuff with it, produced some variant rules that both push the system forward and effectively emulate the media I've set out to well... emulate.
That said, there's alot of good rules I've created that I would like to see other D20 Publishers expand upon. It's all OGL to begin with, so take advantage of it, and use my ideas to push your own games forward.
I produced ALOT of good material for D20 Modern working with Louis Porter- I'd like to see the skydiving rules from Adrenaline Surge (2006, LPJ Designs) used in other contexts. Likewise, the archery rules and equipment from D7ACU: Perfect Archer (2007, Skortched Urf) adds alot of flavor to the games, and provides a nice alternative to guns.
On a larger note, I'd like to see the torture rules from Tell Me Now (2006, LPJ Designs) used as a basis for other opposed, complex skill checks. I could see the system powering that suppelment easily be adapted to things like computer hacking, forensic invesitgations, medical drama.... any time where one party attempts to solve a very complex problem or wear down the opposition through skill and tenacity. Hell, it's a damn fine rule for torture as is.
In terms of more complex ideas, I'd like to see other D20 Modern publishers expand on my ideas of Intermediary Classes (2005, LPJ Designs) and Affiliations (Otherverse America, 2009, Otherverse Games). Intermediary classes are story-based starting classes, not attribute based ones. You might play an ER Intern, or a Blogger instead of a Smart or Charismatic Hero. Intermediate classes are more powerful, but more specialized and less customizable than a Basic Class, but not quite as good as an Advanced Class.
Affiliations are basically like the X-Box 360's Achievements for Otherverse America.... you earn them by meeting specific feat and skill prerequistes and serving with a specific group, who trains you in secret techniques. Affiliations in Otherverse America can be famous military units, criminal gangs, political groups, terrorist cells, corporations, cults.... basically in exchange for cooperating with the GM in buildling a character that's an active part of the world, you are rewarded with the equivalent of a minor feat (and bragging rights) for free.
It's a concept that I think can be easily ported to other games, including fantasy ones. Anyway, that's just some stuff of mine that I'm especially proud of, and I think you, as readers, would enjoy.
Talk to you later,
CHRIS
That said, there's alot of good rules I've created that I would like to see other D20 Publishers expand upon. It's all OGL to begin with, so take advantage of it, and use my ideas to push your own games forward.
I produced ALOT of good material for D20 Modern working with Louis Porter- I'd like to see the skydiving rules from Adrenaline Surge (2006, LPJ Designs) used in other contexts. Likewise, the archery rules and equipment from D7ACU: Perfect Archer (2007, Skortched Urf) adds alot of flavor to the games, and provides a nice alternative to guns.
On a larger note, I'd like to see the torture rules from Tell Me Now (2006, LPJ Designs) used as a basis for other opposed, complex skill checks. I could see the system powering that suppelment easily be adapted to things like computer hacking, forensic invesitgations, medical drama.... any time where one party attempts to solve a very complex problem or wear down the opposition through skill and tenacity. Hell, it's a damn fine rule for torture as is.
In terms of more complex ideas, I'd like to see other D20 Modern publishers expand on my ideas of Intermediary Classes (2005, LPJ Designs) and Affiliations (Otherverse America, 2009, Otherverse Games). Intermediary classes are story-based starting classes, not attribute based ones. You might play an ER Intern, or a Blogger instead of a Smart or Charismatic Hero. Intermediate classes are more powerful, but more specialized and less customizable than a Basic Class, but not quite as good as an Advanced Class.
Affiliations are basically like the X-Box 360's Achievements for Otherverse America.... you earn them by meeting specific feat and skill prerequistes and serving with a specific group, who trains you in secret techniques. Affiliations in Otherverse America can be famous military units, criminal gangs, political groups, terrorist cells, corporations, cults.... basically in exchange for cooperating with the GM in buildling a character that's an active part of the world, you are rewarded with the equivalent of a minor feat (and bragging rights) for free.
It's a concept that I think can be easily ported to other games, including fantasy ones. Anyway, that's just some stuff of mine that I'm especially proud of, and I think you, as readers, would enjoy.
Talk to you later,
CHRIS
Wednesday, April 22, 2009
You know what's really gratifying....
.... going on RPGnow, seeing that a product that I put out less than 24 hours ago is the 6th current best seller, on the Top One Hundred.
Even better, seeing that alot of purchasers have also picked up other products I've worked on, such as D7ACU: Voidsparrow, Otherverse America, Giants In the Earth....
To all my readers:
THANKS.
CHRIS
Even better, seeing that alot of purchasers have also picked up other products I've worked on, such as D7ACU: Voidsparrow, Otherverse America, Giants In the Earth....
To all my readers:
THANKS.
CHRIS
Cruel Evolution, MotherF@#$er!
I mentioned it last post, but Cruel Evolution is up and running at RPGnow.com and all the usual suspects. Go pick it up, I had alot of fun laying that one out. I've realized that post-apoc stuff is some of the most fun to work with, especially magi-tech post apocalyptic fiction, because the blending of the traditional fantasy and sci-fi genre lines. Lots to love.
Anyway, I'm putting the finishing touches on the APEX manuscript, right now. I'm working up the 100 plot hooks section at the back of the book, as well as flavor fiction. The 100 plots part is especially important to me. Otherverse is a politicized, social-interaction heavy, deep roleplaying experience, but I see how it can easily be played as just a 'mission-based' wargame. I've seen it happen with the old World of Darkness stuff, instead of getting deep into an alien psychology and fictional culture, you're tasked by your Boss Vampire or Boss Werewolf with going and killin' something- the same exact kind of missions that you'd find in D&D or Shadowrun.
That always disappointed me, as a gamer, especially when I was stuck in a thinly disguised WOD dungeoncrawl. Not fun. So making sure that Otherverse game masters have ALOT of good inspiration and plot hooks to draw upon, which incorporate mysteries, political action, problem solving, romance, seduction, exploration of the culture, ect.... as well as straight up combat is of prime importance to me. I don't want the missions in Otherverse America to turn into:
"You're all Lifer soldiers. Your XO tells you that you've got to destroy a Choicer clinic and a nearby weapons depot."
-or-
"You're all Choicer soldiers. Your XO tells you that you've got to destroy a Lifer weapons cache and assassinate a terrorist leader."
Anyway, like I've said before, the 100 Plots section is probally my favorite part of the sourcebook.
I'm planning out the third big 'faction splat' for Otherverse America as I wrap up APEX: Outcast America, which focuses on the poor, the young, the abused and the fanatical in the setting. After that, I'll probally give a full write up for Solomon Station, and I'm speculating on creating a HUGE species book for Otherverse America, tentatively titled the "Patriot's Alphabet". (Alternatively, I can release a line of shorter splats, each covering 5 or 6 mutates. I'll probally do the latter.)
In Psi-Watch, I introduced three species of human-engineered supersoldiers codenamed the Patriot Anvils, Patriot Boxers and Patriot Ivories. Those mutates exist in the Otherverse as well, as do the Patriot Couriers and Patriot Mechanic superhumans, who are described in APEX. So we've got A, B, C, I and M covered. There's alot of letters of the alphabet still there, and alot of mutant soldiers whose codenames can start with those letters.
Finally, I have to comment on something I read on Louis' blog (which I follow religiously). In a post last week, he divided RPG publishers into two categories, based on sales footprint and distribution method: PDF publishers and hard-back publishers. I can certainly see where he is coming from, but I think that in his post, there is an unspoken 'submission' to hard-back publishers, a feeling that as a PDF publisher we can't compete on the same level, an acceptance of lower sales and lower levels of prestige.
Certainly, as a small PDF publisher I don't have the logistical support, art budget or advertising capability of a big 'HB' publisher. But in terms of just IDEAS, I think all RPG publishers, no matter what their operating budgets or distribution methods are, compete on the same plane. Every product I put out, I feel like I am directly competing against industry giants like Green Ronin, Paizo, LPJD, Adamant, and yes, WOTC (well, less now, but you know what I mean). In order to feel satisfied as an artist, each time I release something, I have to feel that the ideas you'll find inside are AS GOOD IF NOT BETTER than anything from any other publisher, big or small. The art, the layout, the limitations of the PDF format.... screw it.
The question for me is: are the black words on the white page as good as anything WOTC put out? As good as anything Monte Cook does? If yes, I'm happy as a publisher. If not, I'm pissed and try to do better next time.
I don't know.... I find myself agreeing intellectual with everything that Louis said, but for some reason, some emotional part of me wants to disagree wtih everything. Something about that post just sorta rankles me, and I can't really put my finger on WHY.
Anyway, just my thoughts,
talk to you all later,
CHRIS
Anyway, I'm putting the finishing touches on the APEX manuscript, right now. I'm working up the 100 plot hooks section at the back of the book, as well as flavor fiction. The 100 plots part is especially important to me. Otherverse is a politicized, social-interaction heavy, deep roleplaying experience, but I see how it can easily be played as just a 'mission-based' wargame. I've seen it happen with the old World of Darkness stuff, instead of getting deep into an alien psychology and fictional culture, you're tasked by your Boss Vampire or Boss Werewolf with going and killin' something- the same exact kind of missions that you'd find in D&D or Shadowrun.
That always disappointed me, as a gamer, especially when I was stuck in a thinly disguised WOD dungeoncrawl. Not fun. So making sure that Otherverse game masters have ALOT of good inspiration and plot hooks to draw upon, which incorporate mysteries, political action, problem solving, romance, seduction, exploration of the culture, ect.... as well as straight up combat is of prime importance to me. I don't want the missions in Otherverse America to turn into:
"You're all Lifer soldiers. Your XO tells you that you've got to destroy a Choicer clinic and a nearby weapons depot."
-or-
"You're all Choicer soldiers. Your XO tells you that you've got to destroy a Lifer weapons cache and assassinate a terrorist leader."
Anyway, like I've said before, the 100 Plots section is probally my favorite part of the sourcebook.
I'm planning out the third big 'faction splat' for Otherverse America as I wrap up APEX: Outcast America, which focuses on the poor, the young, the abused and the fanatical in the setting. After that, I'll probally give a full write up for Solomon Station, and I'm speculating on creating a HUGE species book for Otherverse America, tentatively titled the "Patriot's Alphabet". (Alternatively, I can release a line of shorter splats, each covering 5 or 6 mutates. I'll probally do the latter.)
In Psi-Watch, I introduced three species of human-engineered supersoldiers codenamed the Patriot Anvils, Patriot Boxers and Patriot Ivories. Those mutates exist in the Otherverse as well, as do the Patriot Couriers and Patriot Mechanic superhumans, who are described in APEX. So we've got A, B, C, I and M covered. There's alot of letters of the alphabet still there, and alot of mutant soldiers whose codenames can start with those letters.
Finally, I have to comment on something I read on Louis' blog (which I follow religiously). In a post last week, he divided RPG publishers into two categories, based on sales footprint and distribution method: PDF publishers and hard-back publishers. I can certainly see where he is coming from, but I think that in his post, there is an unspoken 'submission' to hard-back publishers, a feeling that as a PDF publisher we can't compete on the same level, an acceptance of lower sales and lower levels of prestige.
Certainly, as a small PDF publisher I don't have the logistical support, art budget or advertising capability of a big 'HB' publisher. But in terms of just IDEAS, I think all RPG publishers, no matter what their operating budgets or distribution methods are, compete on the same plane. Every product I put out, I feel like I am directly competing against industry giants like Green Ronin, Paizo, LPJD, Adamant, and yes, WOTC (well, less now, but you know what I mean). In order to feel satisfied as an artist, each time I release something, I have to feel that the ideas you'll find inside are AS GOOD IF NOT BETTER than anything from any other publisher, big or small. The art, the layout, the limitations of the PDF format.... screw it.
The question for me is: are the black words on the white page as good as anything WOTC put out? As good as anything Monte Cook does? If yes, I'm happy as a publisher. If not, I'm pissed and try to do better next time.
I don't know.... I find myself agreeing intellectual with everything that Louis said, but for some reason, some emotional part of me wants to disagree wtih everything. Something about that post just sorta rankles me, and I can't really put my finger on WHY.
Anyway, just my thoughts,
talk to you all later,
CHRIS
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