First Freebie: FTEG Published & PDFs Fulfilled!
about 6 years ago – Mon, Mar 26, 2018 at 01:33:13 PM

PDF Fulfillment: FlexTale Encounter Generator

General-Purpose, version 1.0, has been published.  As a result, you should all be getting an email from RPGnow today with your free PDF copy.

This version is immensely useful as-is, but you also get future versions of this book FOR FREE, as it continues to evolve.  For example, when ABR is published, the FTEG will be updated to reflect all of the hundreds of beasties it contains.

So, enjoy!  And thank you again for your pledges and your patience.

Onward!

Production Update: March 18th
about 6 years ago – Sun, Mar 18, 2018 at 11:58:26 PM

Hiya!  The good news is that I've been crazily productive and have made a huge amount of progress.  Also, Dark Obelisk 2 is nearing publication as its Pathfinder print edition was just approved by the publisher.

On the Other Hand...

The less great news is that, per my last few updates, I'm a bit behind with all of my work.

The pipeline remains the same: with the work portion of DO2 done, I'm 100% heads-down on Artifacts & Artifice, which is proceeding very well.  From there, it'll be the Character Compendium / Villainous Compendium, followed by the Druid Enclave.  At which point it will be 100% heads-down on ABR.

That's not where I had wanted to be.  There's a lot of factors at work here, but ultimately, it comes down to the same three that have plagued my timelines for the past several years since I started all of this:

• Real life day job and full house of three kids.
• I keep writing and creating more than I probably need to.  Dark Obelisk 2 is just shy of 1,500 pages, for a single adventure; arguably nobody expected that when they made their DO2 pledge!
• Even without either of the above two other factors, my ability to estimate my own work tends to be, um, not great to begin with.

So there's all of that.

The Good News

But the good news is threefold.

First, creating crunch is much different work than sculpting magic items or doing layout: it's also the most flexible of the work I do from a productivity standpoint.  That means that in scenarios where I can't really use two monitors and my ergonomic keyboard to do layout for Artifacts & Artifice, for example, on the train coming home from work, I switch to churning out crunch.

Second, and directly related to the above, I've already produced nearly 400 complete statblocks, 98 monsters total, for ABR 1 & 2.  There's going to be about 430 monsters, all told, or about 1,700 statblocks, across the two volumes, so it's still a bit shy of 25% of the way through... but still, progress.  

Third, once DO2 gets published, I'll be offering discounts to all of my Kickstarter backers whose promised fulfillment has been delayed as a result of all of my work on Dark Obelisk 2.  That means you'll have the chance to grab it for super-cheap compared to full retail when it launches, hopefully next week.  You may or may not care about that, I suppose.

Conclusion

So, where does that leave us?  Behind.  And I do sympathize with the frustration; as a backer of hundreds of indie RPG Kickstarters myself, I'm never super-thrilled when a project's fulfillment is delayed.  

But I continue to do everything I can, as quickly as I can, to deliver on everything that I've committed to, and then some: I produce the very best result that I feel capable of, and especially given that this is not my sole output in life, that's not always helpful to timetables.

As always, I cannot promise you an absolute date of delivery.  But I can, absolutely, promise that you'll end up with the very best result that I'm capable of, and to strive to make the output worthy of your wait and pledge dollar.

Onward!

Live: Western Realm Gazetteer Kickstarter
about 6 years ago – Tue, Mar 06, 2018 at 06:39:22 PM

Check it out here.

Why Do You Care?  

Check it out. Seriously, check it out. I'm 99% positive this is the hugest, most ambitious campaign setting ever conceived, at least in terms of sheer content; there'll be a bookshelf's worth of product if I get to fulfill my vision here.  

I try to make my projects as exciting to others as they would seem to me as a rabid backer of indie RPG products, and... well, this is hugely ambitious. I'm super psyched.

What About Existing Projects?  

I continue to work as hard, and as fast, as I can to continue to deliver on everything I've set out to do. WRG is part of that: it was unlocked as a Stretch Goal freebie as part of the DO2 kickstarter, and I'm finally showing a lot more of what the campaign setting of Aquilae has always been in my mind and notes.  

The pipeline of other work remains the same: AA is in full swing and going great; CC2 is crunch-done and needs only layout; VC is about 25% done; DE is up next after that; and in parallel to all of that is crunch and artwork commissions for ABR.  

FTEG has begun delivery for PDFs; once I get the proofs back I'll fulfill hardcovers too.

Do I Need the WRG?  

Nope. But it makes everything else I do better. And everything else is made better if you have it. It all ties together.

IGS Production Update: February 26th
about 6 years ago – Mon, Feb 26, 2018 at 07:44:30 PM

Executive Summary

• You're all awesome. 
• Dark Obelisk 2 is completed and pending publication shortly. 
• Artifacts & Artifice is in full swing now; targeting late March / April to complete.
• Character & Villainous Compendiums up next; targeting April to complete. 
• Druid Enclave up following that; some work in parallel. 
• Aquilae: Bestiary of the Realm following that; art and crunch in parallel to other activities. 
• Freebies and discount codes coming soon for Dark Obelisk 2 in light of my behind-schedule status. 
• Next Kickstarter launching in March with a target of the end of 2018, following all of the above. 
• For those entitled to design help (e.g., Design an NPC, Design a Monster, etc.), I will be reaching out to you as I approach your project 100%. 

How Are We "Awesome"? 

Because despite my being behind schedule, you continue to have faith in me and my work, and I've gotten overwhelming support and positive, boosting comments along the way. I enjoy the heck out of all of this work, but it's even more rewarding and fulfilling when other folks benefit from it. I will continue to work hard to reward that patience and faith. 

So: you're awesome. 

Why Are You Behind Schedule? 

Three reasons: 

• Real life has interfered. 
• Berinncorte Basecamp and Dark Obelisk 2 both turned out to be way, way bigger and more awesome than originally conceived. 
• I have a terrible ability to estimate how quickly I will finish work in general. 

How Are You Going to Make it Up to Us? 

Three ways: 

• I'm going to continue to make everything I produce as awesome as I possibly can. 
• You'll receive freebies from, and discounts on, Dark Obelisk 2, by way of thanks for your patience. 
• My next Kickstarter will be pretty awesome. And it will tie everything thus far and beyond together in a hugely satisfying way. 

Dark Obelisk 2

The book is completed. That's an enormous task finished, and weight off my shoulders. It remains of course to get the hardcopy proofs, finish the 5E conversion, order fulfillment hardcopies, and send out freebies and discount codes (see below), but the product itself is complete. 

It ended up being the single largest roleplaying product I'm aware of: nearly 1,500 pages, all dedicated to a single mega-adventure. My standing offer is that if you can point out a larger RPG product, I'll consider giving you a copy of DO2 and that other larger product, but in any event, here's how it ended up: 

• 840 page Adventure Book. 
• 94 page FlexTale Encounter Generator. 
• 70 page Players' Guide. 
• 460 page Atlas. 

Artifacts & Artifice 

This is now my main, nearly exclusive, focus. Layout has begun, and content has already been progressing in the background in parallel to DO2. 

It's looking like around 500 pages for each of the two volumes AA1 and AA2, based on about 50 items per book, and about 10 pages per item, in the vein of the Abhorrent Naginata sample. I'll be hoping to compress that a bit, but we'll have to see as writing continues. 

Character & Villainous Compendiums 

Good news here: all crunch for the CC is complete, so it's just a matter of layout. TONS of awesome crunch and interesting, immediately-usable PCs/NPCs in here; can't wait to wrap it up. 

The Villainous Compendium has more than 20 nicely-interesting big bads sketched out already. 

Druid Enclave 

Poor Druid Enclave backers: one of the projects I'm most excited about has gotten positioned behind a bunch of other exciting stuff! 

Pretty much unchanged unfortunately: some artwork is done, most map sketches are done, and some NPC notes are done, but the guts of it has to wait for everything else to wrap up, sadly. It'll be a quick ride once I'm able to focus 100% on it, though, as I've been percolating quite a bit in the background. 

The good news is that as DO2 and DE have some tie-ins together, you'll be able to get even more excited by looking at some of the DO2 stuff once the freebies and discounts go out shortly. 

Aquilae: Bestiary of the Realm 

I'm working on this crunch in parallel to much of the above. A bunch has already gotten done, but I'm woefully behind on the custom artwork commissions. 

Good news is that I'm working with some talented artists who are really psyched to help with this amazing project, so I'm looking forward to continuing this. 

ABR is all-important, as from now on, EVERY SINGLE ONE of my other products will tie into ABR, as I must now admit that my individual books can no longer afford to include stats for every conceivable beastie that they may include! :) 

The Next Kickstarter 

First, a note about how this will be received. Overwhelmingly, my backers get super excited about new projects, even when there are products from earlier Kickstarters that are still in the pipeline. There are those of you who are more frustrated with this approach to things, and I do sympathize. I get it; I've backed hundreds of KS projects, and a few dozen have failed to deliver anything at all. That sucks, and stings. Hopefully I have built up enough of a track record thus far in delivering, and OVER-delivering, that you're less concerned about WHETHER I will deliver, but still concerned about WHEN. That's a reasonable concern, to be sure: I have a terrible ability to estimate. But I am trying to be more realistic about what you can expect, when, and always, always, to provide transparent communication about where I am and what I'm doing. 

So. 

That said, my products are all part of the campaign world of Aquilae. One of the books unlocked in the Dark Obelisk 2 KS was the Western Realm Gazetteer (WRG). 

That's the next Kickstarter. It'll be a campaign setting that ties everything thus far, published and planned, together in a thoroughly detailed and heavily-mapped set of tomes. 

Good stuff and I'm excited to share it with you. Look for it in March. I'll send a note when it launches! 

Onward!

Final Day: FTEG Kickstarter
over 6 years ago – Wed, Feb 07, 2018 at 04:25:06 PM

I've gotten a few questions about this, because frankly it's confusing, and it's my fault.  And the fault of all my backers who are awesome.

Here's what's up:

• You already get the FlexTale Encounter Generator (FTEG) as part of your Aquilae: Bestiary of the Realm pledge.
• There's a separate Kickstarter for the FTEG.  I made the KS figuring, what the heck, I'm making this anyway to help make Dark Obelisk 2, ABR, and other books even more awesome; maybe some folks want the FTEG on its own.  
• Yes, as it turns out, lots of people do in fact want just that.  This has been quite successful, spawning additional versions.  
• There's a General-Purpose, core book--that's the one you're entitled to already--and now, more than 15 additional "context books".
• If you want everything, head on over and pledge at one of the "Context Only" pledge levels to fill in the gap with what you're already entitled to.

What Does My Context-Only Pledge Get Me?

Good question.  Here's a list of the Context Books that are planned based on the Stretch Goal unlocks of the FTEG Kickstarter:

• FTEG: Cold Climates 
• FTEG: Deserts 
• FTEG: Forests 
• FTEG: Jungles 
• FTEG: Mountains 
• FTEG: Plains 
• FTEG: Swamps 
• FTEG: Underground 
• FTEG: Urban 
• FTEG: Aqueous 
• FTEG: Gothic Horror 
• FTEG: Castles 
• FTEG: Druid Forest 
• FTEG: Book of Names 
• FTEG: Mines 
• FTEG: Ruins 
• FTEG: Wastelands
• FTEG: NPC Generator