GenCon Hoo!!!
Too long again... ACK! At least I have a better excuse this time, by the name of Daniel (see below)
I'm psyched to be heading to GenCon again this year! I'll be sporting my RedBrick T-shirt again for most of it (thanks to undershirts and laundry services), so if ya see me, PLEASE by all means say "hi" and introduce yourself!! This year, I'm also signed up for more events and really excited about the opening gaming library area, so I'm looking forward to enjoying it!!!! Unfortunately the RedBrick contingent will be much smaller this year at GenCon, but I am really look forward to seeing James, Dawn, and Jacques again.
As for said events, I'm in a Puerto Rico tournament, a Conquest of Nerath tournament (we'll see how badly my first play goes
... although I've read the rules many-a-time), three Dragon Dice tournaments/playtests, and a night of True Dungeon! I'm also hoping to crash one of Bogie's games with generics, but we'll see how that goes
....
So, in other news.... my fifth son was born on June 5th! He weighed in at a massive 11 lbs. 12 oz. and set a record for head circumference with our midwife (who's delivered >1000 babies in her life). His name is Daniel and he's been a real joy so far, although I'm quite thankful I've had the summer off to help my wife with the major adjustments still involved. He's nearly 2 months old now and a great sleeper at night.... still working on a regular day schedule though...
Over the summer I competed in that online international Hive tournament I mentioned (endorsed by the designer and everything). I highly recommend the site:
www.boardspace.net for any interested in playing Hive or a WIDE variety of abstracts online against quite competent AIs (for most games, some are not so good) or against the nice people there. I'm DrRaven over there (go fig, huh?
), and I'll leave it to the actually curious to see how far I got, but let's just say while I didn't win the whole thing, I'm really happy for how it went!!! It was a blast!
My new hobby this summer has also be making boardgames... as in knock-offs of already produced boardgames. I think I ended up making about 20 such games (mostly abstracts, but some strategy games too), that while a touch crude are completely playable. I hope to break a few out at GenCon, but have already tried a few with my wife. Santorini is one of the favorites and one of the best looking. Although Dynasties went over well with her too.
So.... after all that...
REDBRICK STUFF:
First, Vampire City saw some more love as Dammi made up the cover and we hashed out some snappy text for the back cover. I'm really excited to see a game book with my name right on the cover (along with our very own Angus McNicholl), and am also excited about the game and hope people can really sink their teeth into it and have a lot of fun with it!
Second, I FINALLY finished my chapter on Mystic Energy (aka "magic") in the Equinox universe!!! It covers a wide range of topics from spirits to the astral plane, from mystical materials to the Seven Laws of Mystic Energy. I am particularly proud of some of the new names and theming for some old concepts (carry-overs from Earthdawn, same universe after all, just MUCH later), but until those are finalized I don't want to leak too much
. It ended up at 27 pages, so I hope Dammi doesn't cut too much ;-P, although it might just get plundered and divied up to other applicable parts of the book and that would be fine too, just not preserve the narrative structure. Dammi has been a machine at designing Mystic Powers (read: "talents" taken up a notch!) and the team waits with bated breath to see all 135 of them he's got on paper (I kid you not, yes that many). Other mechanical discussions continue and writing of the GM sections has been underway as well. There's still a lot to do, but things are defintely moving! I can't wait to share the Eighth World with y'all!!!
Third, I've been rather quiet on the Earthdawn front... I've been itching to jump back into one project or another though... Hank's adventure in Landis, Grinder's secret project, and Legends of Earthdawn are all being worked on by others now, so I just have to pick one... not sure I'll have time to do more than one right now... I'm also leaning towards editing, as that Mystic Energy chapter took a lot out of me as far as writing goes. I also had REALLY wanted to prep an ED adventure to playtest... erm... GM as a pick-up game at GenCon. This was to be based on a shard idea I had pitched to the team over two years ago. Sadly, I haven't had time yet to flesh out the mechanical bits I'd need, BUT.... I still have 1.5 days... maybe I can squeeze it in.... we'll see! Keep your fingers crossed Bogie, I might just pull it off... (but don't hold your breath, quite yet, sorry....) If I do pull it off, I do hope to write it up as a Shard, so maybe everyone here might see it one day (there I said, hopefully I'll do it
)
Fourth, I've heard Fading Suns 3E is chugging along nicely, and nearly got roped into some editing there... maybe that would scratch my editing itch... BUT... for the moment I'm holding off as my semester starts up in 3 weeks and I have a bunch of writing to do for work as well. We'll see if James and Angus can finish persuading me in the near future
, or if Dammi can keep his claws fully in me.
Lastly, there's been some VERY preliminary discussion of an Earthdawn boardgame or two... with my passion for boardgames I had thrown out a few crazy ideas, and found an old one almost ready to playtest had been kicking around in the minds of an old timer and a current dev member. I got passed the info and brainstormed a bunch to flesh some bits out, but so far it remains on backburner... for both me and RedBrick. Maybe one day this'll see the light of day in some form, but it's a long way off right now.... but... watch this space! There may be more news on it from the netherworlds if it starts moving some more.
That's all for now... back to the astral realms I go... but first....
SEE YA AT GenCon Indy 2011!!!
Raven
Weiterlesen...
