4/17/06
Hey, all. Great week. Let?s get to the update.
I found a new concept artist, I probably mentioned that, and he?s given me some good work on armor, which is a happy thing. So far we hadn?t been able to produce armor concepts that quite satisfied. Now, some people are going to think our armor looks like D&D concepts, and it does in the fact that it doesn?t look like historical armor designs. Anything that goes in a different direction is probably going to be labeled as looking like D&D. I thought about that a lot in the very beginning, and I decided that I?d rather not look like historical armor and risk people drawing the other conclusion. Our architecture is probably going to look enough like historical Europe that I want something more interesting in armor and fashions.
Speaking of fashions, he?s working on those too. I haven?t seen any of that, though. I?ll either be able to use it or I won?t, so I?m not worrying about it. It will come in sometime early this week and I?ll throw it into an Artist?s Bible in time for them to start work on real illustrating.
Let?s get all the art stuff out of the way. I?ve put together my art list for the main product and it?s big. I?ve doled it out two the two artists and I have three pages of art left. Since that?s three out of thirteen, it?s not a terrible loss, but I might have to flush out the book with some clip art. I have one more lead on an artist, but he just got married so he isn?t answering e-mails. If anyone knows an artist that?s willing to work for royalties, let me know and point me somewhere I can see their art. Since this is an e-publishing startup, working for royalties is the same as working for peanuts, but it?s a credit and I?m giving ads to the artists like someone suggested on the forums (thanks for that). I?m already established as a game designer, so I?m looking to build other people?s careers at this point. And make some money of course. The couple of years I wrote full time were
wonderful.
Where was I?
Writing!
I?m ahead of deadline. This week I finished chapter 4, skipped chapter 5 (I?m not putting it in the first book . . . no room). Then I wrote chapter 6 (power groups). Then I wrote chapter 7 (Religion). Of course I had a lot of text already, so chunks were rewriting, not new text, but at times that made it harder. For instance, I had 17 pages of material for chapter 7. I needed to do three pages of that a day to hit deadline, but I had a lot of writing of new material in the beginning. I didn?t know what the final page count was going to be, so I had to stick to my three pages a day out of the 17 to know I was going to hit deadline. At the beginning, that meant one day where I had to do 9 pages, just because I had so much new material to write that I was covering very little of the existing text. I might have said this before, but professional writing is about being draconian to yourself on deadlines. I?m always two weeks late. I know that. I tell my publishers that and I plan accordingly and I?m always actually on deadline. Anyway, hitting deadline is about realizing you have to hit 9 pages in one day and still doing it. I?d be willing to say that 90% of all people fail as game designers because they can?t hit a deadline. I?ve lost a lot of cowriters to that, even among established designers.
What was the point of all that? Oh yeah. I?m one day ahead of deadline. That gives me a day to completely screw up (which is nice to have) or, if I can keep the lead, I finish the day before my birthday and don?t have to work on that day.
So what do I have Left? Here it is with projected page lengths:
Chapter 8?People. 5 pages (I want 15 but I can?t have it.) This will be a chapter on life in a feudal structure, mostly. Because of size constraints it will probably be mostly dispelling myths and recommending the Gies books for further reading.
Chapter 9--Legendary People and Places. 0 pages. I just don?t have room. One of the biggest complaints about PDFs are they are too long (and I?m looking at 200 pages in the first product as is).
Chapter 10?Miscellaneous. 5 pages. That?s just where I want it. I cover things like metals, and Ulcers and some big magic items (like the Fell Hammer.)
Appendix 1?Ludremon. 32 pages. Here we outline a country for the characters to adventure in while they wait for more sourcebooks. While I have enough info in Chapter 4 to adventure around the world, as a GM I personally like to had one really well-designed area. Some might have figured that out about me, especially if they?ve looked at my ghost writing work. Basically, this chapter is a bonus sourcebook.
Appendix 2?Character Creation and Sourcebooks. 5 pages. Maybe. This basically deals with all the information that wasn?t included in Chapter 2 (Races). Essentially, this chapter is all about me answering questions like, ?Can I use Fire and Ice in this world?? (The answer is yes.) Really, the big deal here is dealing with issues like playing a Mentalist. Mind reading can?t determine a person?s guilt or innocence, and so I have to talk about the implications of that so people can decide for themselves whether to warn away players from the profession.
Hmm. What else. Oh, yes, the play test.
Picture this. A field of waving grass. Seven bad guys are charging you (I?m keeping it vague to avoid spoilers). The rogue has decided that he doesn?t have enough space to hide for the ambush, so he?s going to attack. GerikGnome, reading his intention, screams in horror, ?Go to ground, man! They only get a prone bonus if you fail your hide!?
It was a good play test day. Exhausting, though, and all because of one fight. It was actually a nice anatomy lesson on how things can go wrong in a battle. Again with the vague. There?s a mechanic in this battle of the fourth adventure that will keep most characters out of a battle until they throw off a certain restriction. That vague enough for you? We have 6 characters plus the healer and a street urchin NPC. The encounter was set up so they are fighting an equal number of foes. The urchin don?t count. So that?s seven bad guys.
First round: GerikGnome throws a ball attack and realizes that he can?t practically score a high enough critical to hurt the bad guys (they aren?t medium-sized). The three tanks charge up and hold off all seven bad guys long enough for the others to bring in their own brand of pointy death. Unfortunately, the Bard and the Rogue can?t throw off that restriction I told you about. So the tanks weather the first round of attacks and are blasted by stun and other critical effects. Bad.
Second Round. GerikGnome spectacularly fails a SCSM and blasts himself out of the combat. The healer manages to get the main tank back up, cause she?d gone down. The bard and the rogue still can?t get into play, and this is the point in combat where the Rogue usually drops one bad guy from an ambush, freeing up one of the tanks to switch from tanking to killing. This starts the cascade where one tank can kill their remaining bad guy and flank a bad guy on another tank and this is the beginning of the end of the combat.
But it doesn?t happen.
Third round. The Healer manages to get GerikGnome back into play. GerikGnome fumbles another SCSM. I can?t remember the results, but I believe he just lost the spell and the pp.
Still no bard and no rogue.
The tanks are blasted to near death. We?ve already spent two fate points. GerikGnome is asking politely about whether he has to spend another when the party wipes. Effectively, these guys are fighting two to one odds with creatures only slightly lower level than them. They can?t get their assets into play.
Round four. The rogue manages to get rid of his restriction and lose himself in the trees (or the livestock, I can?t remember). GerikGnome casts his spell and rolls a natural 66. The players are weeping openly now. I roll randomly to determine what spell he accidently casts. Now I can?t tell you what spell it was without a spoiler, but it was 18th level and the table says I can ignore range restrictions. I decided that was enough of a precedent that the spell went off, even though he?d normally have to roll open-ended to cast it (hey, it?s an unusual success after all). Still, it might not have gotten past the bad guy?s RR but GerikGnome rolls a 99 base attack. Bam. One shot kill.
At this point, by the way, they?d done 33 damage to one bad guy and taken a couple hundred themselves.
That was the watershed event. The Bard managed to get into play the same round and controlling songed a bad guy. Now there were five bad guys fighting four tanks. The Rogue killed one the next round and after that it all came around.
But by the end of the play test, I was exhausted.
The funny thing is, when everything was going wrong, they were all telling me the fight was too hard. I had to remind them they?d had pretty much the exact same fight the week before. They?d just gotten all their assets into play in that fight. It was challenging, but I don?t think it occurred to anyone they might lose.
Anyway. Act Two of the adventure has location- and event-based encounters. They have two locations left and two events left, and then they are in Act Three. I suspect Act Two will take the first hour of play this weekend. Then there are some things to do in Act Three, but they should move through that with a purpose.
I quizzed GerikGnome down on what he thought was going on in the adventure?s mystery, and there are only two things he missed. One he missed because one character decided to charge a conversation before listening to hear if there was anything important to be learned. The other they had the week before, but they?d abandoned the theory in favor of another. It becomes obvious in the next event, so I?m not worried. The mystery aspect is nicely in hand. The next event might be harder if they haven?t gotten it all by then, but it shouldn?t be a problem.
Anyway. Everything?s good. If all the art comes in on time we?ll hit deadline (there is a possibility our fourth mystery system version might come out later than the other books, their license has a longer approval period).
If one of you recommends an artist to me, he might end up batting clean-up.
Anyway. Until next week. I?ll post a preview tomorrow. I might do a concept art preview next week if I have all the art nicely in hand.