If you are serious about your photography, always have your camera with you and take advantage of every opportunity. This shot was while my wife was at the doctors office. I just took the camera and wandered around the parking lot edges – proving you never know what you’ll find if you’ll just get out and look!!
Find Larry Winslett on Facebook and Flickr. His photos are available as prints and fine art cards.
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For previous Fine Photo Friday submissions, go here.
Interested in submitting your work to be featured on Fine Photo Friday? Go to this Facebook account and send in your submission via message!
Photographing at the Zoo can be a very rewarding experience and good practice for photographing wildlife in the field. The trick of course is to try and make the shots not look like Zoo shots. It’s always best to just go and see what animals are cooperating. Proceed with an open mind instead of thinking you’re going to that great shot of animal “X” today.
Find Larry Winslett on Facebook and Flickr. His photos are available as prints and fine art cards.
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For previous Fine Photo Friday submissions, go here.
Interested in submitting your work to be featured on Fine Photo Friday? Go to this Facebook account and send in your submission via message!
This week’s photo is a lesson in remembering to look around you – all around you. I was photographing Sandhill Cranes on a Tennessee Lake at some distance when I looked up and sitting right above me was this Peregrine Falcon looking down at me. So don’t forget to look up, behind and all around. You never know what’s sitting there. – Larry Winslett
Find Larry Winslett on Facebook and Flickr. His photos are available as prints and fine art cards.
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For previous Fine Photo Friday submissions, go here.
Interested in submitting your work to be featured on Fine Photo Friday? Go to this Facebook account and send in your submission via message!
“Under My Wing.” Another bird shot, Canadian Geese at a TVA lake in Tennessee. Fast shutter speeds are the key to capturing any wildlife – especially birds in flight.
Find Larry Winslett on Facebook and Flickr. His photos are available as prints and fine art cards.
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For previous Fine Photo Friday submissions, go here.
Interested in submitting your work to be featured on Fine Photo Friday? Go to this Facebook account and send in your submission via message!
This shot is from Bosque Del Apache Wildlife Reserve in southern New Mexico, a real bucket list location for birders and photographers. These kind of shots are always the result of high shutter speeds, timing, and a little luck!
Find Larry Winslett on Facebook and Flickr. His photos are available as prints and fine art cards.
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For previous Fine Photo Friday submissions, go here.
Interested in submitting your work to be featured on Fine Photo Friday? Go to this Facebook account and send in your submission via message!
Welcome to the latest edition of Fine Photo Friday.
We’ll be posting one photo every Friday.
This week’s submission is from nature photography specialist, Larry Winslett:
Water and Rock, Maine Coast
How water shots look are always dependent on how you use shutter speed. This shot is at 1/3 of a second (f14, ISO 100.) Lens is a Canon EFS18-135. Somewhere in this shutter speed range often gives a pleasing effect to moving water. Of course other factors like the speed of the water also play a role in how the image looks. See more water shots at www.larrywinslettphotography.com
Find Larry Winslett on Facebook and Flickr. His photos are available as prints and fine art cards.
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For previous Fine Photo Friday submissions, go here.
Interested in submitting your work to be featured on Fine Photo Friday? Go to this Facebook account and send in your submission via message!
Welcome to the first edition of Fine Photo Friday.
We’ll be posting one photo every Friday.
This week’s submission is from nature photography specialist, Larry Winslett:
This shot is from the Blue Ridge Parkway – Waterrock Knob, North Carolina – Milepost 451.2. The secret with sunrise shots – you always have to get up early to get the low clouds. This was shot with a Tamron 18-200mm lens – Exposure f8 @ 1/80 sec., no filters.
This one is an example of what happens late at night when one is “doodling” in Photoshop. It is always a good idea to play I think – we often learn the possibilities that way! So doodle away! – Larry Winslett
Find Larry Winslett on Facebook and Flickr. His photos are available as prints and fine art cards.
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For previous Fine Photo Friday submissions, go here.
Interested in submitting your work to be featured on Fine Photo Friday? Go to this Facebook account and send in your submission via message!
When I was younger, my grandparents would drive to Jekyll Island (on the coast of Georgia) to go fishing. They’d wake up before the crack of dawn, somehow get my smaller frame from the bed to the back of the car, and drive the forty-five minutes to the beach where we’d spend much of the day fishing and learning about various fish worth eating and not worth eating.
So when I saw that there was a steampunk related comic called The Jekyll Island Chronicles… I had to reach out.
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How long have you been creating/working in comics?
There are three of us in this endeavor and we all have been either reading or making comics since we were kids. I (Steve) used to sit in my room and draw my own versions of Spider-man and the Fantastic Four. Our actual jobs are all doing different things, so becoming graphic novel authors became a side hobby for us later in life. We actually started working on The Jekyll Island Chronicles in January of 2013.
At what point did you sit down to become a writer/artist? Do you remember the first thing you drew/wrote?
I think I am the one with the most graphic arts background. My dad worked in a factory during the day and would come home at night and paint portraits for friends and family members, to make extra spending money. He taught me how to draw when I was old enough to hold a pencil. I remember a book of Disney characters that I drew when I was a kid. I remember him sitting at the kitchen table with me and building dinosaur models. I have since graduated to more extensive and difficult kits, and scratch built a bunch of my own. Creating art has a wonderful, calming effect on me.
All three of us have been heavily involved in writing projects of our own in the past as well. Ed wrote another book several years back and Jack and I have been writing plays and sketch comedy for our church for many years.
Who inspires you? Or do you have a favorite artist or creator?
Jack loves experiences: he is a Disneyphile through and through. He would build a scale (and highly detailed) model of Disneyland in his house if he could. Ed is a voracious reader and plows through novels constantly. He loves sci/fi, mysteries, and westerns. And I get inspirations everywhere, no place in particular. Sometimes, I just like to walk through a retail shopping center and look for things that inspire me.
How do you manage your daily/family life with your creative work? Is this your 9 to 5 or is this your 10 to 2?
Hah! We all have really demanding jobs. This is our hobby. Nights, weekends, while watching tv or sports at night. I am usually sitting drawing thumbnails on my ipad to make life easier for our artists. We try to meet periodically to line up on story and plot development (maybe once or twice a month). We tell our spouses we don’t play golf (at least not well), so this is our club membership.
It’s often difficult to get word out about independent/small press comics. What do you do to market and promote your books? Anything work really well or really poorly?
It’s been an eye-opening experience. I have an author friend at work who told me that marketing of books has changed over the years—authors are really much more responsible for this and publishers are, well, publishers. I have found this to be generally true. Not bad. Just generally true.
Our publisher at Top Shelf, Chris Staros, told us pretty much the same thing after we signed our book deal. They publish the books, invite us to the Cons where they are present, put the books out in the proper channels, but we do the heavy lifting on the marketing (Facebook & websites, blogging, boosting posts, local book signings, reaching out to newspapers and magazines, etc etc etc). We had to learn how to do a bunch of stuff, from a literary marketing standpoint, that we have never done before. But Chris is a great sounding board for us and happily answers any questions we have. It’s so good to have his knowledge and experience base in our corner when we need it (which is A LOT!) We are working with a PR firm on putting together proposals for the release of Book Two. So, we are hoping to have more firepower in that area.
What’s your process look like when you’re writing? Do you go with the full outline? Or are you a fly by the seat of your pants type?
We have to have an outline. We use the classic three-act story structure, but because we are a series, we have to layer that structure over each book as well as the entire series. I guess that’s why trilogies make sense. For Book One, I had a lot of the basic story arc in my head, and Jack and Ed helped me fill in a bunch–like the whole Jekyll Island connection. Book Two was more of a blank page than Book One, so it was harder. We use note cards with plot points and move things around constantly in the beginning. When we get the arc locked down, we divide and conquer the writing duties, usually giving one person an act to tackle. We come back, read together, edit together, and make suggestions. The key is to hold your writing loosely. You can’t be so dogmatic to “have it your way”. If that happens, you frustrate everyone and it flies in the face of collaboration and making each other better. We are long-time friends, so that makes it easier. But even then, every once in a while, we have to work through things. It really is a lot of give and take.
I currently live just north of Atlanta, in Suwanee, Georgia, but I’ve been to Jekyll Island dozens of times when I was younger. So it was very cool to even see that this book existed. What inspired you to create Jekyll Island Chronicles?
Ed was instrumental in coming up with the idea to place much of the story at Jekyll. When I explained the original idea to him, he asked if I had ever been to Jekyll. I had been in Atlanta for 25 years and had never gone there, and only just heard of it but never really knew about its history. So, my wife and I took a weekend, went to down to the island, toured it and my brain exploded. It was the PERFECT set up for the characters and the scenarios, which were all post-WWI and at the height of the gilded age at Jekyll. It is a Georgia treasure and our hope is that people, especially Georgians, will become a little more knowledgeable about their own history.
What’s been the reaction to the book?
It’s been extremely positive. Of course, our family and friends have been our biggest cheerleaders. We’ve gotten good reviews on Amazon (especially) and Good Reads. Every once in a while we get someone who “doesn’t get it” or takes issue with the alt history portions of it. We even had one guy who reviewed it and got the plot/character points wrong, so did he even read it?? But then again we were named one of the Top 10 Books Every Young Georgian Should Read for 2017 (all graphic novels go in that category)—so that was a nice feather in our cap. We already had a second printing. We had a line of people waiting to sign the book at the NY Comic Con, so that was pretty cool. We’ve gotten a lot of interest from podcasters, bloggers and people wanting to do interviews. This is our first rodeo, but so far, so good.
Are there themes and/or subjects you find yourself drawn to again and again in your work?
We started this whole process with themes. We wrote down the things/principles we believed and wanted to be true for our story. First, we saw a lot of cynicism with heroes—dark heroes, conflicted heroes—and we wanted to do something different. Maybe even classic. My grandfather fought in the US Cavalry in WWI to gain his citizenship. He was a regular, simple man of principle. He knew right from wrong. He wasn’t perfect, but he wasn’t constantly dark and conflicted. We wanted a return to classic heroism. We wanted people who were willing to work together in spite of their differences. Our country is torn down the middle today and we are all saddened and sick of it. At least we have a built a world where people can come together for the greater good.
Also, we wanted to have a world where it wasn’t evil to have resources. Andrew Carnegie gave away like $300 million dollars. He built a system of libraries all across the country. Not all people with wealth are robber barons, you know? Jack and I worked for one for decades. There is good and evil is ALL people–not just one group, one type, or one party. We hoped that the book would force people to actually look for the good in all of our heroes. Finally, we wanted a story where the veterans were the biggest heroes. We owe SO MUCH to them. It’s no surprise that our original heroes are the broken WWI vets that get “rebuilt” to fight the atrocities of the early 20th century anarchists.
Your first graphic novel was released by Top Shelf & IDW Publishing. How did that relationship come about?
We actually sponsored a class at SCAD in Savannah to help us create a pitch packet for publishers/production companies that might be interested in our idea. Once we got the packet done, we approached Chris Staros with Top Shelf. He was Georgia-based, actually Marietta-based, which was right around the corner from all of us. We called him, took him to lunch one day, introduced ourselves, and handed him the pitch packet. He said he would take a look at it and give us comments. The next day he called me and said he thought it was good—really good—and if we finished it, he would like to keep the whole thing in Georgia and publish for us. WOW. I know that this is NOT how it is supposed to work. But, it happened for us and we were, and still are, very grateful to Chris and his confidence. When Top Shelf got acquired by IDW, that confidence transferred over to them. They have been huge supporters of ours and they now have us in their catalog that they send to production companies for tv/film.
You currently have 1 graphic novel out there with a second one due out next year. What’s the overall plan with Jekyll Island Chronicles?
The plan is to keep making books until we get too tired and stop (or someone tells us to stop). At least we want 3. But the larger goal is 6. The story arc of the original Jekyll Island Club ends in WWII. We would love to take it that far.
I see on your website that there are teaching materials based on the comic. Can you talk a little about how you came to that idea as well as your goals with the program?
Well, the story has a TON of facts in it. The alt history component actually has a lot of HISTORY. We always loved the idea of using the book to teach history and have students weave through the narrative of what is true and what is not. So we approached Glen Downey (an author who is an expert in this area) and he agreed to put together teaching materials for us. They are all available for free on our website. We have a public high school in the Jekyll area that is using it in both the US and world history class, and a private school here in Cobb County that is doing the same thing. Ideally, this is a great way for creative teachers to introduce their students not just to history but also to the medium of the graphic novel. We think this is a big idea.
Comics is an amazing collaborative medium. Tell me a little about the artists on the books.
We met both of our artists in our SCAD class. They were students who, at the time, were finishing up their studies. Moses Nester is our illustrator/inker and SJ Miller is our colorist. One is in ATL and one is in Vegas. Everything is done digitally. I take the script, gather reference photos, drop them into an app for my ipad called Strip Designer and create tight comps/thumbnails, send them electronically to Moses who inks, sends to SJ for coloring and sound effects and then back to me for final approval. It seems to work pretty well. Our artists are very gifted individuals with a bright career in front of them! We are just so happy that we have access to them at this time of their lives—and we hope this is given them so good experience to bounce off of for the future.
If you could go back in time ten years, what advice might you have for your younger self? Something you wish you knew?
I wish I knew that I was really responsible for my creative outlets in life. I mean, I have always been creative, but sometimes at work, I was waiting for that itch to be scratched there. And at times, that didn’t happen. I wish I had been more aware of the idea to create instead of consume, and now I hope that our creative endeavor helps others to do the same. Bottom line, if opportunity doesn’t knock, build a door (with credit to Milton Berle for that fine axiom).
Where’s the best place to find out more about Jekyll Island Chronicles and the rest of your works?
Steampunkers are welcome to check out our website, where we have a link for selling the book, pre-ordering book two and buying other merch. And the book is available in bookstores and on line everywhere.
STEVE NEDVIDEK has worked in film, radio, and television and received his Masters Degree in Theater from Wake Forest University, where he completed his thesis in make-up design. He is an avid cartoonist, model maker, writer, and movie watcher, and resides in the Atlanta suburbs with his wife, kids, and dog.
ED CROWELL holds advanced degrees in political science and international affairs. He is an executive at a non-profit and a writer with dozens of published articles. A lifelong fan of science fiction and fantasy, he and his wife have two children who went off to college, but left Ed and Cynthia with two cats, a fish, and a dog.
JACK LOWE is a student of film making and themed entertainment. A passionate storyteller with a bent toward immersive, multi-sensory experiences, Jack and his wife, three children, two dogs, and two cats live in the shadow of Kennesaw Mountain in Atlanta.
Ed is on the left, Steve in center, Jack on right
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I want to thank Steve for taking the time to answer my questions!
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John McGuire is the creator/author of the steampunk comic The Gilded Age. Want to read the first issue for free? Click here! Already read it and eager for more?
Occasionally, I like to reach back into the archives to repost something from waaay back when. That time after Tessera had just started, and I was blogging about anything I could think of. The following was one of my very first blogs (maybe a month into blogging at this point). It’s all about how sometimes you are just in for a very bad day.
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With it being Thanksgiving Week, I figured this was a good time for me to reflect on what I’m thankful for. However, this particular thing is not a person or a place, but a moment in time that could have gone all sorts of sideways on me. So, sit back on this pre-turkey day and take a stroll to March/April 1999.
It was during my last year at Georgia Tech, at the end of Winter Quarter… finals week. I don’t know how many finals I had that quarter, I believe 4, and of course, I had 2 scheduled on that Friday.
Which wasn’t supposed to happen. The policy at Tech was that you only should have 1 final per day. They figured, smartly, that you were under enough stress studying for a test that would pretty much make or break your grade, so why complicate things with trying to study for 2 at once. And let me tell you, I tried to get one of them rescheduled for earlier in the week. I begged and pleaded, and each of the professors told me that I needed to talk with the other one as “Their class took precedence”. After banging my head against that wall, I sucked it up and took my medicine like a good boy.
I don’t remember what the classes were, nor do I remember how long I was up the night before (heck, the week before). What I do remember is that feeling of relief as soon as I finished that second test. I walked out of the classroom feeling both the extreme fatigue, but also filled with a warm feeling knowing that I was that much closer to being done with school (I would graduate at the end of the year). The Mountain Dew surging through my veins had managed to keep me awake long enough. So, I begin driving back to my apartment in Decatur, Georgia.
Again, I don’t recall much of the drive until I got into the city limits. Only 1 mile away from my place I come to a stop at a red light. All I want at this point is to go and take a nap and not wake up until sometime on Sunday. My body ached, my brain ached, and my eyes ached. The light seemed to go on forever, but with the free time afforded to me suddenly, I took a glance into my rearview mirror…
And saw one of Decatur Police’s finest behind me. Now I pass the Police Station almost on a daily basis. Never worried about it…
Until right then.
What’s the problem you ask? Well, there was one other thing that happened to me prior to my double finals. My poor Pontiac Sunbird was in the shop (I was just hoping to get through school with it, figuring once I got a job I could get a new car). Courtney, my girlfriend at the time (and my wife now) was going to Cancun on Spring Break. She made me a deal (she loves to make deals, her nickname is Monty Haul): I can use her car for the week if I take her to the airport (or perhaps it was to MARTA) at some ungodly hour in the morning. Not having much of a choice, I agreed. As I dropped her off she said these fateful words:
“Hey, if you get a chance, could you swap out my tag, I haven’t done that yet.” (She placed the physical tag in the passenger seat so I wouldn’t forget.)
“Sure.”
Oh, and if you don’t know, her birthday is in December…
And it was now late March/early April.
And the tag still hadn’t been changed.
Anyway! Flashback to me in the car with the cop behind me.
Please don’t notice, please don’t notice…
The light turns green. I press on the gas and the red lights flicker on behind me.
Damn.
I pull the car over on the next side road. Annoyed. Nervous.
Oh, and the window on her car did not work (did I mention that this Honda Civic from the stone ages was effectively a lemon?). So I have to open the door when he approaches. I’m sure that got his Spidey Sense tingling.
“Do you know why I pulled you over?”
I did.
“I’m assuming it is due to the expired tag?”
“Yes.”
“Look, it is right here. This is my girlfriend’s car. I’m on my way home and I was going to change it.”
When I handed him my license and insurance card my hand was shaking. Visibly shaking. The kind of shaking where you realize that it is shaking and the more you try to stop it from doing it, the more it continues…
Shaking.
“Why is your hand shaking son?”
Because I’m running on about 4 hours of sleep for the week. Because I have enough Mountain Dew in me that my blood is yellow and not red. Because my brain is fried from taking two finals in one day.
I did not say any of those things.
“I don’t know.”
“Please step out of the car, son.”
A second police car pulls up at this point.
“May I search your vehicle?”
Yeah, I’ve got nothing to hide. I’ve never done drugs. I’m not drunk.
“Sure”.
NOOOOOO! What are you thinking? This isn’t your car. You don’t know who Courtney might have had in the car. Yeah, you trust her, but what if they stuffed something under the seats?
Well, too late now.
The second cop pulls me aside while the first begins to go through the car, my backpack, glove compartment, trunk, etc. I joke that Courtney is going to get an earful after this. A few minutes later, the first cop calls me back over. Stacked in a nice row on top of the car are pills of various shapes and sizes.
Courtney was notorious for opening her pill bottle and having them go flying about the car. She never cleaned them up, so the floorboards were littered with various pills. If you knew her, it was no big deal.
These guys don’t know her.
“What are these?”
I looked at them, fear in the pit of my stomach.
“Those are herbal diet supplements my mom sells.”
“Those are my girlfriend’s epilepsy medicine.”
Those I have no idea what they are.
“I think those are more epilepsy medicine.”
And then came the words I never hope to hear again…
“This will go a lot easier on you if you just tell the truth.”
What!?! But I am… I don’t… WHAT!?!
“Are you on something? Speed?”
“No, sir. I don’t do drugs.”
“And this diet pill, if we call your mom and she comes down to the station she’d confirm that?”
I don’t think I was trying to be a smart-ass, but…
“Well sir, she’s in Richmond, Virginia.”
A third cop pulled up (I am not kidding). Apparently it was a slow day in the City of Decatur. That or I was Walter White 10 years before Breaking Bad… or would that make me Jessie?
At this point, I was led to the first officer’s police car and placed in the back seat.
A couple of observations:
Not a ton of legroom. Guess they shouldn’t be all that concerned about whether the criminals are comfortable. Still, I’m 6’5″ and I was kissing my knees.
This was the first and only time I’m ever been in the back of a police vehicle (I’m hopeful that this remains true for a very long time). I missed that opportunity earlier in my life by 15 minutes back in high school (another story for another holiday).
While the 3 officers searched the car, ran my information, and made me sweat, three songs played on the radio. I wish I could say that I remember them (my guess is that there was a Red Hot Chili Pepper’s song since they are the bane of my existence and 99x played them about every 5th song), but my brain focused on the various scenarios where my future mother and father-in-law would have to come bail me out of jail.
My friend Egg’s voice popped into my ear, “John, they’re cops. They can do anything they want.”
Later, when I relayed this story to my sister, she said, “You do realize that there was probably a drug deal going on within 100 yards of you and yet they are harassing you.”
My Dad said, “Well, you did fit the profile. 20-something, expired tags, beat-up car.”
So about 10 minutes pass and the first cop comes around to the door and opens it up.
“Get out.”
I stood up as he handed me my information (along with the tag).
“We’re done, for now. Get that tag changed.”
“Yes, sir.”
Drive that last mile home. Go upstairs and grab my tools and CHANGE THE DAMN TAG.
It was only at that point did my pounding heart begin to slow down.
A small postscript to this story. That night, Courtney called me to tell me she was in Cancun. By this point, I’d relayed the story to my roommate and to another friend, so it was becoming something funny (Comedy is just tragedy from a distance). So I started telling her about it. I was about 1/3 of the way into the story when I heard her start balling on the other end of the phone. “I’m so sorry!” over and over. I felt so bad about making her cry I don’t think I ever really gave her the business about the incident in the first place.
I guess I still owe her for that fun experience.
But, yeah, I’m (very, extremely, beyond, etc.) thankful that I didn’t go to jail that day.
Happy Thanksgiving!
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While Thanksgiving is a while off, I hope you and yours are staying safe. Thanks for reading!
For this post, I’m reviewing nine RPG Kickstarters that are powered by the D&D 5e, Era d10, FATE, Pathfinder, Savage Worlds, Starfinder, and more systems. Nine RPGs that are running campaigns and hoping you’ll back them. Let’s count’em down!
“Explore a solar system and defend Humanity from an alien fleet! Era: Balam runs on your choice of Era d10, FATE or Savage Worlds!
In this game, you are a pilot, with your own “Paladin” one-man ship, sent out to explore space and defend Humanity! Together with other pilots, you’ll form a squadron and head out into the black…
This game offers rules for space combat, salvaging materials and upgrading your fighter, a list of bases you can visit (both friendly and not-so-friendly), space-based dogfights and a variety of weapons from bullet-based to plasma cannons!
If you like games such as Homeworld, Freelancer or Elite: Dangerous, this is the RPG for you!
In Era: Balam, your ship is a part of your character, as much as the pilot.
It defines most of your physical statistics, providing a duality to this game which I’ve never explored before: while a pilot may technically survive without their ship, it will feel like they have lost a part of themselves.
A Paladin and its Pilot are a single character in this game, working together!
The Paladin ships which appear in this game are fully upgradable, and provide various options as the players progress, including painlessly changing “Class” by replacing the Main Module!”
I’ve covered several Shades of Vengeance games in this column, I’ve interviewed Ed Jowett of SoV, and I’m freelancing on an Era d10 project for SoV, clearly I’m all for Vengeance. But among SoV’s games, what makes Era: Balam stand out? In a word, expansion. In this game you’re both your character and your ship, which explains this game’s setup concisely while offering a lot of cool options. Both the person and the tool have a role to play and together they elevate this RPG to be something akin to Star Wars: Rogue Squadron or Battlestar: Galactica. Add to that, this RPG is available for Savage Worlds, FATE, or Shades of Vengeance’s house system, Era d10, and you have a winner.
You can see examples of Shades of Vengeance’s work at DriveThruRPG here.
“Take up sword and gun to seek fame and fortune in this gritty fantasy game set in modern-day Earth.
“I know what you’re thinkin’, kid. With all the stuff out there, all the cash, treasure, monsters and adventure waiting to be had.. what the hell is anyone doing in a nine-to-five, waste-of-time job?”, the old dwarf grunted with a voice like rolling gravel. “Well, I’ll tell ya, it sure as shit doesn’t have anything to do with really livin’, that’s for sure.” The dwarf was eye level with the kid, even though the human boy was probably only a small fraction of his own age. Stubby fingers curled around his massive, braided beard and stroked downward, flattening out a few stray red-and-gray hairs that had gone astray. “It’s all about security. See, cities like this one got all kinds of that stuff. Vancouver. Atlanta. Hell, even the most dangerous hood in Detroit ain’t got nothin’ on the shit you’ll find taking up gun and sword and heading off into the tombs. Most folks’ll tell you that, and most folks are right. I done seen more death and carnage than any CEO could ever dream about in an entire lifetime. I’m the sole survivor of a group of seven of us.” the dwarf said with a half-psychotic grimace that may have been mistaken for a smile, showing off those yellowed teeth interspersed with gold ones that replaced the teeth that had been knocked out by god-knows-what. “It’s a shit life, being an adventurer. You’re going to go hungry. You’re going to get hurt. Shit, you will probably even die.” he said with a chuckle. “So why do I do it?” the dwarf peered at the kid with his one good eye and got close enough that the boy could smell the leather of his armor and the whiskey on his breath, “Kid. If you gotta ask, you ain’t ever gonna know.”
Pathfinder: Modern Adventures is a game of fantasy based in the real-world. It’s Earth, with a twist. Humans are not alone. There are elves, gnomes, dwarves and all manner of other strange creatures, hybrids and half-bloods earning a living and trying to get by. Nearly everyone just wants a comfortable, safe life where they are free to exist in peace, earn a liveable wage and die with a few grandchildren under foot.
Then, there are the adventurers.
The adventurers make their living by scouring the lands trying to find old tombs, abandoned catecombs and places lost to time. They battle monsters, brave dangerous traps and explore the unknown. Some do it in the hopes of getting rich. Others do it to earn a name. Some simply want to test their own mettle. Adventurer’s leave the relative safety of the lives they know, working jobs, tending their home or living on the streets in order to explore parts of the world that no sane person would ever enter.
From the veil of the city, you might never see the truth of the world beyond. All the magic and monsters that only rarely creep into the cities themselves are waiting for a brave soul to come and face them, and earn vast richest and fame in so doing.”
Ray Machuga of Higher Ground Publishing messaged me about this project before it came out (the press release is here) and the concept hooked me. The timing for a Pathfinder product that sits, more or less, squarely in the middle of the timeline between Pathfinder and Starfinder could not have been better timed. Starfinder is a hit and Ray’s product is the logical outgrowth of that – Modern Adventures. How would elves and trolls and mortgages and gazebos live together today? This is the game to answer that and offer new levels of adventures.
You can see examples of Higher Ground Publishing’s work at DriveThruRPG here.
“A Fate Core campaign setting of villainous henchmen in a hero thwarts Doomsday device world.
Your money will bring our Henchmen to life.
The Premise
Henchmen is a game in which characters get to explore the trials and tribulations of being little cogs in the grand machine of an evil organisation. While many games focus on gaining power and overcoming foes, this game takes a slightly different approach.
You can play the game any way you want to, but we envisage Henchmen being played in two ways, the ‘day in the life’ tribulations of an expendable goon squad, or as a long ‘Villains Journey’ campaign. For the latter, we have outlined a ‘development arc’ of significant milestones, linked to each character’s personal journey from nobody to nightmare.
Unlike more ‘heroic’ games, Henchmen is not predicated on PCs succeeding on their various errands and missions. Success might be achieved of course, but often failure, disaster and doom must be coped with, blame must be deflected and whatever credit is left must be seized.
The Evil Organisation is a unique Fate Fractal for Henchmen, with its own aspects, skills, Fate points and perks. You might even think of the PCs as its stress boxes, since it will expend them to protect itself from consequences.”
Wanna-lancer Reward Levels:
“Recruited to Evil / Master of Evil / Master of Good
Pledge £100 ($129) or £150 ($193) depending on reward level
Work with our team to design a Henchman/an evil organisation/an opponent for the Henchmen to join our existing examples. Cast yourself, a friend or a favoured character as…
Includes:
Credit as a Contributing Designer”
Egg’s Thoughts:
Want to be the villain? This setting is founded to be the stage for that idea as you play the no-goodniks! Canterbury Games Studio is offering several options to create NPCs or an evil organization for their FATE-based setting; so, if creating enemies using FATE is your idea of fun, Canterbury Games has you covered.
“A new cyberpunk-themed tabletop roleplaying game where your identity has become the most valuable commodity on the planet.
IDENTECO
IDENTECO is a game about the struggle to define humanity and retain identity in the highly digital era known as “The Static Age.” Corporations hold more power over the people in the world. They have created ways to monetize and commoditize a person’s identity using massive data farms and social engineering hacks to influence everyday life. Through carefully crafted marketing and slick branding, the Corps don’t force their will onto people, as much as they enforce their worth in people’s minds.
You play a character trying to survive in the Static Age, starting at the bottom and working your way up the social or corporate ladder by any means necessary.
IDENTECO is built on an new, modern D20-based system that emphasizes fast gameplay and rewards social interaction and role playing. Every interaction builds onto the story and the legacy of the characters. The more you play the game, the more you construct your character’s identity, or possibly identities. As the game progresses the thin line between famous and infamous depends solely on who’s watching.
The year is 2099. The world is a much different place.
After a series of devastating terrorist attacks on America’s heartland by an unseen enemy the government was in disarray. The corporations were the only thing left to protect the populace and rebuild society. So they did. Like technocratic gods they rebuilt America™ in their image, and then used new economies of scale and political financial systems to reshape the globe. As a reaction to the attacks, the U.N. created the Centralized Human Identity Program (C.H.I.P.), a sort of universal I.D. program for the world. The C.H.I.P. is implanted in your arm when you are born and is encrypted using your unique DNA sequence. It standardized passports, medical records, employment histories, education records, and much more. It’s a sort of living history, if you will. And Corps have figured out ways to use this information for dubious means.
Now neon-speckled city-states called megaplexes have sprung up around the world. These enormous urban areas have reshaped the landscape, blending tech and corporate culture into shiny playgrounds for consumers and industries alike. There is a steep divide between the haves and the have-nots; those in the city, and those on the fringe.
Outside the cities, non-CHIPed folk live off what is left in the wasteland areas in between cities. Small settlements and simple cities act as rest stops for weary travelers and nomadic tribes. Out in the wastes, you battle beast and man to live a “free” life away from corporate influence. It’s a simpler, but no less deadly, place.”
Wanna-lancer Reward Levels:
“Pledge $150 OR $250
Entrepreneur OR Greaser
You get to work with the designers to create a custom Corporation OR a custom R.O.V. [Remotely Operated Vehicle] that will appear in the Core Rule Book, plus all the rewards at the Operative level.”
Egg’s Thoughts:
To help establish the feel of this RPG, Humanoid Games produced a prose anthology set in their world (you can check it out on Amazon here). This will give you a better idea of whether this game is for you. For me, post-apocalyptic cyberpunk presented in a variant d20 system with great art and wanna-lancer* options where I get to create a corporation and then fight it in the game has my interest piqued! Bring it on!
*Wanna-lancer™ – A gamer that’s pursuing freelance RPG work. Some back RPG Kickstarters that offer rewards to create NPCs, spells, items, adventures, etc. in order to build up their resume, make contact with publishers, and learn what’s expected on assignments.
You can see examples of Humanoid Games’ work at Amazon here.
“A massive tome of nearly 300 out-of-this-world creatures for 5E, Starfinder, and Pathfinder sci-fi and space adventures!
In space, maybe no one else can hear you scream, but those cries of terror are music to the GM’s ears. While there are monster books aplenty for fantasy games, there has never been a truly encyclopedic tome of terrors from beyond the stars… until now!
Cover image is a placeholder. The final cover piece is out of this world!
The Alien Bestiary brings you hundreds of monsters for your space and sci-fi game, whether you play with the brand-new Starfinder Roleplaying Game or the 5th Edition of the world’s most famous RPG!
In addition, by popular demand we have added the Alien Bestiary Companion for the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game, which is now available to bring all of our awesome new monsters and your favorites from our More Monsters polls together, with an appendix guiding you to other awesome extraterrestrials already published in official Pathfinder sources.
The Alien Bestiary is a full-sized, full-color bestiary features at least incredible aliens of every description, from tiny robot walking eyes to Lovecraftian Great Old Ones, from humanoid races both friendly and foul to inhuman abominations from the darkest nebulas. Of course, fans of the star-spanning Legendary Planet saga will recognize the fiendish foes like the savage klaven footsoldiers, sinister jagladine genetic engineers, warmongering bil’djooli shock troopers, and many, many more!
Bil’djooli Shock Trooper, by Lance Red
In addition, as part of our continued partnership with Robert Brookes and the gang at Encounter Table Publishing, fans of the awe-inspiring Aethera Campaign Setting will also find more exciting additions to their spacefaring saga, from the invading taur and aether-touched infused to the organic symbionts, living machine phalanx, and, of course, the magnificently malevolent kytons!
That promise of 200 pages of marvelous monsters is just the starting point. As our Kickstarter goes along, we’ll be adding tons of terrific space-dwelling monsters from across the fantasy/sci-fi legendarium, from insidious intellect devourers and aboleth to parasitic viper vines, brain-eating neh-thalggu, space-warping hounds of Tindalos, murderous gugs, lethal lunarmas, a regiment of robots, and spectacular star-soaring solar dragons! Best of all, when you back this project YOU get to help decide which monsters make the cut! Vote early and often for your favorite featured creatures as we keep adding more and more to this beautiful book!”
Solar Dragon by Tanyaporn Sangsnit
Wanna-lancer Reward Add-ons:
“Xenobiologist: Add $150 to select an existing monster from any published source; your monster automatically gets added to the Alien Bestiary and converted for Starfinder and 5th Edition rules. We can’t duplicate creatures from non-OGL sources, like 2nd Edition space-fantasy games involving a Jammer of Spells, but we’ll work with you to create something awesome and evocative of the original! Your pledge includes a beautiful illustration to accompany whatever you create, and you’ll be listed in that compendium’s credits as a Xenobiologist and you’ll receive a high-res PDF (and high-quality print along with a print order) of your sponsored creature!
Join the Space Program: Add $200 to submit a Starfinder or 5th Edition character for one of the races in the Alien Codex (or any of the standard Starfinder RPG races)! Your character will be included as one of the standard NPCs for your chosen race, and your character will be beautifully illustrated. You’ll be listed in the credits as a Astronaut Adventurer and you’ll receive a high-res PDF (and high-quality print along with a print order) of your sponsored illustration!
It Came from Outer Space! Add $300 to help design a new monster for inclusion in the Alien Bestiary! Your name will be listed in the final compilation as a Space Spawner and you’ll receive a high-res PDF (and high-quality print along with a print order) of the monster you create!”
Ysoki Rogue by Arrahman Rendi
Egg’s Thoughts:
Monsters for 5e, Pathfinder, or Starfinder, and you can create a monster for it, and they have art like the Solar Dragon… I know my level of interest is through the roof! I believe that this does not need any more selling, you know if you need this in your library or not so here’s the link.
You can see examples of Legendary Games work at DriveThruRPG here.
“Another collection of one-shot 5E Dungeons & Dragons adventures, designed to easily implement into your campaign setting.
SideQuests are back!
SideQuests are a collection of short adventures designed for Fifth Edition Dungeons and Dragons. These one-shot style campaigns are designed to be compelling standalone stories that can be implemented, played through, and completed in just a few sessions. Whether you’re using them as a filler adventure between your own major story arcs, as one-offs to play with people unfamiliar to D&D, or just because you forgot to plan your next session, the second edition of SideQuests aims to be even more invaluable tools for your DM toolbox.
SideQuests II: The Covers
Each campaign comes with a variety of customization features: Adventure Hooks and Epilogues — so you can naturally ease your players in and out of each and every quest. SideQuests are designed to work in tandem with your own campaigns, so you can easily substitute anything within the modules for your own original content. Each volume also comes with a variety of role-playing, puzzle, looting, and combat scenarios, so players will enjoy them no matter what they personally value in a roleplaying adventure.
Every adventure module comes as a full-colour, beautifully designed PDF, as well as a more minimal print version: So you can either print the modules off, or run them digitally straight off of your laptop or tablet. Every module features stunning design, original artwork, and gorgeous photography.”
“Places by the Way #3: Secrets of Oyster Cove is a short location module for Dungeons & Dragons 5th Edition.
Welcome to Ramen Sandwich Press’ third Kickstarter campaign in support of Places by the Way. This campaign offers one last chance to pre-order copies of the Limited Edition of Places by the Way #3: Secrets of Oyster Cove.
Secrets of Oyster Cove
Places by the Way
For those of you who missed our first two campaigns, Places by the Way is a series of short modules that I’m creating for use with Dungeons & Dragons 5th Edition. They work fine as short stand-alone adventures, but each Places by the Way module is meant to be a kit for creating a memorable interlude in a larger campaign. Each entry in the series consists of two versions sold separately but similar in content. One version is set in the Forgotten Realms, so Ramen Sandwich Press sells it exclusively through Dungeon Masters Guild. The other version assumes a generic setting and complies with WotC’s Open Game License. It’s available through DriveThru RPG, RPGNow and Dungeon Masters Guild, and a print version is available through Amazon and other online outlets.”
You can see examples of Ramen Sandwich Press work at DriveThruRPG here.
“An exciting 3-5 session adventure playable at any level for use as a side quest or part of a main storyline!
A town is beset by incursions from strange creatures; constructs of metal, magic, and old bones. All signs point to the mysterious Quartztoil Tower, standing tall over the mountains to the north, and thought long abandoned. Rumors of the magical secrets contained within have not gone unnoticed, however, and others are drawn to the tower by dark dreams, and darker voices…
Book Specs
Page Count: 50-60 Color: Full Color Binding: Perfect Bound Softcover Paper: Glossy”
You can see examples of Nord Games work at DMsGuild here.
Egg’s Thoughts for SideQuests II, Secrets of Oyster Cove, and Artifices of Quartztoil Tower:
SideQuests and Secrets of Oyster Cove and Artifices of Quartztoil Tower are one-shot modules for 5e. They’re meant to be insert adventures between a larger campaign. They all have a great deal to offer and could fill a hole in your campaign or, collectively, be your campaign.
I want to draw attention to Artifices of Quartztoil Tower because the art is amazing and Nord Gameshas produced some outstanding products. Top that off with a $10 price tag and it’s a winner!
Disclosure: This article contains affiliate links to DriveThruRPG.com.
* * * * * *
Egg Embry, Wanna-lancer™
Wanna-lancer™ Checklist T-shirt available at Cafepress
Interested in being a wanna-lancer? Start with the official Wanna-lancer Checklist t-shirt orwall clock or ice tea glass!
* * * * * *
Egg Embry wrote comic book short stories, edited comic book series, wrote and drew a webcomic, and contributed to comic book journalism across the 2000s. Now, he buys the opportunity to write for a variety of tabletop role-playing games in the tradition of vanity press. His purchases have been published by:
With it being Thanksgiving Week, I figured this was a good time for me to reflect on what I’m thankful for. However, this particular thing is not a person or a place, but a moment in time that could have gone all sorts of sideways on me. So, sit back on this pre-turkey day and take a stroll to March/April 1999.
It was during my last year at Georgia Tech, at the end of Winter Quarter… finals week. I don’t know how many finals I had that quarter, I believe 4, and of course, I had 2 scheduled on that Friday.
Which wasn’t supposed to happen. The policy at Tech was that you only should have 1 final per day. They figured, smartly, that you were under enough stress studying for a test that would pretty much make or break your grade, so why complicate things with trying to study for 2 at once. And let me tell you, I tried to get one of them rescheduled for earlier in the week. I begged and pleaded, and each of the professors told me that I needed to talk with the other one as “Their class took prescedence”. After banging my head against that wall, I sucked it up, and took my medicine like a good boy.
I don’t remember what the classes were, nor do I remember how long I was up the night before (heck, the week before). What I do remember is that feeling of relief as soon as I finished that second test. I walked out of the classroom feeling both the extreme fatigue, but also filled with a warm feeling knowing that I was that much closer to being done with school (I would graduate at the end of the year). The Mountain Dew surging through my veins had managed to keep me awake long enough. So, I begin driving back to my apartment in Decatur, Georgia.
Again, I don’t recall much of the drive until I got into the city limits. Only 1 mile away from my place I come to a stop at a redlight. All I want at this point is to go and take a nap and not wake up until sometime on Sunday. My body ached, my brain ached, and my eyes ached. The light seemed to go on forever, but with the free time afforded to me suddenly, I took a glance into my rearview mirror…
And saw one of Decatur Police’s finest behind me. Now I pass the Police Station almost on a daily basis. Never worried about it…
Until right then.
What’s the problem you ask? Well, there was one other thing that happened to me prior to my double finals. My poor Pontiac Sunbird was in the shop (I was just hoping to get through school with it, figuring once I got a job I could get a new car). Courtney, my girlfriend at the time (and my wife now) was going to Cancun on Spring Break. She made me a deal (she loves to make deals, her nickname is Monty Haul): I can use her car for the week if I take her to the airport (or perhaps it was to MARTA) at some ungodly hour in the morning. Not having much of a choice, I agreed. As I dropped her off she said these fateful words:
“Hey, if you get a chance, could you swap out my tag, I haven’t done that yet.” (She placed the physical tag in the passenger seat so I wouldn’t forget.)
“Sure.”
Oh, and if you don’t know, her birthday is in December…
And it was now late March/early April.
And the tag still hadn’t been changed.
Anyway! Flashback to me in the car with the cop behind me.
Please don’t notice, please don’t notice…
Light turns green. I press on the gas and the red lights flicker on behind me.
Damn.
I pull the car over on the next sideroad. Annoyed. Nervous.
Oh, and the window on her car did not work (did I mention that this Honda Civic from the stone ages was effectively a lemon?). So I have to open the door when he approaches. I’m sure that got his Spidey Sense tingling.
“Do you know why I pulled you over?”
I did.
“I’m assuming it is due to the expired tag?”
“Yes.”
“Look, it is right here. This is my girlfriend’s car. I’m on my way home and I was going to change it.”
When I handed him my licence and insurance card my hand was shaking. Visibly shaking. The kind of shaking where you realize that it is shaking and the more you try to stop it from doing it, the more it continues…
Shaking.
“Why is your hand shaking son?”
Because I’m running on about 4 hours sleep for the week. Because I have enough Mountain Dew in me that my blood is yellow and not red. Because my brain is fried from taking two finals in one day.
I did not say any of those things.
“I don’t know.”
“Please step out of the car, son.”
A second police car pulls up at this point.
“May I search your vehicle?”
Yeah, I’ve got nothing to hide. I’ve never done drugs. I’m not drunk.
“Sure”.
NOOOOOO! What are you thinking? This isn’t your car. You don’t know who Courtney might have had in the car. Yeah, you trust her, but what if they stuffed something under the seats?
Well, too late now.
The second cop pulls me aside while the first begins to go through the car, my backpack, glove compartment, trunk, etc. I joke that Courtney is going to get an earful after this. A few minutes later, the first cop calls me back over. Stacked in a nice row on top of the car are pills of various shapes and sizes.
Courtney was notorious for opening her pill bottle and having them go flying about the car. She never cleaned them up, so the floorboards were littered with various pills. If you knew her, it was no big deal.
These guys don’t know her.
“What are these?”
I looked at them, fear in the pit of my stomach.
“Those are herbal diet supplements my mom sells.”
“Those are my girlfriend’s epilepsy medicine.”
Those I have no idea what they are.
“I think those are more epilepsy medicine.”
And then came the words I never hope to hear again…
“This will go a lot easier on you if you just tell the truth.”
What!?! But I am… I don’t… WHAT!?!
“Are you on something? Speed?”
“No, sir. I don’t do drugs.”
“And this diet pill, if we call your mom and she comes down to the station she’d confirm that?”
I don’t think I was trying to be a smart-ass, but…
“Well sir, she’s in Richmond, Virginia.”
A third cop pulled up (I am not kidding). Apparently it was a slow day in the City of Decatur. That or I was Walter White 10 years before Breaking Bad… or would that make me Jessie?
At this point, I was led to the first officer’s police car and placed in the back seat.
A couple of observations:
Not a ton of legroom. Guess they shouldn’t be all that concerned about whether the criminals are comfortable. Still, I’m 6’5″ and I was kissing my knees.
This was the first and only time I’m ever been in the back of a police vehicle (I’m hopeful that this remains true for a very long time). I missed that opportunity earlier in my life by 15 minutes back in high school (another story for another holiday).
While the 3 officers searched the car, ran my information, and made me sweat, three songs played on the radio. I wish I could say that I remember them (my guess is that there was a Red Hot Chili Pepper’s song since they are the bane of my existence and 99x played them about every 5th song), but my brain focused on the various scenarios where my future mother and father-in-law would have to come bail me out of jail.
My friend Egg’s voice popped into my ear, “John, they’re cops. They can do anything they want.”
Later, when I relayed this story to my sister, she said, “You do realize that there was probably a drug deal going on within 100 yards of you and yet they are harassing you.”
My Dad said, “Well, you did fit the profile. 20-something, expired tags, beat-up car.”
So about 10 minutes pass and the first cop comes around to the door and opens it up.
“Get out.”
I stood up as he handed me my information (along with the tag).
“We’re done, for now. Get that tag changed.”
“Yes, sir.”
Drive that last mile home. Go upstairs and grab my tools and CHANGE THE DAMN TAG.
It was only at that point did my pounding heart begin to slow down.
A small postscript to this story. That night, Courtney called me to tell me she was in Cancun. By this point, I’d relayed the story to my roommate and to another friend, so it was becoming something funny (Comedy is just tragedy from a distance). So I started telling her about it. I was about 1/3 of the way into the story when I heard her start balling on the other end of the phone. “I’m so sorry!” over and over. I felt so bad about making her cry I don’t think I ever really gave her the business about the incident in the first place.
I guess I still owe her for that fun experience.
But, yeah, I’m (very, extremely, beyond, etc.) thankful that I didn’t go to jail that day.
