PAX Adventure 2017

Conventions are great and I don't get to go to nearly enough of them. My wallet is very happy about this, but I still making it to PAX and make my wallet cry for mercy every time. For a few years it was a matter of building up my collection of board games and getting cards for games like Magic or the World of Warcraft game when it was a thing. Now its mostly directed towards RPGs. Well, I still get board games. Today I want to take a look at this year's PAX East and what I managed to get out of it.


The Learning Curve
I am ALWAYS on the hunt for panels that will inform me not just on great new RPGs to play or indies games I should try, but also on how to GM better or move forward making this more of a career. This year, however, I was a little disappointed, though not because I missed a day. Mostly, there was a lot more panels on streaming of video game development. This shouldn't really come as a surprise, but it still kind of sucks. It is a lot easier getting to Boston for me than it will be to get to Philly for the PAX Unplugged. Budget is also a bit of a problem. Still, I may try to make it if I can figure out how.


Board Games....Always
Something that I always do is buy board games at PAX. Mostly, it is an excuse to do so, but there are always games I have my eye on or haven't discovered yet. This year I walked of with three games and, despite their expensive nature, they seem to be great choices. First is Mega Man, which I have wanted for what is essentially forever. We haven't played it yet but the figures and game look great. I mean...it's Mega Man. The other two games were Evolution, which I have been eyeing for years, and Mysterium.

Evolution is a very good game. It is competitive and the way it works each game will feature slightly different strategies no matter what. Not only that but the pieces and rules are pretty straightforward, which is great because it means not setting up forever and explaining it is quick. Mysterium is very similar, though it has more pieces. Set up time shouldn't be bad at all now that we've had a chance to play. This one is a cooperative game where one player does something different than the others. There is a round limit and only one way to win. This is a really fun game and if you are looking for a different style coop, this is it! Both games have a nice ~60 minute play time which is perfect too.


Dice, Books, And Stuff
It is tradition that I boost my dice collection while at PAX. Generally I find dice I really like, sets for specific games, or a themed set for a certain purpose. For example my dice from last year that I got specifically for the Curse of Strahd. This year I picked up Paizo's goblin dice and the Mummy's Mask (I think?) adventure path set. How can you beat those!? I also grabbed a 4E monster book because, for cheap money, I can't not add that to my collection. Aside from those I picked up a fun, if older system, lair/encounter book for a future giveaway as well as some pieces to utilize for the board game we're working on.


New RPGs And Decisiveness
Last year I bought three games and the Untamed Scribe picked up one. We have managed to play two of those. While the intent would be to play all of them before I get even more, I just don't have that kind of control when PAX is such a good excuse to buy hard copies of certain games. Instead, I decided to focus on getting games, not just for our one-shots, but that the player's would look forward to playing as well.

To start I grabbed two new Powered by the Apocalypse games. We all loved Monster of the Week and I see this system as one people will love using to try a new world / setting. It is also a great game to run quicker adventures through, so that will help me in my one-shot designing. In order to spice up our table I grabbed Masks and Epyllion. Masks is the supers game that is designed to feel like Young Justice or Teen Titans. I think it will be the perfect way to get supers to the table with a group that loves the fantasy focus. Epyllion is a fantasy setting, but it is one that is a lot different from the usual. In it players get to be dragons! How can you go wrong there? Of course Magpie Games is becoming a favorite publisher of mine, despite the games not having been played yet. Determined to get all of them in ASAP though.

The other direction I wanted to go was things that were pretty much guaranteed to be over in one session / night. These are fairly hard to find, but I did re-discover Microscope and discovered Downfall. Both are games that aren't anywhere near traditional and they should both be playable within one night. The great thing about these is that the serve another purpose: world-building. Both of these are universe/world builders and I cannot wait to sit down and create with my group. Finally I picked up Ryuutama because it is hard to find and it was there in hardcover. I am in love with the idea of this game and hope to fit it in sooner than later.


Using It All
With all this new stuff, there should be even more for me to write about and there will be. First though, we have to play it all. Then I can get some reviews out and you guys can have some Untamed Dice to listen to. I will likely review the board games as well because, while not RPGs, they are table top games! Of course I must mention that things will continue to be slow in March, but a new website overhaul and a lot of podcast episodes are coming. Leaps are being taken and we aren't really sure how to fly yet....

Updates And Priorities

As the Twitter-verse knows, I decided to avoid both Twitter and Facebook this week. I also ended up avoiding working on very much too. In fact I focused mostly getting through the long work week (February vacation for kids woohoo) and relaxing a little bit. Stuff I wanted to get done, I knew I would and so I decided to just focus on what I could. Which ended up being mostly nothing, so I focused on reassessing how to go about these things. Part of this has been making lists, but I need to start adjudicating and prioritizing those lists. So that is what today's post is about. Why things aren't going to get done or when they are going to get done. How I am going to turn my ambitions here into directed productivity and not bursts of stuff and dead zones.


Luxarrah, Brave New Worlds, & One-shots
We are so far ahead on recording. We did this on purpose. I started a second long term campaign for the express purpose of Brave New Worlds being on hold for scheduling problems. I paused the release schedule to build up a backlog and get some one-shots rolling. That all has gone well. I figured I would be able to keep a regular editing schedule. That...hasn't quite worked out.

First of all, I have had some weeks where I just haven't been able to keep up, or editing has been pushed into a shorter time-frame instead of spread out over the course of the week as planned. Then of course my revamped Patreon goals and rewards change the approach of releases and edits. Getting sessions done for the release of the first episode takes a different approach and a change in planning. I'm learning constantly and some lessons come the hard way.

With PAX East coming up and editing behind, I can tell you the next couple weeks will be bumpy for Untamed Dice. But, I can also tell you I am committing to Luxarrah and Brave New Worlds as the mainstays, as well as regular one-shots. However, the Legend of Zelda One-shot adventure is going to take a long time. I went a little all out and we will end up doing it in mini-series with other one-shot games or adventures in between. All the while new Luxarrah (and BNW soon I hope) will also be released.

Before I will promise the smooth regularity of these shows though I want to get ahead and I want to smooth the bumps to editing. My editor friend would prefer smaller, shorter episode files. No problem, except I need to also make sure I get all of them from one session done....and reincorporate them into a Patron episode. It's an over-site that kind of just crept up as a problem as we got ahead and began changing methodology. As we figure things out I'll be sure to keep you all updated.


Home Games & Developing My Homebrew
Half the reason for this site was to share my homebrew worlds. With all the notes and ideas I have, there has been precious-little fleshing out. I need to get back to that and I need to get back to sharing it. I also want to play without trying to record it or without doing so for the purpose of recording it. I have plenty of players and plenty of ideas. I just need to work out running random sessions now and again just for the fun of it without the extra work of recording. As fun as it is, as easy as it is to add to the session, the weight of too much recording is becoming obvious. Recording energies must be applied to the above three things. Extra creative energies can be used for the good of random, messy, spur of the moment games.


The Site & Publications
I want to improve the site, and I know how I want to do it. This is going to happen sooner than I had intended and with purpose. Part of prioritizing my to-do lists is prioritizing my projects. I am already planning an organization scheme and will be getting help from a friend on some design improvements. Homebrew, regular article titles, and the podcast all have homes here and I would like to make things a little nicer and a lot more robustly filled out (looking at you homebrew wasteland).

As for publications, those keep getting back-burnered. Part of it was computer troubles and then settings re-adjustment. Part of it was re-committing myself to what I wanted to do. Of course a big part, I now realize is the simple need to go back and update my current PDFs and make them look a little nicer. Simple things like a better blocking for the monster stat-blocks and a logo / name that goes with but isn't my blog logo. I also want a better looking page to showcase and link them on my site.


Other Projects
Another thing that has been half neglected and half taking time away from personal ones are two projects I am working on with others. One is a board game that is halfway to a handmade test version. The other is a digital product that is 2/3 -ish to the way to finalization stages. I am very excited for both but my efforts have been scattered. Sometimes I get lots done on those and things here slide a bit. Sometimes the other way around. I am finding a balance and assessing why this happens. That was part of my week of. Thought, digestion, learning. Continuing not to just move forward but to grow.


Essentially, what I want to say is that my slow momentum has worked and I have been building speed, but it is a snowball turning into an avalanche. I need to make that momentum fit another analogy and grab the reigns on whats up. I have figured out some ways to do this and will be doing it in practice now. There is always room for improvement and sometimes the best way of regaining control is to ignore something for a week if you have the chance. I did, and I took it.

Bad Weather and Power Outages Make It Hard To Technology....

After a couple mild winters in terms of snow, here we are again sitting on that nice fine line of 25-40 degrees. We start with rain, get breaks of rain, but end up with hours of heavy, wet snow that piles up like crazy. That makes life a bit troublesome and hectic in February, which is already the shortest and generally most financially difficult. Add in 40 mph winds with gusts up to 80 (depending on who you're listening to), and you end up with 95% of your town being without power. Personally I went 22 hours without power, and needless to say, that's why I'm so far behind.

Sure, there are other factors. I was behind on stuff and was putting stuff off. My fault. Buses screwed my Tuesday and moved that work day to Friday (which also didn't happen). Now I have to work extra this coming week, further throwing a monkey wrench into the already devolving plans I had. That bit is Mother Nature's fault. So, here I am trying tow work out a way to catch up on some stuff, while not falling behind on the rest. Here I am updating you fine folks as to what to expect here and when to expect it!


Untamed Dice
My biggest disappointment of the week. I was planning on getting most editing done Friday. When my schedule shifted that was going to be split among Thursday and Friday night. When I was home Thursday, it became a day project for then. Then we lost power. Oh, and so did Michael, aka Bjorn Gregory Brightwood, who has been doing the sound editing for me. So there are two things that were supposed to be out right about now, and just won't be: Luxarrah episode 8 (I believe) and Cat episode 3.

Hopefully, Michael will have Cat for me this weekend and the power cutting out half way through an export didn't screw the file up. As soon as I get situated Luxarrah will be (re-)edited, as well. Sadly, though I have to say you won't be getting them until next weekend. Should that change, for any reason, you can be sure I'll talk about it on Twitter. If things get super crazy again and the Snow Gods decide my fate is sealed, I'll try to let you know on here....eventually.


Blog Posts
This is not so much a problem as it is a set back. Obviously, I am taking time here writing this post for you all instead of working on what I had intended to write a few days ago. That's just how it goes. I intend to get the Cat review out this weekend, at the very least. There probably won't be another Resources until next weekend, but I am looking to get another post out either Monday or Tuesday. Probably the follow up for the Blog Carnival post.


The Future
Part of all the hectic-ness (and yes I will make up words as I please!) has been trying to plan. You know by now that I have been hard at work building this thing up slowly and working on other projects that relate to my work here. One of those took a writing hit this week. One of them took a planning hit. Then, of course, I still need to fix my export settings on my fixed computer. Needless to say, I'm looking at a messy day planner.

Still, part of that planning involved taxes, which are very stressful. Owing again would but a hurt on a lot of things, especially all of this (waves arms around the virtual world). A refund would allow me to catch up on life and do some much needed self-investing here. Lucky of everyone I am getting a refund and will be planning how to get as much out of it as I can this week. My hope is that it will get me a book or two, some more giveaway material, stickers for Patrons, and maybe even a new mic, but that's the hopeful maximum. Nevertheless, a weight has been lifted and that alone makes catching up on stuff a lot easier!

In good news, my edition of the DM Support Group prep series came out this week! You can find that right here, and be sure to check out the other posts. The group is a fantastic one and there are a lot of varied opinions and styles to be learned from. The Libris Monstrum series has been doing fairly well here and even generated more comments than any other articles or series, so far. Another will be coming out in about a week and a half, featuring a personal choice of monster and then I will allow you guys to vote on the fourth! I look forward to continuing this series and using it as a model to improve the older ones.


TL;DR
When you take online courses, write a blog online, and edit a podcast digitally, well, power is SUPER necessary for life. I am very far behind, but things are looking great for my life, which means things are looking great here. There is still lots coming and plenty to look forward to so stay tuned!

Ideas For Future Articles

Hey everyone, I have been trying to figure out a direction for the articles that come out here and it is stumping me. I figure that, perhaps, writing out some of my ideas here will help me lock something down. For a long time I had a bit of a schedule of release, trying to get something up five days a week. It kept me steady and kept me going regularly, but it ended up being too much, as you probably know. In fact, keeping a regular schedule is probably the hardest thing to do here.

At one point I was trying to do a bigger Monday post that just went over the things I saw during the week, and it was pretty good. The only problem with that was I had slow weeks where I didn't see anything. Or I had weeks where there was just so much out there I didn't know what to mention. Perhaps the flaw in that goal was that I didn't have a plan or habit for checking in on different things. Maybe I should work on a list of regular sites to watch and the like. A certain day or a few days to specifically look for what is going on out there, maybe.

Regular showings of home brew work was nice and forced me to work on my projects, but a little too much. Don't get me wrong, I still have a lot of home brew I am working on, but I can't share it all. At least not right away. A lot of that time as gone into one-shots for Untamed Dice, personal projects to publish, and projects I am working on with friends that I hope to share soon. But, it isn't just stuff that I can put up on the blog.

Resources articles are still coming every week, with the exception of one recently. That series is one in which there is a never ending supply of things to share, and the size of it is contained enough that I can get it isn't too difficult to do regularly. That is here to stay for sure. Of course, so are the posts for new episodes of Untamed Dice in case this is where you find those or watch out for them. Those aren't going anywhere.

What I need to do is get back to the bigger articles. Things like the Blog Carnival posts, the one about Zelda and D&D, and the one where I talk about my recent experiences with the Curse of Strahd and killing PCs. In fact, I have put a good amount of effort in putting together some of that kind of thing. I want to put up posts like those when they come to me or I feel like talking out a topic, but I also want some regular titles. Re-skinning needs to come back, but that might be a little while. World building has been on my mind a lot as well. Specifically the fact that those posts aren't the most well written. I know those topics need to be dialed back and planned out better.

That planning is something I am working on right now, along with a couple semi-regular (monthly?) series. One of those series will consider some of the long time creatures and beings that appear in games like D&D. These will be about the mythological creatures that don't often get the spotlight, but have plenty of crunch to be figureheads in adventures and campaigns. Another series I want to do is to get back to the science thing again, but with direction. What direction? Well, I want to start working on creatures that can be used in games that are pulled from nature. Insects will be a big player in that series because giant insects are scary, but what about giant versions of tiny and frightening bugs that exist in real life. I want to showcase some crazy, weird, and scary things from nature that, when turned giant, are fearsome fantasy opponents.

What else can I actually begin to commit myself to? Reviewing the DMs Guild material I have, for one. I will also be reviewing, or doing retrospectives in some cases, the games we one-shot on Untamed Dice. I supposed I should commit to writing shorter posts too. Getting on and writing about a cool game I saw or played. Expand on some of the stuff I post on Twitter or things that I can't fit in those 140 characters. Posts like that Zelda one, which I already know will get a follow up soon.


TL;DR - I am planning out this blog, getting my brain in order, by typing out what's up to you guys. I have already been back to posting more, though there is no true schedule. I plan on continuing and maybe a schedule will form itself (we can hope!). Despite my ideas, do you have any ideas for topics or series? Things you want to see? Things you don't?

January Patron Expectations!

Greetings everyone! I was hoping to get this done earlier, though I suppose it only feels early. School vacation is when us IT guys take apart the internet! January is coming up and with it the start of our increased, changed, and more viable Patron rewards. We have been talking about it for almost a month now, and changed the Patreon page a couple weeks ago. In case you missed that or wanted a little more information of what we are giving you in January, you came to the right place!


Get Stuff Early
This is an easy one, since we have been doing it for months. Become a Patron for $1 or more a month and you get Cracks of the Rift and the Untamed Rant 2 weeks before everyone else. Patrons will have noticed that there was no Cracks chapter this month, and those who are not shouldn't expect one January 1st. December, as I am sure you all agree, is a very busy time for everyone and the Scribe just couldn't get it done. No sense rushing something bad out to you, right? But you still have time to catch up and become a Patron to catch the next chapter on January 15th instead of in February.

The Rant comes out for Patrons on the 1st of the month, so if you want our big end of the year episode you should definitely pledge today. We're going to share our 5 favorite resources, talk about all the games we have played this year, and go over how everything's progressed on our part this year. Of course you can always wait till the 15th to catch that episode too.


Dice Giveaways
January marks the start of our monthly giveaways. To start we will be picking one Patron every month to send a set of dice to. This giveaway is entered by everyone at the $1 level or higher. Right now we don't have many so your chances of winning an extra set of dice is pretty high! The more Patrons we get the better and more frequent those giveaways become.


Session Episodes
Are you interested in hearing full sessions in one episode instead of being broken down into around three? How about getting to hear the full session when everyone else only gets to listen to part one? Well, if you pledge $3 or more monthly, that is exactly one of the special benefits you get. Whenever a new session begins, you the Patrons will get the entire session uploaded to Patreon while everyone else listens to the first part on the apps!


Drafts
I almost forgot to add this! We will also be sharing drafts of the stuff we are working on. This means the Cowboy Cop class, some archetypes, and PDF formats for the home brew stuff. A few projects are in the works now, so i can safely say that January will get you some (5-10?) levels in the Cowboy Cop class with at least 2 (maybe 3?) archetypes!


And The Rest...
Of course everyone who pledges $1 or more gets a few other things. Shout outs here and on Untamed Dice is one of them, because we cannot tell you how much helping us out means. Then you first timers will get a welcome package. This package will currently contain a couple of Notes of the Wandering Alchemist silicone wristbands, but we hope to continue adding to that package. On the list for included thank you items are buttons, patches, and stickers. Become a Patron and help us get those, and have some input on what we should get next. And don't worry, we will work out a plan to get new items to non-new Patrons as they come along!


TL;DR - Thanks for reading the blog and listening to our podcasts. We would love your support and one of the ways is by pledging on Patreon. We even reward you for it!

Things are happening!

This past year, things have been a wild ride between work, classes, projects, this site, and our Podcast. In fact, a year ago we didn't even have a podcast. Nor did we have a Patreon or a logo. The DM's Guild was not yet a thing either. Look how things have changed! I plan on doing a looking back post right before the New Year, so for now let's just take a look at the things that have happened in the last few weeks.

Untamed Dice

Serious effort has gone into bring Untamed Dice back, though it has changed from what it was. In the year since we began the show, we have learned a lot. I, especially, have figured out many things regarding running games for a show and, of course, am still learning. Brave New Worlds was our premier main-stay but, as you know, summer made everything difficult and our group has been unable to get together for that. While I hope we can rectify the BNW situation, we have brought to you Luxarrah. This campaign features the current world BNW was taking place on and the 5th Edition D&D rule set. The group is different, but we have an easier time getting together for that. As a result, it is our new/current weekly series. You can find the first episode here, and the second comes out this Saturday!

In addition, we made sure to get to work on one-shot adventures we have promised. First, this meant getting out the end of Star Wars Edge of the Empire (playlist here). Then we recorded Cat, which will be out soon and accompanied by a review of the game. We put another game in the pipeline before beginning our regular release, and that was TMNT and Other Strangeness. Now, with those one-shot all recorded and done we have the next in line with a D&D 5E Legend of Zelda game. My hope is to record and release 1 one-shot each month alongside Luxarrah, starting in January with Cat. As things progress I'll have a more detailed schedule for that!

Patreon

Part of me always feels bad continuously plugging our own Patreon page, but your support would not only mean the world to us, it would also help us do a lot more and move forward with our idea, plans, and upgrades. We have been working on making the Patreon more about you, our supporters. You can get more details here, but we are focusing on giving all our Patrons as much as we are able. This includes shout outs, early looks at releases, and giveaways. As we get more of you, and thus more support, we will work towards improving the blog and podcast, as well as having more to give to you as thanks!

Publishing Projects

I have been hard at work on a number of projects, but few of them at the moment deal with the DMs Guild. That is a turn from what I had anticipated and planned, but quite ok. Nevertheless, I recently released Spells of Old Volume 3 there with 13 spells from the Libris Mortis. Next will be spells from the Planar Handbook and hopefully an adventure down the line.

There are two other major projects I have been working on that I hope to better share with you in more methods than just the DMs Guild. Portions and previews will be available here and even more complete (and play-test-y) versions to all $3+ Patrons. The first of these projects is the Cowboy Cop class. Inspired by the movies and shows that created the trope, we already have a number of ideas for a special mechanic, as well as three different archetypes to choose from. You should definitely keep your eyes out for more on that soon.

The other major project is one I am working on with the artist who designed our logos. While I cannot yet reveal too much information, I can tell you that a lot will come soon. We have the first steps complete, the first release nearly ready for play test, and a plan formulating for development and release. Because we are getting that done, we hope to have a site and Twitter handle for that project soon to spread the word. As soon as that is a go, I will be sure to link it here at Notes of the Wandering Alchemist.

DM Support Group!!

Finally, I have some great news! For the past few months a group of folks from the D&D community on Twitter have been talking via Slack in a group called the DM Support Group. All of us are DMs of varying strengths, backgrounds, and playing histories. There we discuss mechanics, ideas, resources, and more. As the weeks go on, more and more people join the group and discussions can be quite in depth. Well, this week it just got even better! Thanks to Loraedor, who started the group, we have a new born website. There are already a number of links to members' websites and a growing list of those who will be contributing articles. You can find more about it all right here.

Me, Magic the Gathering, and Atlazan: What's Going On??

Spoiler alert for those of you expecting me to reveal some kind of insider information on the next Magic the Gathering blocks. I DON'T have it. I don't even have the connections to get it. If you are here because I write RPG material then hello and thank you. If a Google search for Atlazan brought you to my site and from there you were led here, then I apologize, but I cannot help you. I can tell you what's going on as far as I know.

Just over a year ago I began creating a home brew 5th Edition Dungeons & Dragons world. The title of that world, and the continent it takes place upon? Atlazan. Look at any of my posts about it if you want to know more, or look at the world information. It is not Atlantean themed, but it is slightly Mesoamerica themed. I spent months working on this setting and it was my first fully realized setting in a long while. I have even been running a game in it for over a year. At some point I decided to share much of the detailed information about this world with you, the community.

Yesterday, sometime in the afternoon, a photo was "leaked" of some new Magic the Gathering booster packs. These featured new, not-yet-seen, and upcoming blocks. At least that's what people hoped. Come to find out it was part of a packaging design survey. What does that have to do with me? Frankly, nothing, except for one word: Atlazan. You see, one of those expansion sets was titled Atlazan. Since then I have been contacted a few times wondering if my stuff was stolen or if it has anything to do with Magic the Gathering.

The answer to both of those questions is no. I did not steal anything from Wizards of the Coast and they did not steal anything from me as far as I know. If I had to guess I would say that the name sounded good because it is similar to those that exist in real life. It is short and simple. I cannot honestly say, because I have not yet talked to Wizards about it. I do hope to do so soon. I neither want to infringe on any IP they have been holding to reveal for a while now, nor do I want to loose my setting's name if I can avoid.

So, if you are here because you sought much coveted early, insider info on Magic, I am sorry. Feel free to look around if you are into D&D as well. If I learn anything about this situation I will post another update. Until then don't scour this site looking for Magic leaks and please do not suggest that any are here. Thanks for visiting! Even if it was an accident!

November Updates!

Hey folks! Today I wanted to throw up some of the updates that are going on with us and make sure we keep you up to date with what we are doing. To start, planning continues and things are getting hammered out. Yesterday a shipment came in with multiple sets of dice for us to use in giveaways. This will include Twitter giveaways, as well as regular giveaways to our patrons. We hope to do more than this but, one step at a time! We have also figured out some more Wandering Alchemist gear we can start getting out hands on to include in the giveaways and to give to patrons. Buttons are at the top of the list, and right below that are stickers. In addition a newsletter for patrons is also on our radar to give patrons an idea of what they can expect form our Patreon, as well provide a place to make note of what has happened in the past month with links all in one place.

Before the Patreon revamp that is coming in January, we will be continuing to produce the Untamed Rant and the Cracks of the Rift. In addition, as I have been promising, Untamed Dice is coming back! This weekend we will kick off its return with the release of the finale of our Star Wars: Edge of the Empire game. Then we will begin to share our Luxarrah game with you (which we have a lot to share) AND there will be the release of our Cat one-shot.

On that note I will also be sharing my feelings on the Cat with you all, probably next week. I am also trying to get back into a habit of writing on here with more than just resources. I don't want to promise anything specific, but I hope for it to include (finally) review of DMs Guild products I have been using or intend to use. So, continue to keep watch and thank you to everyone who comes here and/or listens to our podcast. You have no idea how much we appreciate it!

Resources For Every GM: Creatures Part 1

This was going to come out yesterday, but was delayed for two reasons. You know the first if you follow me on Twitter. Our refrigerator is broken and I had to spend a good amount of time working on that. And, of course, the evaporator fan need to be replaced despite best efforts. The second reason is because I haven't done anything Halloween themed or related at all! Shame on me! So today (and next week too) will be some Halloween inspirations for your games. Specifically, these three are horrific beings that are rather terrifying and/or create terrifying scenarios.


The Flood (Halo Universe): I couldn't do a Halloween Resources article without committing a portion of my time to the Flood from Halo. Now they aren't the MOST horrifying thing out there. For those who have simply played the game (especially if the deeper lore is of little interest to you), the flood are just horrible fungus zombies that really annoying, really quick. But over the course of the games we learn that, yes they are fungal zombies. Kind of. There is an intelligence to the Flood, perhaps there is or was multiple intelligences to them. We know them as graveminds and they control the flood like a queen ant controls a nest. Only worse. And more gross. And WAY smarter. That's not the most horrifying bit though, they want to devour everything until there is nothing left. Like zombies their is only hunger. But they remember, they wait. Take what is horrible about hive minds, zombies, possession, and add some nasty fungus and you have the hive. The Forerunners build the halo rings to destroy all life in the universe to starve the damn things before life began anew. To go to such lengths!? Yes, I would say the Flood are a great, simple enemy to add to a game with plenty of room for greater complexity and doomsday scenarios.


The Hive (Destiny Universe): Speaking of hunger, leave it to Bungie to go all out on the idea for their next franchise. The Hive are obviously a much more wild, Lovecraftian, what-if brain child of those who either created the flood or really loved what they represented. The Hive were born of ancient warfare and escape, though. They dug too deep, as the saying goes, and what they found was otherworldly. A philosophy so powerful, perverse, and not necessarily false that it was utilized like magic empowering a family and creating a race. The essence of the Hive is the sword logic, that the whole point of the universe comes down to, essentially eat or be eaten. The story of this development is fantastic and disturbing (Book of Sorrows go read it), but it comes down to being more successful, killing more, consuming more essence of others. All to become more powerful. Things get pretty crazy as the Hive wreck havoc through the universe (and dimensions). What is real, not real, magic, philosophy, and laws of nature all become questioned when dealing with the Hive. Add the Taken into that mix? Things get crazy, and scary. Lovecraftian at their core, Bungie has seeded the story with those who learned more about the Hive than you should (looking at you Eris Morn). Those alone are worth looking into for NPC development.


Weeping Angels (Doctor Who Universe): Again, a creature I could not write this article without mentioning. "Blink" is still one of my all-time favorite episodes of Doctor Who and the angels are one of the most frightening. And they don't even kill you. These are a very narrative monster, but make a fantastic one for such game styles. Although they could do a real switch-up for a regular game with lots of combat. All because they are virtually indestructible while being looked at. Some would say they are just made of stone, but the term the Doctor uses is quantum-locked (if I remember). Now there are many ways to interpret that, but if you ask me, the biggest changes something can ever go through a quantum and exist as probabilities and (if that's true) than you cannot affect something that is quantum locked. Sure, sure site some examples or whatever theories. Regardless, they're terrifying. Near indestructible while you look at them, quicker than a pixie on crack when not. Never kill you, but send you back in time, somewhen. For an adventuring party? That is less recoverable than death!

Where Is Everything!?

Have you ever formulated a plan for when things started slowing down and you had more time? A good plan with plenty of time to get everything caught up and back on track? Then you realize that the first time-frame in that plan is actually going to be the most hectic yet and that is the worst time to try to start that plan. Well, yeah, that happened. In August you all know I sat down and stopped working on stuff because I had been loosing control of any semblance of plan. September was for re-establishing things, because the summer business was over. Well the busy first week of September, and I should have known this, is actually the busy first month of the semester. Work, class, work, class, work double, work, work. Every week through September.

So, while I did manage to get some planning in place and figure out a lot of things, not nearly enough foundation work had happened by October. Regardless we are on course with Cracks of the Rift and the new Untamed Rant podcast. There is also two pages in my notebook of ideas, notes, and reminders for the (second) re-work of Patreon including some swag pricing for patron rewards, some dice pricing to start giveaways for patrons, and ideas for newsletters for patrons to see what they may have missed or should expect. I finally have the beginnings of a list for Resource For Every GM too. This means better preparedness on my part, and timely releases of the article.

I have also been keeping an eye on things on Twitter and started a list of things that people talk about to write articles on. Next will be to get a list going for re-skins. If you cannot tell I am fond of lists, but all these lists will help me track things I can do on this blog. I will give me a place to look and, with no particular order to them, I can pick which ever one I have a lot to throw out at you at any given time.

Then there is, of course, the DMs Guild. My projects have become woefully ignored. I feel I have cheated anyone waiting on what I have mentioned, as well as myself, in delaying all of these. But, I know that I have needed to. So, I am not going to promise this or that will be out at any time or even when you "should" expect them. Just know that I am working hard on getting back to them and greatly desire being at that point again.

Untamed Dice is something I can promise though. I have taken advantage of a friend's offer to clean up the audio for me and we have 5 sessions of audio sitting in that folder. The plan is that November WILL see the re-release of Untamed Dice episodes, beginning with Star Wars: Edge of the Empire. As a thank you for listening and apology for so long without episodes, the entire final session will come out all at once to kick us off. It was, by far, the best and most fun of those sessions and a great ending to the adventure. Proceeding that is enough audio to carry us for a while while we continue to record more, but I'll have more on that later.

Stay tuned for more updates and more. It's all coming soon!

We're Back! Not Quite A Dinosaur's Tale...

Hey everyone! It has been a while since I have been able and looking forward to sitting down and catching up here, but here we are! I won't badger on about why there hasn't been posts or what I have been trying to work on, or anything like that. You can find that information from September's post if you haven't read it already. What I do want to do is catch up, share where we are right now.

On the first everyone got to read Chapter 2 of Cracks of the Rift AND our first episode of the reworked D&Donuts, now named Untamed Rant, came out for Patrons. In it we discussed resurrection. This included going over many of D&D's incarnations and how the resurrection spell(s) and reincarnation spell worked. What have the limits been and what have been the results? From there we talked in general about what is important in resurrection and, of course, character death. Some experiences with it, in and out of D&D, were shared as well. If you are interested, but don't want to become a patron yet, do not worry because on the 15th we will have that episode for everyone here on the blog. In its entirety!

These are two projects we are excited to be working on and cannot wait to continue sharing them with you. The schedule for those will keep as it is with each of them coming out 2 weeks early for Patrons and on an alternating schedule. On the first patrons will get the Rant and the last Chapter of Cracks of the Rift will come to the blog. On the 15th patrons will get the newest chapter and the previous Rant will show up here.

I am also happy to say there is another project I want people to start being keeping an eye out for. It probably will not be hosted here but I will definitely be sharing it as we do. The initial project will be a bit of experiment and testing the waters for what people may want. The project itself is for short, relatively easy to manage encounters of some sort. These will often include a combat with special mechanics or interesting twists. They will be designed agnostic to systems and, hopefully, written in such a way that it would be easy to use in whatever system you want, as well as fitting in as a bit of a side trek or random encounter during adventures. That is about all I can share now, but you will see more soon!

I have two fairly regular games going right now and more coming. One takes place in Atlazan and has been going on for a year now, though it has been only about 12 sessions so far. It is ramping up with a bit of regularity and I am getting a great grasp on where I want it to go. I may begin sharing that story here, in a recap form if folks are interested. I also have a game based in Luxarrah which is going well and becoming a regular campaign as well. This one we're recording for you guys to listen to on Untamed Dice as we get back into a regular release of that!

Other than these things, I am taking a horror lit class and a creative writing class and both of these are really helping me to get back into the creative process. I have also been picking up some random resources to share with you, and have many links for resources to. My eye are on some kickstarters and some other things coming out, which I will try to share soon. Finally there are some kickstarters I am finally looking forward to get my hands on, such as Kult. As soon as I get them I will be sharing that with you too.

So, everyone, things are good. Games are good. There is stuff on the way and we can't wait to share it with you!

Autumn Approaches...Finally!

Before I get into what has been going on, I just wanted to thank everyone who has continued watching the blog for updates, all our listeners of Untamed Dice, and everyone who helps keep the creative juices flowing on Twitter. You are the best.

Things have been pretty crazy for the past month or so. Those of you who have followed my updates here know a bit of why and those of you who follow me on Twitter have a good idea. August, very quickly, got away from me. In fact, I am having trouble recognizing the fact that we are already halfway through September. While Summer is always pretty busy for me, the end of it really got crazy this year.

First off, I work IT at a high school and there is a lot of upgrades being done to the system. So, in addition to the prep for the start of the year, there was also a significant amount of extra work. The result was much shorter breaks for lunch and less time after the workday to get things done. Secondly, I work at an ice cream shop during the summer and this year we lost some employees, we had some less than awesome hires, and just generally were busier than last year. The main result of this was just longer, harder nights each weekend. Both of these jobs, with the school year approaching and the season nearing its end, only got crazier as September approached. Very suddenly it was September and even more suddenly we have reached today.

I made a decision in the beginning of the month though, and I have, obviously, been taking a break from making sure stuff get on here. Getting things outside of the blog to make myself more able and comfortable to get things done was a big part of this. Resting, cleaning, organizing. And a lot of thinking. Untamed Scribe and I have also talked about what's been going on and what will be going on here. To best relate to you our plans I am going to break things up a bit.

Notes of the Wandering Alchemist

In August I did attempt to expand on my Monday notes throwing up some of the items I had noticed or run into over the week. Announcements, new Kickstarters, releases, and other related things were all included. I want to continue this and will continue doing the news posts this way, with a couple tweaks. First off all I may do this twice a week depending on how much stuff I manage to come across. Secondly, I will be creating a separate post for updates to the Blog. In fact, I mean to be less strict on myself for posts like that in timing and more lenient on when they come out. I will not be sharing every single post to various sources, though links to each and every post will likely still journey through Twitter and Facebook.

Additionally I will continue to release Resources for Every GM again, once a week, though I may change the day. Tuesday and Thursday are still the two best days to get big posts out there, however, and it is likely to stay on Thursday. A minor change will be in increasing reviews. A big part of this is the large number of DMs Guild titles I have at this point. I want to begin getting reviews out for those and not use them as Resources replacements. Instead I will throw those up around once a week when I start getting to it. Probably on weekends.

What all this means is that I will be more focused on getting Resources articles out regularly, getting more reviews out, and sharing links to awesome stuff more. As this all becomes routine, I will continue to seek to improve it, but there are other projects to work on as well.

Untamed Dice

We haven't had a new episode in a number of weeks now, sadly. At first this was a simple lack of time to edit properly. Now it is a deliberate decision. We still have audio to get you and I am sorry for the delay to our Edge of the Empire game, but I think it'll be worth the wait. One of my players works with audio for a living and he is going to help get me some better software to work with and some tutorials on some basic editing techniques. This increased knowledge should allow Untamed Dice to become that much better.

Another reason we haven't been releasing anything is so that we have a plan in place for new stuff. That plan has begun to form and will hopefully take shape sooner than later. First it involves the very simple fact that a new episode of Brave New World will not be recorded (very likely) until almost November. It's a work schedule thing and unavoidable. Secondly, it involves that all those time issues that caused the lack of material coming out also caused us to play very few games. In fact, we have not played Strahd in almost 2 months, we have not managed to get Monster of the Week finished, we have not had time to try something else, and we have played maybe 2 games in general.

This means we have nothing aside the end of the Star Wars adventure. Well, almost. One of the nights we played was a small Luxarrahn game. Luxarrah has been on my mind quite a bit since prepping the last game of BNW. I have come up with a lot of stuff while putting computers together and stocking ice cream. The result is this new game and I am very excited to keep exploring Luxarrah through 5th Edition D&D. That game is also one we recorded. It is one we will continue to record. It is the easiest game group to get together and should become a very regular game. The only thing that will take as much precedent will be BNW. One shot games of other systems are pretty much on hold till things get brought under control again, but more on that down the road.

DMs Guild & Beyond

This is something I have really enjoyed doing and want to do more of. It is something I have been putting some work into whenever I can. Part of my time will continue to be more regulated towards those projects. I have a few things coming down the line and a hopeful schedule for these. Included among them are the (finally) 3rd Volume of Spells of Old, as well as a 4th. I am also working on some more patrons for Paths to Power Volume 2 to finally come out. Finally there is also the trinket supplement I have been working on.

In addition to DMs Guild products there are a couple of things being worked on, but these are more long-term. Soonest you should see a class a friend and I are working on. A test version at least. Then later on we will get that up as a full class. The other world I am working on with another friend is slow in taking shape, but as winter proceeds I hope to take some larger steps there. Finally in terms of getting some of my homebrew out there, I think Luxarrah will be foremost among my development. In what way this will show up, big supplements or small or both, I do not know yet. Nevertheless these are the things I am dedicating some of my time for.

Patreon

This has probably changed least over its existence, but changes fairly significantly each time. Untamed Scribe and I have decided we need to make some changes here and those are going to be fleshed out overt the coming weeks. Included will be changing goals from things we plan on doing anyway to milestones for which we can reward you folk, such as giveaways and more stuff like wristbands and stickers. We will also be changing the Patron rewards quite a bit. First of all we want to share the Untamed Rant with everyone. This will get more people the Rant and will make things easier on us. All of the Patrons will get it 2 weeks earlier than everyone else though, just like the Cracks in the Rift story.  Other things we are talking about are giveaways for Patrons, newsletters, a mailbag addition to each Rant, and similar things. I will be sure to keep everyone apprised of what is up as we figure it out.

What This All Means

We are coming back. Effort as been focused on making work less daunting and more doable. Ideas and talks are to change things up so that what we do is better and easier on us, even if that means there is less for a while. We will not be overextending ourselves by trying to start this whole plan Monday. October is when we begin to make a big shift. By then a new routine will be in place. Lists for Resources, schedules for Untamed Dice, a reworked Patreon, and more will all be in place. The rest of September is to take all the information above and everything we have been talking about and building a foundation for future things. Extra time will be spent in prep work for this stuff and more fully recovering from August. To keep up with what I am thinking and working on be sure to follow me on Twitter. Do not be dismayed by a lack of posts for September. We look forward to making a good re-impression in October!

Last D&Donuts Before Rename!

Here it is folks out last D&Donuts before it gets renamed to The Untamed Rant (as voted on by you!). Well, the preview of it anyways. Become a Patron (link to the right) to get the full episodes and more. Sorry for the popping and crackles. Some kind of recording problem for the first half of the episode (aka: preview part) appears, gets worse, and won't go away. Hopefully it doesn't annoy you too much!

Things To Come, Putting Out Fires, And New Games

This post is already a day late, and for that I apologize. Before we get into the couple things I wanted to talk about, which you may know more than me about at this point, I want to talk about what is going on around here. Despite all my previous claims to have fixed the internet at my house, the universe as seen fit to make sure that all of those are falsehoods. We have tried a power amp, removed it, replaced splitters, reduced cabling, and gotten a new gateway. At this point the intermittent problems have to be at the pole and it will likely be a challenge to get them out here. I have begun using my phone as a hot spot whenever it is down, so that solves one problem. The lack of options on my end solves to problem of that struggle taking up any more time. From here we can actually get back on track.

Well, soon. Despite all my goals and attempts to do so, the last weeks of August have flown by me and problems keep me behind. So, in all forwardness, with the start of the school year falling on Tuesday next week (both for work and the courses I am taking) there is the chance that something will be late before September 10th or so. Beyond that is a turning point in the season, at work, scheduling, everything. Needless to say, my life will become that much easier.

Until then there are some things you can look forward to though. Later today D&Donuts will FINALLY go up. There we some audio problems with the first half I can't do much about, but so goes this month. This evening you will also get the sequel to last week's Tuesday article. The responses I got from it last week were great and in strong agreement with my feelings and may be even more into the throwing optimization out than I am. I like conversations like that, even when they tell me I am wrong! Thursday you should get not just a resources article (for real this week) but you will definitely be getting the first chapter of our Pathfinder story. Untamed Scribe won't be posting it as we haven't set her up to do that yet, but I have it ready to go don't worry!

Next week we will see how things go, but I may be working a double on the holiday so, as of right now, there will be no news / updates post. The other regular posts should be fine. As for Untamed Dice, I apologize for missing last weeks episode, but it should be up this weekend. Hopefully I will manage one next weekend as well. Following that they should be back to a weekly release. But who knows maybe a black hole will appear in my basement. Now that you know what cosmic shenanigans are going on here, let's get a quick overview of some of the stuff I have been keeping an eye on!


New Games To Play

There are two big names I want to mention here. First is one that I have very little information about. Every time I try to learn more about it, the mysteries only deepen. I think that is the point though. If you have had the time it is likely you know more than I do. Perhaps you have even uncovered some of the secrets Monte Cook Games has for us. You can find more information about Invisible Sun here and check out the Kickstarter here. I am incredibly intrigued by this game, though I don't think we will be able to work out a Kickstarter pledge to get it. All the mysteries, secrets, layers of the universe, and Lovecraftian feelings about Invisible Sun make me really want to buy it. In many ways it reminds me of the way I felt when The Secret World first came out. Playing a game in a familiar, real world that is hiding just so much more is definitely something I am interested in!

The other game I wanted to through out there is one I had not heard about in a while, and one I never got a chance to look into. In fact, I still haven't though it is something I will be doing in the coming days/weeks. What's O.L.D. is N.E.W. is a game from EN Publishing that released this past week or so. It is a system that is toolkity oriented and drives three different games: fantasy, modern, futuristic. There is tons of information on it over here. I'll have more about this later once I check it out more!

Hello everyone and happy Monday! Today is just a quick post because my list of things to talk about is still my list of things to look into. I can however tell you what is going on around here. A lot of work is getting done in my headspace (with the help of the fine folks on Twitter) about greater details of Luxarrah. Part of this is preparing for the world as a bigger work and D&D world for my group to play in. The other part is in preparation for the next session of Brave New Worlds, which honestly can't come soon enough.

Sadly its still going to be a little while before that happens. Those of you listening to Untamed Dice will just have to continue listening to our Star Wars adventure. I have said it before but I'll say it again. The coming episodes are part of the most fun session of the adventure so get excited! In terms of scheduling I don't have too much more for you, but we are playing Curse of Strahd Saturday and and work is actually beginning to slow. Summer ends soon and school begins. The season of gaming is almost upon us and we're hoping to have a ton for you.

As a final quick note we have something fun coming to you soon. I may have mentioned it here, but in case I have not, the tales of our Pathfinder campaign are coming to you starting September 1st. Part 1 is already out to Patrons but you all will see it from Untamed Scribe on the 1st of each month, just a few weeks after Patrons get it. It is already turning out to be a great read and I can't wait to see what you guys think!

Next week I will have a lot more here for you so stay tuned!

Mel Gibson, Necrotic Spells, Space Trinkets, And Cypher Dungeons

OK, so has I was hoping to do today I have a post for you about the various projects I have been working on. Let's start with the one that I never quite finished on time: Spells of Old Volume III. This project is still in the works. Realistically, a small version of this is mostly done, but I did mention before that I wanted to make its release larger. I still plan on that. Finalizing this and getting the work in on it is a bit time consuming, and that is something I have had to be careful distributing lately.  I won't get into it anymore than I have, but I will talk about the other projects that have developed themselves from my use of time.

First off, I did an article earlier this month for the RPGA Blog Carnival. It involved 10 sci-fi related trinkets for your games. As items for sci-fi touched D&D games I would love to use this list and expand upon it. From that article I am keeping that as a slowly building list that, once I have a good number, I will format nicely and through as a PWYW on the DM's Guild.

Second, I have been toying with the idea of trying my hand at writing an adventure. I need the practice and have found the one-shot we played last week a could place for me to work from. It is the first one I have properly designed as a short, self contained adventure. Granted, 3 hours was not enough to explore everything, but that's OK and it would be written with that in mind. This project is on the back-burner until my time frees up towards winter, though.

As for other projects there are two major ones that won't be on the DMs Guild. First will be our first go at a supplement getting published on familiar online retailer(s). This will be a class build from the ground up and there is a hint about it in the title, though it doesn't tell you much. As we design and begin testing the class, we will be looking for more testing help to really make sure it works and stands on its own.

Outside the realm of D&D, I am working on an even bigger, long term project with a friend.  Currently that project is working to fit into the Cypher System and there is a very convenient portal for publishing that setting since their Worlds of Cypher kickstarter.  And that's right, it will be a large setting book. We have put a lot of thought and effort in so far, but it is a slow process, and yes it takes from some of the effort I'm putting into smaller stuff.

Finally, I want to address some of the work for the DM's Guild. Obviously, previously mentioned supplements are on hold. Paths to Power Volume II has some more patrons, but their full ideas are not worked out yet. That is something I plan to have out around November. By then Spells of Old Volume III will be done and out, with Volume IV getting its start. DM's Field Guide series is on indefinate hold. It didn't do too well, and the effort I put into it is the most time significant. While enjoyable, other projects are where more people are getting something out of. As for my personal campaign worlds and their future as potentially published well, there is always work being done on those even if I don't mention it. One step at a time and all that!

Kickstarters, New Games, And Incoming Tales

Hey everyone! Once again there is plenty to cover from the last week. Today I have a couple of Kickstarter campaigns that I have my eye on, some new stuff coming out to add to your collections, and some more updates for things around here.


Kickstarters You Need To Check Out!

The first campaign you may want to take a look at is the new Worldographer. I have mentioned Hexographer as a mapping program for your RPG needs, and the good people over at Inkwell Ideas have decided to kick it up a notch. Head over here to check out the Kickstarter. After 7 years with Hexographer, they are trying to improve upon the program and create an even more useful tool. The new Worldographer will be able to integrate more details into your map, as well as multiple levels of mapping integrated together. On top of that there will be mini-generators for details on things like cities and ruins. If you are interested there are a few backer levels, some of which even include a download of the current Hexographer. And, if that doesn't sell you, they have a ling to a demo on the campaign's page!

The next campaign that I want to talk about is the type of thing I was hoping would show up. Last week, I mentioned Kobold Press' new Tome of Beasts for 5th Edition. This week, Nord Games has far exceeded their goal for releasing their own 5th addition monster supplement. Called Ultimate Bestiary: Revenge of the Horde, you can check it out over here. What makes this an awesome project worth backing is not the horde of new monsters you will get out of it. Instead, you will be getting a horde of details, stat blocks, and ideas for classic enemies. From goblins to gnolls, you will get a host adversaries for you PCs to tackle. Added on top of this are a number of stretch goals, some of which have already been unlocked. Among those are beasts of the horde and tribe details for the different races. The next goal is racial stats to play these monsters, so be sure to head of and pledge your support!


Yet Another World To Play In

In case all the worlds created for D&D over the years weren't enough, or the worlds now being released with the OGL still aren't quite enough, Green Ronin has announced that Matthew Mercer's world from Critical Role, Exandria, is coming to 5th Edition source books near you. If you haven't been watching Critical Role, than you should understand that the world Mercer has created for his players over the last few years is an incredibly rich one. If you have been watching you know just how awesome this is going to be. You can find the press release here, but the key point is the Tal'Dorei book is already in the works and slated for a Spring 2017 release.


Death Isn't The End

This game caught my eye when it showed up over and over on my Twitter feed during GenCon.  Phoenix Dawn Command is a new RPG from Twogether Studios. What caught my eye about it, specifically was the giant, tarot sized deck of cards that comes with it. Apparently the RPG is deck-based, requiring sets of cards to be played in order to overcome the difficulty and complete a task. The artwork looks fantastic and there appears to be a rich world to dive into.  When you die, you're not dead forever. Instead, you come back and become stronger learning from your mistakes and adding more cards to your deck. There is a catch though, well two catches. First off, missions are often time sensitive. Die and you could fail. You don't just rise instantly from the place you were killed of course. Additionally, you only have the opportunity to come back 7 times before the end is final. The result is that you can be reckless to get things done, but how reckless is to reckless and is it worth the risk? Check out the game's site and learn more here.


Stories Need Telling....And Scheduling

This week, we have some fun stuff to talk about here at Notes of the Wandering Alchemist. First off, today marked the official beginning of a novelized rendition of the story of the campaign that we spent two years playing and will be continuing (hopefully soon). We played it in the Pathfinder RPG system, in a world of, mostly, my own design. Initially this was going to be written as minor journal entries, but the tale has taken a life of its own in Untamed Scribes hands. The result is that our first entry is around 5 pages long. If you are a patron at the preview level, you can go check that out and download the PDF right now. If you are not, it will be posted up here on the 1st of September. Given the length of the entries, you can expect to see a new one each month.  Preview patrons will see it on the 15th and the public will get it on the 1st of the following month.

In addition to that we have ever-more updates on Untamed Dice. If you have been following along on Twitter then you know why things have been late this bast few days. Games and time spent with visiting friends (one Aikos Lord of Cakes & Pastries, God of the Harvest and Brew).  Expect Brave New Worlds to come this week instead and D&Donuts shortly.  Also watch for that poll I mentioned as it will finally be going up tomorrow at some point.

Tomorrow I will also have a re-skinning article with some suggestions on re-flavoring things to make something unique. Wednesday i am going to try and squeeze in a new update as to my progress on the various projects I am working on and why some of those are taking longer than they should. Thursday will feature the regular Resources article. Friday will get you an update on the state of Untamed Dice games and our plans for recording, while Saturday will actually get you the episode (finally!).

Until next time!

5th Edition Resources, D&D In Theaters, and Untamed Dice

Hey everyone, lots to share again today!  News that you may have missed, this weeks articles, and what we are up to.  First we will start with some of the stuff I came across this week.


Choices

Nothing is better in RPGs, especially table-top RPGs, than the fact that we have so many choice.  At the table there is an actual infinity of possibilities to chose from.  Last week we got some more opportunities to get such choices laid out with rules and presented to us for ease of use.  The first thing I found, literally as I was getting the link for the article I mentioned a week ago, is a new Unearthed Arcana.  This time the article features divine characters, but not divine spellcasters.  Instead there are options for playing a character that follows the path of a god, but is either not part of the clergy or who is a member of one which prefers different methods.  The first of these is a warlock patron called The Seeker, which represents a god of  knowledge.  This warlock build has plenty of room for flexibility, though.  It's powers inspire wanderlust and any god of secrets, lore, exploration, or travel could easily be used.  Additionally it provides a new pact boon option made for this patron, but one that could easily be adapted for other patrons.

The second build presented is for the wizard and is the school of Theurgy.  This school is for those priests who follow the goddesses of magic and arcana.  However, it is built so that you could be the wizard of any god's order as you do gain access to your choice of domains from the cleric class.  These grant you the benefits a little later than a cleric, except for the 17th level one.  That you get at 14th level.  oh, and did I mention channeling arcana?  Needless to say, this is one of my favorite UA articles to date alongside the one that covers such things as a ghost in the machine patron.  Having extra options that don't go too crazy with the rules is great to have, especially when exploring something like non-divine faithful.

The other thing I wanted to mention is something, if you are playing 5E, you really should have heard about already: Tome of Beasts.  Kobold Press Kickstarted this a little while back and it is finally available to get.  On their site you can get it in print and / or PDF and it looks well worth the cover price.  In it are over 400 new monsters to throw at your players and given only one Monster Manual so far, it will be nice to have another full sized resource to utilize.  Looking for the cost on that for my future order, I also noticed a second 5E book withing a similar vein from Kobold Press: the Book of Lairs.  This features two dozen new lairs to house your big bad monsters in.  These each include treasure, hazards, and traps for your adventurers to fall victim to.  Given the 5th Editions propensity for lair effects in legendary monsters one can only assume that is such options are not provided in this supplement, it will pair quite well with the choices you will have in their Tome of Beasts.


It Keeps Getting Bigger

This is a quick mention, but an important one.  Over the years now, RPGs have been becoming more and more popular.  This is, in no small part, thanks to the many podcasts and streams that are being done for the entertainment of those who can't play as much or want to see what its like (or just want to laugh along with us).  Acquisitions Incorporated is the Penny Arcade / Wizards team up game that started back before the release of 4th Edition.  It has continued regularly since then including live shows at PAX and the recent YouTube series.  If you haven't already watched / listened to it you can find the audio playlist here and I suggest you start at the beginning.  For those of you who are following the series and want to see what is next, but cannot make it to PAX West, well there is good new.  You might be able to see it in theaters.  That's right Fathom Events is hosting it.  The link to the details of the event is right here, and you should go see if there is a theater near you.  If you are wondering why this is important, its because gaming is important to us as a community.  It changes how we look at things and people, it is how we socialize, and it can make us better people.  We should have more exposure of the awesomeness it holds and getting major live shows to appear in theaters, that is just another success for us.


Here With the Alchemist

Ok there are a couple things I also wanted to mention, but I will save them for next week after I check them out a bit more.  Now we can cover what is going on here.  First off, later today you will get another post that features the Star Wars Edge of the Empire game episode 7.  This should have gone up yesterday but 4 extra hours of work messed up the "plan".  So, don't worry that is coming.  Tomorrow, I will be taking a part in the RPG Blog Carnival again.  This time it features science with your sorcery.  Thursday I am going to have a resources article for you, of course.  And Friday you can get another episode of Brave New Worlds.

Moving forward there is still a lot to happen and figure out.  Tonight (for real this time) we record D&Donuts, which I hope to have out by this time next week.  We are trying to improve how we do it and fit more into the time you spend listening.  We have also changed from the original theme quite quickly.  What started as a random talk session over coffee and donuts as become a combination discussion of rules / concepts and discussion of the things we have been playing and working on.  As such we will be re-naming the podcast to better reflect that, and may ask for your votes on that matter.

Aside from that you can also expect a poll for the next game we play.  We have a one-shot for a friend this week that we are not recording for Untamed Dice and we still have another session of Cypher to finish up.  Aside from those, we still have Monster of the Week to finish so that we can present that after Star Wars.  What does all this mean for you?  Well, we have a few more episodes of Star Wars yet, but we are running out of recorded shows.  Personally I would like Monster of the Week to be finished before we start airing it, but I would take scheduling the last session too.  Work is a problem for that game, so its release may get put on hold.  We do have another session of Brave New Worlds scheduled, and those will hopefully pick up as summer closes because things are ramping up on Luxarrah.

So, you can expect Star Wars to pull us through August and into the very beginning of September.  Then Brave New Worlds should once again take its rightful spot every other week.  Hopefully Monster of the week will be featured after that, but we may have some shorter games coming.  Our Last Best Hope will be coming up and, as I prep and run these one-shots I am getting a better idea of what will be 1 session and what will be 3 and how to keep them in line.  Given that, and Fall coming up, we hope to have a lot more games for you to listen to!

Klingon, Cards & Dice, Partnerships, And More!

Another day, another week, another month.  It's August and we seem to be at the height of table top season and gaming season in general.  A lot of great stuff has already happened this summer, but in the past week a bunch more has come to pass and, with GenCon coming, there will only be more to talk about!  Today I continue a path towards more information sharing on my news posts.  I wish I could throw a post out for each thing I hear about and want to share, but I just don't have the time.  Perhaps I will do two news posts a week come Fall.  Until then, what I can do is give a run down on some of the things from the past week!


New Resources!

A couple new resources have popped up from Dungeons & Dragons.  First off a new Unearthed Arcana came out last week that features a great little resource for those DMs who want things to be a little easier.  Especially when they are short on time for prep.  The article is titled Quick Characters and can be found over here.  With it you can make some characters for your last minute game and not stress on making too many decisions.  Everything is randomly generated with dice and you are told what to assign and pick, including spells.  Granted, the only options included are from the Basic Rules, but with this framework you could easily expand the options you have for yourself.  Before you yell about today's UA, don't worry I am going to cover that next week!

In addition to the Quick Characters UA supplement, Wizards and Roll20 announced that they would be partnering up to make things even easier for your online games.  You can find more about that over here.  While Fantasy Grounds has been the virtual table top with D&D licensing for a while now, there will now be more options for those of us who us Roll20.  Beginning with the Lost Mine of Phandelver and (soon) the Storm King's Thunder, you will gain access to real D&D materials.  Eventually, I believe, they plan on working out the ability to purchase not only more adventures but assets like maps for your own varied games.


Games, Games, More Games

There are three major announcements that I want to cover concerning new games from last week that I am particularly excited about.  The first is a table top game that isn't an RPG.  However, it calls to my collector's core and my love of Star Wars.  Coming from Fantasy Flight Games, this is an actual collectible trading card game.  That's right it isn't a living card game, booster packs are random and mysterious die.  You heard that right too; the game features dice in addition to cards.  There are of course your games like Magic or Pokemon that pit two players with their own prepared decks against one another, but this game adds a what-if aspect by featuring a variety of heroes and villains from Star Wars and the added mechanics of utilizing dice.  Rey and Kylo Ren starter sets will show up alongside boosters that contain 5 cards and a die this November.  Personally I'm excited to see how dice change the way such games work, as well as the potential forms of play that will evolve from the rules.  Checkout more about Star Wars Destiny here!

Second announcement is a new sci-fi RPG.  Well, an old one made new.  Sasquatch Games is developing a new version of Alternity which featured settings like Gamma World, Star Drive, and Dark Matter in its day.  The publisher is keen to say that this is not a new edition, a remake, or a reboot.  This is going to be its own thing.  It will focus on creating and exploring new worlds and using what they have learned from working on systems from throughout the D&D editions, the original game, and from the systems they have published like Apocalypse World.  News will come out of GenCon about this and we will begin to get previews and updates on their website as we close in on next years release.  For now, check out this announcement.

Last RPG announcement is about the Lord of the Rings.  While many of us have heard of the One Ring RPG, not all of us have played it.  While it has been on my radar, there are a number of things that tend to grab my attention for forcefully.  Game systems with new, unique worlds and awesome new mechanics tend to be at the forefront of such things.  While worlds like Star Wars and Star Trek are exciting to journey into, the world of Middle Earth is much more contained, and learning a whole new rule set to play in it...  Well, it keeps the One Ring lower on my list.  However, Crucible Seven is going to be releasing the Adventures of Middle Earth.  Mentioned earlier this year, we now have an official announcement about the D&D 5E OGL port of Middle Earth and I couldn't be more excited.  I know much of LotR lore, I know 5E, and I love to see more resources for my 5E home games.  To know the publisher has LotR RPG experience is just the icing on the cake.  If you want to know more or pre-order, just head over here.


A New Language & News With The Wandering Alchemist

Before I get into what is coming this week on this site, there is one more announcement I am really excited about.  My inner nerd is just jumping with unbridled joy.  I heard about Duolingo adding a Klingon course.  Now, the news has been out for about a year now, if you look at the status page, but things are hopefully going well.  The recent update on their status page, here, was from 4 months ago, but it does have a bit of info on what they have been doing including syllabus work and language database entry.  For those interested in learning the language you can keep an eye on its status here, as well as sign up to be notified when they're done (hopefully by the end of the year)!

Now what about this page?  This week will feature an article tomorrow, resources on Thursday (of course), and two new episodes from our Edge of the Empire game.  I cannot yet reveal what will show up tomorrow, but I do think we are going to go with internet resources on Thursday.  We are also recording this month's D&Donuts this week.  It is a bit later than I hoped, but it and all the other Patron rewards WILL go up as soon as possible along with updates on other projects coming down the pipeline.  Thankfully the summer is winding down now and balance is being restored.  Stay tuned for more!

Two New Episodes of Brave New Worlds!

Hey everyone!  Sorry for the delay, but I left my screwdriver at work Thursday and that left me with two hard drives sitting on my desk instead of in the computer where they belonged.  Today the new SSD is in though, and you get two brand new episodes of Brave New Worlds.  Both of those can be found below!  The quality of these (I hope) is an improvement over what we have had.  I am working harder (and learning a bit more) on getting the quiet spots louder without the loud spots breaking ear drums.  The entire thing is much louder now too, so you should have to worry about accidentally blowing out your ears when switching to YouTube or something else after listening.  Next week we are going to have two new episodes from the Edge of the Empire game as I continue to get back on track.  Hopefully by then I will also have a better idea of how things will be playing out in the near future with the release schedule and what we will be recording in the near future.  As always thank you for listening to Untamed Dice!!