What’s New in the Neighborhood?
Well, my summer vacation is about 3/4 done, and it’s been an odd one.
We’ve had two storms that took out the power in Houston, the latter being Hurricane Beryl, which left pretty much the whole city in the dark. For about two weeks of my eight week vacation, Casa Chance has had no electricity. Good times.
I continue to GM games. I’m running a C&C/DCC/MCC mash-up every other Saturday. This campaign is loosely set in The Marmoreal Tomb. The PCs live in Sisak (from Dungeon #24 [July/August 1990]), very nearly the easternmost vestige of civilization. There are two groups of PCs. They’ve fought an evil wizard, a murderous demon-wolf, a human-sacrificing gnome, a hill giant family, a stone minotaur, and a bevy of evil humanoids. They’ve also started to deal with the meta-plot consequences of the campaign world being invaded by modrons.
I’m also running a DCC/MCC mash-up set in a post-apoc World of Greyhawk. In the funnel session, a mob of 0-levels defended the Inn of the Welcome Wench from a bullywug invasion during a horrific thunderstorm. In the second session, the survivors investigated the absence of Rufus and Burne. The PCs broke into the pair’s tower to discover the wizard Burne transformed into a horrid creature using its eye and mouth tentacles to operate Rufus as a puppet. The PCs found themselves facing a deadly threat, and so they fled the tower.
During and since North Texas RPG Con, I’ve picked up a few new RPG products. Let’s read about one of them now. I’ll get to the others later.
Tales from the Tavern, Issue #1 from Elven Maid Inn. This 98-page, system-agnostic gaming magazine is full of good stuff. There’s an essay. There are two interviews. There’s an explanation of Dystopian Dawn character creation. I dig the crossword puzzles and the two “NPC Extravaganzas”, which give system-neutral write-ups for NPCs to be dropped into my campaigns. There’re also monsters, fiction, spells, and campaign lore. It’s a great debut issue, and I’m looking forward to Issue #2.
Caveat: The editing in Issue #1 is spotty. There are numerous typos throughout, some of which would have been caught by spellcheck. This doesn’t make Issue #1 not well-worth checking out, but it does irritate my inner English teacher. Also, those last two links are affiliate links, and I’m the affiliate.
If you’re looking for worthwhile creators on Patreon, here’re the ones I currently support:
Talons and Tales: Art and stories created by a youthful artist. There’s not a lot of content here yet, but what there is amuses and inspires. Talons and Tales had me hooked with 29 June’s “Squirrel Rogue” post, especially the sketch of the squirrel rogue crouched in front of a locked chest, pausing long enough to give the viewer the side-eye.
Tome of Salvaterra: Many wonderful examples of stock art, maps, and creatures illustrated by Fernando Salvaterra, who is “a Brazilian freelance writer and illustrator who loves RPG and maps.” I get a real old-school vibe along with some whimsy as well.
Jeshields – RPG Stock Art: The title says it all. Illustrations come in black-and-white and/or color (depending on your level of patronage). There are monsters, characters, and items, oh my! There is a lot of content here. JE releases 10 illustrations a month and gives away credit for his on-line store of stock art. Not only that JE’s runs a great game of marines versus aliens.
Silver Compass Maps: Silver designs maps for table-top gaming. I’ve used several of them via Foundry when playing on-line. These maps usually have variants, such as daytime or night for outdoor maps. Silver does some lovely work, and my players have commented how nice her maps are.
AlexTheMapMaker: This my newest Patreon. Alex puts out one to three maps monthly. His town maps are what sold me. They’re simple, easy to read, and come with a handy key of main buildings. He also has battlemaps as well as isometric and traditional dungeons. What’s not to like?
