(Almost) On Holiday

I'm going on holiday at the end of the week. Long overdue, much deserved, and there'll be very little in the way of rest because my daughter (who turns three tomorrow), and my wife and my wife's parents are all coming too.

Between now and the taxi picking us up on Saturday (ugh, 3:15am!) I'm technically still on the clock in my day job, except that tomorrow we're going out for the day to celebrate CJ's birthday, then Thursday is another relative's birthday, Friday will be packing and panicking. So today and Wednesday for work. Yet here I am posting, of course.

The holiday will give me a chance to advance some game plans (some of which I can allude to, some of which I can't talk about), as there will be some times when my family are siesta-ing, and I'm not one for daysleeping. I'll be plotting and scheming:

• first, Issue 4 of A Random Encounter is somewhere between a third and halfway through the production process. I can get a rough timeline sorted out while I'm away, but I need to do a follow-up interview. That won't happen until I'm back, and then there's more transcribing, art and so on. New ETA: November.
• second, Project DANDELION: an idea I've been toying with for a while, and actually, being on holiday is the perfect time to work on this. DANDELION is a kind of prototype, and I have grand dreams but also grounded plans for this. Expect me to share this prototype thing hopefully by the end of October (I can work on this well while away, and then type and layout etc when I get back).
• third, game prep for playing Night Witches. I floated the idea on G+ a few weeks or so back, and there was enough, "Sounds cool," comments to make me go for it. I've got the pdf on my phone, and I'll have plenty of notepaper, so may as well start jotting stuff down and figuring it all out.

And that's all I can really talk about that.

TO BUSINESS!

A few weeks back I was fortunate enough to meet up with David McGrogan, Chris McDowall and Patrick Stuart - coincidentally, the subjects of the first three issues of A Random Encounter! We played a great game of Fiasco using a Warhammer 40K-themed playset (I'm not all that familiar with 40K, but got approving murmurs when I declared that an arch heretic character was a Blood Angel Space Marine); more importantly than that they agreed to the following publicity shot:

"Dammit Dave, open your eyes!"

If anyone's been thinking about getting print copies of any of the issues of A Random Encounter, now's a great time, because in a few days I won't be shipping anything for over a fortnight. If you order by midday on Thursday 22nd then I'll definitely get it in the mail before I go on holiday. If you're happy with pdfs then you can get them from Payhip and DriveThruRPG with no problems.

More on future projects soon. If anyone's played Escape The Undermaze or Thursday Night, the print extra games that come with print copies of issues 2 and 3 of the zine then let me know how they worked for you. Or even if you've just read them and have some feedback, drop me a line.

Adios!
N

In The Works

The last few months have been difficult. A couple of busy periods with the day job, plus family medical drama put RPG and zine stuff on the back burner. Even writing this post was delayed. I sat down to do this last night, and then my daughter, who had been a little out of sorts all day threw up. I spent most of last night asleep on her bedroom floor, and most of today wandering around in a semi-zombie state.

Difficult is relative, in reality, I'm a very fortunate guy. Among many things I've been using to buoy myself up recently has been Neil Gaiman's instruction to "make good art" - come what may, just get on with it. Listening to a couple of guests on the Tim Ferriss Show podcast has helped too, particularly Seth Godin and Kevin Kelly. Onwards and upwards, and all that.

In the next few months then, here's what you can expect from me (with some indication as to where they are in terms of completion):

• A Random Encounter Issue 3 - Vandel J. Arden
• Main interview done, transcribed and first editing pass done. Follow-up questions thought through and sent out. Cover commissioned. Print bonus in the works. Interior art in the works. ETA: end-July/start-of-August.
• A Random Encounter Issue 4 - Patrick Stuart
• Main interview done, will start transcription this week. A couple of follow-up questions identified. Cover commissioned, along with interior art. Print bonus is a mystery at the moment but a couple of ideas are tickling my brain. ETA: end-August/start-of-September.
• Fort [working title]
• It's coming up on the one year anniversary of Oddpool, and I had a couple of pages of follow-up ideas for the areas around that haunted and cursed place. Fort will be a Pocketmod-sized supplement about the area to the west of the river, a hold-out of civilisation and a strange place. People who think they're normal, living between a dead city and miles of marshland, but who are a bit... odd. (may or may not be inspired by the geography and locales of my hometown and surroundings) ETA: September/October.

My home office is starting to look like a small self-publishing outfit - which, I guess is kind of what it's becoming. As well as two issues of A Random Encounter, a re-print of Oddpool and two more issues of the zine on the way soon, I have the print runs of two other things that I've done in the last few months. These are for my dayjob, but couldn't have happened without my experiences of self-publishing RPG things.

As Issue 3 moves closer to completion I'll be announcing subscriptions - which will work out at the same cost as individual issues, but I'll throw in pdf copies as well for instant gratification - I have candidates for Issues 5 and 6 who have been tapped and given positive responses. So subscriptions to begin with will be for up to the end of this year/Issue 6. I have a big list of names for 2017, but if people are happy to support subscriptions I want to make sure I can deliver the goods.

I'll be posting RPG ideas more in the coming days as my brain needs space to vent while I get on with transcribing audio, editing three podcasts for my day job and working on admin and emails. I need to find creative outlets! I think I'll be offering a game or two for AntiGenCon this year, so just working through some ideas for that too... Currently a game of Maze Rats is winning out, but I might also run Escape The Undermaze too.

Want to know more about anything here? Comment below or email me! Thanks for reading, N.

Playing Soon: a rambly little update

The last couple of weeks have been frantic and strange. There's some illness in the family unit at the moment (which is thankfully on the way to being treated); work has been frantic as there's been a lot of it on recently but also frantic-state inducing because there is a little less than in previous years; I'm spending spare time when I find it slowly but surely working on Issue 3 of A Random Encounter, and trying to figure out if I have capacity to run a modest little Kickstarter in the summer*...

It's been a busy week! Yesterday, in my work persona, I launched a book that I co-wrote with a friend, and that's been a whirlwind - both to get it from idea to published in under four months, and also to attend to all of the launch day prep and work. And I'm on the cusp of announcing an independent workshop, which is the first time that I'll ever have done something like this and is hugely scary and exciting at the same time (the unknown and the great challenge).

But! All of that is being pushed to one side, because slowly and surely I am playing more games, and this is good.

• A few weeks back I ran a game at OSR Day Manchester, and played another one.
• I've played in the two most recent sessions of noisms' Old Japan 5e game, which has been a lot of fun (even if my ranger got killed by a bird-man wielding a rock).
• A friend that I play Netrunner with has expressed some interest in playing an RPG soon, and I'm thinking Deep Carbon Observatory using The Black Hack...
• In interviewing Chris McDowall for A Random Encounter, he expressed an interest in playing Apocalypse World - he's wanted to play it for ages but not had the chance... We're looking at dates now for a short Hangouts campaign.

Anyway, this is just what's going on with me. I have a 100-copy print run of Oddpool waiting to be assembled, and which I might offer as an incentive for people to help me shift some more issues of the zine. I'm definitely going to set up subscriptions for the rest of this year too, as I think I have interviewees in place for Issues 5 and 6 (just got to get confirmations, but it's all really exciting!).

Last thing then I'm going to sign off: I saw this awesome little CYOA zine being shared on G+ and just had to get it. The idea of solo or CYOA stuff has gone around my head from time to time over the last few years (due to the difficulty I have every now and then of making time for games) so this has me excited that this could be a viable little outlet for awesome ideas.

*I might not run the Kickstarter, but I might do a few little microgames and offer them as a print-only bundle... Watch this space.

Best Laid Plans

The first issue of A Random Encounter should have been in the mail already. I had to go away for work on Thursday and Friday, but had fully expected that when I placed the order for the print run I would be able to dispatch the pre-orders on Saturday morning. And then...

The print run was printed incorrectly, on two counts; first, 98% of the copies had their interiors assembled incorrectly. The pages had all been printed well, but then had been folded the wrong way when they had been stapled in. Meaning that the first page of the zine was in the middle. Not only that, but - in some ways, even worse - the covers had been printed too dark. I hadn't noticed this at first as I was so overwhelmed by the interiors (nearly) all being wrong, but the covers for the print run have come out a lot darker, as if too much black ink has been used. It really overwhelms a lot of the detail that Matthew Adams has put into the image.

Issue 1 on the left, prototype on the right.

It really stands out on the creature, far less detail on the print run, like it has been swamped out by heavier dark lines. Likewise the city in the distance is barely visible in the copy on the left. The only thing that has changed between the two images is Matt adding the title and issue number, the difference is in the printing.

Sigh. Anyway. The printers know about this, I talked with them about it on Thursday, and have been able to send them a full email about it detailing what has gone wrong with the order. They've got that in their inbox and have told me that if they had the complaint in full by 10:30am Monday they would dispatch a corrected print run the same day.

What does that mean? Well, fingers crossed, it will arrive some time on Tuesday and then the pre-orders will be in the mail Wednesday at the latest. Whenever they arrive I'll take them off pre-order, and put the pdf for sale on Payhip and DriveThru. Which means that if you want a print copy and a pdf copy thrown in, now is the time to pre-order!

Thanks again to everyone who has already pre-ordered, you're total stars. For your patience I've sent the pdf copy through already, but if you've pre-ordered and not received this email then get in touch and I'll send it again.

Official launch post coming in the next few days!

Vacant Ritual Assembly and Something Stinks in Stilton

Or: Nathan does quick reviews of two zines to remind you that he has a zine of his own coming out this month...

I think the idea to do something like a zine first came in to my head when I saw Vacant Ritual Assembly, the zine that Clint Krause produces under his Red Moon Medicine Show banner. I've picked up all five of the issues from this volume and loved them all. There's a good amount of playable material in every issue and the latest was no different. Combine that with short interviews with other creators, artwork, news and ideas about Clint's future releases - every issue is a great little package. And it's only $4 in print including postage! Go check it out. (issue 1 is PWYW on DriveThru)

Something Stinks in Stilton arrived through the letterbox yesterday. I've not bought The Undercroft by Daniel Sell before, but I'm going to pick up some of the back issues when I have a little spare cash. Stilton is kind of a special issue, and Oli Palmer's adventure is statted for LotFP, but it wouldn't take much to run in another system. Adventurers are asked to go and investigate mysterious circumstances, which will lead them to a horrific situation in the cheese-making town of Stilton. The adventure and description resonates with the themes and horror in so many of LotFP's official releases. It's creepy and unsettling - as is the cover, in a good way - a feature I particularly loved is the possible timeline of events: nothing binding or railroad-y, just super-useful to the DM. The art supports the text pretty well and it was interesting that the zine was printed full colour throughout: important adventure details are picked out in bold red text. The cover has a real tactile quality with slightly raised print, and it feels special. You can find it here.

For a prospective maker and publisher I haven't read many zines before: what others should I check out?