The Artist and the Assassin

More artwork for Porphyry: World of the Burn

Plus a new commission from Trey at Sorcerer's Skull

KONGTHULHU!!!!!!

Fuck you, Bananacrom.

Calling all Santicore's Little Helpers....

After the "award-winning" success of last year's Secret Santicore and the thousands upon thousands upon thousands of requests for more of the same I would like to announce that very soon I will announce Secret Santicore 2012.

BUT BEFORE THEN... I need to get a few things in order.

Basically I was able to wrangle Santicore into shape last year because:

a) I had no idea what I was getting into
b) I was pretty much unemployed and had time to burn
c) it was my first foray into rpglandia and I wanted it to work
d) you would have all laughed hearty mocking laughs if I had failed to deliver.
BUT I DELIVERED (a couple of days late but you were all too fat and full of santicoremas lard and pudding to care).

HOWEVER I COULD NOT HAVE DONE IT without the generous contributions and support of an awesome team of Little Helper Elves. Who are only now returning from the round-the-world tickets they scored (not from me).

This year things are a little different cause:

a) I know what I'm getting into
b) I am now so overworked I clock in about 4 hours of sleep a night as it is.
c) There might be a few more people who want to give give give (and receive) so it might be a little bigger
d) I just happen to be selling my house, moving overseas, looking for a job and wrangling devil midgets all before Santicoremas.

SO... if Secret Santicore is to happen again, I just can't shoulder as much of the burden as I did last year. So a coupla things: one, I know no-one's feeling all Santicorey yet, but the sooner I get this thing rolling the better so I can have a couple of months to get this thing sorted instead of 3 weeks, and two:

I NEED YOUR HELP TO MAKE THIS HAPPEN.

If you are:

• an rpg artist who'd be willing to contribute an illustration or two or three;
• a graphic designer willing to layout a couple of articles in Indesign;
• an editor with an eagle eye willing to proofread a few pages;
• a project wrangler happy to oversee some of the production; or
• just an awesome slab of humanity willing to give blood, sweat, bones and thinkmeat to the cause...

LET ME KNOW ASAP by emailing malignicant at geeeeee male dawtcalm with an indication of what you think you'd be willing to contribute.

MANY THANKS IN ADVANCE TO ALL WHO HEED THE CALL. Santicore is watching the rest of you veeeeerrrrrryyyy closely indeed.

AWESOMELY NIFTY SS LOGO by the unestimable Jeremy Duncan. HE WHO NOW SITS BY SANTICORE'S TREMBLING KNEE. FEAR HIM.

Bewdy

Jez

UPDATE: Just to be clear, this is a call out for people to help organise and create everything around the actual Santicore requests and articles, not the articles themselves; that call out for those requests will come soon.

REBEL SCUM

So Scrap did this:

and then did this:

then Zak did this:

and Rey did this:

ergo Ian did this:

thence John did this:

compelling Trent to do this:

which made me do this:

:)

Santicore 2012, Lulu, Porphyry, LotFP and Stuff

I'm calling this one early: the Misers have it by basquillion to one, so I'll start prepping a black and white version of Secret Santicore for Lulu. Which I completely get given the price diff, but still, would like to see in in colour one day...

...but none of this happens til I've slain the mighty beast that is Porphyry. Over the hump but still a fair whack of illustrations to go, big push over the next fortnight to try this wrapped up pronto. Cause on the horizon lurks two if not three FOUR modules for the Lamentations of the Flame Princess Great Adventure Campaign, plus a few more surprises from James Raggi, as well as the designwork for The Secret DM's Gary Gygax Birthday Competition Thing.

I'm kinda disappointed that more of Raggi's adventures didn't fund. I had put my hand up to do all 16, which prolly would have broken me, so that's a relief; and in a way not having so many is good thing:

I'll have time to put together Secret Santicore for 2012.

The catch is that at some point late November/early December I'll be moving country – which means packing and selling the house, selling the kids, all the usual. I'm kinda expecting there to be a few more Santicore entries than last year, too. The combination means preparations will have to be in place preeeetty early, and I'll probably have to share the load a little to git it dun in time. I'll be putting out the call for artists and editors and proofers and wranglers soon. You have been warned :)

Gotta say it's been a good year for gaming. A very good year. Thanks!

Death Love Doom

So my first major design job for James Raggi has pretty much wrapped up: a horror throwdown for Lamentations of the Flame Princess that rocked up out of nowhere two weeks ago.

Cover art, cartography, and layout by me, but no illustrations, for reasons all explained here.

Secret Santicore: Poll for your print preferences

K so Secret Santicore 2011 will soon be made available in print thru Lulu! Only question is do peeps want GLORIOUS COLOR or MISERLY BLACK AND WHITE. Either way I'm only gonna prep the files once, so... if you care at all, please make the gargantuan effort to click on the poll just over there on the right side of this blog. You've got til end of the July to speak your mind OR FOREVER HOLD YOUR PEACE.

Also, a truckload of typos have been sorted and a coupla new pieces of art dropped in – big thanks to S.L. Shirley and Boric Glanduum for the proofing, and Jeremy Duncan for the extra arty goodness.

SO GO GET YOUR SHINY NEW PDF NOW. CLICK HERE.

A gallery of stuff I've scribbled

I've added a gallery of illustrations to the blog, mainly some of the recent work
I've been doing for Kyrinn S.Eis' Porphyry and Santicore stuff,
as well as some older pieces. Its where I'll be keeping my faves.
Click here to go see, or on the three-eyed hag face on the right of the page. 
Hope you like'em! 

Why Wampus Country is the best blog around

Insightful, informative, and rather dashing really.

That is all.

MUTANTOR!!! wtf?

Some setting notes about my slowly gestating game from a chat on G+ about stonepunk:

MUTANTOR!!!! is weirdgrim stonepunk. 'Punk' is a rejection of social norms: in a neolithic society that means rejecting the tribe and going your own way. Only it's a dangerous world: you wanna eat well, you gotta hunt as a pack. so these outcasts and exiles need to find other outcasts and exiles they can work together with but still maintain their own self-determination. That's the setup for the PCs, ostracised punks who have to get along just to survive: adventure follows. Each tribe they're from has its own cultural mores, so they're all rejecting something different. If it ever sees the light of day, during character creation you create the tribe you've left behind:

Zak's Barbaric Tribe Generator was my Secret Santicore request for a reason.

Stonepunk is also riffing on its steampunk predecessor. With steampunk you've got technological innovation and wild possibilities... with stonepunk you've got the same thing, just with a different technology. so the world of MUTANTOR!!! is on the cusp of technological evolution, and it requires people who aren't prepared to do things the way the ancestors did things for thousands of generations. It requires people who see things differently... punks who'll experiment and fuck things up and try the new cause they're all about rejecting the old. The PCs, once again. Only it's not just the jump from hand axes to bows and primitive blades, it's stonepunk, so it's about stonebased technology - henges, stone circles, ziggurats and pyramids... architecture as a machinery - and seeing what it can power, as much as smaller ideas - stonepunk weaponry and what rockart can bring into existence.

So take that, make everything a mutant, make the land a living entity infected by cancerous dungeon infestations, make it gritty and bloody and horrible and set it at the south pole with days and nights that last a year and everyone fears the Warriors from the Meat Moon.... well that's MUTANTOR.


more stuff about the game here