Guide to Glorantha KS Update (cont'd)

OK, we knew the books would only be available in 2014. But Jeff promised that at least we'd receive the PDF of the Guide to Glorantha in December 2013. I had my doubts, and they have been confirmed; the latest update says the Guide will be split in two PDFs. One that we'll get at the end of the month, and another one that we'll receive in January. Well, I'm not surprised, and I'm not even angry because when you see art like this you are ready to condone pretty much anything. This is simply AMAZING.

Sog City

The Latest Deluxe T&T Update Worries Me

The latest post on T&T aficionado Tori Bergquist's blog is titled "Deluxe T&T Update 43 is out...and it actually worried me a bit". Well... Same over here at Timinits & Trolls!

I have read Liz Danforth's long update message about the Deluxe T&T kickstarter, and the more I read, the more I grew worried!
There's been a number of illustrations made available on the kickstarter updates but, basically, I am under the impression that the real work on the text of DT&T hasn't started yet. I know Liz was severely ill but reading sentences like “we haven't decided yet whether we should go class-less” or “Ken wanted elves, fairies, hobs, trolls, or ratlings to be their own class” is simply mind-boggling. The former architectural decision would turn DT&T into BRP/RQ, the latter into classic fantasy! Most of us already own and play those games, we don't need yet another d100 based game or classic fantasy clone— what we need is a streamlined version of Tunnels & Trolls combining the best features of the 5th ed., of the 30th anniversary rules, and of the French edition. Period.

I am a sad Troll

Still from Liz: “One of the Kickstarter comments was a request for the Table of Contents. I can’t give that to you”. Er, this to me translates as: 'I haven't started yet so how could I possibly give you even a tentative ToC?'. Sigh.

At this stage, I don't even want DT&T to be shipped in 2014— That would mean the game hasn't been sufficiently play-tested before it's made available. Grr.

Guide to Glorantha Update

Here are the latest news with regard to the Guide.

First, Rick has posted the following to the backers:
Being larger sized pages [賈尼: the Guide will be a coffee-table book, larger than the usual 8.5 by 11 inches; I was told the exact dimensions, but since they were not in understandable SI units, I've already forgotten them], we have a number of new opportunities to present information visually. Even though we have a lot of text, we try to avoid just pages of columns. All of the new art and maps are beauties to behold, but we have a lot of pages to fill.

In the end, as we're approaching the completion of the first third of the layout, we know that getting everything done is going to require a little bit more time than our previously published timetable allows. Thus, we now see the completion of the layout bumping up to the middle of December.

What we now envision is printing the books in January, based on completion of the PDFs of the Guide and Atlas in December. Fortunately, we can distribute those PDFs as they get completed, with Volume One of the Guide, followed by the Atlas, and shortly thereafter Volume Two of the Guide.

Second, I've talked to Jeff yesterday who confirmed the news above. Basically, the larger size of the pages plus the fact that there is AWESOME art on EVERY page of the book slows down the layout process. However, we backers should get the PDFs in December. Then, in January, the books will go to the printer, which should make them available in Q1 2014.

Yummy!

My RPG Person Profile

OK, this is Zak's latest meme, to which I'm obviously succumbing. Here is my RPG Person Profile:

I'm currently running (at home): Oriental Monsters & Magic playtest campaign

Tabletop RPGs I'm currently playing (at home) include: HeroQuest

I'm currently running (online): nothing

Tabletop RPGs I'm currently playing (online) include: BRP, HeroQuest, RuneQuest 6

I would especially like to play/run: Monkey, Tunnels & Trolls, Wordplay

...but would also try: Aquelarre, Món de monstres

I live in: Paris

2 or 3 well-known RPG products other people made that I like: Death Frost Doom, Gloranthan Classics: Pavis & Big Rubble, Rome: Life and Death of the Republic

2 or 3 novels I like: The Age of Doubt, The Name of the Rose, The Water Margin

2 or 3 movies I like: A Chinese Ghost Story, North by Northwest, Yongseoneun Eopda

Best place to find me on-line: G+

I will read almost anything on tabletop RPGs if it's: set in Glorantha

I really do not want to hear about: theories about role-playing games -- I like to play rpg's not to think about rpg's

I think dead orc babies are: cliché'd

Games I'm in are like: http://eternal-con.de/

Free RPG Content I made for Glorantha is available here.

Free RPG Content I made for Imperial China is available here.

Free RPG Content I made for weird fantasy role-playing is available here.

You can buy RPG stuff I made about BRP China here.

If you know anything about East Asia, it'd help me with a project I'm working on.

Cultural Maps from the Upcoming Guide to Glorantha

The Guide to Glorantha should be available by the end of the year. The text is fully written and has been proofread. Jeff et al are now busy with the artistic part: the illustrations and, of course, this being a fantasy product, the maps.

The two maps below have been 'leaked' on the Glorantha G+ community and on the new Glorantha web-site a few days ago. Funnily enough, they both cover my favourite part of Glorantha: Umathela. Enjoy!

Nostalgia and Adolescence

I don't know if it's become some kind of meme already, but there are a few posts out there on G+ about what fantasy gamers enjoyed as novels, art, etc. during their formative years.

I spent my early teenage years in a relatively quiet town in south-western France, and then the family moved to the far suburbs of Paris when I was 15. As a result, I wasn't exposed to many novelties in terms of comics, games or novels. My foraging trips to Toulouse (first), and Paris (last) were important journeys to organise, and they would cost me a lot of pocket money, so they had to be well planned. Mostly, I needed to be sure that some "wow" stuff was to be found, else I'd simply postpone the trip.

Living in the sticks as I was, I hadn't access to any fanzines, etc., and mail order was still in its infancy for anything that wasn't clothes, so I could only rely on Jeux & Stratégie to learn about new games. Contrary to a lot of fellow gamers, I started with war games.

Jeux & Stratégie would carry a free pull-out war game in each issue, and one of these was a bizarre boardgame without any hexes and strange counters:

So the next time I went to my FLGS in Toulouse, I learnt about role-playing games. Apparently, they were fantasy-themed tactical war games that didn't need a board!

I bought the Holmes box and was instantly hooked. I soon bought all the issues of Casus Belli I could get my hands on, and GM'ed the adventures therein for my neighbours.

In terms of other items of geekdom, I didn't read any (US) comics at the time, and I hadn't been exposed to Anglo-Saxon fantasy either. My childhood fantasy world was the classic world of the Grimm stories or of Central European legend:

Again, contrary to what happened to most fellow gamers out there, I didn't start playing D&D because I had read Tolkien, but the other way round: I started reading Tolkien because it seemed so similar to D&D!

After we moved to Suburbia, I was lucky enough to have a huge library really close to home that carried all the Temps Futurs books: Leiber, Lovecraft, Moorcock, et al. I became an avid reader of fantasy novels.

In those same years, I bought the French translation of Tunnels & Trolls, which became my favourite role-playing game as a GM (never liked the solos).

This, in turn, prompted me to look for the Sorcerer's Apprentice the first time I went to the US.
 I bought a huge stack of past issues, and that in turn introduced me to the fantastic notion of house rules (as well as it introduced me to very fine fantasy short stories).

Using Monster Island in Second-Age Glorantha

Monster Island for RuneQuest 6 by the Design Mechanism has been available for quite some time now, but due to very long holidays —not that I am going to complain— which have completely dried up my bank account, I haven't been able to lay my grubby hands on this mouth-watering tome yet.

I have already blogged about this S&S sandbox supplement, so I am not going to go through a description again, especially since I haven't seen the final product.

However, a recent thread on Google+ has sparked renewed interest in Monster Island, viz:

I want to set Monster Island in Second-Age Glorantha but my players are asking where exactly the Island is and what year in 2nd Age - would appreciate any advice on both?

to which I have answered along the lines of:

There is a monster island off the coast of Pamaltela— Loral. According to the upcoming Guide of Glorantha: “Loral was inhabited by humans before the Closing. Their land used to be called the Queendom of Loral”.
As for the year to set the campaign in, it could be just before the Closing, to add an impending sense of doom!

And if you rotate the map of Monster Island ninety degrees anticlockwise, it even becomes very similar to the map of Loral!