View from the Pelgrane’s Nest

Today marks the 75th anniversary of HP Lovecraft’s death. Perhaps it’s morbid to mark his death rather than his birth, a little grim to dwell on the unstoppable ravages of time, indifferent and uncaring. Morbid? Perhaps. Appropriate? Definitely. For contrast, we add to this cocktail of the grim and the deathly a healthy dose of opportunism, with a new Trail Core Bundle for new Keepers at a temporary 25% discount in the store, and set of Hidden Treasures – sadly over looked Pelgrane gems, also at 25% off.

13th Age

We are publishing a new fantasy game by Jonathan Tweet and Rob Heinsoo, 3rd and 4th Edition D&D designers. That’s all I’ll say for the moment, but if you want to play test, you can apply here.

Night’s Black Agents

We really could do with some more REDACTED edition sales to cover our printing costs, so please consider buying it from our store. We need to sell 100 more to break even on our print costs.

Thank you for all your feedback on Night’s Black Agents. Ken will have completed the final ms by the end of the month. Art is progressing well. I’ve been running Night’s Black Agents for my group, and it has a real cinematic feel. The rules at the micro level and the conspiracy structure at the macro level mesh to create a thrilling atmosphere. Every clue leads to danger. Preparedness means you don’t have to micromanage all your planning, and GUMSHOE’s resource management could have been tailor-made for the limited network, cover identities and equipment in a spy game.

If you have any tables or references you want added, or are willing to give us actual play feedback for the DVD notes, that would be great.

Trail of Cthulhu

Robin Laws and Steve Dempsey are outlining the concept and doing the research for a Dreamlands supplement based in Paris. This is Robin’s pitch:

Dreamhounds of Paris* is the Dreamlands book for people who hate the Dreamlands.  The players are prominent surrealists, their rivals, and occult adversaries, fighting to control the Dreamlands and thus alter human consciousness.  The fractious, iconoclastic surrealists were the premiere troublemakers of the intellectual scene of 1930s Paris. Andre Breton, their ideological enforcer, considered the movement not an art or avant garde pursuit, but an exercise in literally changing the human spirit.  The exploration of dreams was but one part of this quasi-mystical pursuit.  In Dreamhounds of Paris, top surrealists–but never the hyper-rational Breton himself–not only discover a way of breaking through to the Dreamlands by randomly walking the streets of the city.  They discover that their powerful imaginations allow them to reshape its oneric geography. Soon the Dreamlands look more like something envisioned by Lautreamont than Dunsany–then they’re overrun by melting watches, ants streaming from giant hands, and bowler-hatted men whose faces can never be seen.

*I haven’t yet decided whether this title is a joke, or brilliant marketing.

• When Ken has finished Night’s Black Agents, he’ll be moving on to managing Mythos Expeditions and the a supplement set in China.
• Adam Gauntlett’s Coffins is in illustration and will be out next month, and new adventure set in Civil War Spain will be in playtest shortly.
• Note the Robin’s Repairer of Reputations, a hidden treasure, is available at a discount for a while.

Ashen Stars

• Kevin Kulp, who created the Stowaway demo game for Ashen Stars is working on new adventures for Ashen Stars.
• We are still considering what other supplements to release – it appeared that a massive campaign would be the most popular, but that is a huge undertaking and even if we sell through the first print run (which seems highly likely) it’s a relatively small market. That’s not to exclude the possibilty.
• Terra Nova, Lenny’s excellent Ashen Stars adventure is now available on rpgnow.com.

Esoterrorists

• Love of Money, Matthew Sanderson’s sombre and exciting adventure is now on sale at rpgnow.com. We are considering a print version, and we’ll offer a discount to PDF purchasers if we do this.
• Eso 2.0 is being illustrated, other products are in editing.

Owl Hoot Trail, New World, Gaean Reach, et all

• Clinton has passed Owl Hoot Trail on to us for completion, and Kevin Kulp will be writing the playtest adventure for it.
• New World is in playtest, and we could do with some more playtesters for it. You can hear about it, and listen to some actual play with Bill White on this podcast.
• Robin has written most of the Gaean Reach, which mixes up GUMSHOE with Skulduggery, and where character’s primary motive is revenge.
• Paula Dempsey has written the first draft of Salem, which is a story game based on Monsegur 1244, where you play folks involved in the witchcraft trials.
• She is also working on her follow up to the Book of the Smoke, the Book of the New Jerusalem.