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Illuminated Site of the Week
Very soon now. Very, very soon. Look for an announcement here this time tomorrow . . . or, if you're really anxious, check the UltraCorps news page on Saturday evening.
Warehouse 23 News: A Collection Of Counters
Arcana Evolved: Counter Collection. A name the strikes fear in the hearts of monsters everywhere. Specifically, monsters from Arcana Evolved. That's right villains, no longer can you hide behind ambiguous GM descriptions! Your place is marked on the map for all the players to see. How much XP are you worth, again?
Not only can you not find real wood paneling at the big-box home improvement places, the quality of the fake paneling they sell has become laughable. Most of it is pictures of wood, glued to heavy cardboard. What comes next? The word "Wood," rubber stamped poorly onto paper towels?
We are having unseasonably warm and dry weather. Parts of Texas and Oklahoma have already burned. On New Year's Eve, a significant portion of the population is going to be firing off bottle rockets ANYWAY, and when the sun rises on January 1, the odds are good that the southern border of the USA will be a blackened crisp on the edge of Kansas.
The jerk who nails diet-plan signs to the neighborhood utility poles has a longer ladder than I do.
After all my complaining about days having only 24 hours, they are going to add one second to the end of one day at the end of the year. That isn't even a token response; that's mockery.
-- Steve Jackson
And the snow. And the water. And the lava. Well, maybe not the lava. . . anyway, your Mobile Infantry need a place to fight those nasty Arachnids, right? Starship Troopers: Floorplans should fix up you up nicely.
Today we moved the archives. Sounds simple. Not.
None of us had ANY IDEA how much mass and volume they added up to. Saving five to a dozen copies of everything published for 25 years . . . and keeping them in a very out-of-the-way place . . .
Aieee.
-- Steve Jackson
Warehouse 23 News: Because Overt Lands Are Boring
Champions: Hidden Lands, as you can probably guess, is not a book filled with detailed descriptions of true-to-life locations. No, friends, this book is about lands that don't exist. Sounds like the perfect place to send all those player characters that also don't exist, doesn't it?
December 28, 2005: For The Well-Dressed, High-Tech Adventurer: Nano-Armor
ApNano, manufacturers of the world's first nanotechnology-based lubricant, is experimenting with inorganic nanotubes as shock absorption material. The idea is to create armor for people and vehicles that is five times stronger than steel, yet light and flexible. TL9, here we come!
Here is the full story. Thanks to Mike Spoto for the link!
-- Paul Chapman
Warehouse 23 News: To Hack Or Not To Hack
That is the question: Whether 'tis nobler in the dungeon to suffer the slings and arrows of enraged kobolds or to take arms against a demon prince and his screwball worshippers. Dungeon Crawl Classics #18: Citadel of the Demon Prince lets you ponder this eternal quandary. It's way more fun than a soliloquy. Really.
One of the artifacts dealt with during the move was Alex's Tower of Cups -- six years' worth of (rinsed out!) soda cups from local fast food eateries. Before dumpstering them, Alex couldn't resist showing off.
Apparently balancing the Tower on his chin was easy; catching them as they fell was the hard part.
-- Paul Chapman
Warehouse 23 News: Guess They Never Got Their Pilot's License
UWO: Unidentified Walking Objects is a card game about aliens called Pnorfs and Gnorfs who live on the planet Znorf and blast the fnord out of each other.
December 26, 2005: GURPS Traveller: Interstellar Wars Proofs
Before a printer actually prints a book, they run a series of "proof sheets." The publisher reviews these proofs for color correction and text reflow. (Ah, yes, reflow. A problem we never had until digital production came along. Nowadays, what you send to the printers isn't necessarily what the printer prints . . . if his hardware, software, or sign of the Zodiac isn't exactly the same as yours.)
Last week, we received the proof sheets for GURPS Traveller: Interstellar Wars. Alex, Justin, and Chris gleefully pored over them, with Moe standing on the edge of the frame. A couple of very minor tweaks were found, and soon they'll be heading back to the printer with approval.
(One of the perks of the new office is the yards and yards of open desk space available for just such occasions.)
-- Paul Chapman
Warehouse 23 News: Because Weapons Of Minor Destruction Aren't As Interesting
You look bored. Bored people are not serving the best interests of their friend The Computer. They're sitting around, gathering dust. Dust that their friend The Computer has far better uses for. You could use some excitement. Some nuclear excitement. Paranoia XP: WMD is a lot like placing an antimatter bomb in your underwear. Exciting, isn't it?
Newly posted for all our fans is a brand new free game aid for GURPS Fourth Edition, GURPS Combat Cards. The cards are the brainchild of two of our fans, Robert L. Beaver and Andy Normansell, who both sent us submissions within a week or two of each other. We took the best ideas from each design and came up with what you can now download from e23 for free!
From all of us at Steve Jackson Games, have a Merry Christmas, or whatever other seasonal holiday is more appropriate to your personal belief system.
-- Scott Haring
Warehouse 23 News: Wars! Huuh! Good God, Y'all
What is it good for? Well, roleplaying, for starters. The Wars Roleplaying Game takes you forward about three centuries and drops you face first into a conflict that spans the solar system. If this sounds a little familiar, that's probably because it's the same universe as the Wars collectable card game.
The office will be closed for the holidays December 26 through January 2. We'll be home, eating too much, shredding pretty paper, and playing games. Hope you're doing the same!
(In reality, some of us will be in the office to catch up on work that was delayed due to the move, but not with enough regularity to call ourselves "open.")
Warehouse 23 will be closed December 26 and January 2, but will be available to take your order during their normal hours during the rest of the holiday season. They still need to finish organizing their shiny new warehouse, so they'll be busy.
-- Paul Chapman
Warehouse 23 News: Slavers And Royals And Rules, Oh My!
Cursed Empire: Slavers of Karg is another fine adventure/sourcebook for Cursed Empire. Part scenario, part rules expansion, all action!
December 23, 2005: The Move Is Done; Long Live The Move!
The bulk of the move went off without a hitch. Now comes the frenzied task of salvaging all those bits that weren't important enough to have the movers haul, but are worth gathering up -- stuff like corkboards, garden hoses, and AC units (groan!).
Of course, as now that everyone is snug in their new offices, and busy with their own unpacking, volunteers have been slightly less forthcoming.
But that's what the FNORD is for....
-- Paul Chapman
Warehouse 23 News: The Big Book Of Aiyyeeeee
Beholders and mind flayers don't make very good party guests, but they do make for excellent villains. Dungeons & Dragons: Lords of Madness gives you a plethora of information on these and other horrors. It also mentions how you might fight these creatures, giving players a glimmer of hope before their inevitable, horrific, mind-shattering end.
A couple of nights ago, while trying to sleep, I had an idea for a dice game. I staggered out of bed and made notes.
Wednesday night I read over them. Amazingly, they still made sense, so I typed up playable rules. At Thursday's playtest, we'll see if it's any good.
I've never created a dice game before, so I'm eager to see what people think of it.
-- Steve Jackson
Okay, that's a moving target. There's always SOMETHING else coming along.
Nevertheless: this is cool. Being auctioned for charity, and already over $31,000, is an 8-foot Lego model of a Rebel Attack Cruiser from Star Wars 3. It was created by Lego Master Builder Erik Varszegi as part of the film's promotion, and is now being sold with the blessing of Lucasfilm (and a certificate with George Lucas' signature).
If I were a big-budget company with a Star Wars license, you can bet I'd be bidding on this myself and planning to win. As it is, I just hope whoever gets it will put it up where a lot of people can see it and give it the WOW it deserves.
-- Steve Jackson
Warehouse 23 News: Roll With The Punches
And kicks. And breath attacks. And . . . well, it goes on like that for a while, but the point here is that Cheapass Games has released a Diceland expansion called Diceland: Dragons. It's fun, it's cheap, and it's got pictures of dragons on it. So it's just about perfect, right?
So here are two superheroic recommendations that have nothing, nothing whatsoever, to do with GURPS Powers. They're just neat.
First: Tom Smith has a new album out. It's called The Last Hero on Earth, and you can get it on his site. If you're not already a fan of the World's Fastest Filker, this one might just do it for you. I am listening RIGHT NOW to "Pirate Ninjas from Dino Island" and giggling. "We've all got pterodactyls where our parrots ought to be . . ." Tom has way too much fun.
The way he works this is: for $20, you can get the download now AND get the actual CD as soon as they're burned. Instant gratification AND hardcopy.
Second: A relatively new webcomic is "Evil, Inc.", by Brad Guigar. Simple premise: an aging supervillain goes legit. Kind of. He incorporates, because a megacorporation can be even more evil than a sup-er-crook. But then he hires a lot of super-crooks anyway . . .
It's just getting started, but it shows promise - and he pulled a nice little twist on us just yesterday.
-- Steve Jackson
Warehouse 23 News: Slice That Gordian Knot Called Life
Few things can be said about the Something Positive: Rippy the Razor - T-Shirt without sounding snide, cruel, insensitive, or just downright mean. Just the same, it's a very funny shirt, and it's a sure-fire way to frighten your parents.
. . .pation.
Monday's our first Official Day in the new office.
"Giddy with excitement" and "Monday" don't usually go together, but what the heck. We've been waiting for this for a long time.
-- Paul Chapman
It's fuzzy! It's twenty-sided! It's both! It's the Fuzzy Dice: 20-Sided Plush Die, Black and it's just dying to be rolled by loving hands. Or it would be, were it alive. Which it isn't. We think.
Okay, now just what are the characters doing in this The Tao of Geek strip?
Yep. That's what I thought, too.
Cool.
-- Steve Jackson
Because you just can't market an evil god enough, it's the Cthulhu Backpack! Just the thing to tote your unspeakable tomes to school, work, or play.
It's hard to tell when you're surrounded by boxes and movers, but it looks like the move went very well. There were no disasters, and we should be up and running when Monday rolls around.
As SJ mentioned earlier in the week, we got a few other things done in addition to moving. GURPS Traveller: Interstellar Wars did get off to the printers on time, and In Nomine Superiors: Eli is off to a flying start on e23. Alex, Justin, Monica and Scott deserve a round of applause, because it sure isn't easy to put the finishing touches on a book when there are boxes mounting up around you . . .
-- Chris Aylott
Godzilla Origins: Plush Rainbow Mothra. Chant it loud and chant it proud: I'm here. I'm Mothra. I don't want any more monsta's.
December 16, 2005: If You're Reading This, Everything Must Be OK . . .
Today's the big day. Movers are tromping through our offices, both old and new, bearing boxes and furniture. Servers are being moved, as are phone lines, so we're not sure if anyone can read this. Or if anyone can receive your phone call to let us know you can't read this.
Might as well consider Steve Jackson Games closed today. Except we're all here, working. Unless we're over there, in which case, "Yah!"
-- Paul Chapman
Warehouse 23 News: The Beginning Of The End
The BattleTech universe has had more than its fair share of troubles. The Succession Wars. The Clan invasion. The FedCom civil war. Now, the Word of Blake threatens to shake the very foundations of the galaxy. Steel yourself, MechWarrior, for the Dawn of the Jihad.
Many boxes have been packed, and we have now entered the exciting "tear stuff down to make the move easier" phase. Today's (yesterday by the time you read this) victim was the last wall of the old miniatures casting area. It went down without incident, except for the power driver that dropped off a ladder onto my head -- hence the title of this post.
It's always amazing how quickly really nasty work goes when everyone pitches in. In particular, the guys in Production have given me a few minutes here, and a few minutes there, and it's made a world of difference. Thanks guys!
Thursday (today to you, tomorrow to me) will be the craziest day. Everything that didn't get packed and labeled over the last week must be taken care of. And while I think we're ahead of schedule, I've grown to expect the unexpected.
Friday? Friday may be crazier still, but that's a worry for tomorrow....
-- Paul Chapman
Warehouse 23 News: Characters Are 100% Recycled Materials
Dungeons & Dragons: Races of the Wild details those races that choose to live in harmony with Mother Nature rather than making an end table out of her. Mind where you step, though. That awful smell is more than just an annoyance, it's a warning.
Today was a day of packing and back-and-forth truck driving.
What's really impressive to me, though, is that the people here are keeping up with the "must do" tasks with one hand while packing with the other. Warehouse 23 is into a very busy pre-holiday rush. GURPS Traveller: Interstellar Wars goes to press tomorrow. UltraCorps gets closer and closer to its first wide-open alpha. And my own Secret Munchkin Project is moving forward. No, of course I'm not going to tell you what it is. It's more fun to drop vague hints.
-- Steve Jackson
The last alliance of players and GMs stand fast on the brink of . . . being bored. Get out of the dungeon and on to the battlefield with Dungeons & Dragons: Heroes of Battle. How else are you ever going to get the chance to have your elf single-handedly scale, fight on, and topple a dire elephant?
The big Move Day is rapidly approaching. On Friday, December 16, the movers will come in and take all of our boxes away. On Monday, December 19, we'll be open for business in our lovely new offices.
Most of you won't notice a thing. Our mailing address, phone and fax numbers, and email addresses will be unchanged. Similarly, our contact info for distributors will be the same.
However, during the physical move of the servers, some downtime will occur. Not only will they physically be disconnected for a few minutes (the new office is less than 2 miles from our current location), but as our new IP addresses propagate through the DNS, the website (and FTP server, and email server) may become unavailable. If you receive an error, please attempt to load the page again a few hours later. Also, our phones will be down for around 30 minutes on the 16th.
In general, Friday is going to be a madhouse. If your question can wait for Monday, we'd appreciate it. Wish us luck!
-- Paul Chapman
Warehouse 23 News: It's Alive! Ha Ha Ha Ha!
Mine too! Ha ha ha! As one of Dr. Frankenstein's heirs, it's up to you to make a monster, push it out into the countryside, and have it beat up any fools that get in your way. You don't have to be mad to be one of Frankenstein's Children, but it sure helps.
It proves to be unreasonably difficult to get really, really random numbers out of a computer. But most people have better things to do than roll dice all day, every day. The GamesbyEMail.com solution was this automatic die roller which can throw 80,000 dice per day and digitally capture their images. For extra points, they built it out of Lego . . .
Warehouse 23 News: 15 Men On A Dead Dwarf's Dome
Matey, ye look to be one 'o them land lubber dungeon types. Ye want real adventure? Get yerself out on the seas, says I! Dungeons & Dragons: Stormwrack is just the book to get yer sealegs. A little advice, matey. Lose the plate armor, lest ye be enjoyin' a walk through Davey Jones' locker.
Joe Kushner is saying good things about GURPS Banestorm on RPG.net; you can read his review here!
Warehouse 23 News: Roleplaying Tooth And Nail
If there is only one flaw with the Player's Handbook, it's that it is nearly devoid of information on werewolves. Well, no longer. Behold! The Complete Guide to Werewolves!
Here is our December release, likely already on the shelf of a retailer near you, just in time for the holidays.
GURPS Powers
Save the World . . . or Destroy It!
GURPS Powers is the ultimate book for the ultimate characters in the new Fourth Edition of GURPS! Here's everything you need to create every kind of amazing, off-the-chart superhero you can imagine . . . as well as amazing wizards, wuxia fighters, shamans who command spirits . . . even gods!
Written by GURPS Line Editor and Fourth Edition co-author Sean Punch, GURPS Powers introduces some new rules, but it is mostly about using the rules that are already in the GURPS Basic Set to cover superpowered characters, megawizards, and earth-shattering psionics. GURPS Powers also include guidelines for "special effects" and several different ways to vary a power on the fly -- two crucial concepts for comic-book superheroics.
GURPS Powers is a Fourth Edition GURPS book that completely replaces the Third Edition books GURPS Supers and GURPS Psionics. Like our other Fourth Edition supplements, it's a gorgeous 240-page, full-color hardback.
If you've got a high-powered campaign – or high-powered players – you want GURPS Powers!
240-page full-color hardback.
Stock #01-0102,
ISBN 1-55634-742-1.
$34.95.
-- Paul Chapman
As of Dork Tower #31, MudCon will never be the same again! With Igor at the helm of Mud Bay's annual gaming convention, hilarity is bound to ensue. And by hilarity, we mean massive amounts of personal injury, financial destitution, and other icky-bad things.
. . . and the Fosfor Gadgets page offers an illustrated list of the Top Ten Weirdest USB Drives for our amazement, and coveting, and possibly squickage.
Warehouse 23 News: Everything You Ever Wanted To Know About Mars
But were afraid to liberate. Mars has seen more then its fair share of trouble. Naturally, that makes it a great place for a Babylon 5 campaign. Babylon 5: Free Mars will guide you from the brutal fury of the Food Riots to the clandestine world of Psi Corps research centers and every speck of red dust in between.
. . . and most of our Senior Staff meeting today was talk of the move. But things are under control. In just a couple of weeks we'll be in our new home.
Very strange, this evening, to close the door of my old office and think "I will only do this a few more times, forever."
-- Steve Jackson
Warehouse 23 News: Exploit Strange New Worlds
Space is vast, beautiful, and chock full of all the resources your country needs to get ahead of The Other Guys. Counter Strike Wargame: The Final Frontier simulates a global power struggle of galactic proportions sized for your dinner table.
I see boxes. Lots and lots of boxes.
Move Day is fast approaching, and the office is begining to look like a warehouse. Well, considering Warehouse 23, I guess more like a warehouse would be more appropriate.
Watch this space for updates on when the boxes will be moved (which may result in staffers being unavailable).
-- Paul Chapman
With great gratitude to Steve Sopko for flying this thing for me for the past few months . . . Wow, is that a mixed metaphor, or what? Unless, of course, the saddle is on a pterodactyl.
During Sopko's watch, we searched for, negotiated for, and bought a great new building; I got about a half-year ahead on game design; and we got our staff onto the same page about GURPS for the next few years, and planned out some very interesting new products. And Sopko personally picked the brains of the whole creative staff and produced a flowchart that describes what we REALLY do when we create a game, and how to do it best.
At any rate, I have learned a lot, and I'm once again the place where the buck stops. Steve Sopko remains very interested in the entertainment business in general. If somebody out there is looking for a consultant to sort out a game company, I can strongly recommend him.
-- Steve Jackson
Warehouse 23 News: Kicked To The Side
It ain't easy being a sidekick. The ridicule, the constant kidnappings, the childhood trauma, and (of course) the tights. On the bright side, the rest of the world gets to make a lot of cheap jokes at your expense. Dr. Blink: Superhero Shrink #2 explores what it's like to be a forgotten sidekick and how best to laugh at them.
Over the last week I read two good and very different books, from two authors I had known for very different sorts of things. So I'll share.
The Briar King, by Greg Keyes, is high fantasy, but not easily pigeonholed past that. There are clear hints that its world descends from our own, or is at least connected in some way. There are kings and queens, served by knights, but other aspects of society are original indeed. Some creature names clearly hark back to medieval fantasy, but both names and creatures are interestingly changed. And magic is very important, and we have only the beginning of description here, but it's original and fascinating. Communicating with spirits by writing on lead foil? Gaining powers by "walking the fanes" left by the "saints," who sometimes sound very unsaintly indeed?
Keyes' previous work includes the four fantasy/steampunk "Age of Unreason" books, beginning with the wildly original Newton's Cannon, and a number of media tie-in novels which should NOT be held against him. If they pay the bills to let him do books like The Briar King, blessings on them. Be warned, though: this book doesn't stand alone. A sequel, The Charnel Prince, is already out; I'm going to pick it up soon. Amazon tells me that at least one more is to come.
And then we have Ken MacLeod's Newton's Wake - no relation to Newton's Cannon, of course. This is a space opera . . . it says so, right on the cover. It's got the sort of plot that gets called a "romp" by the sort of critics who like saying "romp." But if it's a space opera, it's a thoroughly posthuman one. It posits that a Vingean "Singularity" happened . . . but a great many people survived, alive and human, after the AIs and post-post-posthumans went off to wherever they go in stories like this. So there they are, poking among the remains, some of them trying to set off another event that they can participate in, and others doing everything they can to prevent that from happening.
If you like themes of posthumanism, but want characters and plots that you can relate to, this one's worth looking at.
-- Steve Jackson
Warehouse 23 News: Harmonica Not Included
Here Be Monsters: Plush Blue Dragon. This dragon is blue. Very blue. Blue all over, you might say. And if you did say it, you'd be right. Because it's true. He's blue.
Eric Zimmermann, coauthor of the excellent game design text Rules of Play, has drafted A Game Developer's Bill of Rights. He's talking about the computer game industry, rather than paper games, but some of the points he makes are relevant to paper game designers too. And the ones that don't apply to paper gaming indicate some very scary differences between the two fields.
(Sidenote: What paper game companies call designers, computer game publishers call developers. What paper game companies call developers, computer game publishers call "assistant developers" or something . . .)
Zimmerman acknowledges that this is a very optimistic screed, not realizable in today's business environment. But, as he continues: "However, if you agree with me that the articles of the Bill are a proper set of ethical goals, then the question is: How can we change the game industry to make it a climate where developers could in fact retain these rights?"
Now, with my publisher hat on, I have to say that some of those points read, to me, like descriptions of the publisher's appropriate task. A publisher that gives designers veto power over, e.g., distribution channels, is a publisher that shouldn't expect to be in business next year. Nevertheless . . . This is interesting.
-- Steve Jackson
Warehouse 23 News: Tarot, Only Nerdier
The Hanged Man? The Chariot? The Hierophant? Those arcana are so 19th century. Bring your mysticism into the digital era with The Silicon Valley Tarot!
As GURPS Powers draws ever closer to your local game store, we've got yet another excerpt to keep you on the edge of your seat until it arrives.
-- Paul Chapman
I know what you're thinking. You're thinking "I sure could use a sourcebook that discusses Knights in Cursed Empire, covering everything from heraldry to rituals. A Cursed Empire: Knight Sourcebook if you will. Oh, and horses." You're also thinking . . . oh my. Thanks, I think you're cute too.
A couple of gaming-related podcasts have come to our attention recently. First, Mark Johnson's Boardgames To Go series covers, well, boardgames. His more recent entries have some interesting thoughts on various games he saw at BoardGameGeek.Con in Dallas. Long-time Steve Jackson Games fans will recognize Mark as the "character designer" for GURPS Wild Cards.
Second, Paul Tevis' Have Games, Will Travel podcasts have interviews with some interesting folk from GenCon SoCal, including Ken Hite and Ross Jepson.
-- Paul Chapman
Warehouse 23 News: A Very Cool Talislanta Book
Talislanta: The Northern Reaches is really "cool." Because it's about the Northern Reaches. Which is a colder region than the areas closer to the equator. Get it? Ha ha ha . . . sorry. Never again.
NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope has found a brown dwarf which may be exhibiting planet-forming disks. Little Cha 110913-773444 is only eight times the mass of Jupiter, which prompts the question: will its orbiting bits be classified as planets, or moons?
Read the full story on Caltech's page.
-- Paul Chapman
Warehouse 23 News: Warehouse 23 Top Ten
Check out Warehouse 23's top selling items for November at the Warehouse 23 Top 10 page.
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