Monday, August 8, 2011

Isle of the Unknown Art Preview 3: MORE MONSTERS + Blargle

I've had a nasty habit of writing 3/4ths of a blog post lately, but then not posting them. So here's the money shots of all that unposted writing, without the arguments behind them:

  • G1/2/3/D1/2/3 is as much of a story-loaded railroad as I3/4/5
  • Death on the Reik is perhaps the awesomest adventure ever
  • The answer to "Is there room for another...?" is always yes, as long as it's good enough
  • Guns may change the flavor of your setting but they won't change the actual play of your old school game one bit
  • My publishing philosophy moves further along the "pay your people, make everything awesome, if it costs it costs"
  • Ropecon story from Mentzer: Gygax wrote Keep on the Borderlands so he could get the "included in the basic sets that are selling by the hundreds of thousands" royalties instead of continuing to let Mike Carr get that loot with In Search of the Unknown
  • It's weird to be worried about how well I did at GenCon...

And, as advertised, here are some more monster pics from Isle of the Unknown. Concepts by Geoffrey McKinney, artwork by Amos Orion Sterns.







10 comments:

  1. Death on the Reik is perhaps the awesomest adventure ever

    Truth. It's a whole campaign in a box. Also, transvestite goblins and gentleman cockroaches. Only the Great Pendragon Campaign and the COC masterpieces (Masks of Nyarly, Orient Express, etc.) match it.

    Guns may change the flavour of your setting but they won't change the actual play of your old school game one bit

    Yep. They're just (heavy, fiddly, slow-firing) bows that go BANG!

    Congrats on doing well at Gencon: success is a problem you want to have. :)

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  2. I don't know yet if I did well at GenCon... that's why I'm worried. :D

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  3. I like the tree picture. Don't know what it is, but it intrigues me.

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  4. I've always wanted to fight a giant tree.

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  5. I'd shit my pants if I saw a tree with faces.

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  6. This book will be awesome. I just can't wait for it to be released.

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  7. I've got a dozen posts (at least!) with the same unfinished problem...maybe I should do a money shot list. As for you shots:

    G-Q - Check (though there's room for expansion off the main "rail")
    Guns - Check
    Is there room...? - Check, though it's hard to believe at times (5 billion people, yo)
    Death on the Reik - Awesome for LotFP conversion perhaps; I always found it difficult to run (even for WHFRP). Maybe I need to re-read it...
    Gygax the Merc - Doesn't change the fact B2's the better mod (IMO)
    Publishing philosophy - Check, checkity-check!

    Nice art, by the way.
    : )

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  8. G1/2/3/D1/2/3 is as much of a story-loaded railroad as I3/4/5

    True, but, like JB said, G-D (especially D3) does also provide lots to explore beyond just what's necessary for the story.


    Death on the Reik is perhaps the awesomest adventure ever

    Just based on you saying that, I was going to say I should check it out. But, after Chris added "It's a whole campaign in a box. Also, transvestite goblins and gentleman cockroaches. Only the Great Pendragon Campaign and the COC masterpieces (Masks of Nyarly, Orient Express, etc.) match it", now I must check it out.


    The answer to "Is there room for another...?" is always yes, as long as it's good enough

    Especially if it's not just good enough, but the best yet.


    Guns may change the flavor of your setting but they won't change the actual play of your old school game one bit

    Only if they're just muzzleloaders. In that case, then, yeah, like Chris said, "They're just (heavy, fiddly, slow-firing) bows that go BANG!" And that might still be somewhat true even for early (single-shot, double-barreled, revolver, lever-action, bolt action) cartridge firearms too. But probably not semi-automatics. And certainly not machine guns. Those give ordinary people the kind of power that otherwise only high-level spell-casters would have.


    My publishing philosophy moves further along the "pay your people, make everything awesome, if it costs it costs"

    Sounds much like Walt Disney's business philosophy. I hope it turns out as well for you as it did for him. So far, so good!

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  9. >>Only if they're just muzzleloaders.

    Well, obviously.

    Now I'm imagining that guy from the early D&D 4e promos carrying an M60 into a dungeon, blasting monsters right and left as he gives his "ZE GAME REMAINS ZE ZAME!" warcry.

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  10. M60 M-shmixty. Imagine him with the XM214 Minigun that Jesse Ventura's character used in Predator.

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