Welcome To My Process (part 5)

New here?  This is where you begin.

Before I forget, the blog has a new heading.  Jon Mollison did the last one based on The Outer Presence, and he created this one for Cha'alt.  Let's give him a round of applause.  Yes, slap those slimy tentacles together in appreciation.  Huzzah!

Ok, everything is taking shape and we're close to the "finished" stage.  Once the writing's done, I'll start handing things off to professionals who can take the rather rough material and make it look awesome.

Specifically, I'll need to find one or more artists.  The cover image is key, but this could do with a couple additional pieces of interior art, as well.

As I mentioned before, the map should be re-imagined by someone who draws maps every day and is head and shoulders beyond my passable skills.  So, find a suitable cartographer.

What else?  Oh yeah, layout.  I don't do my own layout.  That, too, gets farmed out to someone who'll do a great job.  Obviously, if you're creating an adventure for home use, you don't have to do any of this.  And if you're just starting out or really want it to be a DIY project, feel free to go it alone.  That's up to you.

As I reach out to those individuals, I will refine what we already have, embellishing the good, pruning the bad, and turning what's ugly into beauty.  Basically, it only needs a bit of TLC from this point until we're ready for the tedious but necessary writing-it-all-out phase.

Let's work on that random table for those touching the green slime dripping down the curving crimson-brown walls.

1. It stings a bit, but nothing serious.
2. You get a nasty chemical burn (take 1d3 points of damage).
3. Whatever touched the slime and the surrounding flesh pulses with an eldritch green glow (save or die in the next 10 minutes).
4. You're mutated into a screeching, hot-to-the-touch, green and hairy primordial man-wolf [props if you get that reference].
5. You get a psionic ability.
6. The flesh that touched the slime is forever stained with Old One ichor - the next time you're knocked unconscious, a ghastly visitation of horrors beyond time and space take you on a little tour of your own past, present, and future.  Each stop contains gratuitous and unwanted groping by one or more tentacles. 

I might change things later, but that's a good start.  Want my generic advice on creating a random table with various effects?  Here we go...

• One result where nothing much happens.
• One result where something bad (minor) happens.
• One result where something bad (major) happens.
• One result where something weird happens that could be either beneficial or detrimental.
• One result that's clearly a benefit.
• One result that's just plain weird.

Ok, what now... the dimensional toxic waste?

I'm thinking a pile of sludge on the floor that's a melange of strange, constantly changing colors.  Touching it won't do anything, but lengthy handling of the waste will transport one to another dimension... maybe through time, as well.

Now, onto Queen Tresillda's personal magic item!

What about an anklet of youth?  Wearing it makes one look and feel like they're 25 years old.  I may decide to give her another one, something with offensive power... or possibly her sorcerer Xa'algex.

Last but not least, there should be some kind of twist or revelation at the end.  Something to make the adventure pop, taking it to the next level... 

What if the PCs eventually (either before the Queen is killed or just after) learn that Queen Tresillda was right all along?  The priesthood disavowed and banished her because of their idiotic hypocrisy and cowardice, and the Queen's revenge was not only justified but thoroughly righteous.  Perhaps the PCs would even be willing to help her, or finish her task if they killed her off before realizing the truth?

Now, that we have a strong foundation, we write it out, revising little details as we go, making improvements.  That's how adventures get finished.  Before too long, you just have to get in there and get to it.  Remember to feel the flow, ride the snake, and make it awesome!

Good luck,

VS

Updated Softcovers for Kort'thalis Publishing

All three of these have had a face-lift over the last couple weeks...

Trilogy of Awesome +1 includes Slippery When Wet (Alpha Blue), A Green Jewel They Must Possess (The Outer Presence), and Slaves of Tsathoggua (Crimson Dragon Slayer)... plus the bonus Death Race: Fury Road.

Trilogy of Awesome Returns +1 includes High-Stakes Q'uay-Q'uar (Alpha Blue), His Flesh Becomes My Key (The Outer Presence), and Stairway of V'dreen (Crimson Dragon Slayer)... plus the bonus scenario Guarding Galaxy XXX (Alpha Blue).

Dead God Excavation includes the scenario Dead God Excavation (Crimson Dragon Slayer), La Bas Chartreuse (The Outer Presence), and the brand new Totally Random Tables.  Usually, I release the PDF and weeks or months later the content appears in softcover - not so this time!

What's new?  A few things have been cleaned up and corrected, and Dead God Excavation should be much easier to read now... 

But most of all, they're on fancy, heavier paper and full-color.  Many of the illustrations are still in black and white, but these books are now higher quality - befitting the fine-ass, weird, gonzo sleaze you've come to expect from Kort'thalis Publishing.

Enjoy,

VS

Totally Random Tables

How many d6 tables does it take to get to the center of a gonzo campaign?  Thirty.  The answer is most definitely 30.  And I can prove it...

Yes, I've got a new PDF for GMs looking for something a little different.  As the title hopefully indicates, these tables are filled with results that are unique and purely stream-of-consciousness.  There's no overall theme, genre, or any other guiding principle - except that it all came from my diseased mind.

Check out Totally Random Tables right here!  2018 Gold ENnie award winning layout and graphic designer Glynn Seal of MonkeyBlood Design did the interior.  It's retro-futuristic funky and I love it!

And if you use it in one of your games, please let me know.  I want to read about all the gory details.  ;)

VS

PDF Sale at DriveThruRPG

There are a lot of titles on sale over at DriveThruRPG right now.  The sale's going on until March 11th. 

Apparently, many of my own PDFs are 33% off and burning a sleazy, eldritch, gonzo hole in the internet's back pocket!!!

Thanks for supporting Kort'thalis Publishing, guys!

VS

p.s. Endzeitgeist just reviewed Gamma Turquoise here and Save Yourself From Hell over here.

La Bas Chartreuse

This is something I've been toying with for a few months.  Finally decided to present things in a bare bones way, rather than couching the outstanding elements in a passable storyline.

I present La Bas Chartreuse!  You can use it with The Outer Presence or any investigative horror / eldritch pulp RPG.

For $2, you get the usual Kort'thalis Publishing treatment - awesome layout, fantastic art, evocative writing, and random tables. 

Thanks for checking it out,

VS

p.s.  The piece you're looking at here is from none other than Paul "Night Serpent" Carrick!

Kort'thalis Publishing Testimonial

[First, a quick reminder that my latest Kickstarter Battle Star Trilogy: Trek Wars is still going.]

It's always nice to hear that you've made a positive impact on someone's gaming life. 

The following was posted by +Brian Courtemanche on the Kort'thalis Publishing g+ community (please join us!)...

I am fast becoming a fan of Kort’thalis Publishing. It started a couple of weeks ago with my purchase of The Outer Presence rpg and then having a great time running/playing it with friends this weekend. I’ve just now downloaded the Crimson Dragon Slayer bundle (CDS, Candy Crypts, and No Escape from New York) from DriveThruRPG.


The combination of simple, playable rules plus utterly gonzo situations is glorious. I’ve been on the rpg scene a long time (started with AD&D a loooong time ago) and this stuff is a breath of pure FUN. I’d sorta forgotten about fun. Somewhere down that line I became more concerned with rules systems, simulationist vs. narrative play styles, balanced encounters, and a whole bunch of Not Fun stuff that somehow crept into my skull. And in the midst of all that, I’ve spent a ton of money on crappy games (or games that used to be cool but have ‘upgraded’ to crappier editions), and wasted a lot of time. And must have had a blind spot to Kort’thalis Publishing somewhere in the middle of all that. Well I’m correcting all that now...rather like a blind man learning to see again. More like finding the FUN again!

Venger, man, thanks. Really, thanks. Your stuff rocks. I took a look at CDS 1.11 - the whole less gonzo, more dark science-sorcery stuff - and went ‘ugh! No! I want my crazy!’ And promptly purchased/downloaded the original CDS (bundled with Candy Crypts and No Escape from New York). I’ll buy a few more of the modules and such when my credit card has had a few weeks to lick its wounds.

Venger - speaking as a customer and consumer of the glorious products of your fevered imagination - I implore you to please keep these two things as your guiding stars as you forge more material:

1. Keep the rules simple. Please, please, please. I’ll take a simple, well-wrought system that handles the basics cleanly and leaves room for GM and player ingenuity any day over the plethora of overly-complex, pain-in-the-butt, multi-chapter mega-tomes that take forever to learn and shoehorn one’s gameplay to fit within a matrix of Byzantine rules. The simplicity and robustness of your game rules are a huge breath of fresh air, Venger. When we played The Outer Presence this weekend, explaining the rules to the players was a snap and we just got on with it. That ease of play and level of comfort with simple, robust rules that let us just get on with things can not be undervalued or overstated.

2. Keep it gonzo! When running The Outer Presence this weekend, my group had a blast partly because it was so ‘oh wow. Huh.’ Meepie atrocities, Dr. Steiner’s whole attitude, the weird thing floating thing flitting about the mountain (don’t want to get too specific and give anything away). One of my players rolled randomly for his background and got that he was an, um, ‘body double’ (say no more) for 1970s adult films. Well he took that and ran with it for the entire session. It was great. And now I’m skimming Crimson Dragon Slayer (just bought it, must now eagerly give it a proper read) and there’s the gonzo...well written gonzo! To me, the new, more somber approach of CDS 1.11 feels...meh.

Give me adventures that feel like a 1980s Conan rip-off made in the back half of a Spencer’s gift shop! Adventures that feel like a 1970s black velvet fluorescent poster lit by black light. I can get ‘somber, serious’ (aka: more muted and dull) stuff in a pile of other rpg offerings. Your stuff pops off the page because: a) it’s gonzo and b) you write it very well. A lot of people try for gonzo but they really don’t have the imagination and wordsmithing skills to pull it off. It just comes off as cheap and immature. But your stuff - well you hit the mark!

The potent combination of simple, rugged rules and unchained, un-politically-correct, refreshingly original craziness has made me a fan. Keep up the great work, man! Thanks, Venger! - Brian C.
_________

4th Wave OSR

I was slumming over at TheRPGpundit's blog and saw him writing about three distinct waves of the OSR here.

• The first wave is devoted to retro-cloning original material from the 70's, 80's, and early 90's.  An example would be Swords & Wizardry.
• The second wave is devoted to new RPG systems that incorporate large amounts of the original 70's, 80's, and early 90's material but take them in slightly new directions.  An example would be Dungeon Crawl Classics.
• The third wave is devoted to taking that original 70's, 80's, and early 90's material (specifically the rules and game mechanics) into new settings, genres, and milieus.  Examples would be Raiders! of the Lost Artifacts, White Star, Apes Victorious, etc.

Well, I'm here to tell you about the OSR's 4th wave...

4th wave OSR incorporates the spirit, tone, objectives, aesthetics, play-style, rules philosophy, mechanical principles, and hobbyist attitude from the 70's, 80's, and early 90's into RPG material that does it's own thing.  Many consider these products neo-OSR, OSRish, OSR adjacent, or quasi-OSR because they've taken the next logical, evolutionary step away from original D&D, Traveller, Call of Cthulhu, Gamma World, Ghostbusters, Toon, Vampire: the Masquerade, etc.

While Kort'thalis Publishing started out with third wave adventures and campaign settings like Liberation of the Demon Slayer, The Islands of Purple-Haunted Putrescence, and Revelry in Torth, it soon went 4th wave with such titles as Crimson Dragon Slayer, The Outer Presence, and Alpha Blue.  

Mechanically speaking, they feel old school (rules-light old school, not giant tomes with a rule for everything and everything having a rule without streamlined congruency old school), but they do not slavishly adhere to the d20 or systems that came before.  

While I doubt that 4th wave OSR will ever replace the first 3 waves, it is my belief that the 4th wave is necessary for continued innovation.  Even though I won't be basking in the popularity of core OSR, I have my place just outside where there's more room to breathe.

VS

Three New Adventures!!!

Writing three books at once - even small ones - isn't easy.  There are a lot of details to keep track of.  Focusing, scattering that focus, and then undividing it again can give one either creative or logistic whiplash (sometimes both)!

There was a time, just before taking a break to surprise people with Guarding Galaxy XXX, where I considered the rough drafts of Stairway of V'dreen, High Stakes Q'uay-Q'uar, and His Flesh Becomes My Key to be a hot mess.

Thankfully, a little patient effort and infernal inspiration honed each one into a many-faceted gem.  I'm biased, of course... my RPG books eventually feel like my babies.  Not that I need anymore of those!

Also, I'd be remiss for not mentioning the superior layout and graphic work of +MonkeyBlood Design (Glynn Seal) and the various artists who illustrated each PDF.  Glynn will soon be working on a print-on-demand compilation of all three scenarios out this Fall.

These are OSR-ish adventures that are quite adaptable.  Really, the systems they were made for replaces the d20 with d6 dice pools.  That's the main difference.  So, customize away!

I love hearing feedback and war stories, so don't be shy.  Thanks!

Venger As'Nas Satanis
High Priest of Kort'thalis Publishing

p.s.  I forgot to talk about all the little extras - like the Q'uay-Q'uar board and rules that you can download/print yourself and start playing.  Then, there's the official Outer Presence character sheet... and the Alpha Blue campaign manager!

p.p.s.  This is a link to Zarono's original arachnosaur artwork.

Gary Con IX

I left Friday mid-morning and returned Sunday late-afternoon.  I really shouldn't have gotten so much convention time, but plans changed and I got lucky.

Overall, it was a great time.  I ran into, met, gamed with, or became reacquainted with many awesome individuals during those three days. Such as... +Erik Tenkar +Clint Bohaty +Jeff Bernstein +Timothy Brannan +Follow Me, And Die! +Julian Bernick +Harley Stroh +Forrest Aguirre +Del Teigeler +Jeff Talanian +Bill Webb +Satine Phoenix and many others (I'm terrible with names... and sometimes faces).

It surprises me to hear someone say they're a fan of my work, and I was pleasantly surprised quite a few times.  So, that was really cool.

Volunteering to GM is one of the things I love about RPG conventions.  Although, I'm never sure what's going on 4 - 6 months in advance.  I might have a new product out, I might want to playtest something I'm currently working on, or I might feel like running something completely different.

Over the last year, I've become increasingly comfortable with and excited by Alpha Blue, my sleazy scifi RPG.  Every half-dozen times I describe Alpha Blue to people who don't know what it is, I find myself coming up with new ways to characterize it.  Over the weekend I came up with this - it's like Star Wars... with a money shot.

I signed up to run The Islands of Purple-Haunted Putrescence using Crimson Dragon Slayer on Friday afternoon, Alpha Blue Saturday night, and Alpha Blue again on Sunday afternoon.  I was able to sneak in an off-the-books session of Alpha Blue on Friday night.  That's a lot of sex, sleaze, and exploitation in space!

So much happened this weekend!  It's probably a fool's errand to try and document it all.  Instead of going through each day, I'm just going to bullet-point some random highlights.  That way, if I suddenly remember a detail (or someone who was there reminds me) I can just add it to the list...

• For whatever reason, I decided to start the session by using The Outer Presence character creation.  Everyone was a "normal" human in the real world.  It made the purple islands seem more like Lost and Land of the Lost rather than D&Desque science-fantasy gonzo.
• There's usually at least one "table captain" in each game.  This is the kind of player I talk about in my latest book - Play Your Character Like A Fucking Boss. 
• The Doctor-without-borders character (Dr. Haywood) who crashed onto the beach of a purple island was the most devious PC in recent memory, and when he stranded his former guide and now prisoner of the lizardfolk (Enik-type Sleestaks) while capturing a lizardman to bring home for showbiz riches before closing the pylon's gateway, we all thought the adventure was over.  And then the Purple Putrescence ripped its terrible way into our world...
• I really love the movie StarChaser: The Legend of Orin.  I had the PCs start as subterranean mind-wiped slaves mining for blue crystal.  It was a good setup which I'll be using again in the future.  And from there, it went off the rails - in a good way.  
• An ooze with bio-luminescence when turned on rubbing up against a lamppost in the red hologram district while various other PCs were having sex on the street.  
  
• The telepathic pimp kept me laughing throughout Saturday night's session, but everyone was in rare form - both getting their sleaze on and doing a deal with one of Grabba the Butt's girls.
• Another space pimp was looking to further his business by stealing one of the most popular Satisfiers of Alpha Blue - Jessica 3.  After the indigo haze roofie, he was having sex with her (while she was unconscious) while a laser shootout was going on in their hotel room.  
• Arra was played by a woman who'd been in one of my Crimson Dragon Slayer games from last Gary Con.  Her character was a really interesting alien - humanoid with slimy with translucent seaglass skin.  She rolled "lesbian" for Arra's sexual fantasy/fetish, and that led to some interesting moments.  
• There was a player who randomly rolled "pirate" as his profession and "noble" on the something special table.  Confused with the juxtaposition at first, we discussed it for a couple minutes and decided that he was a pirate king, so well-versed at pirating that he became lord of the seven space seas aka The Pink Diver because of his pink, magenta, and pink pirate outfit.
• Finally getting to play Alpha Blue with girls was a nice treat.  Despite close-minded and just plain wrong "conventional wisdom," women can be and often are just as dirty, depraved, and wild as men... if not more so!  Anyway, the ladies impressed me by being just as sleazy as the guys.  
  
• There was so much sex in that session that I should have had PCs roll for acquiring a venereal disease, but forgot all about such things in the heat of all those moments.
• Speaking of which, I got a big reaction from debuting the desert planet Akockiss, commonly known as P'oon.  The players came up with a great new villain - Acock'n'lips (or Acock'n'licks... season to taste).
• Had a wonderful dinner at the Grand Geneva Resort hotel Friday night.  The prime rim, mashed potatoes, and shrimp were fantastic.  I also was in great company with Peter Tiso (who played in the purple islands game).
• Had a very satisfying breakfast with Erik Tenkar on Saturday morning.  We demolished our omelettes like a pair of fucking bosses!
• Only a single game was in one of those big rooms full of tables and gamers - the first.  All my other games, I made sure they were in quieter and less distracting areas of the convention.
• Speaking of places to game, my favorite was on Sunday afternoon.  I asked the con staff if any of the fancy private gaming rooms were going to be free as of noon.  One of them was, and I got to run the last Alpha Blue game of the weekend in the Geneva Room (or something like that).  It was so peaceful and awesome that I almost wept for joy!
• Brought a dozen books with me to use and possibly sell if people wanted and came back with only one!
  
• Got to try out my latest dice rolling tray - scifi themed.  Lots of compliments.  
• Had a chance to talk about the philosophy of Game Mastering with a purple island player named Jeff.
• Bought a bunch of gaming stuff - most notably (and expensively) books at the DCC booth.  Finally took the Metamorphosis Alpha plunge, got a nicely illustrated hardcover book on adventure design (cause even old Venger runs into writer's block), and had a 20% off ticket for the mammoth leatherbound tome on Traps.  I don't do enough with traps, so this should open up a whole new universe for me!

That's about it, though I'm well aware that I'm leaving many terrific moments out.  Oh well, those are for my fellow gamers to document!

VS

Trinity of Awesome Returns!

Yes, I have a new Kickstarter called Trinity of Awesome Returns!  Like the previous Trinity of Awesome Kickstarter, you get three PDF scenarios, one for each genre/system.

I like the format because I love fantasy, sci-fi, and horror, just as I love Crimson Dragon Slayer, Alpha Blue, and The Outer Presence.  Providing consistent support for each of them is important to me, and this gets the job done three-at-a-time!

These adventures are beginning to take shape.  I'm organically molding them into what they are destined to become, a little at a time.  So, it's an exciting process.  Can't wait to show you the finished product... probably sometime in July.

In the meantime, please do what you can to help promote Trinity of Awesome Returns!  Without you guys, there's no project at all.

Thanks,

VS

Call of Cthulhu session report

I finally got to game again (tentacle fist-pump)!  This was last weekend.  The twins are over 2 months old now and things finally settled down enough where I could organize a monthly session of roleplaying.

I gave the players their choice of games, a variety of stuff that I already had and knew how to run.  The first voters chose Call of Cthulhu.  Figures, that's the one game that can't be GMed on the fly.  I had little time to prep, probably a total of 2 hours.  That was barely enough time to read through a scenario, let alone take notes and consider changes.

I decided to just create a new scenario from scratch.  One hour spent creating the basic framework the night before and another hour fine-tuning it the day of.  Below is a quick rundown of what happened.

If you're interested in my Call of Cthulhu hack, check it out.  It effectively cut our character creation time and effort in half.

The characters were an odd assortment from the 1920s - gangster, archaeologist, journalist, occultist, etc.  I read over the motivations in Trail of Cthulhu.  When I came to the entry for "ennui," I braced listeners for my ignorance on how it was pronounced.  Minutes after learning that it was pronounced "on-wee," I purposely referred to it as quinoa... which made everyone laugh.

It began with a ski trip to the Alps organized by The Outdoors Society - a Miskatonic University club.  The PCs were on the ski trip for a variety of reasons.

After the obligatory warning that something ominous might happen (a comet was seen overhead last night), the PCs were settled into the ski lodge, either socializing or retiring for the evening... when some kind of starship landed a mile away.

These icy shoggoths with tentacles shambled out of the ship, attempting to grab a human specimen from one of the many onlookers.  That specimen just happened to be the party's Austrian bodybuilder.  There was a struggle, a second alien, and a couple of NPCs getting melted by a milky discharge that came out of their tentacles.

Luckily, all the PCs made it out ok.  The aliens decided to cut their losses and flew away in their ship.  However, the force from their departure caused an avalanche!  Two of the PCs were buried in snow.  Thankfully, they were buried out in time and all returned to the lodge.

A year later, each of the PCs receive a telegram inviting them to Herr Zandyke's castle in Austria.  Herr Zandyke being an alumni of Miskatonic and generous donor, everyone attended.

Upon arrival, the celebration was in full swing.  About 50 attendees were present and all wearing fanciful masks.  One was a peacock with shimmering blues and greens, but also suckered tentacles hanging from where the mouth should be.  Another was a demonic spider with bulbous scaly head and membranous sacs inflating and deflating as the mask wearer breathed.

Each of the PCs was being wooed to join a certain faction and wear a particular mask pertaining to that faction.  Unfortunately, I didn't have time to work out the intricacies of these factions, but I want to flesh that out in the near future if I run this scenario again or self-publish it for The Outer Presence.

Regardless, the PCs ended up below the castle on the shore of a subterranean lake.  At the center was a small outcropping of rock, a grotto which contained something of great value.  Each PC was given a ceremonial knife and locked down there for an indefinite amount of time.

Deep Ones came for those who stayed on the shore and another Deep One protected the grotto from those who tried to swim to it.  One loss of sanity was so great the character went temporally insane. A swimmer almost drown; being at zero hit points from a vicious claw attack, he fell unconscious before reaching the rocks.

Luckily, the occultist swam over to save him before he drowned.  Meanwhile, the others were trying to break through the door in order to get back into the castle.  Thanks to the bodybuilder, they managed it.  Taking out a couple of cultist guards, stealing a car, and engaging in a high-speed chase / firefight.

Eventually, the PCs evaded the cultists and flew back to the United States.

It turns out that 3 of the players had never played Call of Cthulhu before.  So, it did my RPG fanatic heart good to pop a trio of tentacled cherries!

VS

p.s.  For the record, "69" was rolled 5 times over the entire evening.

Trinity of Awesome +1

For those of us who prefer paper to PDFs...

The collected works from my Trinity of Awesome kickstarter - Slaves of Tsathoggua, Slippery When Wet, and A Green Jewel They Must Possess - in addition to Death Race: Fury Road are now available as a single softcover book!

You can purchase Trinity of Awesome +1 at CreateSpace now or wait a couple days for it to show up on Amazon.

VS

p.s.  Image used by permission by Wasted Warriors.

Vote Today!

Yes, the United States Presidential election is also important, but I'm talking about this...

Vote for your favorite Kort'thalis Publishing product! 

Below is a list of everything I've put out since October 2013 (it's been a busy 3 years).  I'm so close to 20 that I can practically taste the blood dripping off Kalthalax's infernal blade. 

But it's hiatus time, sadly.  Although, let's not be too sad because the wife is giving birth to twins any day now (yay!) and the break will do me good - I hope to come back stronger than ever in 2017!

Simply comment with your favorite.  If you can include a brief explanation or anecdote, please feel free to elaborate on your choice. 


Kort'thalis Publishing Products

1. Liberation of the Demon Slayer
2. The Islands of Purple-Haunted Putrescence
3. Revelry in Torth
4. The Baleful Sorcerer of Tsathag'kha
5. Three Swordsmen
6. Crimson Dragon Slayer
7. Crimson Dragon Slayer, edition 1.11
8. Descent into the Candy Crypts
9. No Escape from New York
10. How to Game Master like a Fucking Boss
11. The Outer Presence
12. Alpha Blue
13. Girls Gone Rogue
14. Universal Exploits
15. A Green Jewel They Must Possess
16. Slaves of Tsathoggua
17. Slippery When Wet
18. The S'rulyan Vault
19. Death Race: Fury Road
20. Roll twice... ;)

__________

Thanks for taking part in this survey.  Discovering what you like best will help me create more of your favorites.

VS

Outer Purple Fury

I just read the latest review for The Outer Presence.

It's my contribution to 1970s, Lovecraftian investigative horror RPG/scenario combo from last year.  I think Endzeitgeist did a fantastic job analyzing it.

This is an actual play report using The Islands of Purple-Haunted Putrescence as hex-crawl inspiration.  Good stuff!

And here's the second blog post talking about Death Race: Fury Road.

Until next time, keep reviewing, blogging, and playing my stuff.  It drives me onward and downward, spiraling into the black nothingness at the very heart of awesome itself!

VS

p.s.  My dice go out to my brother and sister gamers at Game Hole Con happening right now.  Wish I could be there with you all!

Trinity of Awesome PDFs live!

As of this morning, the Trinity of Awesome PDFs that I funded via Kickstarter are available on DriveThruRPG.  But they're not lumped together anymore (although, I'm tempted to eventually bundle them together as a print-on-demand softcover).

No, today they stand on their own two (three?) feet (or virtual tentacles, maybe).

"Slaves of Tsathoggua" is an eldritch fantasy scenario Crimson Dragon Slayer (both versions).  It also contains several random tables that can be used in any fantasy RPG.

"A Green Jewel They Must Possess" is an investigative horror scenario set in the 1970s.  I made it with The Outer Presence in mind, but any self-respecting GM who appreciates Cthulhuism & Yog-Sothothery can easily convert the adventure for their favorite system.

"Slippery When Wet" is a scenario for the sleazy space opera RPG Alpha Blue.  This includes a +MonkeyBlood Design (Glynn Seal) map of underwater vessel The Bearded Clam.

All these scenarios are short and come in both a rich parchment color with blood stains, Kort'thalis sigil echo, and disturbingly lurid tentacle veins, as well as, a printer-friendly black and white version.

The KS backers have theirs, now it's your turn!

VS

Last call for Awesome!

If you didn't know, my final Kickstarter campaign until Summer of 2017 (at least) is winding down.

And guess what?  VS, your fucking boss of a hoss, is planning on over-delivering... again.

Yeah, not only are you lucky dogs getting three PDFs for $3, but they'll be double the promised length.

But that's not all!!!  Glynn Seal +MonkeyBlood Design (Glynn Seal) and I have a good relationship.  I tell him to make something awesome while shouting out random words like "Tentacles," "Veins," and "Vagina Whale!" then he turns around and makes it visually awesome.

Case in point, the eldritch fantasy adventure will have the red, the investigative horror will have the green, and the sleazy space opera will get blue.

of

Click on them to get the full effect!

So, thanks for backing.  Keep telling your gaming friends about this wondrous deal of insanity on acid meth!  Let's see if we can hit $2,000 in four days.

VS

[KS] Trinity of Awesome!

Yes, back at it again with a new Kickstarter.  Don't hate me because I'm prolific.  I only wish I could unleash more weird, filthy darkness upon the world.

Let's take what we can get!

VS

I have questions for you...

Though they tried in all their myriad ways, Disney, Florida, a cruise ship, Bermuda, my family, and one of the worst flu viruses I've ever experienced could not destroy me.  After all, I'm Venger Satanis.  I endure.

Today, I'm polling.  I want to know what you - the fans, audience, customers, friends, and critics want to see from Kort'thalis Publishing over the next few years.  Why?  Because I couldn't do it without you.  I wouldn't want to.  A roleplaying game is not a solo activity.  It's a group thing.  Without the gamers, there's no game.  Likewise, without your input, my output probably won't meet your expectations.

Don't be shy.  There are no wrong answers or stupid comments.  If you like what I've been doing so far, say so.  If you think things should go in a certain direction, say so.  If you think I should go in a completely different direction, then tell me that.  Whatever is on your mind.  Only the silent get no vote!

1. What's your favorite/preferred RPG from Kort'thalis Publishing:  Crimson Dragon Slayer, Alpha Blue, or The Outer Presence?
2. Should Kort'thalis Publishing focus on these three RPGs or keep come up with something new?  Bonus question, if you said "something new," then what would you like to see?
3. In your opinion, what does CDS, AB, and/or TOP need next to keep you interested and gaming?
4. What is your favorite/preferred tone(s)?  Sexual/sleazy, grim/dark, comedic/parody/spoof, gonzo/weird, Lovecraftian/cosmic horror, action/adventure, kitsch/vintage, etc.
5. What is the ideal length?  Less than 10 pages (PDF only), 11 - 20 pages (PDF only), 21 - 35 pages, 36 - 80 pages, 81 - 150 pages?
6. What's your favorite/preferred content?  Random tables, campaign/setting, detailed NPCs, maps/plans/schematics, or new monsters, items, spells?
7. Of all Kort'thalis Publishing's books, which is your favorite cover art?
8. Of all Kort'thalis Publishing's books, describe (with name of book and page number, if possible) three of your favorite pieces of b/w interior illustrations.  Alternatively, describe or show an example of the kind of b/w illustrations you'd like to see in a future work (naming an artist is also fine).
9. Is there something you'd like Kort'thalis Publishing to offer that hasn't been offered yet or isn't currently available?  Such as GM screen, widespread convention support, hardcover editions, miniatures, video tutorials, more virtual one-shots on Roll20, etc.?
10. Is there a favorite/preferred color that I haven't used yet that you'd like to see incorporated into a future work?
11. Please let me know if there's anything in particular you'd like to either see more of or less of.  Inside the box, outside the box, anything!  Your feedback is very important to me.

Thanks for taking the time to answer these questions!

VS

New Investigative Horror Scenario

I finished the text for Alpha Blue last week.  Glynn is almost finished doing the layout.  [Get your interview questions submitted now, before it's released!]

I had last Saturday free for roleplaying but didn't know what to run.  These days I only get to GM about twice a month.  So, it makes sense that I would come up with a little something and use my upcoming session as a sort of preliminary playtest.

There were so many different genres, products, systems, and worlds to choose from, but I ended up deciding on The Outer Presence.  Partly due to a conversation I had with +Brandon Watkins months ago about reptile people within the hollow earth and my desire for a humorous ripoff of Delta Green.

The system for The Outer Presence takes place in our modern world around the 1970's, investigating weird and horrifying stuff.  However, I envision the game to be more like The Tomorrow People or Jon Pertwee era Doctor Who than Call of Cthulhu - even though Lovecraft will always be a huge influence on my writing.

Character creation was short and sweet, providing a balanced group of a-holes, wack-jobs, and addicts.

The scenario I concocted contains reptoids disguised as humans (did some research on David Icke and his conspiracy theories), time travel to the far future, shoggoth-like nastiness, and an agency that monitors all the crazy stuff influencing our world, its people and culture.

All I had was a couple dozen bullet points.  So, it was short, and there was quite a bit of improvisation on my part.  Some things didn't fit as neatly into the scenario box as I had anticipated.  But the players were excellent, driving the play forward and occasionally making cool suggestions - like the translucent strands hanging from the ceiling - having them worm their way into the pilot's orifices was a stroke of genius.  I believe my friend, +Tim Virnig came up with that one.

Anyways, it was a good time.  TheRPGpundit recently reviewed How to Game Master like a Fucking Boss.  In my opinion, he was dead wrong about the d100 table of colors.  That happened to be the only random table I rolled on all session.  The non-human PC (I sort of pictured him looking like 70's David Bowie) was shot during the adventure and his blood turned out to be mauve.  Mauve, damn it!  That's an important detail.

All ended well.  The PCs were even asked to join a secret organization who watches the watchers, none other than Theta Chartreuse!

When I'm finished with the scenario, it should have enough meat on its bones to support about 6 hours of play.  If it's somewhere between 10 - 20 pages, it'll probably just be a PDF.  If it spirals out of control into something larger, there will be a print version available this Spring.

Thanks for reading!

VS

p.s.  Almost forgot... here's my favorite quote of the session, "As you manhandle her through the portal, her heaving reptoid bosom is exposed."

Game Hole Con III (part 2 of 2)

Ok, we're back!  This is part one.

Liberation of the Demon Slayer, I've found, makes for a good convention game.  There's an abrupt beginning that gets PCs where they need to go with a definite objective - retrieve the legendary demon-slaying sword Kalthalax or see your beloved homeland ripped apart by demons.

Because it's fairly deadly, the adventure is perfect for a funnel / meat-grinder type situation.  Pre-generated characters was the obvious way to go, but there were two things working against that idea.  One, my wife and children.  Two, players will form more of an attachment to their characters if created there at the table, by their own hands.

Since the adventure has several tables at the beginning for fleshing out backgrounds, we dived right in.  That morning I quickly scribbled out a quadrant character sheet so all four zero-level characters could be seen at a glance.  But, since this was a convention game, I wanted every character to be able to do some cool stuff.  So, 1st level for all!

Next, I told all the players not to worry about any limitations of rule-book or system.  Rather than playing DCC with the serial numbers filed off, we were playing a fantasy RPG that never had serial numbers, one that only lived in our imaginations, unfettered by arbitrary restrictions.
Forget all the fiddly bits about your characters, I told them.  If they wanted to play a half-orc, lizardman, demonic humanoid, dark elf, or whatever, that was just fine.  If they wanted to play some weird class like bard, monk, or anything else, that was cool.  I didn't care if they wanted to pick an old school alignment like Chaos or chaotic neutral.  All that was fuel for their imaginations and wouldn't be a focus for today's session.

Before I forget, one player had played in my The Islands of Purple-Haunted Putrescence game at the last Game Hole Con.  So, it was nice to see a satisfied customer.  Although, I had my doubts about that particular session.

Highlights

There was some quick thinking as PCs got tossed out of bed and marched to the caverns below Clear Meadows without dilly-dallying for supplies.  One character snapped the leg off a wooden table on his way out.  After hearing that, a few players attempted to do something similar.  I let player descriptions and luck rolls determine their success or failure.

The first death came quickly.  A skeletal wizard at the bottom of a pit trap.

A magic ring allowed one of West's characters to summon a demon.  The demon was summoned and the PC asked the demon to transport him to someplace in the dungeon that contained a really powerful weapon.  The demon did as he was told.

West's character suddenly appeared in a white room containing a pedestal, upon which rested an innocent looking orange.  A few seconds later, the orange killed him.  Such is the life of an adventurer - especially since it was a convention game, he had three other characters, every player except West laughed, and West actually wasn't even scheduled to play, but we're friends and I let him in the game as a favor.

Instead of revealing Kalthalax at the very end, after a big boss fight, I decided to offer it up early so someone had the chance to actually use it!  The demon slayer laid upon a black altar, guarded by a gelatinous green slime.  I was expecting a harrowing fight, but the party's thief (one of them) made his roll to tumble past the creature (both times!).

The party wizard (one of them) discovered and pocketed a yellowish green vial of liquid that would become useful later.

Basically, the adventurers fought the Devil.  It was a 30' demon lord just coming out of some gigantic gateway to Hell.  Kalthalax did a lot of damage, but so did a character with a shovel!

A portal opened after defeating the demon lord.  Out stumbled an American family - the Sterlings - from some "other world".

There was also some necrophilia going on.  A couple PCs rolled that for their dark secret.  One woman in particular named Angela Nekro (played by +Julian Bernick) kept staying behind to play with the corpses.  Awesomely gross!  If this had been more than a con game or one-shot, her creepiness could have been explored in depth.

I was using the DCC mercurial magic table for spells cast.  If the percentile dice fell into the middle range (yielding no strange effect), I rolled on the weird magic side-effect table in Purple.  Just as the adventurers were leaving the caverns, a wizard cast a spell and rolled something close to a 50.  So, I rolled on the other table only to discover that his spell had inadvertently brought the Purple Putrescence itself to Clear Meadows.

It loomed in the sky like a slimy purple Rhode Island of mouths, tentacles, and foulness.   The wizard who had the yellowish-green vial of liquid drank it, started to glow and grew more and more unstable until he ran into the thing's tentacle.  The Thing That Rots From The Sky scooped him up and popped him in its mouth - just as he went nuclear - blowing the purple godlike thing back to its home dimension.

Clear Meadows was saved!


The Outer Presence

Unfortunately, I don't have time to go into detail about this game.  Character creation was fun.  I just used the random tables and players made their own connections based on available data and intuition.

Everyone had a good time.  The world was narrowly saved, yet it cost all the characters their lives - with the possible exception of those who rolled the "hard to kill" distinction.  If there's a sequel, I'll allow those PCs to survive the fistful of dynamite shot point-blank in Nafu Aata's inner sanctum.

Thanks again to everyone who played in my games at Game Hole Con III.  I'm looking forward to next year's games!

VS