Dreamation Begins With A Big Bang!

Big Bang Mudang, that is!

Dreamation, the first con on our sched this year, began last night. I went intentionally light on the WEGS Old Skool schedule this time around, running only three events (one of Fri., two on Sat.). The exciting news is that two of these events are the new playtests for the Badderlands series.

B3 Grim Reapings, wherein the party explores the crypt of a not-so-dead Grand Warlock.

B4 Druids Ruins, wherein the party messes around with the forces of nature while searching for fabled treasure.

To add to the excitement, I kicked off the con with a super-secret playtest of Big Bang Mudang, my cosmic time-travelling witch-seer game. Details on this twisted little game will trickle forth over the course of the coming months.

And now it's time to start working on all the other con event submissions...

Make Way For The Mino!

The second installment of the Badderlands series has arrived!

Minotaur Meat Has Arrived!

The long-awaited second module for the Badderlands series has arrived! I can finally check it off my 2009 To Do list!

B2: Minotaur Meat is the next Old Skool adventure from GameWick Games and it's chuck full of fun and adventure. It follows the three chapter narrative format, allowing the game to be played in three encounters.

The module was started in early 2009 and offered as an event for the conventions that we ventured to (Origins, Gen Con, Dexcon, Ubercon). Bit by bit, the module was forged into what it is today. One thing stayed the same, though: it ends with an awesome encounter with a classic minotaur!

The minotaur is depicted twice in the module, once on the cover and later in the third chapter. Both illustrations are drawn by Jim Holloway, a fantastic sword-n-sorcery artist known for his great work during the early days of the role-playing game industry. The module also features the art of Tony Steele and Brian Thomas.

Check it out!

B1 Hobgobble's Eve

Are you ready for wicked adventure?

After four months of rigorous playtesting, the first adventure module is launched: Hobgobble's Eve! As this is an intro to the WEGS Badderlands series, it's also lovingly called B1. This module is jam-packed with some great Old Skool art and tons of hobgoblins (like every intro adventure should be). To call it an intro is a little misleading though; it's going to be quite challenging for new players to "beat". There are only three chapters in the adventure, each one gets progressively harder. The module also contains its fair share of wacky WEGS lingo, and I'm hoping the casual reader will have their curiousity peaked by how different the Wickedly Errant Game System is from other sword-n-sorcery game systems.

Dreamation Aftermath!

Dreamation was like getting my own stimulus package for WEGS: the energy of the con and all the great games we ran got the creative juices flowing just in time for spring. After a long winter of limited play, it was fantastic to sit back and play one game after another after another. With The Prof as Minion Master, I was able to take the overlord position and sit on high watching the action go down. Mucho gracias to The Prof! From running through the final test of Hobgobble's Eve to throwing down the initial pass at Minotaur Meat, we were able to gather gamers for every WEGS offering on the schedule (with the exception of our Sunday Pirates of Penzantium demo).

We took some chances with new rules, like allowing folks to burn 6% Rank for a Phew! at the Spante*; this made the end game go on forever! This, though, is part of the fun of going full throttle at a con; for the House, it keeps the game interesting and also allows us to test out and tinker with enhancements. I'm all about trying to break the system, giving it too much gas and flooding the engines. The downside of this is that players may get caught in the crossfire and walk away with a different view of what the game is about. One big thing learned: keep the intro games intro (no tweaking rules one jot).

One last thing on Dreamation... awesome location. GameWick Games was given three tables at the hotel entrance in front of a cascading waterfall; it was like being poolside at the Flamingo. Word is that we're in same location for the summer con. It will be awesome.

*"burn 6% Rank for a Phew! at the Spante"... A line that only a Wegshog could comprehend!

Hobgobble Cover Art!

For all twelve of you who read this blog, there's some exciting news for our first adventure module: Jim Holloway is the cover artist! Jim was one of the original artists for TSR (the publishers of Dungeons & Dragons for those of you who aren't geeks). Check out his site and all his contributions to the hobby. His art has filled the pages of the early D&D modules (the B series) to AD&D covers for the Desert of Desolation, Oriental Adventures, Spelljammer and lots of interior stuff for everything in between. Outside of D&D-land, he's illustrated Boot Hill, Gama World, Star Frontiers and Gangbusters, too. If you spent any time perusing the shelves of a game store in the 80s, you know his artistic mettle! Hobgobble's Eve drew a lot of inspiration from the early TSR modules that shaped how most of us think of the sword-n-sorcery adventure game; having an Old Skool Master like Jim involved has really made this inaugural launch of the WEGS Module B1 very exciting!

And the cover is just amazing!

The Hobgobble Update

So, about two months ago I started working on Hobgobble's Eve, the first official WEGS 101 adventure. It went through numerous playtests and revisions, and then some more playtest. While all this was going on, I began contacting artists to illustrate the adventure. Three of the artists are from Three Headed Troll Art Wurks; guys who specialize in the old skool art form which is perfect for this module (check out the 3HT site). I came across their art while attending Con on the Cob, a con with a very heavy artist attendance. Tony Steele, who did some illustrations for Pirates of Penzantium and who also attended COTC, jumped into the Hobgobble fray as well. All the art is complete (with the exception of the cover which will be the topic of next post). I'm really thrilled with each artist's work; this module is jam-packed with cool art!

So, after two months, the first pass at the concept/playtest/art/layout/design is done. In my humble opinion, the end result is gonna be pretty fantastic. I've had a bunch of fun with the design on this, and the layout is inevitably for landscape, three-hole punch format (so you can throw it in a binder after you print it at home); the landscape design also takes up less table space during the game.

One more pass at text revisions and layout and this sucker is done.

This module is gonna ooze the old skool spirit that WEGS 101 is all about!

Playtesting: Hobgobble's, Chapter 3

We concluded the Hobgobble's Eve playtest with the good folk of the Garden State Gaming Society last night; the final chapter of the soon-to-be-released adventure is going to be a brutal one for players! I jumped in as a player, letting the Professor run the newly revised minions for this encounter. We had four players to face-off against his eight minions; with no Warriors in the mix for us, the odds were stacked against us. It was a struggle all the way to the final inning (14 innings!), but we managed to survive. We missed hitting the eigth inning "sweet spot", but my thoughts are the chapter could have concluded sooner if we had one more player on our side of the table. We're officially sticking a fork in this module, 'cause it's done (from a playtest standpoint)! We ran this adventure twice, as did the Platinum Warlock (thanks for the notes, A!). Time to start layout and design on the pdf. Hoping to publish this sucker before the end of the month for the whole darn Wegsworld to enjoy!

Playtesting: Hobgobble's Eve, Chap 2.

Me and The Professor threw down Chapter 2 for the Garden State Gaming Society this week. Unlike the first session where we had 2 players, this round we had 7 players (the perfect number of WEGS players in my book). This allowed me to step out of the game as a player and into the role of Kreator (judge). The Prof was fully in charge of the minions and innings. All players were new to the game with the exception of the 2 who returned from Chapter 1. Arkreation took about a half hour, then we plunged into the game. The Arks were:

3 Gnobbit Tricksters
2 Warriors (1 Humnz, 1 Goblin)
1 Elf Mage
1 Elf Ranger

Chapter 2 starts the Arks off in a cave prison, the entrance to which is guarded by 7 Hobgoblins and a Giant Rat. The chapter took about 2 hours to finish, and was wicked fun from the start. The players were a great mix of solid board gamers and rpg veterans; all had plenty of game experience under their belts and took to the game system far too well, far too quick; making the game that much more challenging for the Minion Master. The players were having a rollicking time of it, and the only thing that slowed the game down was the deliberation by the players as to what course of action was best (and that was a blast to watch).

From a playtesting standpoint, I'm considering this one Santa's gift to me! With a table full of new players, a couple who now own book-n-card sets, this was a great way to end the year.

Playtesting: Hobgobble's Eve

Last week, me and The Professor threw down a Hobgobble's Eve playtest for the good folk of the Garden State Gaming Society. We only had two players, so I jumped in on their side as a Sage (imagine that!). The Prof had the job of Kreator/Minion Master and did a great job of beating us down in the first encounter with a trio of fowl turdragons (turkey-dragons). I did my best as the team's Sage, but by encounter's end found myself quite low on spoints; alack, the problems of liberal spell-tossing! All said and done, I had a blast jumping in on the player side, which I don't get to do very often. There's something to be said for this from a playtesting standpoint: it's easy to run the game and be in control, but it's critical to see the game from a player's view. You gotta know how the dice feel on that side of the table, too!

Hobgobble's Eve

Spent the last couple weeks cranking out a mini-venture for WEGS called Hobgobble's Eve; basically a "turkey hunt-in-the-swamp-gone-bad-real bad" scenario. It's been sent around to a couple of the royal Wegshogs to run for their friends (you know who you are), plus I'm running it tonight for a local group. Should be a blast (literally, as there's a weapon in it called the Blunderboomer)! The hope is that I can get the adventure on the site in pdf, so folks all around the globe can download a little bit o' wegs for their year-end enjoyment.

Have a great Thanksgiving folks!