Lots of Progress, Two Movies and Books, and a Brief Look at 'Broken Earth'
Get ready for a shock. I was incapable of finishing the Harvesting book by the end of the month as I had hoped I would.
The reasons are pretty good as to why however. Earlier this week we published issue 51 of Wisdom from the Wastelands: Animal and Plant Genotypes. I was quite busy over the past two weeks getting the last little bit of information written up and ready to send to Michael Varhola. After he got it and formatted it, we had to then go through and make sure it was good to go.
I have to say I’m pleased with the new format, being over five times the size of the previous issues and the fact that I no longer need to split issues up into chunks due to size constraint!
My next three issues are going to be as follows: Nanotech Undead, Android, Synthetic and Replicant professions, and then Skills and Alternate Advancement rules.
I do believe my regular readers will recognize all those titles. I’m in no rush because it will be around six months or so before we see all of them in publication. After all, Derek Holland has his issues as well to be published. I don’t know what they entail, but I’m pretty sure one is going to be the rest of his Super Science artifacts.
However, now that the issue has been released, I will be finishing up the work on the Harvesting book.
Next will be writing up brand new material to add to my Weapons compilation. This will be a re-release of issue 3: High Tech Weapons, 9: High Tech Weapons 2, 11: Optional Combat Rules, 21: High Tech Melee weapons, 22: Personal Shields, 24: Weapon Modifications, 26: Energy Weapons, 43: Optional Combat Rules 2, and 46: High Tech Weapons 4.
This will also include all the bonus material I wrote for the books, and will be edited a second time and a few minor changes implemented. I will be adding a lot of optional combat rules to this, as well as quite a plethora of new weapons. So yes, it is a re-release but I also have every intention of making it worth my readers time.
It’s quite nice to be able to speak about all the material I’ve been working on instead of devoting a line or two like I have been for the past few months.
This week I was a guest on the D-Infinity Live podcast and it was going great until technical difficulties ended up cutting our show a little short. Still, we discussed mutant monsters at length and how we perceived they should be used in a game.
And four more critters were posted on the page over the past two weeks - the Octoids, Pengnasher, Yeoseong Seubji and Kyoryu Sasori Teru. I have two more that are ready and will go up tomorrow morning.
And yes, I have kept up with my promise of posting Buck Who? every Friday night. Chapter 36 went up last week, and Chapter 37 was posted this week.
Just in case anyone was curious as to why there was no blog last weekend, the reasons were as follows. First I went to Edmonton on Saturday for the Edmonton Comic and Entertainment Expo. I spent the entire day with my son and a friend’s twins. It was damn late when I got home! Then Sunday my wife had me work on a great deal of things around the house and that evening I went to see Fluffy in concert.
By the time I got home it was damn late and I just wanted to get some sleep.
So there you have it.
I finished two books as well. First was Pillar to the Sky by William R. Forstchen. This is about a dream of building a space-elevator and all the obstacles that confronted those who wished to see it become a reality. It is a very well written novel, which appeared to have been heavily researched to make it as accurate as possible. I certainly can appreciate that!
The second was the 4th book in the Odd Thomas series by Dean Koontz called Odd Hours. This book had my mind wandering a little bit when I was listening to it, which is not a good sign. Maybe I’m starting to lose interest in the series. Who knows. Don’t take that the wrong way, I still enjoyed it and I have every intention of finishing the series!
And over the past two weeks I watched ‘Maze Runner: Scorch Trials’ and Hotel Transylvania 2’. The first one was quite action packed and finally revealed a great deal more about the world and the place the young adults hold in it, although why they were put into the maze to begin with is still unclear to me. I’m tempted to get the four novels in the series and read them to find out.
As for the second movie, it was cute, but I did not like it as much as the first. The movie went too deeply into what is essentially racism, which kind of put a damper on my enjoyment of it. Although out of all the monsters, I have to say Wayne is my favorite.
I finally got my hard-copy of ‘Broken Earth’ Pathfinder edition. To be honest, this one was a little disappointing to me. The book was far more campaign oriented than I thought it should have been. The mutations and feats were on the very light side of crunch, and there was a very distinct lack of mutant terrors to inflict upon the players.There were a few, but that section certainly could have used a lot of padding! For a kickstarter backed book, this in my opinion is very much lacking. At least the company that produced it has been doing a fairly good job of putting out additional material for sale on Drivethrurpg.
Still, I would have to give the book a 3 at best. The content that was included is well written and there is a great deal of potential in the book, but for me it is seriously lacking.
Speaking of Kickstarters, there is one for a brand new Battletech computer game. It’s already closing in on $1.5 million and has had a great deal of content unlocked already and there is still nearly a month left in this campaign. I do believe that I will be backing this near the end, as right now my liquid funds are a little scarce. Still, I would very much like to get my hands on this once it is available.
For those of you who happen to follow my free conversions, I will be trying to write a few up a week to get them posted on the site. Here is the index for what I have created thus far, and the count is sitting at 241. I am hoping to increase this to 300, as I really want to be able to have the creatures then edited and finally published (after a few name changes and new images of course!). Thankfully I have a lot of sources to use, including from a few TV shows I’ve talked about like ‘The 100’ and ‘Defiance’.
I’ll be sure to post the links and the updates to this project in my weekly blog.
Before I finish this week’s blog, there is something I would like to talk about.
Social Media is mercurial. One moment someone is being praised for the good they do, then the next they're being turned into the next villain in the ever-changing flow that is social media.
I'll give you a perfect example.
For months people have been praising the Pope. Saying how he's reforming the church, how he is pro pretty much everything that the church has condemned for centuries. The fact he is a scientist as well.
Been like this for months!
All of a sudden, he visits the moron Kim Davis and he's now the anti-christ?
Well - maybe not that bad, but now people on FB are stating how by visiting this woman, it essentially destroys all the goodwill he has generated.
Okay people... let me explain something here.
The pope is a good guy. He promotes peace and change for the better. He is preaching what the good book (not just the bible mind you) says about being tolerant and forgiving.
The way God is.
Unlike many who claim to know the will of god, he doesn't say stupid shit like 'god hates gays' or 'god hates this and that'. Those people are idiots.
Instead he is trying to show compassion and understanding towards those who have made big mistakes in their lives. Only god can forgive, but he's showing that the almighty IS compassion and understanding!
The way real religion is supposed to be.
So before you start to say he's lost credibility and he's not a good man, think about what I said. By showing Kim Davis compassion and understanding, he is LIVING UP to the guidelines provided in the holy works!
Think about it.
And that’s it for this week. It is now officially fall and the weather is turning, so while you get the warm days, try your best to enjoy them as it’s only going to be around for a short period of time.
Until next week, enjoy life and be kind to those you love. Remember, we’re not going to be here forever, and life can be not only too short, but cruel.
