Updates from the Forge 26: June 2018

[Jubal]

Issue 26: June 2018

EDITORIAL

Guess who forgot that June only has 30 days, not 31? The imaginary llama who helps write this column, that's who. That creature is utterly useless. But never fear! Your slightly belated issue of Updates from the Forge is here at last...

In terms of news, our big release news of this month is that Frozen Skies is now airborne - you can buy Stormwell's fully published RPG supplement from DrivethruRPG, and set your Savage Worlds palyers off on adventures through the icy wastes of Aleyska. Deadly aeroplane battles, high-speed chases across the ice, ferocious Wulvers and mysterious technology from a forgotten age all await. If that sounds up your street, do check the book out!

On a staffing related note, we're particularly excited to welcome La Ciguapa, our new social media officer. If you interact with us across Twitter, Facebook, and beyond, she'll be taking the lead and no doubt improving considerably how we do things there!

And with all that said, let's see what's been going on across Exilian this month...

CONTENTS:

• The Neofeud Continues...
• The Exile Lands Await
• Monster Man Contest II!
• Ready to watch a tourney?
• Chain Writing!

The Neofeud Continues...

Well, the grabber arm robot might be friendly at least?

The epic cyberpunk showdown that was Silverspook's award-winning Neofeud may have had a happy ending for some of its heroes... but for how long? And how far can a revolution get in the high-powered, reality-bending tech future that Neofeud happens in? The green and blue may be more evenly distributed for now, but there are more problems and plots ahead. Who is behind this ramshackle looking set of old containers? Is anyone behind that big ol' volcano at the back? And what's Proto-J doing here?

Keep tuned on Silverspook's dev thread to find out more!

The Silver Spook Devlog

The Exile Lands Await

Jubal's new game, The Exile Princes, puts you into an epic, mad fantasy world where the pages of medieval manuscripts come to life! Roam with your gallant followers across realms of ferocious wibulnibs, cunning nobles, tusked kinklades, ferocious manticores, and much much more, and embark on your quest to make your house master of the Exile Realms! With a detailed procedurally generated world, and a variety of ways to advance through the game including quests, wars, and even elections, there'll be a lot for you to discover. Improvements this month include the addition of lakes and seas to the map, the addition of farm tiles in areas near to cities, and major battle improvements.

Read on to find out more!

The Exile Princes Devlog

Monster Man Contest II!

James Holloway's Monster Man podcast is doing another contest! This time, the aim is to take the output of a neural net that was fed the names of a load of D&D monsters, and turn the resulting concoction of words back into a monster fit for the gaming table! Will you aim to design the Space Ogre or the Rain Golem? The Purple Fang Dragon? The Bat Unicorn? The... Brown Peg? (OK, maybe not all of them work...) There will be excellent gaming related prizes for the winner, so it's well worth checking out if you want cool tabletop gaming stuff, or if you just like spending your days deciding what a Burglestar is and what it looks like. Have fun!

Good name for a band, too, maybe?

If you've not been listening to Monster Man, it is very, very well worth your time to do so - in it, the eponymous monster man and podcast-master goes through the gaming supplements of days gone by, and talks about the monsters he finds in them - be that their mythic background, how they found their way into the book itself, their in-world attributes, their artwork, or advice for making them part of the games you play and run. It's just getting into its second season, looking at the 1981 Fiend Folio supplement to 1st ed. Advanced Dungeons and Dragons (the first season looked at the earlier Monster Manual). If you want to find out about Bunyips, Bullywugs, and more, now's a good time to jump in.

(Editor's note: Exilian is not responsible for any fatalities caused by failure to check for Bunyips before jumping in.)

Monster Man Contest II Thread

Listen to Monster Man

Are you ready to see a Tourney?

Dev work on Tusky's medieval tournament sim, Tourney, continues to saddle up and keep charging forwards. Recent updates have included the addition of the tournament stands (as above) from which the peasantry will be able to watch armoured knights charging hell-for-leather (or, more likely, hell-for-plate-mail) at each other to see if they can knock one another off their steeds. Improvements have also been made to the systems for putting the tournament fields together, so stands and beer kegs will snap neatly into place.

Tourney Dev Thread

Chain Writing!

The hum of the engines finally fell to a whisper, and then nothingness.

A breeze was blowing outside; scans read an ambient thirty degrees surface temperature. What was really of interest, though, were the movements and the chemistry and the life. Barren rock after barren rock a ship could land on, but this – this was colour. Deep greens, bright blues, and tanged red laces that grew up trunks and hung over branches.
This was uncharted land, undiscovered life. And for Mat, at least, food for the soul.

He adjusted his turban and goggles, and started running scans on the air chemistry. It would be a few minutes to complete the ground-level checks and scans before he would risk going outside.

Eila bustled into the room, their eye-stalks swivelling down to look at the scanner readings as they handed Mat a plate of what could, on a good day, be described as food.

"Humhum. 'tis looking good?"

"Yes, good enough." Mat grinned at the diminutive S'ruba. "Life everywhere.  Tell Kageth it looks like we can do an on-foot survey. Doesn't even look like there's too much that'll try to kill us. Oh, and maybe tell Winse too if he's woken up yet."

Hypothetically, Winstanley FitzSamuel was the ship's captain. It was a decent hypothesis, but it was, Mat reflected, not one that tended to stand up to rigorous repeat trials.

How would you continue a story that started like this? Well, it might be time to find out this summer, because Exilian is doing chain writing! This summer, Exilian members and friends will be writing collaborative stories in 250 word chunks, building words and fashioning plot twists as each writer has to deal with whatever story they've had thrown at them by their fellow writers.

And guess what, dear reader? YOU can be part of it too!

Yes, all this excitement can be yours. All you need to do is click the link below and follow the instructions to sign up either via the forum or by email. We'd like to get a decent number of people together to ensure we can get a good number of chains going, so please do join in, it's going to be a really fun project for the summer months and one you can do with limited time commitment from wherever you are in the world. Take a look at the link below to read the rules and find out more!

Sign Up For Chain-Writing Here

Well, that's issue 26, in all its glory! And all the glory it has is down to YOU dear reader, so please, if you enjoyed this issue and think anyone you know would be interested in the articles contained therein, then please send it to a friend, send it to a relative, send it to someone you know who retweets everything without looking at it - get the word out and we'll have more readers, more feedback, more interest, and more great stuff to show you in future.

Hope to see you next time for Issue 27 of Updates from the Forge - until then, take care!