Of Beasts and Men, our first supplement, was officially announced today in a press release that can be found in a way-too-big download (5M MB, for resolution) here (http://www.theriddleofsteel.net/riddlefiles/PR-OBAM.pdf). The release date will be early this summer, in June or July. A PDF pre-release is still being planned.
Jake
We've tacked on an official date as well for the print ed.
June 3.
Jake
Crap, but I've got a big stupid grin on my face.
One thing thing though - in the breakdown it says 144 pages, but in the blurb it says 128. Given the volume of stuff in there, I'm guessing 144 is right, but...
Happy Brian.
When's the PDF going to be available?
Mike
We've been tweaking the blurb. It was 128, now it's 144 (by publishing it might be 160...). And the price dropped to 19.95...but we'll see.
The PDF...as soon as it's done. I think late april/early may.
Jake
Quote from: Jake Norwood
The PDF...as soon as it's done. I think late april/early may.
Jake
So it really
is going to be a birthday gift for me...
I'm getting excited now. The first official hard-copy TRoS supplement..
Hurrah!
I can wait, but i don't want to....and i know it's going to kick ass.
Huzzah!!!!!
I am so glad to hear it will be comming out soon! :)
Kudos to Driftwood and Jake!
Good to hear it's finally getting released!
Is the cover shown in the PR intended for release? I must say that I'm not pleased with the font and placement of the "Of Beasts and Men" title (great title, btw ;) - it just looks awkward to me. Re-using the same font as in the TROS logo would be easier on the eye. Using two so much different fonts on one page doesn't make it look good most of the time. If you don't want to use the TROS logo font, at least go with a more plain and simple font for the title.
Wasn't there a plan once to use a cover design similar to the core rule book?
We could play around with the title font, if you think it's an issue. I like it as is, but I'm not too particular. There was never any plan to do the crystal-ball thing for this cover, although the SATF cover had planned one.
Jake
There's certainly something to be said for "line unity", as in making all the books look similar, which would mean using the crystal-ball look and the font from the main book.
On the other hand, the crystal-ball look would obscure a lot of the picture (and it's a nice one), so it's a toss-up I guess.
Brian.
I'm not that interested in "line unity" where the crystal ball is concerned. I do like the crystaline background, though, which will probably go on the back of the book.
Jake
Cut out the houses in the background, get the Hef, the wolf behind him, and a bit of the face of the one below, and you'll have enough. I'm really for the Crystal Ball look for all of the products.
Line unity, to me, makes a project look professional and well-thought out.. A problem I had with many of the AD&D supplements, and part of why I never allowed my curiosity to get the better of me. If it doesn't share the same theme as the main books, it looks like an afterthought, rather than one of the core-books. I can see adventures having a different cover format, but for any of the cover books, I think a uniform look is best.
One way or the other, people who already love the game will probably buy OBaM. I know I will (though I may way wait for hardcopy, considering what it would take to print a PDF version, and how often I get a chance to play) but it's effect on marketing shouldn't be understated.
Okay...see...
I never liked the crystal ball. It's not that I disliked it, but it's never been what I wanted. The crystal ball is gone from the "line." I like the crystaline mesh, though. That stays. As for product unity...we're not TSR here...we only have the one product, and variety is the spice of life. We'll continue using the TROS logo (albeit with different colors) and perhaps the interior knotwork (which I really like), but as for "cover unity..." I like Jeremy's painting a lot (and I paid a lot for it) and I'm not going to cover it up with some cheesy graphic.
The font for the title is a matter I'll take into real consideration, though.
End of story on the Crystal ball.
Jake
No crystal ball. Re-consideration of font. Fair enough.
Can you tell us what finally made it into OBaM? Or was this already posted somewhere?
Quote from: Jürgen MayerCan you tell us what finally made it into OBaM? Or was this already posted somewhere?
Uh.. I think this may have been mentioned somewhere, but briefly..
Beasts
and
Men
Does that help? :-)
Sorry. Err, ok. The requested generic NPC's from all walks of life (more than 30 I think; Guardsmen, Assassins, Shopkeepers, Mercenaries, Beggars, you get the idea), Ten or so fully fleshed out NPC's/Characters, Animal rules (including hit location tables/diagrams, animal combat maneuvers, pack tactics, mounted combat, jousting rules, barding etc, lots of animals statted up, and more), a Fey section, a Trollspawn section (quite proud of this one), a "Beasts of Legend" section, an Other World section, a Traditional Favourites section (not quite what you may expect), plus some new character rules like gifts/flaws and a new skills package along the way. Plus of course some damn cool artwork, plenty of great stories to introduce the various beasts, and probably some other stuff I forgot.
Quality over quantity was the goal, but I don't think anyone will be complaining about the quantity either.
Brian.
Quote from: Brian LeybourneSorry. Err, ok. The requested generic NPC's from all walks of life (more than 30 I think; Guardsmen, Assassins, Shopkeepers, Mercenaries, Beggars, you get the idea), Ten or so fully fleshed out NPC's/Characters, Animal rules (including hit location tables/diagrams, animal combat maneuvers, pack tactics, mounted combat, jousting rules, barding etc, lots of animals statted up, and more), a Fey section, a Trollspawn section (quite proud of this one), a "Beasts of Legend" section, an Other World section, a Traditional Favourites section (not quite what you may expect), plus some new character rules like gifts/flaws and a new skills package along the way. Plus of course some damn cool artwork, plenty of great stories to introduce the various beasts, and probably some other stuff I forgot.
Quality over quantity was the goal, but I don't think anyone will be complaining about the quantity either.
Brian.
Damn you Mr. Leybourne. *grin* Taunting us again. Will our pain never stop?!? (Until May was it...?)
And might I add a [breathless]
wow[/breathless] and a [excited]
cool[/excited]! (Nice effect Stephen) I hadn't seen it all laid out like that before. Really looking forward to the fruits of your labor.
Chris
Brian-
I think Juergen meant "which submitted entries made it in."
J-
Off the top of my head not many, but your doppelganger did.
Jake
Quote from: Jake NorwoodI think Juergen meant "which submitted entries made it in."
Ah, sorry. My bad.
Err.. I don't know whose they are in most cases, but these are the submissions I kept:
Doppelganger
Gremlin
Hearn and the Wild Hunt
Swamp Sprites
Yr Tair (The Three Swords)
Infernal Guardian
The Eternal Ones
Walking Dead
And the following NPC's:
Julianos Vainsteel
Tiberius Damarisk
Yssir Abu al Japhra ibn Mukkaf
Brian.
Yup, that's what I wanted to know. I expected that OBaM would contain more submitted material, but of course I'm proud that I made it into the book. Is the deal still that each submitter gets a free copy of the book (and credit, I guess)?
Will you use Fufu's pic (the one with the mirror) for the Doppelgänger (remember the ä if it should be proper Stahlnish... um, German)? He told me that you never got back to him for more artwork...
Crap! I lost his address. I really want to use his stuff, and more of it. Have him email me. I knew I forgot someone!
Jake
Color me thrilled. 3 of those are mine (to include the NPC Tiberius Damarisk).
I'm published! Sorta. My contributions are, anyhow!
::goes off to color himself thrilled::
<mutters> What color is "thrilled" anyhow..?
Quote from: WolfenColor me thrilled. 3 of those are mine (to include the NPC Tiberius Damarisk).
::goes off to color himself thrilled::
Then you'll be even happier to hear that I used Tiberius as the main character in one of the introductory stories I wrote for the book as well :-)
He even lives, unlike most of the subjects of those stories...
Brian.
Quote from: Brian LeybourneHe even lives, unlike most of the subjects of those stories...
It's true that half the fun of those stories is watching somebody die, because it almost always happens...
Jake
Quote from: Jake NorwoodIt's true that half the fun of those stories is watching somebody die, because it almost always happens...
What can I say, I'm mean to my characters :-)
AND it highlights just how nasty the world of Weyrth can be for the ill prepared...
Brian.
(edit: Hell, even Jake meets a grizzly end in one of the stories. Heh heh...)
Quote from: Brian LeybourneAnd the following NPC's:
Julianos Vainsteel
Tiberius Damarisk
Yssir Abu al Japhra ibn Mukkaf
Brian.
WOOHOO!!!! JULES MADE IT IN!!!
HEHEHEHEEEEHEHEEEEE!!!
Man, I'm gonna have soooo many faces to rub that in..... oh yeah bay-bee!!! :-D
And his old friend/rival Tiberius is there too! How cool is that?
Brandon
PS: Congrats on the chargen Brian, I'm gonna have to check that out for sure!
Quote from: Brian Leybourne
Doppelganger
Gremlin
Hearn and the Wild Hunt
Swamp Sprites
Yr Tair (The Three Swords)
Infernal Guardian
The Eternal Ones
Walking Dead
And the following NPC's:
Julianos Vainsteel
Tiberius Damarisk
Yssir Abu al Japhra ibn Mukkaf
*blink*
Wow, I had almost forgot I submitted things for that book, now I find that a couple of my critters and one of my npcs actually made it in. Excellent...now if I ever inflict those beasties on players there will be an air of officialness to it all.
*was feeling meanspirited when he wrote up his critter submissions*
Jake,havn't spoken to you since GAMA,but was able to get more books from dist. Anyway, glad to see OF Beasts and Men coming. There is a group of your games greatest fans eagerly awaiting its arrival. Oh and don't pay to much attention to Rattlehead....his head will get unbearably large and rattle alot . Hey wait a minute .....that's it......the Great Northern Articulated Stahlnish Rattlehead....a huge hidious beast of questionable intellect and terrible diposition....it has been known to lay waste to the whole country side in its never ending search for boiled halibut and fricasede ,whipped pomagrate suflay........LOL just kidding, Brandon is good people, just don't say I said so.....that expanding head thing and all that.
ROFL!!! And all this time I thought it was just my hats shrinking...... hehe.
Brandon
Eddie's right...
I've known Brandon for years.... Back in the olden days we used to call him Rumblehat, that is, before we knew about his "condition".
Guys~
Just wondering... is OBAM out yet? I just came back to the forums after a couple of months break for school finals and such, and have been out of the loop. Is it published yet, or is there another release date?
Charles
I'm dying to find out what is up for OBaM. Players chomping at the bit, I have groups of them demonstrating outside my apartment building. Next will be the torches and pitchforks. Please help me. a PDF distribution would be great. Anything to keep the ravening hordes placated.
Yeah, I've $20 burning a hole in my pocket as well. My fantasy game is ready to re-commence with RoS as its game system, if only I had OBAM to guide me through man-beast combat.
A pdf is fine. I'll get the hard-bound later.
Out this month online. In hard-copy at Gen Con. Hold me to it.
Jake
Quote from: Jake NorwoodOut this month online. In hard-copy at Gen Con. Hold me to it.
Jake
Oh man, oh man...
Quote from: Jake NorwoodOut this month online. In hard-copy at Gen Con. Hold me to it.
Jake
Ex...Cell...Ent!
When will it ship to distributors Jake?
-Claymore
Honestly...
I don't think we'll be doing much through regular distributors. They don't pay on time (if at all), and no money = bigger debt = dead driftwood.
We'll be doing all direct sales initially, though some retailers may have it, too.
Jake
Jake
QuoteWe'll be doing all direct sales initially
Will that also include shipping the hard copy to individuals in the UK? I know that when the core book came out you were accepting payments via Paypal - will you be doing this again for OBAM? If so, then please put me down for two!
Thanks
Harry
Will you only take Paypal? Unfortunately I refuse to have a Paypal account because they claim the power to arbitrarily freeze your assets with no legal oversight, unlike banks which are heavily regulated. They regularly abuse this legal loophole against people who haven't been proven to have done anything wrong. This means that if Paypal is the only way to get OBAM, I can't get it. :(
Ummm...how is that an issue unless you plan on carrying large paypal balances. The only way to have a large paypal balance is if you're a seller and you're not sweeping your paypal account to checking or if you voluntarily add money to the pay pal mmkt.
Most paypal users have a 0 balance because the charges just get directly debited from your checking account or charged to a credit card.
Zero balance = who cares if they freeze it?
Seems like a pretty silly principal to inconvenience yourself over, especially since banks are not nearly as "highly regulated" in whose accounts they freeze as you might think. In fact, since the Patriot Act banks pretty much operate on a freeze first, ask questions later policy.
Sorry, I shouldn't have said the specifics as it's not on topic. The main question is: Do you accept any other forms of payment? That's all.
we'll accept checks as well.
Jake
Cool! Thanks.
So, thias won't be a pdf, but a hard copy?
Either way is fine; time is my big crisis right now, but if I had the choice, I'd prefer hardcopy.
From the phrasing, I think it will be .pdf at first, with hardcopies available by GenCon for direct purchase there, and online order. Jake will of course clarify.
QuoteOut this month online. In hard-copy at Gen Con. Hold me to it.
Jake
That seemed pretty clear to me.
Wolfen's right. With the way things are right now in the distriubtion tiers, etc., is would be suicide for us to print even 1,000 copies and sell them all. The numbers don't add up.
Jake
So no exact online release date yet, though?
That's correct.
Quote from: Jake NorwoodWolfen's right. With the way things are right now in the distriubtion tiers, etc., is would be suicide for us to print even 1,000 copies and sell them all. The numbers don't add up.
Jake
Even if it were done in the perfect bound style of binding, like
The Burning Wheel FRP system from Luke Crane? The copy I picked up this week is numbered 224 of 1000.
Unless the online copy is dirt cheap, I'll wait for the hard copy version; I'd like to have both, but hard copy is more important for me to own.
Quote from: Jake NorwoodOut this month online. In hard-copy at Gen Con. Hold me to it.
Jake
SWEET!
Cuenca Brian (Ecuador)
Those of us who dont go to gencon can order it from your website though, right? :)
While supplies last.
Jake
I wish more game companies would switch over to the Columbia Games model. They have both an Autoship program and a program where you can pre-order potential items. if a target number is reached -- 100 in the case of Columbia -- they get the product out.
They've gone to direct only and though I am not privy to how they are doing financially, they are still around after at least 15 years.
Quote from: turgonI wish more game companies would switch over to the Columbia Games model. They have both an Autoship program and a program where you can pre-order potential items. if a target number is reached -- 100 in the case of Columbia -- they get the product out.
They've gone to direct only and though I am not privy to how they are doing financially, they are still around after at least 15 years.
By the way, if there is ever such a way to pre-order, put me down for three. That's the number I have of the "core" book and, of course, I need to keep complete sets!!!
Quote from: turgonI wish more game companies would switch over to the Columbia Games model. They have both an Autoship program and a program where you can pre-order potential items. if a target number is reached -- 100 in the case of Columbia -- they get the product out.
They've gone to direct only and though I am not privy to how they are doing financially, they are still around after at least 15 years.
Th program now requires 500 before it ships. At least one war gam has shipped that way, and 8-10 Harn supps are lined up; the top one had 209 pre-orders; it gets about one pre-order every other day.
Quote from: Darth Tang
Th program now requires 500 before it ships. At least one war gam has shipped that way, and 8-10 Harn supps are lined up; the top one had 209 pre-orders; it gets about one pre-order every other day.
You are correct. I have a faulty memory today -- I'm dividing everything by five, it seems...
Okay, cross your fingers, but we should have the "buy" button up by wednesday or earlier, with PDFs going out immediately and print copies (along with a PDF download for free) going out within 2-3 weeks after that (due to Gen Con). I told you I'd be there. Ha ha ah ah ah haha
Finally.
Anyway, the book looks pretty good, IMO. It'll be worth the money.
Jake
That's great news! I hope it's a smash hit, Jake! :-D
Brandon
Hah. So do I.
Good to see you again, Rattlehead. Long time no see.
Jake
Oh I'm still around.... Lurking mostly... With decent employment comes a lack of free time... hehe. But I still watch and post when moved to do so...
If you need me, just yell! I'm around! :-D
Brandon
Excellent!
It looks like I couldn't have timed my first TROS game [this coming sunday] any better.
Thanks Jake.
-Chris
hoooray! Seneschal's of the world thank you.
My players have mixed feelings however, they had already bought pitchforks and torches and were looking forward to storming my apartment in the near future.
Get them to take those pitchforks and torches against the beasties. Oh yeah.
Jake
Here's the schedule:
The book goes to press tomorrow. I should be able to ship the first couple of copies before I leave for Gen Con.
The PDF will be up tomorrow or the next day, depending on 2 things:
1) My getting a reliable method of distribution arranged, such as the Forge Bookshelf
2) My figuring out how to compress an image-heavy 140-page book into a downloadable file of reasonable size. I'm really not sure how to do that, so any and all comments would be appreciated.
Other than that I finished the last touch just about 10 minutes ago. It's all done.
Whatever the case I'll be putting the Paypal button up tomorrow, so long as everyone realizes that the product won't be available for a very short time, due to the above reasons.
Jake
Oh, one more thing. I want those who buy the print edition to have access to the PDF as well. I'm currently figuring that the Print + PDF will cost $25 (plus a nominal shipping fee?), and the PDF alone will be $15.
Jake
It's going to be hard for me not to go ahead and pay for the pdf download version while waiting for Gencon to come to town next week where I'll buy the book! ;-)
I have to wait another MONTH before I get my paypal confirmation number with my credit card bill!
Can you check your online billing statements for your credit card? Charges usually show up within a couple of days.
Quote from: DurgilIt's going to be hard for me not to go ahead and pay for the pdf download version while waiting for Gencon to come to town next week where I'll buy the book! ;-)
I'll have the "buy the PDF with the book" option available at GenCon, too, so bring your money and we'll hook you up. Alternatively, you can send the money and I'll reserve a gencon copy for you.
Jake
Quote from: Jake NorwoodI'll have the "buy the PDF with the book" option available at GenCon, too, so bring your money and we'll hook you up. Alternatively, you can send the money and I'll reserve a gencon copy for you.
Jake
I think I'll pick the latter option, Jake. You are awesome! You'll have my $25 bucks as soon as you put up that "Buy Now" button.:-)
Hey, if I can pay and have a copy mailed to me, that would be great. I really want a hard copy; I don't know how much you are printing, but I want to make sure to get mine! :)
Hm. So, when is Gencon? I won't be there... if its after august 1st, though, and if you will be willing to let me buy a copy to be mailed to me, I'm all over it!
Gencon is from July 24 to July 27 right here in Indianapolis, IN.
Drat!
Ya bastich! It figgers :(
I wish I lived in a major gaming city, heh.
The Buy buttons are up. Happy Shopping.
Jake
Would kanseg please contact me. Thanks.
Jake
When I click the buy button, I just get taken to the paypal login screen and it doesn't get added to my shopping cart. I tried adding the core rulebook and that worked fine, but OBAM just spawns a new login screen everytime I click (no matter if I already logged in or not).
Glitch in the button or am I just special?
Quote from: Furious DWhen I click the buy button, I just get taken to the paypal login screen and it doesn't get added to my shopping cart. I tried adding the core rulebook and that worked fine, but OBAM just spawns a new login screen everytime I click (no matter if I already logged in or not).
Glitch in the button or am I just special?
Your not special, and I probably messed thing up as well. I'm sure you're now very busy Jake, but when you get a chance, send me an email to let me know if I need to re-order my book.
I noticed the same thing when testing, but Tony's order came through. Kinda weird. I may try re-doing the button.
jake
That was only because in my rush to purchase the book, I simply went to the "Send Money" tab on the top of the Paypal page and put your email address, norwood@theriddleofsteel.net, in the "To" box and $25 in the "Amount." I guess I basically did it all manually. :-)
In that case I need to fix the link. I'll get it done shortly...
Jake
Link fixed. Everything is as it should be now.
Jake
Quote from: Durgil
You're not special.
*cries*
On a serious note, it seems to be working correctly now.
Quote from: Durgil
You're not special.
I've very sorry about wording it that way, and am glad you understand.