Rana Reader Issue #24 - Necromancer Games Returns!
Greetings!
BIG NEWS! Necromancer Games is back for 5th Edition! We've launched a Kickstarter project for not one, not two, but THREE INCREDIBLE BOOKS written by a hand picked group of untouchable RPG writers. This is going to be big folks!
Necromancer Games 5th Edition Kickstarter
Funded in 17 Hours!
It's true, the project launched at midnight on Sunday and was funded by 5PM Sunday evening. Now it's all about stretch goals. Each one adds books and/or content to each of these fantastic titles. Here is a message from Steve Winter (project manager) about the line up of authors we've assembled:
"To pull this project together and give it the right "feel" for Necromancer Games, we recruited an amazing lineup of writers. Start with a core of Necromancer Games regulars like Bill Webb (Rappan Athuk, The Lost City of Barakus), Matt Finch (Swords & Wizardry, Tome of Adventure Design), J. Collura (Caverns of Thracia Reloaded, Chaos Rising), Michael Curtis (The Dungeon Alphabet, Realms of Crawling Chaos), and Casey Christofferson (The Tome of Horrors, City of Brass). Throw in a few D&D long-timers like Steve Winter (Tyranny of Dragons, Murder in Baldur's Gate), James M. Ward (Gamma World, Pool of Radiance, Castle Keeper's Guide), Skip Williams (Axe of the Dwarvish Lords, The Rod of Seven Parts), and Ed Greenwood (The Forgotten Realms Campaign Setting, The City of Splendors). The result is a stack of adventures that are guaranteed to break bones, stir long-forgotten nightmares, push heroes to their utmost limits, and cement massive grins on the faces of players and DMs alike."
If that lineup isn't enough for you to click the link below then we don't know what is!
Click Here to Visit the Kickstarter Page!
Thank you for your continued support of Frog God Games and Necromancer Games through our various endeavors. We hope that you are well and are enjoying the awesome campaigns you are currently in. We will continue to deliver high quality RPG materials and unbeatable customer service to you and other gamers for years to come.
Sincerely,
Frog God Games Staff
Frog God Games | froggodgames@gmail.com | foggodgames.com
5045 NE Minder Road
Poulsbo, WA 98370
Its started as soon as Basic PDF was released: http://froggodgames.com/wizards-amulet
Lets hope they can keep up the high quality of standards that they did with their Creature Collection books.
That's sarcasm by the way. That book was full of crappy monsters with even crappier stats. And that was with them actually having an SRD to work from. What will the quality of this be, given they don't have an SRD?
And as I said on ENWorld, this is probably going to result in crappier products for Pathfinder and S&W fans as well. The more systems you support, the worse your support is going to be.
Here comes the Rappan Athuk Redux for 5e. The $250 pledge level includes a level you can't get anywhere else...ever!
Apparently this guy (http://www.enworld.org/forum/showthread.php?356600-SRD5-A-Clone-of-Part-of-D-amp-D-5E-Basic/page6&p=6329782&posted=1#post6329782)has already released an SR5 for it. Upon cursory examination, his SRD is nothing more than a cut and paste from the basic rules.
This won't end well for him I suspect.
Seems like Kickstarter could be set to explode if they put out any sort of open license.
Some good authors in the list.
No personal point of reference on the quality control.
Quote from: JeremyR;765777Lets hope they can keep up the high quality of standards that they did with their Creature Collection books.
That's sarcasm by the way. That book was full of crappy monsters with even crappier stats. And that was with them actually having an SRD to work from. What will the quality of this be, given they don't have an SRD?
And as I said on ENWorld, this is probably going to result in crappier products for Pathfinder and S&W fans as well. The more systems you support, the worse your support is going to be.
That was by Sword and Sorcery not Necromancer. Necromancer and Frog God have good reps. Paizo used some of Frogs monsters in adventure paths.
Quote from: JeremyR;765777Lets hope they can keep up the high quality of standards that they did with their Creature Collection books.
That's sarcasm by the way. That book was full of crappy monsters with even crappier stats. And that was with them actually having an SRD to work from. What will the quality of this be, given they don't have an SRD?
Creature Collection was Sword & Sorcery, not Necromancer.
(ninja'd)
Quote from: hexgrid;765840Creature Collection was Sword & Sorcery, not Necromancer.
I'll jump on this wagon and also point out that the monster books Necromancer
actually did were the
Tome of Horrors collections, which were generally excellent.
(Although I was not a general fan of the art.)
What I don't get is how Frog God are going to put out a couple hundred monsters without knowing what's in the upcoming Monster Manual. The Tome of Horrors books were old-school monsters that didn't make it into WotC's Monster Manuals.
Also, while I have no interest in a monster book, the Frog God adventure book piqued my interest. But you can't buy it separately in the Kickstarter, so I guess I'm out of luck.
Quote from: Sacrosanct;765834Apparently this guy (http://www.enworld.org/forum/showthread.php?356600-SRD5-A-Clone-of-Part-of-D-amp-D-5E-Basic/page6&p=6329782&posted=1#post6329782)has already released an SR5 for it. Upon cursory examination, his SRD is nothing more than a cut and paste from the basic rules.
This won't end well for him I suspect.
He yanked it already after everyone told him he was either a total moron or a total asshole.
This is, to me, a sign of the great enthusiasm for the new rules, and clearly some of my predictions made just before the release of 5e will be coming to pass...
Quote from: Haffrung;765873What I don't get is how Frog God are going to put out a couple hundred monsters without knowing what's in the upcoming Monster Manual. The Tome of Horrors books were old-school monsters that didn't make it into WotC's Monster Manuals.
Also, while I have no interest in a monster book, the Frog God adventure book piqued my interest. But you can't buy it separately in the Kickstarter, so I guess I'm out of luck.
Quote from: RPGPundit;767018This is, to me, a sign of the great enthusiasm for the new rules, and clearly some of my predictions made just before the release of 5e will be coming to pass...
Isn't it fun to be right? Seriously to be everybody's alternate game isn't a bad thing. That means lots of willing players.
Quote from: Marleycat;767051Isn't it fun to be right?
Yes. You'd think I'd be used to it by now, but it entertains me every single time.
So, um.
Is there any information on how licensing is working yet??
Quote from: Will;781765So, um.
Is there any information on how licensing is working yet??
They seem to be focussing in the initial core releases, before anything else. But they have just announced a second Adventure Path due in March 2015 that is to be written by a 3rd PP (Sasquatch games), though published by WotC, much like Kobold Press did for Tyranny of Dragons.
Quote from: Will;781765So, um.
Is there any information on how licensing is working yet??
same as above. 2015
Well, Goodman Games is announcing 5e modules. I'm just... curious whether 3pp are just hoping for the best, or have some insider info, or what.
Quote from: RPGPundit;767018This is, to me, a sign of the great enthusiasm for the new rules
Or at least great enthusiasm for the hope of cashing in on the inevitable early sales spike.
Well, I have a scifi project that has bounced around several systems, but isn't strongly tied to any.
Right now it's a DungeonWorld mod, which is, well, D&Dish already. And I've always wanted to do scifi D&D anyway.
And having 100x as many people go 'eh, sure, I'll give this a look'...
Quote from: Will;781774Well, Goodman Games is announcing 5e modules. I'm just... curious whether 3pp are just hoping for the best, or have some insider info, or what.
Not just announcing, two of them are already up on RPGNow, as well as products from a couple other companies
http://rpg.drivethrustuff.com/browse.php?filters=0_0_45189_0_0
Apparently they are just using the OGL and hoping that protects them from lawyers....
... Huh. Well, I'll definitely be watching what happens closely. ;)
Frog God Games is in on 3PP too: http://froggodgames.com/5th-edition
I am guessing the basis is that you can't copyright mechanics, and most flavour/story/setting material is either so generic or created by the 3PP so as not to cause an issue.
The same happened with 3e and 4e IIRC, and arguably the whole OSR movement is based on the concept.
Quote from: JeremyR;781788Not just announcing, two of them are already up on RPGNow, as well as products from a couple other companies
http://rpg.drivethrustuff.com/browse.php?filters=0_0_45189_0_0
Apparently they are just using the OGL and hoping that protects them from lawyers....
especially since anyone who reads the OGL can clearly see they are in violation of it. Specific note should be made as to the definitions of product identity are. Another mistake nearly everyone makes is that according to the licence, you're required to detail out everything you're copying from the contributor.
people should be glad wotc doesn't bother pushing C&Ds
I can half imagine WotC not making any OGL announcement for a while, especially given its previous troubles in that regard. In the meantime, it benefits from 3PP efforts when its releases are just building up whilst reserving the ability to take action at a later point.