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Lawless Heaven Now Available

Four cops. One hundred criminals. Countless broken bones.

The Sword’s Edge adventure, “Lawless Heaven” is now available through the Composed Dream Games RPG Marketplace. You can also find Sword’s Edge there.

In this homage to modern Korean action cinema, Three cops and an intelligence operative in South Korea’s industrial heartland face off against a local gang involved in a heroin smuggling ring. The cops have only one order: bust the ring, but no one realizes the true depth of this particular cesspool.

This is an adventure for two to six characters for Sword’s Edge. It includes six pre-generated characters and supplemental rules for chase scenes.

This adventure, and others, are part of my Patreon campaign, which I would appreciate you supporting.

You can find out more about “Lawless Heaven” here.

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All Quiet On The . . Wait, No It Isn’t!

It may have been quiet in the internet-facing portion of Sword’s Edge Publishing, but there’s been lots of work behind the scenes. The files for the Sword’s Edge books are with the printers and I’m awaiting a proof. Once that has been approved, the final PDF will be available to Kickstarter backers and I’ll be in contact with Magpie Games to take care of the shipments.

Plans continue apace for the Patreon which will go live in September. Both “Lawless Heaven” and “Face ‘Splosion” are ready to go. The third release looks like it will be an adventure for Nefertiti Overdrive which bridges the period between “Rumours of War,” presented in the Nefertiti Overdrive Quickstart Rules and “Get Netiqret,” which was presented in Nefertiti Overdrive. December will see “Swords & Searchers,” a revision of “the Nor’Westers” as I believe a sword & sorcery setting will work better than early 19th century Canada. “Swords & Searchers” will be a mini-campaign and depending on how many pages it encompasses, it might end up being two releases. It uses the Sword’s Edge rules.

At that point, I’ll be taking stock of the Patreon. I have two stories in the sword noir genre ready to go, and I may also be releasing the Wall RPG, depending on the backers and their preferences. I also have “Gang War,” a take on the Warriors – which was itself an update on Anabasis by Xenophon – using Sword’s Edge. I’m going to keep working on possible releases as I want to make sure the Patreon is stacked for at least a year. Once that first year is done, I’ll review and adjust accordingly.

So rest assured, I am busy working. I want to make sure I have a buffer of product for the Patreon just in case real life happens, as it always does.

Until the Patreon launches, if you haven’t picked up Sword’s Edge, the pre-order is open but will close once the books start shipping, so this is your chance to get it at Canadian rather than US prices.

You can find the Sword’s Edge pre-order page here.

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Patreon-izing

As Sword’s Edge slowly moves towards completion and delivery to its backers, I have been using what time I have to get some other projects in order. Right now, both Lawless Heaven and Face ‘Splosion are ready to go. These are Sword’s Edge adventures designed for convention play, meaning they are one-shots with prepared characters, although they could be introductions into longer campaigns if so desired. Right now, I am working on the Nor’Westers, which may get a new name for its release, and is different than the other two releases in that it is a campaign, though one built of the truncated summaries I use to run adventures, which I tend to lump together as one-pagers.

Along with these three Sword’s Edge products, I have a Centurion and a Nefertiti Overdrive adventure that I could release, as well as a possible second campaign product (a covert special forces campaign set in modern Africa) that could be completed.

You may wonder about this flurry of activity. It is because I am intent on exploring another type of crowdfunding – Patreon. Unlike Kickstarter, Patreon is a subscription service in which one pays a specific amount per month or per release. My intent is to set mine to “per release” and to release adventures as well as some other items at a planned rate of once per month.

As it stands, I’ll have three months (possibly four) covered, and I intend to keep that buffer going – so I will always have some extra time in case there is a month in which I am unable to get a product completed. Each product will be around 20 pages. The idea is that they will be provided to backers of Patreon. Depending on the amount of money I am making on Patreon, the products may then be sold elsewhere or they may remain available only through Patreon. Along with adventures, I intend to offer game supplements – such as an Egyptian history and culture supplement for Nefertiti Overdrive and a Sword Noir supplement for the new version of Sword’s Edge – and fiction – I am toying with the idea of a serial novel along with speculative fiction short stories.

This will happen once Sword’s Edge reaches its backers as a PDF. I don’t want to put a date on that as all is going well and I don’t want to raise expectations only to then have to dash them.

I’ll be talking about this both at the SEP Google+ community and on Twitter.

I hope that you’ll be kind enough to support me on Patreon when the time comes. If you like what I do, it is a way to make sure I keep producing.

You can find the SEP G+ community here.

You can find me on Twitter here.

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Lawless Heaven at CanGames

Are you going to be in Ottawa this weekend? If so, do you want to kick some ass in Ulsan? Then “Lawless Heaven” would be your jam.

I’ll be running “Lawless Heaven” on Saturday at 14:00 and Sunday at 09:00 this weekend (20 & 21 May).

In case you don’t know, “Lawless Heaven” is my homage to South Korean action cinema using my recently Kickstarted RPG Sword’s Edge. Seats are still available.

You can find the schedule here.

You can find CanGames here.

Here‘s a quick rundown of “Lawless Heaven”

And you can find out more about “Lawless Heaven” here.

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Kick the Edge of the Sword’s Start

It’s going to happen. The Sword’s Edge Kickstarter is going to be a thing. It should be going live next next week and running for 30 days. It’s going to be in Canadian dollars, which is kind of wonky since most of the backers of my last two successful Kickstarters were from the US, but I’m going to include an approximate cost in US dollars for all rewards.

Unlike my other two successful Kickstarters, Sword’s Edge is done. It’s actually been done for quite some time, but I had neglected it in favour of Sword Noir and Kiss My Axe. Sword’s Edge is the underlying system for both of those games, and both of those games alter it somewhat to make it fit their particular genre. Sword’s Edge has lived in their shadow for a while, but when I decided to update Sword Noir, I chose to update its foundation first.

I’m very glad I did. Getting my hands dirty with Sword’s Edge reminded me how simple the system is while still allowing for generous customization. It rewards optimizing a character for a niche, so playing a generalist is only useful if there a minimum of characters. A generalist in a crowd of specialists will have a hard time getting the spotlight.

And so, after working hard on getting its innards working, I finally have the outards in place also. I printed copies of the Sword’s Edge Ashcan for Breakout Con in Toronto (10-12 March). This is going to be a Kickstarter where I’ll have a finished products though not the finished product to send to backers as soon as it successfully closes. It’s an Ashcan because it needs professional editing and indexing. The Kickstarter will pay for that and also pay me for the costs already sunk into the project mostly art.

The target is going to be $2,700 CAD, which is about $2,020 USD with the current exchange. I believe this is a realistic and reasonable target, lower than both of my other games, and I’d be kind of sad if I missed it. If the Kickstarter fails to fund, Sword’s Edge will still come out, it will simply lack professional editing, won’t have an index, and I’ll be in the red when it hits the streets.

And for those interested in Lawless Heaven, it will likely be a stretch goal, probably at the $4,000 level.

Below are a couple of pages from the Ashcan. Pretty soon, that could be yours. Cool.

You can learn more about Sword’s Edge here.

You can learn more about Lawless Heaven here.

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State of the Edge

I’ve finished updating Sword’s Edge. I mean I’ve really finished. As in the Ashcan Edition has been sent off to the printers. This doesn’t actually mean that Sword’s Edge will be soon available at discriminating retailers near you. Those Ashcan Editions are specifically for Breakout Con in Toronto, running 10-12 March 2017 at the Holiday Inn at Yorkdale. I’ll be running three sessions of Lawless Heaven, my love letter to Korean action cinema using the updated Sword’s Edge rules, and the Ashcan Edition will be available there.

It’s an Ashcan Edition because it is not entirely complete. It has not been professionally laid out. It has not been professionally edited. It has not been professionally indexed. Does it need these things? Maybe not. The original didn’t have any of these. I would, however, like to have these, so I’m looking at costs and strongly considering Kickstarting once again. This would likely happen in April or May, but we’ll have to see.

Lawless Heaven is also done. Not only is it done in the sense that it is ready for me to run, it is also done in the sense that it could actually be published. If I Kickstart, it will likely be a stretch goal, because I would dearly love to have portraits for each of the characters and maybe some other art and a stretch goal might afford that. Otherwise, if Sword’s Edge heads out into the wild without Kickstarting, Lawless Heaven will likely follow it there.

So now I am working on updating Sword Noir: A Role-Playing Game of Hardboiled Sword & Sorcery. Most of the mechanical changes will follow those from Sword’s Edge, but there are also some idiosyncratic parts of Sword Noir – like Flaws, Reputation, and the magic system – that will need to be fit into the new rules. We’ll see how that goes.

Wish me luck!

And if you are at Breakout Con, come and say hi!

You can find out more about Breakout Con here.

You can find out more about Lawless Heaven here.

You can register for a game of Lawless Heaven at Breakout Con on Friday at 20:00, Saturday at 14:00, or Sunday at 11:00.

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Breaking Down Breakout Con

It’s been announced: I’m an industry guest at Breakout Con, running 10-12 March 2017 at Holiday Inn Yorkdale in Toronto. In case you were wondering, this is what I’ll be doing:

On Friday, I’m running a game of Lawless Heaven from 20:00 to 00:00. I heard somewhere that Friday nights were made for fighting. We’ll put that to the test.

On Saturday from 13:00 to 14:00, I’ll be moderating a panel. More on that when the schedule is announced by Breakout Con. Hopefully I can learn some stuff at the panel, because the lineup is stellar.

I’ll be moving from the panel directly to another game of Lawless Heaven, from 14:00 to 18:00. I should be very ready to run a good game after basking in wisdom at the panel.

Sunday morning from 11:00 to 15:00, I’ll be running the final session of Lawless Heaven for Breakout Con. This will be bittersweet, as it means another amazing Breakout Con will be drawing to a close and it’ll be a whole other year until there is another one.

What will you be doing 10-12 March?

You can learn about Breakout Con here.

You can learn more about Lawless Heaven here.

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What Is Lawless Heaven?

Lawless Heaven is a modern action adventure set in Ulsan, South Korea using Sword’s Edge RPG. The tagline is: Four cops. One hundred criminals. Countless broken bones.

I’ve actually made sure there are 100 criminals the PCs can beat up. That was a design goal.

In Lawless Heaven, three cops and an intelligence operative in South Korea’s industrial heartland face off against a local gang involved in a heroin smuggling ring. The cops have only one order: bust the ring, but no one realizes the true depth of this particular cesspool.

It’s a love letter to Korean action movies, and especially Nowhere to Hide. There are a few paragraphs in the text discussing my favourite movies in Korean action cinema, and some of the movies mentioned are The Man From Nowhere, A Bittersweet Life, and the Yellow Sea.

This adventure was designed as a convention game, so it runs in 3 to 4 hours. At present, there is no plan to publish it, but I am moving toward the idea of Kickstarting Sword’s Edge to recover costs, and this would make a good stretch goal.

Right now, the only way to get in on Lawless Heaven is to join me at Breakout Con in Toronto on 10-12 March 2017. I will be running a game on Friday night, Saturday afternoon, and Sunday morning. I hope to see you there. Following Breakout Con, depending on interest, I might run some online games, especially if I end up Kickstarting Sword’s Edge with Lawless Heaven as a stretch goal.

You can learn more about Breakout Con here.

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Lawless Heaven

Sword’s Edge RPG has been updated. It’s ready to go. And the first place you can find it is at Breakout Con in Toronto 10-12 March 2017. I’m going to be running three games of Lawless Heaven using Sword’s Edge: Friday 10 Mar, 20:00-24:00; Saturday 11 Mar, 14:00-18:00; and Sunday Mar 12, 1100-1500,

In Lawless Heaven, three cops and an intelligence operative in South Korea’s industrial heartland face off against a local gang involved in a heroin smuggling ring. The cops have only one order: bust the ring, but no one realizes the true depth of this particular cesspool.

This game is inspired by Korean action cinema, and especially Nowhere to Hide, a 1999 actioner that is really style over substance but has some of the best acting talent working in Korea at the time and some amazing scenes.

Watch Breakout Con for information on how to register for these games. The con’s indie game store will also have Ashcan editions of Sword’s Edge RPG for sale.

I hope you are as excited as I am.

You can find out more about Breakout Con here.

You can find out more about Nowhere to Hide at Wikipedia and IMDB.