Kickstarter - Heart of Varrul (Sourcebook / Setting / Adventure for White Star)

I love me some White Star. You can play it as space opera, hard scifi, mash it up with fantasy - it all works. What it lacks is setting. Sure, there are some settings for White Star, but +Pete Spahn knows sandboxes, settings and adventures.

Heart of Varrul is a setting sourcebook and a series of adventures for the White Star RPG (follow the link and it will take you to the PWYW version of the White Star rules) Its probably something you didn't even know you needed until you knew it existed ;)

Heart of Varrul is a White Star: Science Fiction Roleplaying™ campaign setting book that details the aliens, factions, and conflicts of the Rul System, Tathkee Station, and the Planet Varrul. The Rul System is on the brink of an interstellar gold rush and the PCs are poised to get involved on the ground floor. How they get involved is up to them!  

Written by Peter C. Spahn and James M. Spahn, Heart of Varrul expands on the foundation laid by the critically acclaimed White Star: Science Fiction Roleplaying™. With illustrations by longtime White Star™ artist James Shields and maps by Just Insert Imagination's Morne Schaap, Heart of Varrul is specifically designed to give Referees a readymade location to run hours of adventures.

Pete is an experienced KS project creator and he has always released strong finished projects.

15 bucks gets you the Heart of Varrul and some prior Small Niche Games White Star releases in PDF.  25 bucks gets you the same in PDF plus an at cost coupon for the print version of Heart of Varrul.

Note: Pete Spahn and +James Spahn are NOT related ;)

Open Letter from "Poo Poo Face" to #ConManKen

This is an open letter to #ConManKen. 

Kenny,

No, I'm not going to talk with you on Facebook Messenger.

Why is that? Let's see, you've threatened me with lawsuits, federal and local criminal charges, having the FBI pick me up at home... really, you've run the gauntlet. It was all bullshit and empty threats. I know, you are used to bullying people when you can't charm them. Neither works on me.

What you haven't done is:

Complete even ONE of your outstanding Kickstarter obligations.

What you have done is:

Now you are making some vague sort of threat?

Kenny, please understand. So long as you keep attempting to separate honest folks from their cash, I will be watching your every move and reporting what is relevant to the gaming community. We'll, I'm not exactly watching your every move. But folks you have fucked over in the past are. Friends. Coworkers. Maybe even the guy fixing your toilet. They all feed me info on your latest money making scams.

Then there is Not Another Dime, probably one of the best investigative websites on the net these days, and its devoted solely to you.

Do yourself a favor, your backers a favor, everyone a favor - complete your obligations. Really, is it so hard? I mean, from what I can gather from Not Another Dime you probably made 50k under the table recently. For that you could at least get some Pencil Dice completed.

Oh, and stop trying shortcuts. They never work.

Yours in medias res,

Poo Poo Face

Midweek Monster Mayhem - Razor Rat (Swords & Wizardry Light / OSR)

Razor Rats appear to be part rat, part dog and part lizard. Standing one foot high at the shoulder and about two feet from snout to end of tail, Razor Rats and pack hunters. They hunt in packs of 2 to 12 and will generally choose just one or two targets in a party in an attempt to drag them to the ground. If a target is attacked by 3 or more Razor Rats, all attacks will be + 1 to hit due to the swarming effect.

Razor Rats will flee if confronted by fire or if they suffer casualties of half the pack or more.

Razor Rat
AC: 7[12]    HD: 1+1 Attacks: Swarm / Bite 1d6-1 Move: 15
Special: Swarm - if 3 or more Razor Rats are attacking a single target, attacks are at + 1

Art copyright James Shields

Midweek Monster Mayhem is brought to you by the generosity of The Tavern's Patreon Backers.

OGL

ConManKen - In Case You Were Wondering About that Certificate of Authenticity...

Remember earlier in the week? #ConManKen was trying to hock some Walking Dead memorabilia with some Certificate of Authenticity that raised some warning bells among readers.

Here's the #ConManKen CoA:

And here's the response PSA (the company logo in the lower left corner of the suspicious CoA):

BTW Kenny Boy, how did your diagnosis go? You know, the one where you need to be deceased before they can actually perform it?

August 1st seems like a lifetime ago. So many broken promises Ken. Its almost like you don't care.

Well, beware of another first Kenny. All bills come due at some point and the collection process will be most painful. But hey, you're used to living in your store's stockroom so any other accommodations should be an improvement.

Three hots and a cot, Kenny. Three hots and a cot.

Signed
Ever Yours in Truth & Honesty

Poo Poo Face

Kickstarter - 100+ Rappan Athuk Color Maps- JPEG, PSD for PFRPG, SW,& 5e

I love Rappan Athuk, but it wasn't the easiest to run on a Virtual Table Top. Sure, I could screenshot the maps from my PDF copy, but room numbers, traps and secret doors were all exposed when revealed via "the fog of war." With the 100+ Rappan Athuk Color Maps- JPEG, PSD for PFRPG, SW,& 5e Kickstarter, I won't have those issues. Then again, what REALLY excites me is the outdoor maps!

You can back for digital files (JPEG or PSD) or even go for physical copies. I want it all, but I'm a map freak anyway.

I think my sweet point is 75 bucks for the printed folio and JPEG maps for GMs and players. Damn you Frog God! I thought I had left Rappan Athuk behind me! heh!

Did I mention it funded in hours?

Note: I swim the the Frog God's pond these days and they printed and distribute Swords & Wizardry Light for free. They produce good shit and this looks to be more awesome stuff.

Denis McCarthy has Completed the Art for The Tavern's October Adventure!

Holy shit!

+Denis McCarthy does awesome work! Hire the man! ;)

He even used Swords & Wizardry Continual Light for reference.

Remember, this was funded by The Tavern's Community. Y'all are the best!

Castles & Crusades - Mythos Collection - 5 PDFs - 30 Bucks

Looking to bring some Celtic background material into you Castles & Crusades (or other OSR games)? How about Roman, Greek, German, Nordic and Slavic? If so, the Mythos Collection is your bundle.

I literally have these books in hardcover sitting behind me, stacked in a neat little pile waiting to be read and integrated into my Swords & Wizardry Light campaign. At six bucks a PDF these are a bargain for endless inspiration.

Over $81 individually and usually $60 for the bundle, through Sunday the Mythos Collection PDF bundle is halved in price to $30.

I think I'll pull Codex Germania out for reading after tonight's SWL session.

Yep, that's an affiliate link above. Monies raised via The Tavern's affiliate links goes to support The Tavern. Thank you :)

Kickstarter - Baby Bestiary 2018 Calendar

I've backed the Baby Bestiary Kickstarters over the last few years. Always top quality art, printing and timely delivery.

The Baby Bestiary 2018 Calendar Kickstarter launched yesterday. I am so in I backed for 2 copies (one goes to my niece - what a surprise)

I love Travis Hanson's art and it fits perfectly for a Baby Bestiary.

A single calendar in Print plus PDF is 20 buck. Two print copies is 30.

Seriously, what gamer doesn't want a cool calendar like this?

Reminder - Tavern Chat Tonight - Celebrating 7k Posts ;) - 9PM Eastern

I'm sure we will have lots to talk about aside from The Tavern hitting it 7,000th posts (7,001 with this post) but you can't blame me for celebrating the milestone ;)

When? Tonight, 9 PM Eastern until we tap out.

Where? The Tavern's Discord Server:

https://discord.gg/fReGmuD

Who? Everybody and anybody.

When you log in the text chat is in the tavern-chat-wed-9pm-eastern channel. Voice chat is in the Open Bar channel. Voice chat is, by default, "push to talk" as we have gotten upwards of 20 folks logged into voice at once, and open mics are painful ;)

See you at 9 PM :)

Tavern Post 7k - Past, Present & Future

7,000 posts. My God but that snuck up on me. I knew it was coming up, but then I posted earlier this morning and I saw we were at 6,999. Just one post away from 7k, which is this one.

First off, I want to thank all of you, the readers of Tenkar's Tavern. I had a creative writing teacher in my college days and his advice has stuck with me all these years later: "You don't write for yourself, you write for an audience. Without an audience you may as well be masturbating, and there are easier ways to masturbate than writing." You might not agree with the above statement, but the meaning is clear - without an audience words aren't read and if they aren't read, were they even written?

You are my audience. You are the reason I post daily, multiple times per day. I work for you. You may not like everything that gets posted here at The Tavern. Some may even quite vocally disagree - and that's okay. If everyone is pleased with everything I write I'm doing something wrong. If you disagree and come back, I'm doing something right. Hopefully you all come back ;)

The Tavern is very much a living thing. Focus has and will change over time. Thanks to our readers and Patreon backers we are offering weekly content. This month I will be writing a free adventure to be posted here.

New OSR releases, new gaming related Kickstarters, keeping thieves and neer-do-wells feet to the fire, gaming news, thoughts, occasional rants and guest posters, gaming content, giveaways, OSR Christmas and more. That is what The Tavern is in words. But it is more than simple words. It is a Community.

The Tavern's Discord Channel has surpassed 220 members. The Tavern's Facebook Community is about 30 members short of 1900. I can't begin to express how privileged I feel, to be both a member of the OSR at large and The Tavern's Community in particular.

Does the future hold another 7,000 posts for The Tavern? I sure as heck hope so :)

Remember, Go for the eyes Boo!

Kickstarter - Lost Hall of Tyr: A 5e Adventure (Dungeon Grappling support)

The Lost Hall of Tyr: A 5e Adventure (Dungeon Grappling support) is Gaming Ballistic / +Douglas Cole 's 2nd Kickstarter, the first being Dungeon Grappling.

Now, if you don't know what Dungeon Grappling did is it brought usable grappling rules to the various D20 systems - everything from Swords & Wizardry / OSR through 5e.

So, what is the Lost Hall of Tyr? 

Lost Hall of Tyr is an adventure scenario for Fifth Edition, targeted at four to six characters of level 3-6. It offers support for the alternate grappling rules from Dungeon Grappling, including an introductory two-page quick start.

And at $8k raised? It gets converted to Swords & Wizardry ;)

I'm looking forwarded to the S&W conversion...

Work in Progress - Denis McCarthy - October Tavern Adventure Commissioned Artwork

Huge thanks to The Tavern's Readers. Their support in the month of September funded an adventure for October here at The Tavern. Their use of our affiliate links also funded the original art for the adventure (which is using a map drawn by +Dyson Logos .) +Denis McCarthy does some fine work.

Just a reminder. Every month that The Tavern's readers hit $300 or more monies raised via The Tavern's affiliate links, I will follow the next month with a free adventure. At least half the monies raised beyond $300 in a single month will go towards art costs, either purchasing stock art or commissioning original work like that above.

Thank you all for making this happen :)

Benefit Bundle - Puerto Rico Hurricane Relief

There is a new bundle up to benefit the Puerto Rico Hurricane Relief. 25 bucks gets you over 500 bucks in gaming products.

Puerto Rico was devastated by Hurricane Maria a few short weeks ago, and is in dire need of humanitarian assistance and relief. We've organized this bundle to provide what help we can. The proceeds for this bundle will be going entirely to GlobalGiving's Puerto Rico and Caribbean Hurricane Relief Fund.

Note: That's an affiliate link above - for every $25 in affiliate monies raised via the above link credited to the Puerto Rico Hurricane Relief bundle, The Tavern will purchase another Puerto Rico Hurricane Relief bundle (and will gift the bundle's contents to a random reader)

Kickstarter - DRAGONLOCK 3: Dangerous Lairs (Terrain for your 3d Printer)

I love Fat Dragon's line of releases. Their printable paper terrain line is quite simply amazing. Now they've gone into making files for 3d printers and I am soooooo very tempted to buy a 3d printer for this reason alone. DRAGONLOCK 3: Dangerous Lairs looks damn good.

Yes, if I had a 3d printer I'd be all over this.

Maybe I should get a 3d printer...

Already funded and then some, busting through stretch goals like they are paper (terrain) heh!

If you have a 3d printer this is a no brainer. If you don't have one, maybe you should.

As an aside, Fat Dragon has a strong Kickstarter history of delivering on its promises.

DRAGONLOCK™ is an interlocking terrain system that allows you to create fully modular, multi-level 28mm scale village terrain for your RPG or wargame on your home 3D printer. Each set is delivered in a downloadable .stl format via our online distribution partner DriveThruRPG.com, and once you have the set, you can print as many pieces as you like and never run out or need to purchase more. These terrain sets represent the culmination of over twelve years of gaming terrain design experience. 

Fat Dragon Games is the only 3D printer terrain company that is part of the prestigious DriveThruRPG Community Content program, which includes Margaret Weis Productions, Monte Cook Games, and Wizards of the Coast’s DMs Guild. Our Dragonbite Community Creator program allows YOU to sell your own Dragonbite-compatible terrain designs on DriveThruRPG, RPGNow, and Wargame Vault! 

By supporting us through Kickstarter, you get bonus models that won't be available later, and access to free stretch rewards. We have been in the 'print-and-play' terrain business for over twelve years, and have successfully delivered eight previous Kickstarter projects, so you can pledge with confidence that we will deliver a high-quality product on time.

Is ConManKen Committing Another Fraud? You be the Judge

So, #ConManKen is selling some Walking Dead memorabilia. Nothing special with that. He's been hocking that shit forever. But as NotAnotherDime points out, he's now offering Certificates of Authenticity that don't look all that authentic.

Case in point?  These boots:

You know its Kenny - because of the "pruce" tags ;)

See that Certificate of Authenticity? Here's a closer look:

Look in the lower left corner. Notice the PSA / DNA logo?

Now read and weep #ConManKen:

 #ConManKen - the cons just keep going and going and going...

http://notanotherdime.blogspot.com/2017/10/20171002-ken-whit-whitman-trying-to.html

Go to the above and read the complete investigation. BTW, Kenny, you do know that all ink jet and laser printers have their own unique identifiers, right? Just like a fingerprint...

Deal of the Day - The Swamp Daughters of Marshsund (DCC RPG Adventure)

Normally 3 bucks, The Swamp Daughters of Marshsund is currently on sale for 90 cents. Seriously, even if all you do is steal a single idea or hook you've probably gotten your monies worth ;)

The people of Marshsund have allied with strange powers, but for almost a hundred years nobody bothered investigating. Now the daughter of a powerful lord has gone missing in the Dystermarsh, and he is looking to you for help. Can your players unravel the mystery of the Swamp Daughters and find a solution in time?

This adventure was made for use with the Dungeon Crawl Classics Role Playing Game and requires the rulebook to play. For use with characters of level 3 or higher. 

Includes: 

• A dungeon map by Dyson Logos.
• A hex crawl map of the southern Dystermarsh, two more for easier use in the digital edition.
• Encounter tables for the surrounding regions.
• Several factions the players can interact with.
• A full chapter on the town of Marshsund and NPCs to interact with there.
• Several new monsters.
• Additional rules for outdoor survival.
• Lots of OGL content for reuse in your own works.

When you use The Tavern's affiliate links you help to support The Tavern. And unicorns. Well, maybe not unicorns.

Kickstarter - Frank Mentzer's Empyrea Fantasy Setting (for 10 RPG Systems)

+Frank Mentzer 's Empyrea Fantasy Setting (for 10 RPG Systems) Kickstarter launched in the early hours of the morning and it is ambitious.

I know many readers have been anxiously awaiting the launch of this Kickstarter and the wait is over.

So, the big question - what do you get?

You will receive at least 350* pages of goodness:

• Empyrea Core Book (perfect bound softback, full color, UV laminated) 
• Empyrea Player’s Guide (perfect bound softback, full color, UV laminated)
• Full Color 2-part Darlene Map detailing the entire Realm of Empyrea
• Three "Little Brown Books" with special details for players and game masters
• A System Book with rules for playing in Empyrea using the RPG of your choice

* 350 pages or more; we reserve the right to add more cool stuff if we can. The bigger the Kickstarter, the more you get. 

The funding goal is a lofty $250k and the funding period is 41 days.

Buy in for PDF is $50, physical boxed set is $75.

List of systems supported:

  1) D&D 5E
  2) Pathfinder
  3) Runequest
  4) Savage Worlds
  5) Dungeon Crawl Classics
  6) Castles & Crusades
  7) Swords & Wizardry
  8) Hackmaster
  9) D&D BECMI
10) D&D 1E/2E

Weekend Wonders - Necromancer's Dagger (Swords & Wizardry Light)

Necromancer's Dagger - This dagger is made of a black metal with a carved ivory skull serving as its pommel. In the hands of anyone other than a necromancer it is a simple + 1 dagger. In the hands of a necromancer, it has the following additional abilities: + 2 to all turning / control undead attempts; may attempt to permanently control one undead (only one may be permanently controlled at a time.) Undead must have no more hit dice than half the level of the necromancer in question. Note, the possessor of a Necromancer's Dagger no longer gains hit points from rest. These life energies are instead funneled to the dagger. The possessor can still be healed via magical means.

OGL

Note - Necromancer is an optional character class in Swords & Wizardry Continual Light. The beta rules are available at The Tavern's Discord Server, pinned in the swords-wizardry-light channel.

https://discord.gg/fReGmuD

Art copyright Patrick E. Pullen. Used with permission.

Thanks to The Tavern's supporters at both The Tavern's Patreon and directly through Paypal, we have a monthly backing of over $150. This means 4 to 5 monsters for Swords & Wizardry Light / OSR per month, 4 to 5 Swords & Wizardry Light / OSR magic items per month AND backers at $1.50 a month or higher via Patreon will get a collected PDF of the prior month's releases emailed to them. Paypal backers will need to email me in the middle of October to receive theirs.This is the first release for the month of October.

Deal of the Day - Book of Lairs for 5th Edition

I really like Kobold Press and their various releases. They may write for later editions of "the game" but they seems to be well rooted in older editions.

I'm pretty sure Book of Lairs for 5th Edition will work fairly well with most OSR games with simply conversions. Heck, six bucks for 24 lairs / adventures complete with maps and hooks? I'll buy that for any system.

Who am I kidding? Many of you will run it in straight up 5e. I swear, kids these days ;)

Book of Lairs brings you 24 great one-shot, monster lairs for 5th edition! Each of these exciting and unusual battlegrounds comes with a complete short adventure, including a hook, area hazards, tactics, and treasures, and many use monsters from the Tome of Beasts. Stage your 5th Edition fights in unforgettable locations like: 

• Alchemist’s Guildhall
• Necromancer’s Cistern
• Clockwork Tower
• Den of the Rotten Kings
• Lost Halls of Everforge
• A Pirate Cove
• Crypt of the Warlock
• Citadel of the Void Dragon
• A Dark Grove
• Lost Fane of the Serpents
• Branches of Yggdrasil
• Tomb of the Scorpion Prince
• Sky Stairs of Beldestan
• Imperial Ghoul Outpost
• Umbral Vampire Lair

And 10 more!

Is There a Project Creator with more Abandoned / Failed Kickstarters than d20 Entertainment?

+Jolly Blackburn asked the following last night on Facebook and I thought I'd give the question some wings:

Someone brought up an interesting question a few moments ago. Anyone know of an individual or company with more abandoned/failed kickstarters than d20 Entertainment? (they have six failed projects and had two more readied to launch). 

I can't think of anyone that comes close. 

This is really a question about Kickstarter's ability (or inability) to get in front of project creators with so many red flags around them.

As I recall, there was a 7th Kickstarter that was quickly shut down by Kickstarter for "pop-omatic" dice, as Ken had the lead on a hoard of these sitting in a warehouse somewhere. Kickstarter shut it down as it wasn't funding something new or some such reason. The don't call him #conmanken for nothing ;)

Some quick recaps for the curious:

Knights of the Dinner Table: Live Action Series - 795 Backers, $69,525 raised
      59 Day funding period - Dec 8, 2013 through February 5, 2014

Spinward Traveller - 827 Backers, $49,588 raised
      44 Day funding period - June 1, 2014 through July 15, 2014

Castles & Crusades: Beyond the River - 125 Backers, $6,001 raised
      30 Day funding period - October 3, 2014 through November 2, 2014

Pencil Dice - 1351 Backers, $38,161 raised
      30 Day funding period - January 29, 2015 through February 28, 2015

RPG Pencil Dice - 337 Backers, $8,623 raised
      20 Day funding period - February 18, 2015 through March 10, 2015

Deck Dice - 184 Backers, $5,197 raised
      30 Day funding period - March 8, 2015 through April 7, 2015

Some random observations:

-Ken didn't want to wait too long for the monies to come in, thus going from 59 days to fund and gradually cutting to 30 days (with a 20 day in there for good measure)

-The last three projects overlapped in funding periods. Because, you know - the monies.

-Not one of these projects has completed, although some Traveller ship models have shipped. Some even shipped to backers.