I hope everyone is having a good week. So far it has been a very productive one, so let’s jump into all the news.
The Broken World
The free setting guide has been out on DriveThruRPG for a while. Encourage anyone you know that might be interested in any aspect of the project to check it out, as it is the single best way to grow interest in Ashen Frontiers.
Patreon Articles
Along with The Broken World and the revised set of articles that I released this month, I’m very close to being done with Ancestries (all four of them) and Backgrounds 2 for both systems. However, with proofing and final consultation yet to be done, they will almost certainly be releases for early next month. In a way, that’s ideal. If I can be finishing up articles one month for release in the first few days of the next month, then any slip (sickness, injury, happenstance, going to Gen Con, etc.) will be mostly invisible. That’s always been my goal, but there’s a balance to be had between amount of content and timing of releases. I had originally planned to not release The Broken World until the new articles were ready, but a good friend advised to not wait on something else, release what’s done as soon as is reasonable. That seems the best way forward to me, but I’d be glad to hear differently.
Universal Paper Size
So I’ve been meaning to explain my choice of size for the articles for a while now, and I finally got around to finishing my graphics to explain things, so here goes…
As you probably know, the United States is a bit weird when it comes to paper sizes. And our weirdness has dominated the tabletop gaming space for decades. This is mostly an accident of roleplaying being a great thing to do in your basement during the winter, but no matter. Growing up in Florida (which has neither basements, nor winters), the size of the books in the Friendly Local Game Store seemed perfectly ordinary, and it was not until I began working with gamers that had grown up with more Rational (not a dig, a mathematical thing) system that I realised that one size does not fit all (bookshelves).
So for Ashen Frontiers, I certainly didn’t want to limit my audience, especially over something as silly as printing something out to play the game. So I decided to do a Boolean operation (more maths jokes):
The red area is the combination of the US Letter (yellow) and European A4 (magenta), or 8.25 inches by 11 inches (209.5 × 279.4 millimetres, compared to A4’s 210 × 297 mm). That means that a PDF printed on either paper looks like this:
which is about the best I can do with our crazy world. I hope this help explains why, no matter, what, there is a little extra bit of blank space on at least two sides of your paper version. If we ever get to a real print version of an Ashen Frontiers product, I’ll make adjustments to fit the end target size, but that is a long ways off, if it ever comes at all.
Gen Con 2023 Plans
I booked the hotel room for my son and myself for Gen Con today. We’re driving up, so while it is a bit out of downtown, that shouldn’t be a problem. After all, parking is cheaper than flying for sure, and maybe even cheaper than rideshare apps.
If you’re going to be in Indianapolis for the convention, let me know. I’ll be around all weekend (with brief breaks for sleep and personal maintenance), and there is plenty of room for at least two sessions in the Event Catalogue.
I’m working on the demo sessions, and have been writing the backstories for the premade characters this week. I’m trying to be really intentional with their backstories – they all link together, and are intended to produce the effect ‘remember when you did this’ sort of at-the-table banter that makes a Con game feel like a (very occasional) home game. I’ve got several Con friends that I see only once or twice a year, and an (almost) annual industry-insider campaign, so having that ‘home game’ feel is important to me.
Discord
You can always chat with me, ask questions, make plans, and connect with fans on our Discord. I don’t do a great job of promoting the Discord, but I want to make sure to maintain a cozy, ‘among friends’ vibe that Discord (despite the name) seems best at.
Signoff
Well, that’s all the news that’s fit to (digitally) print for the week. I’m enjoying the regularity of a weekly release, and looking forward to the first update of July, where we may celebrate our independence from The Tyrant.
Later,
Jacob