Prelim PDF for Nordlondr Folk and Hand of Asgard this weekend
over 4 years ago – Thu, Nov 21, 2019 at 04:45:00 PM

I've been getting a lot of notes on this, so wanted to broadcast.

Backers will be receiving preliminary PDFs this weekend for Nordlondr Folk and Hand of Asgard. I've checked with SJG, and these two books are polished enough that 100% of backers will receive them and be able to provide feedback for typos, errata, and ask questions if needed. That's great news for everyone.

The larger adventure books are lagging behind. I'm about half done with a pretty intensive edit of Forest's End, which is enough over word-count that I may need to pull a large chunk out of it (a complete sub-mission) and release it separately while STILL giving y'all an 80-page book.

I'm focusing on cleaning up HoA and NF, and putting Forest's End into a state that is edited and checked, so the first layout will make it ready for art. The team for that will likely be 10-12 strong, which means faster turn-around.

While art is being done for Forest's End, editing and layout for Rosgarth will occur.

As noted in a prior update, the books will go out to you guys when they're ready and professional. They're not there yet. I'm not thrilled about the timing, but that's why I'm feathering the books that are done NOW, so that you get the PDFs that ARE ready and not wait on all the product.

Backerkit Cards Charged: Phase 1 PDF Distribution shortly
over 4 years ago – Tue, Nov 19, 2019 at 02:33:59 AM

As was foretold a few days ago (my prophetic vision has severe near-sightedness), orders have been locked and cards have been charged.

This means that in the next day or two, Phase 1 distribution begins, and everyone whose card was successfully charged and who ordered books in PDF that already exist will get them. If things go well, I'll push that out tonight.

Phase 2, which is the preliminary review copies of Hand of Asgard and Norðlondr Fólk, are on track to go out this weekend, likely on Sunday. I received word from Ksenia that it's her intent to finish up the art by the end of the work week. That gives me the weekend, if all goes to plan, to insert the art, do a final edit pass on both books, add internal bookmarks, assign an ISBN to Nordlondr Folk, and then spool out PDF files for your review and comment.

Phase 3, which is the distribution for review of the two adventures, made some good progress this weekend. I got what I find are the "hard" parts of the editing done for Forest's End, which consists of all the setting and lore material. That needs to be consistent with other published materal, consistent with GURPSy rules, and of course be well written and helpful to those running the game. This means adding word-count - sometimes a lot of it - to ensure that obvious questions are answered. Nearly always, this can't (or shouldn't!) be done by the author because they're do darn familiar with their own vision they don't know what the reader doesn't know, but needs to. The rest of the editing, which will get a lot of attention from me and Emily this week, are discrete room-by-room descriptions of four encounter areas (dungeons!). Those are detailed and still have to look and sound right, but they are short and self-contained. Mildly easier, then.

Once the first eight chapters are finished, the only thing that's left - and it's big in terms of formatting time but smaller in terms of editing for prose content, larger in terms of getting numbers right - is the bestiary chapter, which as far as I can tell will contain at least 20 creatures.

The book is LONG. Like pushing 90 pages without art. Editing will take care of some of this, but not all. Normal text flow layout will increase this page count, and adding art spaces will increase it still more. At some point, I'll have to decide between an 80-page book that'll be pretty art light, or a 96-page book that's art-medium. That's going to be more a decision of "where do the natural breaks happen." We'll see...but I don't see a way to do a 64-pager out of this unless I rip out whole sections. So . . . there we go.

Once the document is edited, layout should be fast, and art direction then goes out to nearly a dozen folks. Then I'll start in on Dragons of Rosgarth, as the art is worked for Forest's End.

That's where we are. More later!

Phase 1 (Existing Books) Distribution Underway
over 4 years ago – Mon, Nov 18, 2019 at 09:53:01 PM

This post is for backers only. Please visit Kickstarter.com and log in to read.

Backerkit Locks and Charges Soon
over 4 years ago – Thu, Nov 14, 2019 at 02:41:34 PM

First, a brief word: Thursday is GURPSDay . . . so why not nip over and check out the GURPSDay Feed for Nov 14, 2019

Backerkit Phase 1 Completing

So, in a few days, the first phase of Backerkit closes. I will lock orders and charge cards shortly thereafter.

What does that mean?

First, everyone who ordered a PDF that already exists, such as Fantastic Dungeon Grappling, Citadel at Norðvörn, or the TFT books, will get a note from Backerkit and a download link.

Some of you (about 15%) will also get preview/proofing files of two of the books from this Kickstarter.  I will be doing a formatting check and typo search pass, then nip it over to the mostly-randomly selected folks to see what fresh eyes see. This is a vital part of the process, and anyone catching errors (and I'll explain what constitutes error vs 'you didn't do this the way I would have done it,' which is a different thing in an associated email) will be given credit as a playtester in the book(s).

• Nordlondr Folk: Your copy of Nordlondr Folk will have some art in it, but not 100%.
• Hand of Asgard: This one's as close to done as I can make it. 

Big Books are Slow Going

What you won't see is the big adventure books. These are going much more slowly than I'd like in both the writing (though that's nearly complete) and the editing (which isn't).

I have brought on another professional editor - Emily Blain, who did such a great job on Nordvorn - to help move things along. 

Here was the original schedule to give a rough idea of where things are supposed to go from where we are forward.

Schedule

• Mid-November: Backerkit "closes" and cards are charged[1]
• End November: PDF review phase[2]
• Mid-December: PDF feedback due
• Before Xmas: PDFs sent out and final files sent to printer
• End January: Printing
• End February: Moving books through the world
• End March: Arrival in-hand

[1] Backerkit won't really CLOSE until the final printer files go out, so I know how many orders to place.

[2]The PDF review phase will see about 15% of the backers get preliminary files. These are chosen based on a combination of how much was pledged (total pledge amount, not pledge level) plus a random factor, so that the highest pledge levels get priority, but lower pledge levels are not locked out. This phase is IMPORTANT, and everyone who provides useful feedback will get credit in the book.

What's Different?

Maybe nothing. Maybe we'll get this thing into a proofable state (but no art) in the next two weeks. I don't think so, but it's possible.

But even if we do, I still can't get the art process going until it's all edited and laid out, because I won't know where my art holes are until then. And though my art team for these two books will be very large (pushing a dozen people), I'm likely looking at 128-144 pages of material, likely 3-4 pieces of art per artist. So at least 2-4 weeks there. I will note that if we DO get all the editing done in the next 2-4 weeks, that also gets the layout and art spaces done. It's possible an art-free version of each book will make it into your hands, and that art gets inserted and ready by Xmas, as promised. 

Ultimately, though, I won't let the PDFs out to you guys until they're ready. And they're not ready YET. There's lots of opportunity to still meet schedule (and technically we're not behind at this point), but my gut tells me there are going to be some delays in getting these ready to distribute in PDF form.

Upshot

What this means is that backers will be getting the PDFs piecemeal. First phase is all existing PDFs. Those go out to EVERYONE immediately.

Second phase is PDF previews of the short books. They're nearly done anyway, and ready for inspection. When THOSE get proofed (I'll leave a few weeks for people to look at 'em), and the final art is in, I'll send these out to all backers. 

Third phase is the PDF of the adventures. These longer books need more study, and if there are delays, this is where they'll be. 

Every effort is going to be put forth to stay on schedule. But I'm a big believer in either no surprised, or all surprises are good ones. So I wanted to be frank: the adventure books are not where I want them to be just yet.

I'll keep everyone posted.

Backerkit Progress; Area Map Pricing; New PDF Collection
over 4 years ago – Tue, Nov 12, 2019 at 12:46:33 AM

This is mostly an administrative update.

Backerkit Survey Progress

We're over 90% on survey completion, which leaves fewer than 40 people - 37 to be precise - who have not answered their survey. Of that 37, 22 are not receiving any items that requires shipping, so it's really 15 folks that need to tell me where to send their stuff.

That's not bad. 

Nordlond Area Map

I made a legit whoopsie on the Nordlond Area Map in PDF. The SKU internally was set to $0 (Backerkit requires putting a lot of info in a lot of different places; I missed this one), while it was advertised for $4. I've corrected this in the SKU list, which will automatically update the totals to be charged. 

ALL the Dungeon Fantasy RPG PDFs

A backer contacted me and asked if I could put a single-click item that sticks all the PDFs compatible with the Dungeon Fantasy RPG in one place.

I've done so.

This is $66 and will get you all eight PDFs:

• The Dragons of Rosgarth ($9)
• Forest's End ($11)
• Nordlondr Folk ($5)
• Hand of Asgard ($5)
• Nordlond Area Map in PDF ($4)
• The Citadel at Nordvorn ($14)
• Hall of Judgment Second Edition ($14)
• Fantastic Dungeon Grappling ($4)