Deinos said:
I appreciate the support Deinos mate...
Deinos said:
We think it looks amazing.
...and the kind words.
Deinos said:
1. The first two wights and the flying decapitated head is friggin hilarious.
Glad you liked them. I imagine they have been detailed somewhere before (?) but I think there are a lot of monsters in the book which
very few people will have seen before.
Deinos said:
2. The art is pretty freakin awesome. I particularly find the uktena fight memorable looking, like an old 1e book,
Peter (Szmer) is an incredible artist, he has done all the art for parts 2 and 3 (I think part 2 needs 2 more illustrations from him and part 3 needs about another 6 at this point). I can't thank him enough, he really gives the book its own identity.
The Uktena illustration was actually commissioned as a half page spread, but Peter packs so much detail into his art that I was able to use that as a Double-Page Spread.
For all the Solo monsters I set out the plans early on to have full page art with the solo monster fighting a bunch of adventurers (actually my iconic adventurers from the cover of Ascension).
Deinos said:
and of course the winged vampire early on (who doesn't seem to actually be in the book).
Okay, this was one of those last minute problems that just arose. When I put in the WotC GSL information I found that I couldn't fit it all on the Credits/Contents page. So that meant I had to add a new Page
#1 . However, all my layouts are done with specific facing pages. That meant I had to add two pages. So I was struggling for what to put on the second page and I just thought of Peter's fantastic "Young Dracula/Vampire Lord" illustration that is technically meant to be in Vampire Bestiary - Castle Dracula (part 3 in other words).
One problem I had with the Young Dracula illustration was that there is a lot of 'noise' on the image. I spent hours and hours cleaning it on photoshop and I still don't think I caught everything.
Deinos said:
3. The new guidelines for being behind enemy lines and morale and the artifact are all intriguing and thought provoking, and would make 4e's feel entirely different. However, from the behind enemy lines bit, I was really hoping to see guidelines for how difficult it should be for PCs to break away from the enemy and have nap time, and guidelines for when different guard levels will be mobilized, and how long it will take them to get demobilized, if ever. Easily the hardest thing to arbitrate as a DM, imo, is how hard to make getting a nap on the PCs. Nap time is to 4e heroes what blood is to Vampire the Requiem characters or quintessence is to Immortals Handbook heroes, and so doling out nap times, I feel, could use some sort of objective guidelines rather than the DM arbitrarily taking pity on his party vs arbitrarily keeping them awake with only encounters and at wills.
I'll have a think about it and maybe I can add some stuff for the update. Off the top of my head, concentric circles of the enemy 'tightening the net' when the alarm is raised might work as a basic structure. With 'no short rests' zone, 'no extended rest' zones and so forth based on the size of the stronghold and enemy numbers.
Deinos said:
4. Cannibals are a really cool, iconic sort of enemy that easily fit as a staple like orcs, cultists, and zombies. By far my favorite monster type in the book. I was just saying the other day, to myself, as I drove home, "You know, ghouls are usually kind of pointless in D&D, people care more about zombies and vampires. I really love Warhammer Fantasy Battle's take on ghouls, as deranged and demented former humans." So, yeah, LOVE these guys.
I tried to do the cannibals justice. Plus, in the adventure, I really wanted the sense that while the cannibals were generally weaker than the PCs, with cunning and good use of terrain, traps and so forth, they would be a dangerous threat.
There are a few 'Easter eggs' in the book nodding towards Italian cannibal movies of the 80's. But the inspirations were manifold (Resident Evil 5; King Kong; documentaries on the Viet Kong - for many of the traps; Jackie Chan's Armour of God movie) including lots of historical (and mythological) details about different tribes and their practices and society.
Deinos said:
5. Did I mention the humor? I was telling my fiance as I read, "These guys will totally tie you up and throw you into a gigantic cooking pot alive while you tell your party member 'this is another fine mess you've gotten us into,' then I noticed there are rules for that."
Glad you liked it!
Deinos said:
6. Ultimately, the attention to detail and amazing skill at fleshing out stuff I've come to expect from your work is really interesting, to see it applied to such humble not so epic stuff as cooking pots and sharp sticks.
I still love my 'epic' of course, but it was a nice change of pace. Plus sharp sticks are cool...hopefully adventurers will get to see the point of them (pun intended).
Deinos said:
Naturally, I hope we still get that conversion to 3e for this stuff that you hinted at aeons ago, not that I actually expect it, but the book was still good for a read.
Mr.Satan said:
I'm looking forward to the 3.5 version. =)
That's still the plan although I will need a few collaborators for that project.
