Sly Flourish Is Bringing You 15 Fantastic Locations

One thing that most fantasy roleplaying games have in common is a range of exciting, fantastic locations. While new monsters and spells are easy to come buy, unique and memorable adventure locations are a little more sparse. Over on Kickstarter right now you can find a book which provides you with 15 interesting locations - a mad king's cursed castle, an ancient structure beneath the ice, and so on.

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You can check out a sample chapter for free here. 7 pages which includes the introduction, and one location - The Ziggurats of the Doom Priests. "Built into the cliffs of a steep mountainside, the ruinsof three ziggurats rise above the jungle surroundingthem. Twin waterfalls ow from caverns deep in the cliffwalls between the three ziggurats, tumbling into riversthat form a natural moat around the central ziggurat.A crumbling stone bridge spans the moat, leading toa set of sturdy stone doors in the central ziggurat. Twohuge pillars stand before the ziggurats, while a third hascollapsed into rubble. Massive carvings of dead godsdecorate the stonework of the ruins."

The book is a black-and-white volume which you can get in PDF for $15. For $25 you get the PDF, and an opportunity to purchase the book at cost. Stretch goals include colour artwork and additional locations. It's a rules-neutral affair; the idea is that you populate the locations with monsters and events of your own making.

The mastermind behind the book is Mike Shea, with art from Brian Patterson. Other contributors include Scott Fitzgerald Gray, and Erik Nowak.

You'll find the Kickstarter here. It's already funded, with 3 weeks to go, and has already passed the first stretch goal which guarantees 5 pieces of colour art.

 

[MNblockhead]

I thought that this would be exactly the kind of work I would be interested in, but then I visited their Kickstarter page and learned that they will not be providing any maps for these locations. Disappointing.

 

[tripleneck]

I thought that this would be exactly the kind of work I would be interested in, but then I visited their Kickstarter page and learned that they will not be providing any maps for these locations. Disappointing.

No, as I understand the description, there will be maps for some of the locations, but not maps for every location and not every nook and cranny of any particular location will be mapped. A lot of the stretch goals are for additional drawings that *might* be maps if appropriate.

 

[darjr]

The Tome Show interviewed sly flourish about the Kickstarter. http://www.thetomeshow.com/e/round-table-97-fantastic-locations/

 

[MNblockhead]

No, as I understand the description, there will be maps for some of the locations, but not maps for every location and not every nook and cranny of any particular location will be mapped. A lot of the stretch goals are for additional drawings that *might* be maps if appropriate.

Oh, well that would make it more appealing to me at least. I'll keep an eye on it.

 

[Chimpy]

I think idea is to provide inspiration rather than precise scenarios.

 

[Desh-Rae-Halra]

I want to like and support this KS, but it is difficult for a number of reasons:

1. Even if they are going with "You get to draw the map however you want it" approach (see the sample chapter section "Where are the maps?"), I wish they provided one map of here's one way it can look for each site.

2. Now the stretch goals are for either 5 full color art pieces or 5 B&W pieces (they just added the 5 B&W option). For someone that would really like full color, the stretch goal is now saying you might get that, but maybe not.

3. Then there is the whole Drive thru RPG aspect. I pledge $25 for the print books on KS, then @ $10 each for color copies of each book (standard printing which means, for full color products, not that good: premium printing will cost more if it is offered), plus shipping: minimum $50 and I'm not sure I am going to actually get more than 5 pieces of full color art. I get that this is the easiest way for indie press to get their games out, but even though I know that, I always end up feeling nickel + dimed by this approach even though I know it isn't the intention.

I hope he is successful, but just dont know if I can back it.

 

[KaceCarter]

It still looks cool.

 

[MoutonRustique]

Just backed it - evocative art is better for me than a map (there are oodles of those easily found**).

Also, I'm planning on viewing it more like a "story-less" fantasy novel than anything else : something to read, find cool, draw inspiration from, etc.

Just my take on it.

**Yes, there are also oodles of awesome art - but most of it isn't actually free to use. The "Internet mentality" may make them seem as such, but, they aren't. So, you know, there's that to consider.

 

[SlyFlourish]

Hi folks! Thank you for the comments and discussions. I thought I would clarify a little although I think you guys get what I'm doing.

On Maps

Some of the locations, such as the one in the sample location and a few others in the book are just not easily mappable. They have a bunch of different places in a larger area with some corridor connections and some overland connections. Think about an ancient elven ruined city and the like. For those, an overview picture is likely to be more useful and interesting than a map.

Others could use maps but they tend to run best if the GM decides which rooms they want to use and connects them the way they want. For example, I ran a game last week and we only used two rooms out of the twelve. In that case, the map would have actually gotten in the way.

On Color vs. Black and White

I wanted to add in some flexibility so we could decide if each location is better served with a color piece of art or with two black and white pieces of art. Some locations are more monotone in their description than others. Color always looks nice but it isn't as necessary and it might be nicer to have two pieces of art for that location instead of just one. That's the reasoning behind that decision. Brian Patterson and I will go over that as we go over each location.

On RPG Now

I know buying the books from RPG Now at cost is not always a popular option but it ends up being much cheaper for everyone than if I had them all shipped to me and then shipped out to you. A lot of Kickstarters have done this and one of two things happens: the creator loses a lot of money because they didn't consider the shipping prices as well as they should have or the backers have to pay a lot more. I wish I could be more precise with the costs but because the books themselves are changing as we hit stretch goals, I can't say for sure how much printing will cost. It's a good deal, though. I've used it before.

My suggestion for anyone who is interested in this book but who doesn't like the idea of the RPG Now print on demand thing is to back the PDF version. It's going to be great and you can print whatever part of it you want however you want at your local print shop.

Thanks again for the conversation and support!

Mike Shea