Announcement: The Explorer's Guides

[Fearsome Monkey]

Guide vs Almanac

The explorer's almanac: the forbidden jungle looks quite good and does touch on many of the same topics we will cover. Although the jungle in the almanac is specific to their campaign setting, they are clearly making efforts to keep it generic enough to be useful in most any jungle setting. To me, this is a good tactic. As I see it, our guides and their almanacs will be complimentary. I certainly hope so.

Regarding titles. In an effort to avoid confusion among gamers and intrusions onto product identity with series such as 'The Slayer's Guides' and 'The Explorer's Almanacs', our sourcebooks will be individually titled. For example, the arctic book will be 'The Savage North: An Explorer's Guide to the Arctic' With emphasis on the savage north portion.

BTW our website is www.monkeygodenterprises.com
We have a link to a forum where you can discuss our products and projects with our writers and artists.

David K Hurd
MonkeyGod Enterprises

 

[MEG Hal]

So Monkey God,
What is your first release....will it be jungle?

 

[Fearsome Monkey]

first release?

Funny, we are still debating which would be best to release first. We are leaning towards the woodlands or mountains rather than the tropics, desert or arctic. These regions are more commonly in use. What would you suggest?

David K Hurd
MonkeyGod Enterprises

 

[MEG Hal]

Re: first release?

Funny, we are still debating which would be best to release first. We are leaning towards the woodlands or mountains rather than the tropics, desert or arctic. These regions are more commonly in use. What would you suggest?

David K Hurd
MonkeyGod Enterprises

Well....
So we do not clash......
September is Dry Lands (desert)
Decemberish is White Wilderness (Arctic)
and jungle, water and deep forest are being written as we speak...so woods may be good since our release dates will not compete with each other

 

[Mouseferatu]

I'm not working on any of these myself--I've got my own little thing brewing with Monkey God --but I've gotta say, as a quasi-insider, these are going to be nifty. Not giving away any secrets or anything, but I know the authors are really stoked about this. And nothing's more valuable than enthusiastic authors who also happen to have talent.

(So tell me, Larry and David, is that sort of plug worth any free copies? )

 

[Ron]

This is all very cool, I hope that both series will do well in the market. May I ask what exactly I should expect from your tropics sourcebooks?

 

[MEG Hal]

This is all very cool, I hope that both series will do well in the market. May I ask what exactly I should expect from your tropics sourcebooks?

To early to tell from our standpoint and this is MGE's thread so go for it guys.

 

[kenjib]

Hey guys, are you doing some good science research and explaining things like where these ecosystems form and the kind of environmental elements are needed to create them? Coastal situation, ocean current, prevailing winds, rain shadows, river basins, latitude, etc? Different types of forests for example, and how weather patterns, vegetation, support for animal ecosystem (info on large predators is esp. important to D&D), tend to differ for each: temperate rainforest, temperate dry, tropical rainforest, cloud forest, boreal/taiga, alpine, etc. What types of trees are more common in these different forest types. Also toss in some notes about magic, druids, divine power, presence of monsters and how this changes things.

Perhaps I'm the only one interested in this sort of thing, but for a generic supplement that a DM could use to really bring a forest to life this is one thing that I would definitely be looking for - help with getting a feel for how the forest and all organisms in it live and breathe in a great network. In fact, this would probably be the main reason I would possibly get something like this - all of it dramatically simplified and presented in terms of what's relevant to the DM. It would help me to determine what kinds of trees (very important in decribing the forest and giving it a feel) and animals would be in a given forest just based on map location. Zing!

Other terrain types could have different types of info - info on stone type and minerals found within certain types of stone, how age of mountains effect mineral types and richness, different ways mountains are formed and how this effects the shape of the mountains (jagged vs. rolling, etc.), the treeline, how mountains effect climate (what kind of ecosystem will we see on a mountain), the relationship between mountains, clouds, and precipitation, etc., etc.

 

[Damon Griffin]

Hey guys, are you doing some good science research and explaining things like where these ecosystems form and the kind of environmental elements are needed to create them? Coastal situation, ocean current, prevailing winds, rain shadows, river basins, latitude, etc? Different types of forests for example, and how weather patterns, vegetation, support for animal ecosystem (info on large predators is esp. important to D&D), tend to differ for each: temperate rainforest, temperate dry, tropical rainforest, cloud forest, boreal/taiga, alpine, etc. What types of trees are more common in these different forest types.

Perhaps I'm the only one interested in this sort of thing...

No, you aren't the only one. Makes my mouth water just thinking about the possibility of a product that covered that sort of thing, even in overview.

Other terrain types could have different types of info - info on stone type and minerals found within certain types of stone, how age of mountains effect mineral types and richness, different ways mountains are formed and how this effects the shape of the mountains (jagged vs. rolling, etc.), the treeline, how mountains effect climate (what kind of ecosystem will we see on a mountain), the relationship between mountains, clouds, and precipitation, etc., etc.

Yup, yup, yup!

At least one edition of Traveller had a series of environmental books; I think I have three of them on one of my game shelves somewhere. They weren't bad for the time.

My advice to anyone attempting generic terrain-based sourcebooks would be three-fold: (1) completely divorce the material from any campaign setting; (2) keep in mind that it's easy for the consumer to add fantasy to fact, usually harder for us to add fact to fantasy, so for a product like this we rely on you to do the research on ecology, geology, oceanography, etc. and (3) try to imagine what Steve Jackson Games would do with this series -- GURPS Arctic, GURPS Desert, GURPS Woodlands. Now, do that (or better, if you're feeling really confident.)

I can try to answer more specific questions about what kind of content I'd like to see, but there's not much I can think of right this minute...

* Mountains: How are characters affected by working in very high mountain elevations?

* Arctic/Tropics: How does the length of the day vary (assuming an Earth-like planet) with the latitude at different times of the year? Rolemaster's VIKINGS supplement addressed this.

* Arctic: What things might seem like a good idea, but are actually counterproductive in terms of arctic survival?

* Woodlands/Jungle: Where are different types of wood found, what are the different types good for, and what's the material density of each (so we can figure weight by volume for transport purposes?)

* Mountains/Hills: Same question, for different types of stone.

* Mountains/Hills: I've always hated completely random mining tables. Where would I *really* expect to find the usual sorts of precious metals and gemstones? Among what other materials? I think silver and lead are often found together, though I can't remember where I read that.

For any given environment:
* What the expected extremes of weather? What's normal?
* What kinds of exploitable resources can I look for in this environment?
* What supplies/equipment will I need, or need more of, when traveling through this environment that I wouldn't need elsewhere? What common equipment should I leave behind as useless in this environment?

 

[Fearsome Monkey]

Suggestions

These are great suggestions. Rest assured these books will be as complete as is reasonable and they will not be tied to a specific setting. They are intended to be an enhancement to whatever game you're already running and should have something of use for everyone.

B.T.W. We have decided to add groups for discussing the explorer's guides to our Monkey Forum. It should get done over the weekend. Feel free to drop in and discuss these products with the authors and other resident monkeys.

David K Hurd
MonkeyGod Enterprises
www.monkeygodenterprises.com
http://pub64.ezboard.com/bmonkeygodenterprises