[Necromancer Games] Lots of New Books and Cover Art Previews Posted!

[Mouseferatu]

Wow. And here I thought Destiny of Kings was an obscure enough module that few people would even get the reference. Now I'm hearing about how great people think it was, and how excited they are about a module that was inspired by it.

I think I set the bar higher on myself without meaning to.

Actually, I'd love to do a sequal to DoK for WotC or Paizo--sort of a "Return to" sort of thing--if and when circumstances allow. For the meantime, though, a module that was thematically inspired by it will have to do.

 

[Michael R. Proteau]

Destiny of Kings

Destiny of Kings was definitely a great little module, and it is funny that you mention it as your inspiration, as it is the first thing I thought of when I read the blurb for this. It sounds like a great addy.

I would like to take a sec to give kudos to Rick Sardinha. Not only am I equisitely pleased with the cover to Shades of Gray, I like every piece in this batch of stuff by Rick. With each new piece, Rick grows in my estimation, and he has become one of my favorite artists currently working in the industry. When Bill told me he was going to be the cover artist for Shades, I was psyched, and getting to see the final result was just downright breathtaking. It is a haunting image, and one that has had a great reaction form my non-rpg playing friends and family.
-M

 

[saturnin55]

Slumbering Tsar trilogies

Greg, do you have an idea of the estimate page count of each these books ? From what you just told us about each book, I'll surely look for them. I love the Orcus feel (RA1-2-3, Tomb of Abysthor.

Orcus rocks.

 

[Duskathion]

The Six Spheres of ...

I like the Shades of Gray cover - nice and evil-looking.

then, you should probably get into buying this title ... there is plenty of evil ... the whole area where the adventure is set is impregnated with nauseating evil ... the horrors from the past are coming back and the adventurers can easily be overwhelmed by this malignant force, by the conspiracy of evil sects ... and there is more: investigation, thrilling quiz, chases in the wilderness, ...

OK ... I should admit this: I am the writer of "the 6 Spheres of Zailhhesshh".

I am italian and collaborate as a free-lance with Necromancers ... so I hope you will justify my non-perfect english (don't worry, the book has been checked by Bill !!!)

This adventure is the sum of 3 years of DMering ... a complete campaign I proposed to my friends here in Italy ... in reality the original campaign was for the second edition and consisted of much more than what is in the adventure Necro will publish ... maybe these could be some additions for the future ... who knows what Orcus thinks ...

Please, ask me if you'd like to have more hints about my work ... or myself ...

 

[DaveMage]

Thanks! And welcome to EN World!

 

[Greg V]

Greg, do you have an idea of the estimate page count of each these books ?

Thanks for asking Saturnin. You pose a really good question, and I'm not exactly sure of the answer, but here is what I do know. Bill mentioned on a messageboard (either this one or another, I don't remember which) an estimation of 120+ pages. Which is probably a good estimate.

ST1 came out to about 95,000 words for whatever that converts into in page count after artwork, maps, headers, etc. are added. I have seen estimates of about 750 words a page (can't remember where I got that from either). So that's about 125 pages. Also that doesn't include the approximately 50 monsters in the back, of which I don't know if they'll each have their own page or be lumped together. Not all 50 are original. I think I designed about 8 or 10 new ones and the rest are from heavy usage of the 3 Creature Collections and the 2 Tomes of Horror. I wanted to incorporate as much Necro and S&S stuff as possible in the adventure since it seems like we never get to see a large enough dose of these many cool monsters incorporated into a published adventure. So figure 95,000 words, 50 monsters, about 17 maps, a four-panel poster map, and a lot of great artwork crammed into as few pages as humanly possible to bring the best value possible to the reader (how's that for a sales pitch?). That's about the best I can do for a guestimate until I hear more myself.

ST2 which is in the finishing phases now is going to have a little over 100,000 words and a similar number of maps, monsters, etc.

I haven't broken ground on ST3 yet so I couldn't say with certaintly, but I would guess it will be comparable to the other two. It will probbaly have fewer total maps, but they will be larger in scale since they will be a major dungeon rather than discreet encounter areas.

Anyway, thanks for your interest. I hope it pleases. I await with bated breath myself. These are my first works of this size for which I am suitably nervous. It seems like all 3 adventures of the Istivin arc in Dungeon and the city article that went with it were something around 60,000 words altogether, maybe a little less, so this much coherent cohesion has been a challenge for me.

 

[Greg V]

As to Duskathion above, I was privileged to see an early manuscript of the adventure when I was learning the Necromancer Games style format from Bill, and I can attest that it was fantastic. Either the author's English was "plenty good" (there's some good English for you teachers out there) or Bill cleaned it up nicely, because it was a very good and easy read...not to mention a great adventure.


I'll definitely being picking up a copy of "Six Spheres..." when it comes out.

 

[Duskathion]

As to Duskathion above, I was privileged to see an early manuscript of the adventure when I was learning the Necromancer Games style format from Bill, and I can attest that it was fantastic. Either the author's English was "plenty good" (there's some good English for you teachers out there) or Bill cleaned it up nicely, because it was a very good and easy read...not to mention a great adventure.

my teacher at Cambridge will be pleased ...

as for the adventure: I have quite a bunch of material from SSS and Necro and I have almost always been happy of the "expense" ... especially adventures are great ...
so I did my best to write a good adventure, complying with Necro's style and with a tremendous 1st edition feeling ... ah ... the smell of those plastic bags with which these adventures arrived to Italy back in old 80's ...

Happy to see that my work was liked ...

and thanks to Dave for the welcome!

 

[Grazzt]

Scott,

Thanks for the heads up on ToH 3. Looks even BETTER than 1 and 2. *Demilich!!! as done by Scott! Oohh...*

Actually, that should read "Demilich as done by Scott, Clark, and Bill."

 

[Nightfall]

Okay that kicked up Demi-lich to be like "I will make that Epic thingie look trite!"

Now I SERIOUSLY can't wait for ToH 3!!!!

*rocks out*

BOYAH!