December 31, 2002: Searching For Rogerio Vilela
If you know Rogerio Vilela, or you are Rogerio Vilela, please contact Mia Sherman. We have some things we need to send him, and all of our contact information is out-of-date.
Warehouse 23 News: You Can Never Have Enough Zombies
Bag o' Zombies!!! (Non-Glowing) is 100 plastic zombies designed for use with the Zombies!!! card game, but useful for any horror board, miniatures, or roleplaying game.
December 30, 2002: Die, Spammer Scum!
AOL has won a $7 million judgment against a spamming operation that sent over 1 billion emails to AOL accounts advertising adult websites.
Read the Reuters article here.
Warehouse 23 News: Inventory and Deck Building
Card Vault is a revolutionary new tool for collectible card and miniatures games.
December 29, 2002: Give The Gift Of Hair
Hair is great. It keeps our heads warm, hides our funny-shaped skulls, and allows us to make a multitude of fashion statements. Think of how awful it is, then, to lose one's hair as a child. Wigs for Kids is a not-for-profit organization providing hair replacement solutions for children affected by hair loss due to chemotherapy, alopecia, burns, and other medical conditions. While they can always use monetary donations, they also need donated hair. If you shorten your hair by 12 or more inches (and it hasn't been permed, straightened, or colored) consider giving it to this worthy cause.
-- Michelle Barrett
Tales From the Vault #4 is a complete compilation of the KODT strips appearing online between May and October of 2002.
December 28, 2002: Half Past No. 2
History is written by the winners. At this website, so is the current time.
-- From multiple suggestions
Warehouse 23 News: A Bestiary of Undead Creatures
Whether you need a particularly challenging encounteror just want to add a touch of exotic flair to your d20 System campaign, Necromantic Lore has just the undead you're looking for.
December 27, 2002: Newsgroup Instability
Over the next few days, I will be testing some new configuration options for the Pyramid news server. For readers of the Pyramid message boards, this may mean occassional unusual behaviour, including groups being temporarily inacessable, or strange new groups appearing. Please be patient if this happens -- the end result, which should be finished in a week or so, will be worth it.
Thanks again for your patience.
-- Mark Cogan
Warehouse 23 News: Summer in December
Banish winter gloom with the Summer Fun Plush Cthulhu.
December 26, 2002: Munchkin Play Aids, Special Items, And More!
We've got a few new extras on the Munchkin page that you just might be interested in... here's the rundown:
- Bob Portnell has created a Munchkin flow chart, in PDF format, that makes it easier to follow the order of events during a turn. A valuable asset for beginners and veterans alike!
- Looking to speed up your game? We have a few simple rules for fast play that should cut down the length of a Munchkin session.
- If you've been wondering exactly what the Munchkin t-shirts and bookmarks are good for, we now have a page with the details.
- The Munchkin FAQ has been updated.
ps238 #0 collects all the strips that have run in the pages of Nodwick, Dork Tower, and PvP.
December 25, 2002: GURPS Combat Cards Revisited
Dave Kagarise has contributed a new colorized PDF of Warren "Mook" Wilson's Combat Cards. The new version lays out several cards on each page, and thus requires less paper to print. Printing and cutting instructions are included in the file, which can be found from the game aids page.
Warehouse 23 News: The Blasphemous Tome of the Mad Arab
Within The Necronomicon, you will find stories about it, different versions, and two essays on the blasphemous tome.
December 24, 2002: New Miniatures Line!
Wherever adventurers go, there are monsters . . . but often the most interesting creatures are the least likely to have a suitable figure.
Monsters Miniatures is our new line of figures created to endanger 28mm adventurers. The pieces are designed to be easily assembled and customized, so GMs can quickly put a group together, and not be afraid to use them on the gaming table.
Our first figure is Valor, a dragon of noble bearing, and a perfect stocking stuffer. Also currently available are Cerberus, the three-headed dog who guards the gates of Hell, and the Giant Ant. Check out the Monsters Miniatures page for assembly instructions and GURPS stats.
Coming in January is the infamous Harpy. Look for further releases in late spring, including the Chimera and the Hydra.
Warehouse 23 News: Magic Flows from the Blood
Swashbuckling Arcana is the definitive d20 sourcebook for magical powers in an era of pirates and musketeers.
December 23, 2002: Axe And Ye Shall Receive
If we ever had any doubt that Munchkin and its sequels were popular, the response to the Munchkin 3 title contest did away with them! By the deadline, we had received 220 e-mails with 778 (!!) title suggestions. (Some of those are repeats; I'd estimate that we got a little over 700 unique suggestions.)
By far, the most popular title was "Random Axe of Violence" (and there were many other Axe titles among the entries), and we liked this one a lot -- but as every punster knows, you cannot repeat the same pun and have it be nearly as funny. So we arbitrarily disqualified all the Axe entries. Sorry.
Other entries parodied the d20 system -- Munchkin d3 cropped up a few times -- or alluded to the Third Edition of a certain popular fantasy RPG (but we've already had confusion problems with Knightmare Chess, Second Edition and Knightmare Chess 2, and we don't want to go through that again).
Even knocking all of those out, we had hundreds of entries. We immediately did away with the ones which were too long or -- how to say this gently? -- LAAAAAAME. Then we applied a (not very) arbitrary selection criterion: we had to be able to get a good card out of the title, like we did with Unnatural Axe. Finally, we narrowed the list down to 15 entries, which the staff then ranked via our super-secret balloting method ("1 is your favorite, 15 is your least" . . .). These rankings were tallied, and we're happy to announce that the new Munchkin expansion will be called Munchkin 3: Clerical Errors, a title first submitted by Dan O'Brien.
Congratulations to Dan, and thanks to all our entrants!
-- Andrew Hackard, Managing Editor
Warehouse 23 News: Illustrated Science-Fiction Adventure
Phil Foglio's Buck Godot: Zap Gun For Hire graphic novel is now available in softcover.
December 22, 2002: Go Not Gentle Into That Good Futon
Casketfurniture.com wants to reduce the cost of dying. They sell furniture made of caskets, casket novelties, casket merchandise (some of the naughty kind for Mom and Dad only), and, should you be feeling under the weather, actual coffins.
-- Suggested by Joshua Marquart
Warehouse 23 News: A City Torn Asunder
Splintered Peace is a political campaign for d20 that emphasizes both action and intellect as the player characters race to prevent racial tensions from tearing their home apart.
December 21, 2002: Apostrophe Catastrophe
Here's a very literate salon.com column about one of my pet peeves . . . misuse of apostrophes. Yes, it bugs me. I take about 5 points off of the writer's perceived IQ for every apostrophe error I see in a letter or manuscript. That adds up . . .
-- Steve Jackson
Warehouse 23 News: A Resource for a Cybernetic Future
Digital Burn introduces hard-hitting cyberpunk to the d20 System.
December 20, 2002: Carol Turrietta
Carrol Turrietta, owner and manager of All Star Games, died earlier this week after a brief battle with cancer. With her husband Dave, she was a regular volunteer at GAMA events - helpful, cheerful, and competent. We will all miss her.
-- Steve Jackson
Agatha's adventure continues in Girl Genius #8.
December 19, 2002: OgreCave Plays Santa
The folks at OgreCave have published a list of "The Twelve Games of Christmas" -- games that would make great Christmas presents -- in several price ranges.
In the Under $40 list, both Star Munchkin and X-Bugs were recommended. Thanks, guys!
And if you need any other ideas beyond those, you can always go check out the entire list, plus their Under $20 and d20 categories.
Nodwick #18 is now available.
December 18, 2002: Pyramid, JTAS Rates Go Up
Effective January 1, subscriptions for Pyramid and JTAS will go up to $20 . . . this gets you one year of Pyramid or two years of JTAS. Subscriptions entered before then will be at the old rate, so this is a good time to renew.
Why the hike in costs? Simple. JTAS loses money right now. Pyramid doesn't, and we want to keep it that way . . . and we also want to pay a bit more to certain key staff and contributors to keep them happily cranking out the good stuff for you.
-- Steve Jackson
Warehouse 23 News: The Jungle Is Awake
Dire Spirits is a d20 System adventure for 1st-level characters and provides an introduction to the Nyambe: African Adventures campaign setting.
December 17, 2002: Life On Mars Update
Ever since I edited GURPS Mars, I've been keeping up with the latest scientific news about the Red Planet. Here's two more stories that tie together in an interesting way:
While scientists have long believed that a good deal of water could still be on Mars -- or, more accurately, in Mars, buried and frozen -- new data from the Odyssey mission provides new evidence of what is being called a "staggering" amount of the stuff.
So there's the water. Scientists have long speculated that even trapped underground water can support life under the right circumstances. And they've found evidence of that very thing -- microbes living off water and radiation more than two miles deep in the Earth's crust.
-- Scott Haring
Warehouse 23 News: Crutch Ado About Nothing
Knights of the Dinner Table, Issue 73 is now available.
December 16, 2002: Fun With Math, Buffy-Style
Using more math than I ever learned (or, frankly, care to), a Stanford University PhD. candidate has applied the theories of predator-prey population dynamics to the question of how many vampires the population of Sunnydale, CA, can support.
No, really. Check it out here.
-- Scott Haring
Warehouse 23 News: An Amusing Diversion
Nodwick: The Card Game is a fast and furious race to assemble and field a contestant for the annual Hench Games competition.
December 15, 2002: Visiting The Outlaws
I had the opportunity last week to visit the Austin offices of Outlaw Studios and get a preview of their current project. Unfortunately, I can't tell you much about it. But I had a great time. The game they're building is true to the roots of its genre but goes off in some pretty cool directions, and one of these days maybe I will be able to give you some details.
And I learned some worthwhile things about the computer game business, and everything I learn goes into the hopper and brings closer the day when you'll see some of my own designs on the screen.
PS: Yes, I know that URL just points to their logo, but it's a neat logo, and now they have a reason to get on the stick and build a site . . .
The revised, expanded, and updated Rifts Conversion Book One is page after page of rules and stats for bringing other Palladium characters, magic, and powers into the multi-dimensional realm of Rifts Earth.
December 14, 2002: Embarrassed, The Planet Plans To Start A Diet Jan. 2
Using a technique called astrometry, a group of scientists (including some from the University of Texas) have determined the weight of a planet in another solar system.
Read the Science Daily story here.
-- Scott Haring
KODT: Illustrated, Issue 16 is now available.
December 13, 2002: Harry Potter Is Buff
Improve your charisma! Increase those abs! Sweep the business world! It's unfair, but it's also undetectable because it's Magitech! Their technology will boost your mystical powers and make initiation into a coven a thing of the past.
-- Suggested by giovanni
Warehouse 23 News: Superscience Combat
Fighting Vehicles of the Modern Age takes a look at the many types of fighting vehicles fielded by the armies of Gear Krieg.
December 12, 2002: Now Shipping
'Twas two weeks (or so) before Christmas, and all through the (ware)house . . . the following products left on the way to game distributors everywhere, in the hope that St. Nicholas and his elves (the ones that drive the big brown vans) will have them on your local game store shelves before the big day:
Chez Dork 2/e
"It MUST be mine!"
Welcome to Chez Dork! In this stand-alone card game, you and your friends (up to 6 people) enter the world of John Kovalic's award-winning Dork Tower.
Matt, Igor, Carson, and their friends compete to feed their fannish obsessions and collect the games, cards, and other geeky treasures they can't live without. The object of Chez Dork is to get more Stuff, faster, than all your friends. But your particular Obsessions determine what you think is neat at any given time. And a gamer's obsessions can change . . .
Boxed game.
Stock #1340,
ISBN 1-55634-697-2.
$24.95.
Frag PvP
Scott Kurtz' hit comic PvP is now a game. And it's not just any game . . . it's Frag!
Join Francis, Cole, Jade, Brent, and Skull as they blow each other away with flamethrowers, rocket launchers, and anything else they can get their hands on. This set features metal miniatures of the five main characters, sculpted by Richard Kerr, and 56 Frag cards illustrated by Scott Kurtz!
Extra special bonus: three original comic strips . . .
This is not a stand-alone game; it's a supplement for Frag, SJ Games' best-selling game of "first-person shooter" computer game mayhem, and you'll need that game to play.
Boxed supplement with rules, cards, and five metal miniatures.
Stock #1344,
ISBN 1-55634-481-3.
$29.95.
Transhuman Space: Personnel Files
Complete your party with these ready-to-go Transhuman Space characters, usable as PCs or NPCs! Transhuman Space: Personnel Files has heroes and villains at a range of point totals, and includes bioroids, cybershells, weblife, and even ordinary humans. Dozens of humans and transhumans stand ready to welcome your group to 2100 . . . and adventure!
64 pages.
Stock #6710,
ISBN 1-55634-679-4.
$13.95.
GURPS Alpha Centauri
Earth is dead -- but in the last years before the catastrophe, the starship Unity was launched. It carried a few thousand colonists to the nearby Alpha Centauri system, where they were to build a new Earth on the world called simply Planet.
Then disaster struck. Mutiny split the crew into factions, each with its own plans for the new world. The colonists were plunged into a centuries-long struggle against hostile nature, horrific alien life-forms, and each other. Only one faction could win control over Planet and the destiny of humanity . . .
GURPS Alpha Centauri is a sourcebook based on the award-winning computer game Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri. It includes everything you need to recreate the story of humanity on Planet, from the desperate days after the landing to the edge of human transcendence.
Hardback, 128 pages, full color.
Stock #6717,
ISBN 1-55634-520-8.
$29.95.
Warehouse 23 News: Do You Have A Plan?
The Director Screen includes everthing a Director needs to run a high intensity, large-living, and sweet Buffy the Vampire Slayer RPG session.
December 11, 2002: Looking For A Slipstream Wizard
It's been a frustrating month. Yes, month. We're trying to get this Photoshop file for the first Cardboard Heroes Castles set into a form that the printer's CAD reader can handle, and it's been a nightmare. So someone recommended Adobe Slipstream. Well, we ran the file through Slipstream, and it SEEMS to have converted it to vectors all right, but for some reason it also reduced the dimensions . . . which won't do when you're making a die.
If the above is NOT gibberish to you . . . if you are a knowledgeable user of Slipstream and willing to help us out a bit . . . please drop a note to Alex Fernandez (alex@sjgames.com). Thanks!
-- Steve Jackson
Warehouse 23 News: The New International Language
Froop! is the new symbol matching card game from Savant Garde. It is playable in groups of up to ten, fits in your pocket, and includes rules in over a dozen languages.
December 10, 2002: GURPS Historical Character Book Cancelled
Steve Jackson Games is sorry to announce that we have cancelled the book that was being assembled under the working title of GURPS Historical Folks. The market has changed since we first announced this project and started accepting submissions, and we no longer feel that this book is a profitable use of limited resources. Authors of the various entries are free to use them elsewhere (for instance, in Pyramid articles), subject to the rules covering any other material created for GURPS.
Please direct any questions about this announcement to Andrew Hackard, at andrew@sjgames.com.
-- Andrew Hackard, Managing Editor
Warehouse 23 News: Liberty, Justice, Security, and Peace
Featuring the intuitive and easy-to-learn d10 Tri-Stat System game engine, Silver Age Sentinels Tri-Stat invokes the themes and ideals of the Silver Age of comics placed in a modern context.
December 9, 2002: SJ Games Needs Your Help!
Please look at the following two holes that need filling, and write to the appropriate contact person. Your help is greatly (and, in one case, monetarily) appreciated!
1) We'd like someone who is intimately familiar with the history, people, and culture of India to review our current GURPS India manuscript. Our ideal candidate has either lived in India (whether born there or posted there on a diplomatic or professional assignment) or has had much academic study of the area. We'll give title-page credit and comp copies to people who can help us out! Contact Andrew Hackard if you're interested.
2) SJ Games is in need of skilled cartographers for a number of projects. Accuracy is mandatory; ability to match existing map styles is almost as important. Our maps must be correct, clean, and legible. We can accept almost any sort of digital files, although we use Fractal Mapper in house. If you're interested, please send a sample of your work to Mia Sherman; include any published credits you may have. We treat maps as interior art; our cartographer(s) will be contracted by the project.
Warehouse 23 News: With Enemies Like These . . .
Conquerors, Killers, and Crooks is a book of supervillains for Champions, containing nearly 100 villains of every type and motivation.
December 8, 2002: War Breaks Out... On Pyramid!
That's right, we've got three new playtests in Pyramid, and they're all for GURPS WWII supplements! Whether you're a WWII buff or just someone who likes roleplaying a good military conflict, these playtests offer a chance to test out three exciting new books in the series: GURPS WWII: Dogfaces, GURPS WWII: Frozen Hell, and GURPS WWII: Grim Legions.
So if you're not a Pyramid subscriber, now's your chance to get in on the action!
Warehouse 23 News: Adventures in the Xtreme Dungeon Crawl League
Xcrawl is the new D20 game setting that brings classic fantasy adventure into modern times. Xtreme Sports Athletes race through artificially constructed dungeons, hoping to come out
victorious and win fabulous prizes and fame.
December 7, 2002: Munchkin 3: Bard For Life
Pretty lame title, huh?
We think so too.
In fact, we're so dissatisfied that its perpetrator has been taken out back and shot. However, this leaves us without a title for the next Munchkin expansion. Rather than suffer more bad staff-generated titles -- and the inevitable personnel attrition -- we've decided to throw it up to you: our loyal, witty fans.
E-mail Andrew with your idea. If we use it, we'll give you credit for the title on the cover (actually, probably on the back cover) -- and we'll send you a copy of the new expansion when it's released, autographed by Steve Jackson and John Kovalic!
The rules:
1) It must be short. We can't fit a 20-word subtitle on the cover and still have room for cool art.
2) It must be funny. Lame entries will be ignored. REALLY lame entries will be posted on the office bulletin board for general mockery.
3) It must be original. No poaching on other people's trademarks, no matter how funny your idea is.
4) If we get multiple suggestions of the winning idea, the person to suggest it first gets the credit. You snooze, you lose.
5) We reserve the right to toss all the ideas if none of them are good enough.
Deadline for entries is Monday, December 16, so mail them in today!
-- Andrew Hackard, Managing Editor
No Fudge game is complete without Fudge dice (six-sided dice with two "plus" sides, two "minus" sides, and two blank sides). The Deluxe Fudge Dice sets include 20 dice (four each of five colors) and a dice bag.
December 6, 2002: Writ Large
If you're the creative type running out of stylized type, Killer Fonts offers you brand new ones, all of them based on handwriting samples of the dead. Jesse James, George Washington, Christopher Columbus . . . now you've got a signature style to go with your .sig file.
-- Suggested by Bud
Warehouse 23 News: Awesome and Terrifying Dragons
Whether you need a particularly challenging encounter to spring on your players or just want to add a touch of exotic flair to your world, Draconic Lore has just the dragon you need for your d20.
December 5, 2002: Ubercon
I'm scheduled to be a Guest of Honor at Ubercon February 14-17 . . . near, but not in, New York City. I just visited their site and it's looking like more fun all the time, even if their bio does call me "Mr. Jackson" a lot. Also present will be Greg Costikyan, Phil and Kaja Foglio, and Pete Abrams, creator of Sluggy Freelance.
Woo, as they say, hoo!
-- Steve Jackson
Warehouse 23 News: Daring Heroes, Brutal Thugs, and Mastermind Villains
Gear Krieg: Heroes & Villains provides extensive guidelines and tips for adventuring in the pulp-style Modern Age, plus design notes, suggested backgrounds, dozens of data files, and a headquarter generator.
December 4, 2002: May The Fnords Be With You
Now you can have fnords wherever you go. Andrew Otto has fashioned a version of the Fnorder for the Palm OS. Check out this and other versions of the fnorder on our game aids page.
Not familiar with the fnorder? First of all, where have you been? Second of all... The tree from Katmandu will go to Cheyenne Mountain.
Warehouse 23 News: Sentient Cetaceans
Ancient Echoes provides everything needed to fully integrate cetacean characters into Blue Planet games.
December 3, 2002: See? We Told You.
GURPS has long resisted the call to deal in metric measurements, instead sticking with the American standbys of feet, yards, miles, gallons, etc.
Turns out we were right all along, at least if the new book The Measure of All Things is any indication. Read the CNN.com story here.
-- Scott Haring
December 2, 2002: March Releases
Steve Jackson Games has announced the following products for a March, 2003 release:
GURPS Traveller: Humaniti
In the far future, mankind has scattered to many worlds and divided into many races . . . and some are very alien, despite their Human ancestry. GURPS Traveller: Humaniti describes 13 Human-descended races from the far reaches of the Imperium and beyond, including the technologically advanced Darrians (with their sun-smashing Star-Trigger), the carnivorous Dynchia, the dour warrior Azhanti, and the aggressive Itharans. Compiled by Loren Wiseman, this book is a valuable resource for any GURPS Traveller campaign.
128 pages.
Stock #6623,
ISBN 1-55634-521-6.
$22.95.
GURPS WWII: Frozen Hell
GURPS WWII: Frozen Hell covers the Finnish campaigns of World War II. Strap on your skis and scrounge for ammo to fight for young Finland's continued freedom, or join the Russian armies trying to secure their border from German attack.
Frozen Hell covers all of the Finnish involvement in WWII, from the struggles of the diplomats through the sacrifices of soldiers on both sides of the wars. It includes:
- Information on the Finnish armed forces, from their organization to the weapons they used;
- The history of the Winter War (1939-1940), the year between wars, the Continuation War (1941-1944), and the Lapland War (1945);
- Advice on diplomacy campaigning, with a character template for Diplomats.
An introduction by William R. Trotter, historian and author of A Frozen Hell, the definitive book on the subject.
GURPS WWII: Frozen Hell brings you into an unfamiliar corner of World War II -- a very cold corner of a very hot war.
48 pages.
Stock #8008,
ISBN 1-55634-639-5.
$11.95.
Skeletons Miniatures
The dead walk . . . and they're coming for you!
The walking skeleton -- grinning malevolence and otherworldly evil -- is a staple of horror and fantasy gaming. Sculpted by the renowned Richard Kerr, Skeletons Miniatures gives you eight classic figures, with the heads and arms separate. Mix and match for the ultimate in variety, and create the skeleton army you want! Arms include everything from clubs and swords to deadly modern-day hardware, and extras are provided.
So take a tour through our graveyard . . . Skeletons Miniatures are waiting!
Boxed set: eight skeleton bodies with separate heads and arms.
Stock #13-0200,
ISBN 1-55634-528-3.
$24.95.
Warehouse 23 News: Create and Customize Monsters
The Monster's Handbook is the definitive d20 System resource for enhancing and modifying monsters in any fantasy campaign.
December 1, 2002: To Boldly Lego Where No One Has Legone Before
Ever wonder what happens when two geekish hobbies collide? Here's one possibility.
(And we notice that he's an Austinite, too. Must be something in the water.)
Warehouse 23 News: Top 10 for November
Check out Warehouse 23's best selling items for November on the Warehouse 23 Top 10 page.
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