This Monday Meeting we’re trapped here by freezing rain coating the roads with a loverly slick surface, so once again I love that we can Skype our Onyx Path meetings and don’t have to commute to an office. This also is a vital tool, when, like this week and a bit of last, Rollickin’ Rose and I are calling each of our developers in turn to talk about the upcoming couple of years’ releases. If you recall, we did a whole Pitch Season a few months ago, and then submitted those pitches (after discussion) to CCP for their OK to proceed. Now we’re coming back to the devs to make sure we’re all in agreement on what we’ll be doing.
And for those bigger projects that require more time, we may even be starting preliminary work now for 2016. In fact, part of what Eddy and I discussed today was how we will be proceeding on a Very Important Project for that year, and setting up a time for he and I to discuss creating the “conceptual borders” prior to reaching out to different folks we want to get together as our brain trust of folks who love the game line we’re working on. I usually borrow a phrase from Alan Moore for this phase of game conceptual design: “high altitude mapping”. Getting the big picture scoped out so you can zoom in on more and more details as the project moves ahead. This is all pre-outline, which is in turn pre-writing, so still very early on. Which is where it belongs.
The nWoD Dark Eras Kickstarter has reached that part of the lifecycle of a Kickstarter where folks kind of drift in and out, so if you like the idea of different historical periods and even more you love the idea of the community determining which eras will be added beyond the original ones, then please spread the word on your social media and to all your friends and acquaintances. Hey, tell perfect strangers about it if that works for you! The thing is, we’re in great shape to make the book right now thanks to our current backers, but if you, the community, want even more eras, then we need to get pledges that raise the totals to hit the Stretch Goals. If you need to point folks to a spot with a nice overview, and a couple of pieces of art not on the KS page, then there’s this page at GeekNative:
http://www.geeknative.
And this interview where Rollickin’ Rose Bailey, Black Hat Matt McFarland, and I talk about the ideas behind Dark Eras:
We’ve got more than two weeks to go, so spread the love!
If you are a classic Vampire: the Masquerade fan, I also want to point out that we are teamed up with Bundle of Holding again, this time to offer discounted bundles containing VtM 2 and Revised PDFs. What we love about these is that they’re a great way to pick up classic PDFs while contributing to an excellent charity. Here’s the link for the page:
http://bundleofholding.com/index/current/name/Vampire2015
Wow, that’s a lot of links today. Well, we’ve been busy, and there’s more to come. As you can tell below, we have many cool projects coming up and a couple of very big books are getting very close to being ready to PDF. Mage20, V20 Dark Ages, and Werewolf: the Forsaken 2nd Edition are all coming through layout, and as hard to believe as it is, Exalted 3rd Edition is at the start of layout. We’re all incredibly filled with excitement about getting these books out to you all, and appreciate your patience while we wrestle through such big tomes. We think you’ll love them once we can get them to you.
And, of course, we love making all of these for you:
DEVELOPMENT STATUS FROM ROLLICKING ROSE (Projects in bold have changed listings)
First Draft (The first phase of a project that is about the work being done by writers, not dev prep)
- W20 Pentex Employee Indoctrination Handbook (Werewolf: the Apocalypse 20th Anniversary Edition)
- M20 Book of Secrets (Mage: the Ascension 20th Anniversary Edition)
- Cursed Necropolis: Rio (Mummy: the Curse)
- Secrets of the Covenants (Vampire: The Requiem 2nd Edition) – In Open Development
- Exalted 3rd Novel by Matt Forbeck (Exalted 3rd Edition)
- Demon Storytellers’ Guide (Demon: the Descent) Extension to writers was given.
- Beckett’s Jyhad Diary (Vampire: the Masquerade 20th Anniversary Edition)
- M20 Anthology (Mage: the Ascension 20th Anniversary Edition)
- Demon Translation Guide (Demon: the Fallen and Demon: the Descent)
- Changeling: the Lost 2nd Edition, featuring the Huntsmen Chronicle (Changeling: the Lost 2nd Edition)
- nWoD Hurt Locker (World of Darkness 2nd Edition)
- Pugmire (Be a Good Dog.)
Redlines
- Mummy Fiction Anthology (Mummy: the Curse)
- Arms of the Chosen (Exalted 3rd Edition)
- Mage: the Awakening 2nd Edition, featuring the Fallen World Chronicle (Mage: the Awakening) – In Open Development
- W20 Novel by Mike Lee (Werewolf: the Apocalypse 20th Anniversary Edition)
- Wraith: the Oblivion 20th Anniversary Edition
- W20 Changing Ways (Werewolf: the Apocalypse 20th Anniversary Edition)
- “Sardonyx” System Rules (Base rules set for Scion and the Trinity Continuum)
Second Draft
- Beast: the Primordial core book (Beast: The Primordial)
- V20 Black Hand: Guide to the Tal’Mahe’Ra (Vampire: the Masquerade 20th Anniversary Edition)
- W20 Shattered Dreams (Werewolf: the Apocalypse 20th Anniversary Edition)
Development
- V20 Red List (Vampire: the Masquerade 20th Anniversary Edition)
- V20 Ghouls (Vampire: the Masquerade 20th Anniversary Edition)
- Promethean: the Created 2nd Edition, featuring the Firestorm Chronicle (Promethean: the Created) Being playtested.
- M20 How do you DO that? (Mage: the Ascension 20th Anniversary Edition)
Editing
Development (post-editing)
- V20 Lore of the Clans (Vampire: the Masquerade 20th Anniversary Edition)
- Exalted 3rd Fiction Anthology (Exalted 3rd Edition)
- Sothis Ascends (Mummy: the Curse)
ART DIRECTION FROM MIRTHFUL MIKE
- Sothis Ascends – Sketches are in for everything but fulls. Thus far good to go.
- Book of the Wyrm 20 – Fixed the Deluxe cover on Friday. Hopefully it works this time.
- DAV20 – Got CCP comments in and will spend the next couple of days implementing. Also putting together the screen (and probably wallpapers as well).
- T-Shirts – Holding pattern until the log jam is cleared out a bit.
- Art O’ The Changin’ Breeds – Mage still a priority.
- Fallen World Chronicle Anthology – I’ll ping Dave about getting the errata ready so we can finish this one out. http://rpg.drivethrustuff.com/product/143174/The-Fallen-World-Chronicle-Anthology
- WtF 2 – Sto working on it. We had to replace Abrar.
- Scarred Lands – Cover for [REDACTED] finished.
- Wraith 20 – Getting Mr Cobb started on remaining Guild logos.
- M20 – Proofing to Phil.
- Dark Eras – KS rolling along. (see above)
- V20 Lore of the Clans – More sketches coming in as well as some of the finishes.
- Lore of the Deceived – got text in this morning and went ahead and knocked it out as it was only 11 pages. Sending proof off to Colin today.
- M20: How Do You Do That? – got art notes from Phil for everything now. Going to start putting together the art buy for that after I get DA wrapped up.
- EX3- RichT here, once again tagging onto Mirthful Mike’s report: the last few pieces of art are still coming in. Maria and I went over her first “drop the text in” proof and made several significant decisions on fonts and sizes and sent that version, which had reduced the page count dramatically, back to the Devs for more extensive text revision. Maria has some beautiful ideas on different page borders for each chapter which still hold together with a single design aesthetic that she can now match to the text.
REASON TO DRINK: Absinthe makes the heart grow fonder…happy Valentine’s Day.
Comments
60 responses to “Heart of Ice? [Monday Meeting Notes]”
For EX3 do you still have to commission the artistic elements of the layout like borders, banners, and backgrounds? I’m sure who is even responsible for those design greeblies?
Typically Layout and Design is a single person’s job, so Maria would probably be doing that. Notable exceptions include things like Wraith and Werewolf: The Wild West, where borders included actual illustrations, so an artist would usually be contracted for that separately.
Those are all under Maria’s care, and she has some pretty interesting ideas. She’s headed to a family thing in Southern Asia this coming week and will be speaking to some artists there. Might turn into something, might not.
Speaking of Southern Asia, can Kindred of the East 20th be a thing at some point? Please? Sorry, seemed as good a place as any to insert this.
A bit far off, but who knows?
I would LOVE this.
How about DAV20’s Tome of Secrets, is it going to be released as a pdf?
Every product we have ever made has been made available as PDF, and we have no plans to change that.
Thanks for the answer. I only asked after noticing it’s not on the current projects page, or mentioned on the meeting notes.
It’s on the Current Projects page. It’s under “Stretch Goals Coming Soon” as “V20DA – V20 Dark Ages Tome of Secrets: PDF/PoD”
Thanks
Not in the Meeting notes because it hasn’t gone out to be written yet. Fear not!
Thanks
Going back through the EX3 KS updates and I came across this –
“Some of you have expressed interest in more meaty Updates, and once we have the text completely in editing, the Devs will be providing some significant excerpts. […] Also, I just talked to Holden about coming to the KS comments section here to do a regular Q&A/AMA and we are setting up plans for he and John to do so.”
Are there still plans afoot to do this or something like it? Or is the stance still ‘no spoilers until release’?
That’s up to John and Holden. We had expected they would have more time for them to be more available, but the demands of the next EX3 projects seem to have curtailed that.
isnt the ask the developers thread in rpg.net the Q&A??
How was I supposed to know that, and why should I have to go to a third-party website to find a thread I don’t know about, when the text I quoted was specifically referring to the comments section of the Kickstarter?
well, there was a thread here with a link to that other thread and also in Eric Milton Blog you have a summary of everything that the Devs said and every new page was posted in the thread about his blog.
We were trying to set up a regular Q&A in addition to the forums here or on RPG.net.
It’s also quite explicitly not what the KS comment said either. The KS comment says meaty updates with excerpts from the book. The RPGnet thread is little more than vagueries and handwaving and obfuscation. Don’t go to the RPGnet thread and expect to come away with more than vague inklings of [thing X] being something like [thing Y].
A shame about Abrar Ajmal. I’m really itching for Forsaken 2e.
Yep, and good. 🙂
Hmmm…Any chance V20DA will be out to Kickstarter backers in the next 2 weeks?
Lore of the Deceived? Can we get a little more info on that? Obviously its a Mummy supplement. Covering some of the extra stuff that could not fit into Book of the Deceived maybe?
Here’s hoping for M20 out to the Kickstarter backers before the end of February!
H, you know I don’t do prognostications. LotD? Could be…
Depends on how long Satyr Phil takes to review the proof, how many corrections he finds that need fixing, how long that all takes. Etc.
Lore of the Deceived? Did I miss something?
Maybe, it’s for Mummy: the Curse.
It’s bonus material that CAS and co have mentioned they wanted to give out to add to what the awesome Deceived book game. Like rank 5 seba.
Oh another point of clarification in EX3
Does “dropped the page count” mean the book is smaller because the pages are more efficient in their layout/text size, or is it the opposite the pages didn’t have enough room so you had to send the text back for “extensive text revision” to cut for space?
Yes and yes. Both aspects are necessary for the book design.
So how far off is the “No Indexed” backers copy of M20 at this point?
Depends on Satyr Phil and how long it takes for him to review the proof, how many corrections he finds, how long those take to correct, etc. With a book of this size and importance, it is not something we want to rush through.
I get the feeling there has never been a rush on anything with this project
We’ve tried very hard to allow all of our creative team to tackle their phases of this project in a way that enables them to bring forth their absolute best efforts. That does take more time, but we’ve seen the results of not taking the time to do it right before. And with a project this big, with so many moving parts and expectations, we want to err on the side of trying to get all the parts right.
I’m going to chime in and say you are doing fine. I really wasn’t holding any realistic expectation of seeing anything on this project before April. If anything, you feel a bit ahead of the game. Proper expectations makes all the difference in the world.
If I remember right from when I backed, the PDF was estimated at December 2014. We’re a little past that and I’m not going to deny im hungry for the end product. That said, for months Mike Chaney has been as clear as I think he could be and the delay past December has felt organic. Keep going as is guys. I look forward to finally getting my hands on this bad boy when you tell us it’s ready.
Yeah, it’s not like they got their kickstarter money already. What’s the rush?
That’s how Kickstarter works. People pledge, and we make the product. It’s taken longer than anyone involved likes, so what’s your point? We should say fuck it after all the hard work everyone has put into this so far and just toss the thing out there without doing the best job we know how to do?
My point being, all sarcasm aside is that during this whole production process there has been no signs of expediency on your end even when the project missed its delivery goal. Apart from a little blurb on the Monday meeting notes and the occasional backer email update (which by the way only seem to come about when we backers raise a fuss in the comment section) there really hasn’t been that much transparency at all. No milestones or set due dates, just a big load of it’s done when it’s done. Granted it’s a big book, but you are a company that produces big books so this is hardly your first time at the dance. You talk about getting the backers an index less pdf but you can’t ever fathom a rough idea of when we are going to get it, common.
I’ve said many times that we were not going to rush this, or frankly any, of our books. We have been through the expediency mines and they are not conducive to creating lost-lasting excellent game lines. I also have been upfront for, what, two years about no longer giving estimates AND why I no longer give estimates on this project in particular. And no, no project Onyx Path has done has been as complex as Exalted 3rd, which I have also explained many times. Look, I’m sorry the book didn’t come out when we first estimated it would. We explained why it happened and have kept backers informed at every stage through the updates here and the backer updates. Other than the estimates that seem to be stuck in your craw, we have told you what we knew when we knew it, from the stages the project is in each week, to the unfortunate issues that cropped up during the long course of getting the text finished. We have been as transparent as the devs are comfortable in being, and I’m not willing to sacrifice their ability to create in order to hit some ephemeral standard for transparency. This process has been grueling for all of us, and it has been 8000% more transparent than either of the first two editions. Looking back at the updates you can see a steady slow progress, but progress nevertheless, and now here we are moving the text into layout.
Lore of the Deceived?
Is tht the grab bag of stuff about True Names and seba that CAS mentioned on the forums? I’d assumed that would all be blog posts,
Nope, it’ll be a wee PDF for folks to enjoy.
Is there going to be a POD version of the Fallen World Anthology or is printing the anthology going to be strictly DIY?
Our process for non-Kickstarted books, so for most of our books, is to do an early release PDF and garner errata, fix the PDF and then use those fixed files for the PoD (and the ePub and Mobi versions for fiction).
As you can read in the art/production updates above, we’re at the phase of getting that errata together in order to make the fixes and get the fixed files out.
Hope that helps!
I sent the corrections we’ve gathered in the forum thread to Mike this morning, so the PoD version is on the way.
This is on the Fallen World Anthology product page on DriveThruFiction.com:
Note: EPub and Mobi digital format versions are coming soon. Customers who purchase this advance PDF will also receive the other digital versions for free when they are available. Print format versions are coming soon and customers who purchase this advance PDF version will also get a discount offer on the Print version to match the Digital+Print combo price.
You must make sure your Account is set to receive e-mails from DriveThruRPG & Onyx Path Publishing _before_ the Print edition is activated in order to get the discount offer.
So did y’all already find a replacement for Abrar, or has the replacement already been finalized/secured?
Basically “How much longer you think before all of the art’s in?” A week? A month?
Replacement has been finalized and secured. The artist has to do six half page pieces… so definitely more than a week but I doubt it will be a month.
In the theme of love, seeing Changeling: The Lost 2E there on the updates makes me super hopeful to see an update about Changeling: the Dreaming in the not too distant future! While I love all of the classic World of Darkness games, Dreaming is my nearest and dearest.
If there’s anything I can do to help out with it, I would love to!
The M20 news is exciting! I can’t wait to read it 😀
GUY DAVIS! Guy Davis needs to return to do art for any and all Classic World of Darkness books. Keep asking him until a space opens in his schedule
We do, and will keep trying. Thanks!
Dear Lord!!
I want WtF2 so baaaaaaaaaad!!!
Sounds like February/March will be a shotgun blast full of Onyx Path goodness!
Thanks for the info. It’s nice to hear about the process in question.
damn, Wraith20’s already in art direction? where’ve I been?
As above, Wraith20 is currently at the redlines stage, but with a product this size a lot of the art is usually solicited fairly early in the process.
A few pieces are being arranged, in particular the illustrated Guild logos by John Cobb. We do still have to wait for art notes from Rich Dansky for most of the art.
Backed and love Wraith, but passed on the Kickstarter T-shirt but hoping there will be a similar one w/o “Kickstarter” on the image. I know there are those who love to show they backed it, but I really adore the logo plain, which speaks for itself -similarly I am a huge Game of Thrones fans, but collect the things that have the house name and logos without all the HBO tags! Hoping you will have a different version! Will you? 🙂 Keep up all the wonderful happenings!
Yes, that’s coming, but not at a discount unless we do another special sale. But I totally understand your point and do the same thing with GoT items. Thanks!
Aw man Friday’s almost over and no WtF2e.
It seems that everything advances smoothly, thank you for your work! I think that rushing too much isn’t probably the best way to work…
By the way, I have a question, in m20 there will be different page/edges for technocracy pages and traditions? Or there will not be such difference?