Short Story completed

My first short story for submission is finally complete! I'm going to start sending it out to publishers tomorrow. Cutting Teeth made some good progress today as I was sitting around for a good hour at the start of work. It won't be too much longer at this pace before it's ready to be typed out. Terracats might be something I start this weekend, but I don't know just yet. Now I'm off to bed to get some more reading done, so catch you all later until then.

My first manuscript

I've come to the conclusion thanks to a meeting with some wonderful authors at the local author showcase, that in order for my name to start to circulate amongst the community, I need to get myself published. Soon. The best way to get my feet wet is a short story, something I can crank out in a few days. I've done some research on proper manuscript layout and applying that to how I'm presenting it. I'll locate a publisher probably tomorrow that accepts fantasy short stories, and see about getting it submitted A.S.A.P.

The name of the story is one that my fellow gaming friends will be familiar with: The Blue Lupine. It encompasses his first real fight against injustice that takes place shortly after the Yakuza burned down the village he had been staying at for the past two years. It's a character close to my heart, and a setting that's very familiar to me; write what you know as they say. I'll probably be finished with it by the end of the week at the latest.

I'd also like to take this time to announce my young readers book idea. I've decided to actually DO something with the Battlecats characters and call them Terracats: Defenders of Humanity. Nothing solid on paper yet, but I'd been brainstorming the few scenes of the book in my head at work today.

The Chronicles of Gaia has had its name changed. I've decided on something to call the series that's a bit more appropriate: The Wintermoon Legacies. The first book in the series will be called Cutting Teeth, since the main character is on his first adventures away from home.

That's all for tonight, time to write some more of that short story, then curl up on my bed to read for an hour or so. Thank you and good night.

Novel Progress

The title says it all. I'm currently at a point in the story where the party just defeated an animated suit of armor with a massive black greatsword made to look like a wavy flame. I won't spoil how they defeated it, you'll have to find out for yourself when the book gets published.

On a sidenote, my gaming club/charity organization is starting to get off the ground. I currently have nine people including myself on board. Granted, they may just be my gaming buddies, but you gotta start somewhere right? For those of you who don't know, please check out Argent Fangs for more information. It's a work in progress so be patient. Drop me a line if there's anything you'd like me to put up.

Battlecats!!!

This is sort of a random thought that I had at work today while brainstorming ideas for my book. For whatever reason, I thought back to when I was about 11, and I had come up with a version of Battletoads called Battlecats. Instead of Zitz, Pimple and Rash, I had Claw, Fang and Tails. I made a little comic strip about them on my old IBM 486 that was pretty lame, but hilarious to me looking back on it. Claw was a gray tiger cat with a blue belt and black metal boots and gauntlets, Fang was a muscle-bound orange cat with a green belt and metal teeth, and Tails was a lanky black cat with a red belt and a metal spike on his tail. I'm half-tempted to give them a real go and give them some backstory, but I doubt I will. It's fun to think back to my childhood characters that I made up.

New World Musings

I've been thinking about my campaign world a bit more, thinking about the shape of it, the days in the year, the types of classes I want in the game, things like that. Most of the core classes from 3.5 translate perfectly into this setting, though I'll have to use the alternate rule system for the defense skill, since armor usage isn't very common and I don't want players getting hosed ten minutes into a session. I'll probably drop the spellcasting from the Ranger class and either up its hit die to a d10, give it more skill points, or give it some other little ability to make up for the loss of magic. The Sorcerer is being melded with the Favored Soul and I'm making a sort of "Shaman" class out of it, not too sure about the intricacies just yet, but I'm thinking of elemental masteries and a unique spell list. Duskblades will be in the game, but I'll probably just call them Mage Knights or Swordmages or something along those lines. The Blackguard prestige is coming out since I'm making a Dark Knight base class which is basically the Paladin of Tyranny from the Unearthed Arcana, perhaps with a little more flavor to it. Swashbucklers are a perfect fit for the world, but there is no culture in the world that even remotely resembles Asia, so the Wu Jen, Shugenja and Samurai are not going to be playable, though there is the possibility that I'll use the Nezumi (rat people) race in the game.

There's other stuff, but that's all I can think of off the top of my head. Thank you and good night!

Novel Update

So the dungeon sequence has been laid out in a manner of speaking, a graveyard in the middle of a foggy forest. Currently, they're looking for the source of the undead that they just finished fighting. Taking my notebook to work has helped my creative processes quite a bit.

Weekend

The weekend is here, another week of manual labor behind me, and my novel is getting to another good "dungeon" sequence which I'll start writing about this weekend. I don't have much else to say right about now other than to give a good shout out to my friends at the Constellation Chamber. I'm not as big into it as I was a year or so ago, but I still like it as a symbolic view, and it certainly gives me plenty of inspiration for my storytelling.

Thank you, and good night.

Prologue

As promised, here's the prologue to my up and coming book, currently called The Chronicles of Gaia.

It had been a long journey for Glenn Allister, Paladin of the Allister House. He was looking forward to returning home to his friends and family after his training mission. Soon he would be a true paladin, just like the rest of his family. Or so he thought…
As Glenn was heading up the last hill that would give him the perfect view of his home, he was not treated to the sight of his silver citadel home. He bore witness to nothing but smoldering ruins. His heart raced and his pace quickened, but it was too late, there was nothing but charred corpses and burnt-out shells.
“What evil happened here?!” Glenn shouted as he started to search the ruins. Judging from the wounds on the bodies, he could only guess that they were caused by some sort of monster. Closer inspection reveals a demonic symbol engraved on one of the charred walls. Glenn cannot recall what demon lord it belonged to, but it didn’t really matter right now, for a sharp pain started to occur in his left eye. That only meant one thing: he wasn’t alone…
Drawing his sword, he spins around and it meets an axe blade that was poised to go through his back. “So, there’s more of you,” the demon hissed. His skin was as black as coal, covered in rough spines, mottled with decaying flesh. “I was worried that I wasn’t going to have any fun!” The demon lunged with a malicious grin, his axe dripping with fresh blood. Glenn readied his shield, blocking each attack as they came.
The battle raged on as Glenn fought for his life. “Some homecoming,” he couldn’t help but think to himself. That small distraction made him lower his guard just enough for the monster to deliver a mighty blow to his left side. He fell to one knee, cursing his carelessness. Was this the end? Was he going to die here? As a last desperate attack, Glenn drops his shield, takes his weapon in both hands, summoning all of his strength and with the memory of his family firmly engraved into his mind, he delivers a soul-shattering smite that sends the beast back to his home plane in a flash of silvery light.
After tending to his injury with his saved up divine energy, Glenn sees to giving his brethren the satisfaction of at least being buried on their homeland that they labored so much in making. Once the burials had been completed, all Glenn could do was salvage what provisions he could carry. With a heavy heart, he says his final farewells and heads east to Otaria, the capitol of the Zenan continent. He swears upon their graves that he would not let the Allister name be forgotten, nor the spirit of the Winter Moon die out…

Let me know what you guys think.

Devising a new world

So after some discussions with friends back in Maine, I've decided that the next time that I partake in roleplaying, I'm going to make a brand new setting for them to play in. This project will take a back seat to the book of course, but it's something I'm going to start brainstorming about on here. The basic concept for the world is going to be sort of a mix of renaissance and wild west with the high fantasy appeal of your standard D&D game.

I'm thinking that there could be a culture clash of sorts, the renaissance people snubbing their noses at the rough and tumble frontiersmen, while they criticize them of being too soft and weak. Race-wise I know that I want the Orcs to have a Native-American like culture, savage but honorable and in tune with the land. Humans will be a mix off frontiersman, aristocrat and everything in between, like they are in all gaming worlds. Elves will be the pioneers of the renaissance style, since I'm going for the conceited high elves with this world. (sorry, no wood elves or drow here.) Dwarves are well, dwarves. They fit perfectly into that rough and tumble frontier society, especially the towns that are built near a mine or mountain range. Gnomes would probably have a sort of steampunkish feel to them, bowler hat with a brass clockwork backpack or some nonsense like that. I don't know if I'll use halflings, but if I do, they'll more resemble the classic halfling and not the kender wannabe that WotC turned them into with 3rd edition.

The book is progressing slowly, but it's getting there. I'm currently in a flashback sequence of sorts with Glenn lying awake at night thinking about his first real friend that he made the same day he started learning how to use a sword, wondering how he's doing back home. I'll perhaps post the brief prologue that I have tomorrow for people to get a feel for the story. I still don't have a true title, The Chronicles of Gaia really doesn't do it for me right now, it feels forced more than anything. Ah well, I'll worry about a title later on when I'm done with the rough draft. That's all for now, thank you and good night.

My love of gaming

Gaming has always been a part of my life, ever since I was old enough to remember. It all started with the Atari 2600 that belonged to my older brother and sister. The graphics and music were primitive to what we are used to now, but oh did I love them, I could spend hours playing those games. Then I discovered the NES when I was over at my babysitter's house when I was about 5. The quality of everything blew me away from what I was used to, Mario in my mind was probably the coolest character ever at that point in my life. Megaman took that throne away from Mario when I was about 8 and played Mega Man 2 for the first time, still probably my favorite video game character to this day.

I wasn't introduced to the world of the RPG until about 7th grade when I was staying over at a friend's house and his cousins brought over some of their Super Nintendo games. One of them was this little gem of a game called Final Fantasy III. I was blown away by the graphics, the music, the storyline, I had no idea that video games were capable of such a fascinating storyline akin to a movie or a book. It budded into a love of other games like it, Chrono Trigger being one of the big ones.

The video game RPG led me to the world of the MMO back in 1998 when I first discovered Ultima Online. I had no idea what to do when I first started playing the game, but it was such a deep and freeform world with plenty of player interaction if you wanted it, it was like nothing I had ever played before to that point.

It's a little backwards looking back at it now, but my love of RPGs and MMOs led me to the tabletop version of the games from whence they came. I never knew or wasn't friends with anyone back in school that played such games, but when I was hanging out at a gaming store during the week, a small group of people were rolling character for Dungeons & Dragons, and I was drawn in like a moth to candlelight. I could dictate the path my character took, which was a Human Paladin names Turalyon, and that level of control over my actions was truly liberating. It was even more so when I got my own collection of books and started running games with my friends. I have met a fair amount of people I would call good friends because of this game, and the friends that I had from work, it only served to solidify it even more.

It's that love of storytelling that eventually led me to the path of writing my own story in the form of a novel. True, it took the guidance of my sister to give me the motivation to start upon this endeavor, but the drive and stamina to keep it going comes from me and me alone. I can only hope that other people will love my stories as much as I enjoy crafting them.

So yeah...

I haven't used a blog since LiveJournal YEARS ago, so I guess now's a good time to start a new one. I'll mostly be using this blog to talk about the progress on my novel and whatever little musings I find are too long-winded or irrelevant for Facebook. I hope you enjoy your stay.