Highmoon's Ponderings

Ever since I posted that I was going to start playing in a D&D/d20 Play by eMail campaign called West to the Empire I have not said anything else on the subject. It has been mostly due to real life stuff and my attention drifting to other things, but fret not, I have been playing and it has been awesome.

This is my first time playing pre-gen characters–Squire Fisner, in my case–and while, indeed, at first I had absolutely no attachment to the character, little by little that faceless pre-packaged set of stats has become MY character, Squire Argus Fisner, of the noble Fisner family of Argalis, novice in the Order of the Red Griffon, and now heir to the honor and legacy of his falled mentor, Sir Galwaith. I very much look forward to playing Argus a lot more.

Mark, our DM, has been doing a bang up job running this play by email game. The main problem is the lag time between actions, and at one point or another we all have been either waiting or causing the wait; it happens, it’s part and parcel of the format, you deal with it. One thing Mark has been doing that I am incredibly glad for is that, as a DM, he treats this as a narrative, so even though the technical part is a bunch of statement declarations and dice rolls being emailed back and forth, Mark takes the time to, every Action, weave all our disparate orders and rolls and whatnot into a narrative block of description that incorporates all the ambiance of our environment.

So, to summarize, it’s been awesome, and now we are heading back into the dungeon to begin the final act, and track down this minotaur that has been terrorizing the forest and villages nearby, and enslaving a tribe of kobolds to do its bidding.

You can check out the West to the Empire website Mark put together for our mutual benefit.

Breaking format just a little, The Digital Front - Episode 02 brings you the OGL/d20 Panel held by Wizards of the Coast at Gen Con. This panel was held Friday, August 17, at 6:00 pm, immediately after the closing of the Exhibit Hall, meaning a lot of publishers were either not present or arrived late. The panel, hosted by Scott Rouse and Bill Slavicek, was meant to discuss the issue of the OGL and d20 Licenses under the newly-announced 4th Edition D&D, though it was more of a townhall meeting as WotC admitted they did not have a clear idea yet and wanted to hear opinions. The audio file is long, almost an hour and a half, but given the small amount of publishers that made it, we thought it a good idea to distribute the recording as widely as possible. Special thanks go to Zachry Ashmore of The Groovecast podcast for recording the panel as a favor to Daniel. Please feel free to discuss this episode on our forums or call our voicemail line at 206-350-4441.

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Highmoon Media Productions, in association with Green Ronin Publishing, presents Targum Magazine – Issue 03.

Welcome to the third issue of Targum Magazine, the magazine in support of Eternal Rome: Roleplaying in the Age of Gods and Emperors, Trojan War: Roleplaying in the Age of Homeric Adventure, Testament: Roleplaying in the Biblical Era and all Ancient World campaign settings. In this issue you will find the following articles:

• Ostraca: Lost Tribes by Spike Y Jones – Spike explores the Lost Tribes of Israel in great detail (14,000 words worth of detail, to be precise).
• Bless Me, For I Have Sinned by Allon Mureinik – Exploring sin and redemption as themes in your games.
• The Passover by Scott G. Carter – Using this pivotal holiday in your Testament games.
• Era Spotlight: The Battle of Thermopylae by Eric Hansen – A mini-gazetteer for roleplaying alongside King Leonidas and his 300 Spartans; usable with Trojan War and with standard d20 rules.
• Free Paper Minis from Arion Games.

Come adventure in the lands of the ancient world today!

NOW AVAILABLE from RPGnow!
And remember there is a 4-issue subscription available as well.

Last Thursday I went to check RPGnow.com as I normally do, and one of the new releases immediately called my attention due to the big Israeli flag on the cover. It was a d20 Modern Advanced Class from Skortched Urf Studios called Scion of Masada. I went to the publisher’s site, listened to the audio commentary (a very neat idea) and bought the product. It was just simply great: the class presented a special operative of Israel’s MOSSAD agency called Scion of Masada who, armed with very unique blades and esoteric Torah learning, could defend Israel against regular and supernatural enemies. On top of everything, the class demanded the character be an Orthodox Jew and stick to Halacha (Torah Law) lest he loose access to his abilites.

Dude, where do I sign up!

There were, however, some minor issues with the class where the abilities and description did not match with Halacha, so I sent an email to Skortched Urf’s Mark asking him if he’d mind me pointing these issues up. He didn’t, so I sent him a very detailed rundown of things that needed to be changed along with suggestions on how to implement those changes. Mark surprised me by asking me to write up the edits myself, and I worked hard overnight so I could send him the edited file early on Friday. My main objective was to simply change the little things that did not match Halacha to version of the same idea that did, because I though Chris A. Field’ idea was just brilliant. I think, in all modesty, that I achieved that goal, and already the updated file has been uplaoded to all the RPG e-tailers and sent out to all early buyers.

Thanks to Chris Field for writing such a cool class in the first place, and for making it be an Orthodox Jew specifically, and to Mark and Skortched Urf for publishing it. I am honored to have had a small part in the project. As an Orthodox Jew and a gamer, this product is dear to me and gives me something I can play at the table that fully allows me to bring in my heritage to bear.

In the end, I get to play an Orthodox Jew who gets to kick terrorist and supernatural ass in defense of Eretz Ysrael.

Highmoon Media Productions, in association with Reality Deviants Publications, is proud to present the first in our new line of d20 Modern/Future support, DaVinci Labs.

DaVinci Labs is a research and development facility specializing in mechanized systems, ranging from civilian solutions to military contracts. Simplicity of design and innovative concepts are our driving force, applying these ideals to everything we produce, be it cyber-organ replacements, nanotechnology, zero-G construction systems, mecha units and systems, or orbital and sub-orbital ships.
DaVinci Labs, A Renaissance in Mechanization. (TM)

UDR-4 Arrowhead

DaVinci Labs, Volume One focuses on the UDR-4 Arrowhead mecha, providing a history of the mecha, 2 variants of the design, new weapons and equipment and suggestions for using the mecha in your own campaign as well as in the popular Dawning Star campaign setting by Blue Devil Games.

, Volume One focuses on the mecha, providing a history of the mecha, 2 variants of the design, new weapons and equipment and suggestions for using the mecha in your own campaign as well as in the popular campaign setting by .This PDF comes with a screen version and a RTF file for your convenience.

Written by: Joshua Hoade
Mecha Artwork by: Adam Dickstein
Dawning Star is a trademark of Blue Devil Games, used with permission.

RDPDVL001 – $3.95
Buy it today from RPGnow.com.

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This is the product that almost never happened, seriously. The whole idea to start Highmoon Media Productions was due to me coming up with this series about 2 1/2 years ago. Since then, I have been trying to get it going, and for various reasons, I could never do it. I was almost resigned to have it be the product series that would break my heart (and part of my wallet, as over time I had paid for a number of pieces of mecha art to use), until David Jarvis came along.Reality Deviants had been putting out a series of single mecha PDFs called OGL Mecha that I thought were pretty cool. On a complete whim, one of those “why not” moments, I emailed David to see if he would be interested in collaborating on a modification of his OGL Mecha series, morphing it into the brand I had already been at work to get off the ground. I explained to him my idea of DaVinci Labs, what I wanted to accomplish with it, and the plan I had for our collaboration. I honestly expected to be told that it was neat, but no, thank you. To my surprise, David loved the idea, and wanted in. 

With the help of our mutual friend/freelancer/uber-helper Mark Gedak, David took the raw materials I gave him for this first issue and expanded them with excellent new material that further developed the concept of DaVinci Labs, and ended up with this awesome product. Thanks to David Jarvis and Mark Gedak, DaVinci Labs is now a reality, and my heart’s happy as hell.

We are already at work on further releases, so keep an eye out for more innovation from DaVinci Labs, A Renaissance in Mechanization. (TM)