Pavis & Big Rubble Companion: The Directors' Cut Relaunch

[Ian A. Thomson]

First of the last thresholds just passed - Just five mins ago I finished writing the last brand new section of material for Vol. 06. It was a Holiday Glorantha outline of an (as they say in Click Bait) place that will surprise you (and as far as I know has never been detailed before) that features in an important scenario

Pretty soon we'll be into the finishing touches of the practical side of Vol. 06. It's still going to be a few weeks before it will be released, as there's a lot to check and double-check, but the actual written content edited and formatted to first full draft should be complete within a week. Which of course is a great threshold to reach!!

Remaining now (and no rush if any of the awesome and hugely-appreciated volunteers working on this see this post - I envisage at least another 5 weeks of all my own reviewing before its time to consider putting out the first public PDF) is:

Editing & Additional ideas  to be returned for one major scenario that one of the most ruthless editors is working on (And to be clear, their input is deeply appreciated, and the scenario is one that needed a LOT of rewriting which i did, and still needs these improvements, so this wait for their fine work is a very good thing!)

Proofing to be returned for several other smaller pieces (and edited in of course)

Three (hopefully even four) significant illustrations to be completed

Completion of another Holiday Glorantha piece. This one is better known and closer to home, but also as far as I know has never been well-detailed, so a fair bit of work still to do. Probably half-done currently I'd say

Expansion/Adaptation Notes of a relatively small scenario from another source. Not a big job that one, as the source is back in print, so i can just refer people to that

Expansion/Adaptation Notes for the epic Cradle scenario. I already have great notes from previously, but they need to be edited in, corrected and formatted. So, again comparatively not so much work left to do. Though I want to make sure to do a good job here

 

Edited August 5 by Ian A. Thomson

[Ian A. Thomson]

Extinct Praxian Herbeasts?

Hi Folks

I've seen a list of them somewhere and just spent 15mins searching for it

I got writing and editing to do, so am putting that aside and hoping someone who sees this knows where such a list is

Thank you

EDIT: Was directed to what I needed :)

Edited August 15 by Ian A. Thomson

[metcalph]

6 minutes ago, Ian A. Thomson said:

Extinct Praxian Herbeasts?

Hi Folks

I've seen a list of them somewhere and just spent 15mins searching for it

Cults of Prax p28 and Cults of Runequest: The Earth Goddesses p79

Quote

The other five are
priestesses of the lost, hidden, or minor tribes: High Priestesses,
respectively, of the Rhino, Plains Elk, Nosehorn, Longnose, and
the Zebra. 

 

 

[svensson]

HEY! Don't you be muckin' about with my tank ponies, man! 😆

 

[Ian A. Thomson]

UPDATES

VOL 04A

Waiting just for one final map image to be done before we send the PoD PDF off for processing

VOL 05

Slogging away on the two final big tasks of Vol. 05

1) One scenario is benefitting from some rewrites. Not a lot of work in terms of wordage, but a lot in terms of revising a bunch of the encounters with new options. (This is one of the old scenarios from the series that played totally fine and fun at the time, but wasn't written up very well in the series. So I feel impelled to kick it up a notch this time and despite all the efforts so far just went: 'Nah, it's not yet good enough.')

2) Half of a Holiday Glorantha location still to finish

Otherwise, very rock and roll. Even trimmed down it is going to end up about 330 pages

This will then take another few weeks for all final proofing and the last few images that are underway by far better artists than I am

Edited August 16 by Ian A. Thomson

[Mark Mohrfield]

Do any of these works contain information on the various Troll clans of the Rubble?

[Ian A. Thomson]

2 hours ago, Mark Mohrfield said:

Do any of these works contain information on the various Troll clans of the Rubble?

There is a summary of the troll info in Vol. 02 (pp140/141)

The rest of the material is already written and will be in Vol. 06 if there is room, and Vol. 07 if not

It needs revising but mainly just to fit RQ:G, and may need reformatting, and will definitely need proofing when it's done. If you want to put your hand-up for any of that I can bring it forward in the task list even if it doesn't hit a book for a while

Due to the massive amount of space this all takes, a few parts (such as the troll clans details) that should ideally be out sooner just don't have room, and so are delayed until the scenarios they are most associated with

I hope to have room for the troll stuff in Vol. 06, but its doubtful

Unfortunately occasionally we have to view the series as a whole, even though it's not all done yet. IE that people in the future who want more details troll info can look in the later Vol. with the troll details in - even if they haven't reached that point in the Campaign yet

We are basically setting the trolls up in this campaign as more deadly and dangerous. IE adventurer parties don't just go down there to seek some loot, because the trolls will capture and eat people. Larger parties that go there just encourage a greater aggressive response. Basically it's almost as dangerous as trying to go into the Garden

Edited August 22 by Ian A. Thomson

[Ian A. Thomson]

MAP PERSON SOUGHT FOR ONE DUNGEON MAP

Hi Folks

Three wonderful volunteers are working on maps & plans for Vol. 05 right now, and there is one more set of interior plans required to be produced

I'm working on the plan now, and am hoping someone can copy my really crap Photoshop creation into a style similar to Five Eyes Caves in Borderlands, or Nosferal's Lair (Vol. 03, p174). or the old Chaos Lair (Vol. 04A, p91)

Better is also great if you have the skills, but those examples are fine

I can put it through a Photoshop filter at the end to spruce it up, but I'm hoping someone has the time and decent basic skills to make a decent attempt for me to do that with

Since I mentioned art volunteers above, I'll also mention the many proofers and formatters and additional ideas people with gratitude as well

I've said it before, and I'll say it again - Thank you so much. It would be literally impossible to finish this project without you all. I've nearly given up at least three times cos of the insane amount of work to do, so the wonderful volunteers of their time and energy are directly responsible for the project still continuing! :)

Edited August 22 by Ian A. Thomson

[Mark Mohrfield]

2 hours ago, Ian A. Thomson said:

We are basically setting the trolls up in this campaign as more deadly and dangerous. IE adventurer parties don't just go down there to seek some loot, because the trolls will capture and eat people. Larger parties that go there just encourage a greater aggressive response. Basically it's almost as dangerous as trying to go into the Garden

I was thinking of using the Trolls as the PCs. Hopefully the info will be useful for that as well.

[Ian A. Thomson]

25 minutes ago, Mark Mohrfield said:

I was thinking of using the Trolls as the PCs. Hopefully the info will be useful for that as well.

Yes, it totally will. Lots of good stuff there; plenty of details. It will be difficult to fit a party of only troll PCs into this specific campaign if they are the only PCs, but no problem to have one in the party

The bulk of them represent traditional foes that must be bested in a major chapter of the campaign later as part of reclaiming back Pavis for the humans of the Old City.

Some of the scenarios could be adapted for trolls, but the main motivations built into the campaign are from being part of the Old Pavic culture

 

[Erol of Backford]

13 hours ago, Ian A. Thomson said:

It will be difficult to fit a party of only troll PCs into this specific campaign if they are the only PCs, but no problem to have one in the party

Maybe they are Arkati trolls and or one of them is and has access to Shape-Change Troll - Human. Not sure how the whole voice-speech thing would sort out but might be fun to role play.

Makes me think of the Movie Coming to America when Eddie Murphy plays an old white barber. Where's the soon ah-haa!

How much fun is that!?

[Ian A. Thomson]

Thanks to Nick for once again doing the transmogrification of Vol. 4A's PDF to PoD format. There was a big delay from my side of things as I was considering adding a new image before it went to PoD. It proved not possible to do that anytime soon, so we're going ahead without it. (It wasn't anything critical, and will be in a future volume anyway.)

So, today, Vol. 04A's PoD file has just been sent off to Drivethru for approval :)

Vol. 05 still needs some more images to be completed, but that's all ongoing. The last article proved problematic and just didn't flow, but I've finally worked out how to make it sparkle, and so am powering through the last pages of that. (Which means the actual written content should be done in a few days.)

Edited August 28 by Ian A. Thomson

[Ian A. Thomson]

Last article of Vol. 05 finally completed and checked through!!!

Still a few things remaining to be completed for this book, so could be another few weeks yet, but we are on the last stretch

You can see the check-off list of remaining work in this thread if you are interested :)

https://basicroleplaying.org/topic/24464-the-land-of-the-giants-vol-05-of-the-pbrcdc-nearly-done

 

[Ian A. Thomson]

Vol. 04A's proof PoD has been shipped to the ever-helpful Nick, so fingers crossed that this arrives without any issues and then it will be available shortly. (There aren't usually any issues, so we should be good, but there's always a chance that the printing has failed or an image not reproduced OK or something, so we have to wait and see.)

I'm working on the Rough Guide to Pavis City now, though I think that will be Vol. 06A rather than Vol. 06. Huge amounts of the content are done and laid-out already, and just being proofed, and other parts are well-advanced. So I'm chomping into it in order to get another book done fairly quickly, which will leave me with only two left most likely. :)

Also, all of the written contents of Vol. 05 are completed, proofed, laid-out and triple-checked, and so we just wait on the last three images, and it's good to go.

(Once again I want to clarify that if any of those wonderful volunteers working on the last images see this post, there is NO pressure. Take your time. I'm just extremely appreciative that you are assisting, and the book will be ready when it is ready.) This part of the post is just an updated to let people know where things are at. :)

[Ian A. Thomson]

Proof copy for 4A (The Strangers in Prax Companion) PoD arrived with Nick and looks mighty fine. Will arrange with Fabian to get the hardcopy option active asap :)

Also the final version of the cover for Vol. 06 just arrived in my inbox an hour ago thanks to the epic artistry of Dario, and I've put the border, text etc on it, so here's a low-res preview...

Edited September 16 by Ian A. Thomson

[Ian A. Thomson]

The extra free PDFs documents has just been updated

It has now been split into different pdfs for ease of reference, and all of the lists have been updated to reflect Vol. 05 better, which had some unexpected page/content shifts

On my screen the cover image preview hasn't changed, but that can take a day or two sometimes, but the new contents are definitely there (along with the old file, which we will delete soon)

https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/248ru9kidmgoofwlo3unn/ExtraMaterialIntroPage_P-BRCDC_JPG.jpg?rlkey=pg141f1s5nw9x3kprp2gewpbi&dl=0

Edited September 20 by Ian A. Thomson

[jajagappa]

14 hours ago, Ian A. Thomson said:

It has now been split into different pdfs for ease of reference, and all of the lists have been updated

One minor comment/thought - with the very long file names, DriveThru ends up cutting off the information about version # or date that you have appended and thus difficult to determine which files are new/updated vs. old (without downloading everything again).

[Ian A. Thomson]

Ah. I can see all the file names on my screen

Oh, maybe it's different for phones or something :(

The top one above with the number is there by mistake. I saw it yesterday when I checked, and I've already asked Fabian to delete it when he can

The others are just the different parts, so once that one is deleted that will partly solve the problem (The main page description also clarifies that there are four files)

Oh yes, and also someone who is not me added Tentacles Press at the start :) I shall ask this unnamed person to put this at the end instead in future updates, as it looks as if the full titles would be visible without this

Edited September 20 by Ian A. Thomson

[jajagappa]

3 hours ago, Ian A. Thomson said:

Oh, maybe it's different for phones or something 😞

No, that's from my laptop, but it's not a widescreen. But it's one of the challenges I find with a lot of titles.

[Ian A. Thomson]

2 hours ago, jajagappa said:

No, that's from my laptop, but it's not a widescreen. But it's one of the challenges I find with a lot of titles.

Ah yes, mine is widescreen. Will bear all this in mind for changes next time there is an update

[Baron]

I even have problems reading the titles of some blog articles, both on my PC and on my phone. There's one in particular that has a long preamble that he uses on every post, so that I have no idea what the current topic is -- that's the part that's always cut off!

[Ian A. Thomson]

STRANGERS IN PRAX COMPANION NOW AVAILABLE AS POD :)

Thanks to Nick's fine conversion work, and Fabian's stirling efforts working with the increasingly-tricky DTRPG system, the Strangers in Prax Companion is now available as a hardcopy.

https://www.drivethrurpg.com/en/product/483301/vol-4a-the-strangers-in-prax-companion-runequest

 

Also a new free PDF:

In related news, Gary Norton is busy creating some easy-reference guides for GMs in Pavis, and said that he would be happy for the P&BRC:DC series to include some of his work in the free PDF handout bundle. So  there is now also a fifth PDF there as of a few hours ago. (A large document of locations & who you might find there, temples & associated worshippers, and lists of options for those seeking accommodation or other services, All with page references to the campaign series Volumes, the Pavis PoD and 'Pavis: Gateway to Adventure')

 

Vol. 01 PDF Updated for the Final Time

In his collating of page references, Gary noted several small errors in Vol. 01, and sent them to me at a moment when I was feeling perfectionist. So the Vol. 01 PDF is now updated. You gotta stop somewhere, so that's the final version.

 

Edited September 23 by Ian A. Thomson

[Ian A. Thomson]

VOLUNTEERS ARE AWESOME!!

I do this from time to time, and I don't feel like stopping!

This series has proved massively more work than I anticipated, and without the help of the volunteers of all sorts I would definitely have had to stop at least twice!!!

As I put things in order for the final volumes and reflect on the work still to do (formatting, corrections, expansions, layout and the new articles) I am pausing to feel a LOT of gratitude for everyone who pitches in.

This would all be impossible without you!!!