#RPGaDAY2015, Day 12: Favorite RPG Illustrator

by ThomasNo Comments

This one is a bit odd. In the past two days of #RPGaDAY, we’ve had favorite writer and favorite publisher, so we’re pointing at specific people (or entities comprised of people), but today we’re looking at Favorite RPG Illustration instead of illustrator.

I’m going to pretend that’s a mistake.

FFG Star Wars Ace Pilot
FFG Star Wars’ Age of Rebellion’s Ace Pilot. Man, even the background frame element is fantastic.
Age of Rebellion Core Rulebook, page 49
Just look at that page. It’s amazing!

For art direction, I don’t think anyone is doing it better than Zoë Robinson of Fantasy Flight Games. The only games I’m currently getting from FFG are things in the Star Wars Age of Rebellion line (probably I’ll pick up Force and Destiny) ((Must check my store credit at Bullmoose… Oh, they don’t have it yet. Yet.)) and the Android: Netrunner card game. Both have a lot of representation of women and people of color ((that last one is a bit easier to accommodate in the Star Wars universe, but you’d be amazed at how many SF properties have a whole bunch of white humans running around with their laser swords)), yet it doesn’t seem to be overt that FFG titles are specifically using women and POC and eschewing white males in their artwork. Instead, they’re just there, and they’re just regular people in the setting. Go ahead, do an image search for star wars age of rebellion. Lots of logos, and there’s a shot of Leia in a shooting stance, protecting Luke. ((Which is on the cover of AoR’s core rulebook, no less!)) And you scroll down and there’s female characters pretty much mixed in with male characters on an equal basis.

It’s not just having a diverse set of figures in the artwork, either. It’s the artwork itself. Take a look to the right. That’s page 49 of Age of Rebellion. When I came across that, I was thinking that it was a nice way to do a full art page and integrate typography with the X-Wing pilot ((Who just happens to be female.)) trying to pull her R2 unit from her downed craft. But then I look up and there, above the atmosphere, through the atmospheric perspective, the battle rages on. Wow. ((This might just be my favorite RPG illustration. Huh.))

All the artwork is like that in Age of Rebellion (and the other FFG Star Wars products I’ve seen). All this art is original. No mining the publicity photos or movie stills for this product. No, everything — including the images that look like they’re taken from the movie series — everything is created just for the series.

There are few other illustrators that come to mind: Juan Ochoa has been doing some amazing things on the Magpie Games titles I’ve worked on — The Fate Codex and Urban Shadows. I’ve been on The Fate Codex for over a year and a half. Over that time, I’ve seen his work improve. It’s pretty darn near fantastic.

Ochoa's linework from The Fate Codex
Ochoa’s linework from The Fate Codex. Look at the faces on the zombies on the right! Just look at ’em!

Over on the Firefly RPG, Levon Jihanian has been providing excellent work for the headers to the adventures. This piece of Levon’s is from the “Bucking the Tiger” adventure.

Jihanian's work from Firefly
Jihanian’s work from Firefly. One of my favorite pieces from that line.

Oh, I just found something on Levon’s site about how that above image was created!

#RPGaDAY, Last Year: Day 12 – Oldest RPG You Still Read or Play

by ThomasNo Comments

Day 12! This time last year, everyone is leaving for Gen Con and our topic for #RPGaDAY yesterday was the oldest RPG you still read or play.

#RPGaDAY
“I’m going to bust out Twilight: 2000 and read about Soviet troop movements!” No. I’m not going to do that.

Man, this is proving difficult to answer! I have some older games, but I don’t really play them. And of those older games, I reference some earlier Shadowrun books when I do that other Shadowrun game.

PZO9054_500Maybe Pathfinder, but that’s just the Adventure Paths, really, to get an idea of the type of 5e game I’d like to run for the family. Pathfinder doesn’t seem that old, even though when I look back at Curse of the Crimson Throne, it’s only 2008.

I am guessing that prompt is hoping I pick something from the 1980s or something at least a decade old, but I just don’t go back and read RPG books for pleasure – maybe for reference, but even then…

Maybe Mayfair Games’ edition of Chill, but probably not, because (again) that’s reference. But then, that means that going through the Pathfinder Adventure Paths is reference, too.

When I get the itch to run a game, I’ll look back over some older things, like Godlike or Unknown Armies or get the Blue Planet books out again. But I more often think about how to fit a game concept into Fate.

No, I think it’s more of the older ideas for the game that I read. I’ve always wanted to run a game in the setting of Cherie Priest’s Clockwork Century novels, so I’ll read those instead of a game system. The Dresden Files Accelerated Edition is going into playtest soon, so I’ll probably read the novels instead of the Dresden Files RPG. Stuff like that.

It’s not a good answer, but it’s probably the best I’ve got right now.

Well Thomas, it’s been a year. Did you come up with a better answer?

Not really. For example, over the past few days, I’ve been redoing the basement. This involved tearing down all the modular shelving and moving them to the garage, which meant I had to move all the stuff off those shelves first. One of those shelves is dedicated to roleplaying games—the ones that I’ve kept, anyway. They’re on that shelf in the hopes that I’ll revisit them again, or in some cases, for the first time: Godlike, Blue Planet, Shadowrun, Dresden Files, Buffy, Pathfinder ((Pathfinder: Not really. I can’t see myself wanting to go back to that system. But it’s there because of the three Adventure Paths as idea fodder for other fantasy games.)), Chill (Mayfair’s version. Chill, 3rd Edition is up in the office bookshelf.), and several adventures.

But have I actually gone through any of them in the past few months? You know, to read?

No.

Shadowrun, maybe? I guess I did reference some old SR2/3 things in the past few months, but I didn’t play SR2/3.

Hmmm…

I may have to revisit this next year.

#RPGaDAY2015, Day 11: Favorite RPG Writer

by ThomasNo Comments
Sorry, but I just had to change it from that horrible pink color. Click through if you want to grab the color-shifted fullsized image.
Sorry, but I just had to change it from that horrible pink color. Click through if you want to grab the color-shifted fullsized image.

Regarding a Favorite RPG Writer, I don’t really pay much attention to that, or at least as much as others do. See, I do graphic design and book layout and I’ve always equated it to a letterer’s job in comic books: if you do it right, nobody notices. And because I work behind the scenes (although usually coming in at the end of a project), I see a lot going on in creating one of those big RPG books. Sections are written by different people and have to be rewritten to have a book’s “voice”: chapters three and seven have to sound like they’re written by the same people, even if the two writers have never met. There’s the project manager and the editors and proofreaders keeping all this straight. They’re also the invisible hands on a project. They do a good job and you don’t notice.

This process subtly changes the output of the writing. Bob’s contributions on the Big Book of Laser Rockets and Mega Swords RPG and his work on Small Press Fantasy might have different feelings, different impressions. What can I really say about Bob, besides from what I know from him on social media and the moments I’ve run into him at Big Con? Well, I can look at some of the rules that he uses in his work: differences or similarities. I can’t even tell if Bob likes the Oxford comma, because the editors decided to use it in the Eclipse Comics Superhero RPG but not in Harryhausen Mythological Roleplaying. It can be difficult to get a sense of a writer.

That is, unless the writer independently publishes her own work, generally doesn’t seem to collaborate on her games, and keeps the same editor(s) across her career — the same guy that gets her voice and helps to make it shine through her games.

So I guess it’s probably John Wick.

4216523-0945709326-john-
No, not this one.

Play-Dirty-2-CoverNot only does he have a writing style that I enjoy, he was also the guest of honor at the first Gamemasters’ Conference that we held in Tucson. He got up, delivered a great talk about some things he learned running games, and I helped to fuck up a magic trick he was performing. ((I seem to always screw something up when John’s around. It’s seriously not on purpose.)) I’m always interested when John has a new thing out, although nearly everything I have that John wrote seems to be short form: I have both Play Dirty essay collections, several of his little games (including the Big Book of Little Games), and even the What’s That Smell? adventure for D&D 3.5. But I don’t have any of his bigger games, like 7th Sea or Legend of the Five Rings, having been aware of them far too late to delve into the massive backstory. ((If I had come across L5R back when the game started, I know I would have thrown way too much money at Alderac.))

Coincidence: See last post. It’s John Wick day.