Black Gate

One of the things I’ve always enjoyed in the realm of fantasy has been the sword. There’s just something so pure about a good blade at your side, and if that weapon is somehow touched with magic or fate then all the better.

Something so ancient and primal is attached to a sword, and even when the world has outdated their use they still find their way into science fiction just because of the nostalgic power they evoke. Space pirates have swords ala Captain Harlock, and Jedi carry their glowing Lightsabers ‘which are not as clumsy or random as a blaster‘, to name just a couple of instances where time couldn’t deny man’s need for a blade at their side.

I myself have dreamed of blades, forged them with my imagination and made them come alive in both my writings and my games over the past thirty years. There is a power in such creation, and it goes back beyond my ability to remember my early childhood yet I see my own reflection in the actions of my son as he started swinging sticks in phantom duels as early as age three.

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There’s an argument brewing again here at Black Gate’s L.A. offices, and yes, it’s about the Avengers. Ryan Harvey, Mr. Captain America himself, seems to think it’s ok that Black Widow is the token female member of the Avengers in the upcoming movie, while I ardently believe that Wasp should have gotten the nod.

Now that’s not to say there’s anything wrong with Black Widow, or Scarlet Johansson for that matter, but Wasp WAS a founding member of the team and she’s certainly one of my favorite comic book heroines.

There are several reason for this, primarily because she was the very first comic book heroine I had a crush on when I bought my first comic, Avengers #195. But putting first crushes aside, there is another reason I love Wasp, and that’s because she isn’t static.

In the world of animation, be it on TV or in comic books, there is a static formula for most characters involved, the basis of which is uniform. It’s rare that a character gets to change their clothes, and for some reason that always rubbed me that wrong way.

Wasp, however, has certainly had the most uniform changes of any comic book hero ever, and I truly dig that about here because it makes her more human.

I remember watching the G.I. Joe cartoon when I was a kid and thinking, “You know, Cover Girl was a freaking super model and she’s always in the same damn outfit!” And don’t get me started on Scarlet, bless her, because she had to wear the same stupid unitard on every assault. Then there was Lady Jaye who looked great in her army gear but you’d think she might change it up a bit once in a while.

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So a bit over a month ago I started my first every Kickstarter, a retro-fantasy book launch with Jeff Easley that ended earlier this week. It was a very interesting month and as people seem interested in Kickstarter’s and the possibilities that the Kickstarter site provides, I thought I’d continue blogging about it on Saturdays as long as I find out new and applicable facts concerning the program.

That being said, I’ll take you into the process once more and even append some of the numbers I initially reported during my first discourse into this topic.

This post will be about percentages, and how they can affect your project.

When I started my Kickstarter, my pledge numbers [which is to say those who became backers of the project and gave money] were mostly rolling in from feeds on Facebook. This was a cool fact, and showed that viral marketing through your social network does pay off. The percentage was roughly 70% Facebook and 30% Kickstarter internal marketing, and I was happy with that. As the month continued, however, the numbers started to realign with less and less Facebook traffic and more and more Kickstarter original pledging taking place.

Why is this, you might ask? Well, it’s an interesting thing. You see, Kickstarter has a tag it calls ‘Discover’ on its Home Page, and from that tag you can find various categories that might interest you as a possible backer. There are a bevy of them including Art, Music, Photography, Publishing, etc. One of these categories is ‘Recently Launched’ which is a nice way for Kickstarter to promote new projects and give them a bit of a boost when they start out. Still, as a Kickstarter page is laid out, a viewer can see only three projects across the top of their screen per category and perhaps another three below those before the ‘cut’. These first three projects featured at the top of the page are called ‘Staff Picks’ which are prime real estate for any project looking to draw the eye of a backer.

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Ok, so I don’t get to game as much as I like, and that’s a shame, but there are still times when I do get to have fun with RPGs. I mean, I’ve been doing this for 28 years, and during that period the bulk of what I’ve run as a Dungeon Master has been all home brew, which in gamer terms means I made it up. There is something to be said for the creativity of doing so, and as an imagination centered guy I get a great kick out of creating adventures, timelines, histories, legends, and anything else you can name.

That being said, I’ve also had the opportunity to sit back and use someone else’s creative spark to frame my adventures when I DM. In Old School terms this means using a module, and many and many again famed ones exist from the 1980s when D&D was new to the mass populace and DMs were raw and could use a little help when driving their business.

I’d like to say in my time within the genre ‘I’ve played them all’, which of course isn’t true, but I will debate the concept that I’ve played all the ones that truly matter… Yet for all their old school wonder, I was always on the lookout for something, anything, in today’s market that could rival the simple genius that were those original supplements.

Enter Paizo’s Pathfinder Adventure Paths. With ‘Edition Wars’ in full swing and Wizards of the Coast trying to rally a bloodied banner with 5th Edition, I’m not going to disparage any game that helps creative people gather around a table and share face time for fun, but I will hold up Paizo’s Pathfinder as an example of what ‘good’ really is in today’s RPG market.

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Earlier this week I had all my AD&D 1E hardcover books face out on a shelf in my home office for another project, each of the Jeff Easley covers staring at me while I worked. It was a truly inspiring set of images to have at your flank while you composed fantasy literature, but I think the best part was that later in the day my five year old son walked into the room and smiled as he stared up at them.

“Which one do you like?” I asked, knowing full well what his answer would be.
“This one,” he replied, pointing to the top shelf where Easley’s red dragon fighting with four pegasi on the cover of Monster Manual stood at attention.

Yep, of course my son the vegetarian and animal activist would pick that one, even if the animals involved are all imaginary.

A conversation followed with various questions like, “That man is going to save his friend, right?” for the cover of Wilderness Survival Guide, and, “I know the ninja is going to get away.” for the cover of Oriental Adventures.

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The summer of my sophomore year in college a friend of mine bought a copy of TSR’s Dark Sun Campaign Setting circa 1991. As I’d just gotten into my newest comic book obsession, I didn’t have the cash to spend on RPGs so I was content to let him spend his money on the game as I relegated myself to being a player.

I found the world fun, surprisingly new for stodgy old TSR, and although the campaign I played in ended abruptly when my human gladiator decided he’d had enough of a Halfling in the party and clove him in two, it was still something that stuck with me for many years afterward.

To me, the demise of the setting in 1996 revolved more around the rise of Magic the Gathering and less about TSR’s new age of design that was being brought forth around 1990. This isn’t to say that those works are innately perfect and simply died as the foundation of the industry was eroded away because I often found them lacking, particularly in the department of art.

Now certainly I couldn’t have dreamed that the newest member of TSR’s pit, Gerald Brom, would go on to be one of the greatest fantasy artists of his generation, but he did bring a very different feel to this new universe.
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