Dig a Thousand Holes Publishing

That’s right, it’s all available now. Get ‘em while they’re hot!

Dread House (requires Jenga to play)
Physical Edition (includes PDF): $20 plus $5 shipping & handling
PDF Only (some assembly required): $10

Time & Temp
Unbound Edition (includes PDF): $20 plus $5 shipping & handling
Paperless Office Edition (PDF Only): $10

Can’t decide if you want to play a vampire game or a time travel game? Well, here’s your chance to do both. Time & Temp: Paperless Office Edition is now bundled with Annalise: The Final Edition in a promotion we’re calling The Time Immortal Bundle. Get both PDFs now for only $15.

Then you can combine the two into an awesome weekend of gaming.

Here’s how you do it:

Night 1: Put together a Time & Temp game in which the temps are sent back in to the late 1800s to prevent a time traveling Stephanie Meyer from convincing Bram Stoker that Dracula would be so much cooler with sparkles.

Night 2: Put together an Annalise game in which Bram Stoker, right after being saved from a fate worse than death by the temps, gets involved in a tryst with a real life vampire that inspires him to write Dracula.

Next Weekend: Rinse and repeat.

The good news is we sold out of Dread House at GenCon.

The bad news is we sold out of Dread House at GenCon.

Emily and I are currently on a post-GenCon vacation, but will be returning to home base next week. On Tuesday (August 17th, 2010) we’ll be set up to take orders and print more. Stay tuned for more details.

In case you’re not going to GenCon and won’t be stopping by ye olde Design Matters booth (#2100), here’s a sneak peak at that physical product:

I’ve hit that spot with Swords Without Master where I have to decide if I want it done for GenCon or if I want it done right. And that’s not a real decision. So, alas, there will be no Sw/oM at the Design Matters booth this year.

As it got closer and closer to the wire, I just found myself making more and more compromises. And at some point it drifted too far from my original vision in a way I became less and less comfortable with. So I’ve moved the deadline to November of 2010 to give me time to uncompromise it and making the game I want.

If you’re at GenCon and looking for Swords Without Master, please do stop by the Design Matters booth (#2100). We’ll have a small preview of the game there to browse. And I’ll be handing out coupons for a discount on the November release of the Sw/oM book.

It’s not all bad news. Dread House is done and will be at GenCon along with more physical copies of Time & Temp. So there’s plenty to be had from Dig a Thousand Holes at the Design Matters booth this year.

So let’s talk about this game.

What is Swords Without Master?

• It’s a sword & sorcery game, with a focus on the short story end of the genre particularly inspired by Fritz Leiber’s Fafhrd & Gray Mouser series.
• It is very prep-flexible. Swords requires absolutely no prep whatsoever, but is able to accommodate those lovingly detailed maps, carefully constructed NPC communities and a well designed monsters you’ve sunk all that time into.
• It’s a fast playing game. Like a short story, it covers a lot of ground in very little time. Typical Swords games take about two to three hours, but can cover years of the characters’ adventures or the longest night of their lives.
• It’s a descendant of the game MonkeyDome. You should check it out, it’s free. Swords Without Master greatly expands upon the MonkeyDome foundation, but it is still firmly set in it.

What will be in the book?

There will be six main chapters and a ton of appendices.

• Tale Yet Untold Of–An introductory chapter to get you familiar with key concepts and a word of advice for experienced role-players as well as advice for those coming at it with more of a story game background.
• The City of Fire & Coin–An introductory adventure that will teach you the rules as you go along. It’s designed for you and three friends to just open the book and go.
• The Basic Game–The complete game presented in a manner that’s easy to reference during a game if need be.
• Crows at the Crossroads–An example of play of an entire session from beginning to end, covering all the major rules.
• The Advance Game–Supplementary rules that aren’t necessary to the game, but can be useful at times.
• The Book of Thunder & Storm–A collection of monsters, villains, traps and other perils that can be encountered in the world of Swords Without Master.
• The Appendices–Lots and lots of additional material that can help you get your game together, including how to play it on the road, how to play it without an Overplayer (something akin to a GM), and several types of random adventure generation.

When will it be available?

November 2010.