Chronicling a Dark Year [Monday Meeting Notes]

Monday Meeting, News

Funny, it only hit me now after writing it that the blog title means more big-picture, real-world than just Onyx Path’s publishing year. Huh.

Actually, next week I’ll be taking a look back at the whole year, but this week I’m just focusing on one thing. Our intrepid archivist, Impish Ian Watson loves to hit us with historical tidbits about past releases, and this week was a very cool nugget from our man north of the border: it was a year ago we introduced the Chronicles of Darkness brand to everyone after weeks of working with the very new at the time White Wolf Publishing.

If ya’ll recall, this was something that WWP needed us to do to further differentiate the World of Darkness and the New World of Darkness as they began their focus on a new edition for World of Darkness. Since we really feel that the second editions of lines like Vampire: the Requiem have evolved the lines into settings and games very different from their WoD inspirations, we at Onyx Path are very happy that we can shine a spotlight on those lines with the Chronicles of Darkness overall brand, while still nurturing the World of Darkness with our 20th Anniversary Edition lines.

Wow, that’s a lot of bolds and italics and branding talk. Pretty vital for us as we try and keep things straight, maybe less interesting for you.

So let’s instead look at this list of Chronicles of Darkness projects released this year, excluding merchandise items:

– Chronicles of Darkness: Revised Storytelling System Rulebook

– 12 Days of Onyx Condition Cards

– Chronicles of Darkness Condition, Numina, and Dread Power Cards

– Werewolf: The Forsaken 2nd Edition Condition Cards

– Dreams of Avarice

– Demon Storytellers Guide

– Beast: The Primordial

– The Primordial Feast Fiction Anthology

– Chronicles of Darkness: Dark Eras

– The Pack

– Mage: The Awakening 2nd Edition

– Curse of the Blue Nile Fiction Anthology

– Tales of the Dark Eras Fiction Anthology

– Mage: The Awakening 2nd Edition Condition and Numina Cards

– Dark Eras: A Handful of Dust (Promethean chapter stand-alone)

– Chronicles of Darkness Tilt Cards

– Beast: The Primoridal Condition Cards

– Promethean: The Created 2nd Edition

– Chronicles of Darkness: Hurt Locker

– Secrets of the Covenants

I think these are more or less in sequence through the year. Some smaller books, a solid raft of big core books and a gargantuan Dark Eras book for all the game lines, a few fiction anthologies so folks can dip into the lines when they don’t have a game to play, and a bunch of various kinds of cards to help smooth playing. This looks like a really healthy start for Chronicles of Darkness!

One thing I want to point out, and expect to talk a bit more about in the weeks to come (but not the week between Christmas and New Years as we are off that week), is how many of our projects have started as Kickstarter stretch goals and why. And also, why we need to talk more about these additional projects added to the schedule, as I think their coming out of KSs may be counting against them once they go on sale.

Out of this list, we have:

– Dreams of Avarice

– The Primordial Feast Fiction Anthology

– Chronicles of Darkness: Dark Eras (partially)

– Curse of the Blue Nile Fiction Anthology

– Tales of the Dark Eras Fiction Anthology

– Dark Eras: A Handful of Dust (Promethean chapter stand-alone)

Which is nowhere near as many as those coming from the WoD KSs or Exalted‘s, but worth noting anyway as a part of how we build releases and what goodies are out there for any given game line. But it does bring up two things. The first is a question: would you be interested in us starting to Kickstart projects like Hunter: the Vigil 2nd Edition for Chronicles of Darkness in 2017?

And second, last week we forwarded White Wolf Publishing‘s Survey to the folks signed up for our Onyx Path Mailing List. We got some interesting feedback, but the one issue some folks had that I’d like to address is the focus on WoD in the questions. Some of our community indicated that they felt ignored or dissed because of this focus. I just want to re-emphasize that WWP is focusing on WoD now, as the first brand they want work on, not forever. They chose to work on the part of the White Wolf IPs that they know best, and that had the largest media footprint outside the tabletop RPG community. Because, you know, they’d like to get some big-ticket licenses out there so they can keep exploring these game worlds for years to come, rather than having to sell them off if one of their plans falls through.

So that is the focus of the information WWP need from their Survey.

You might be confused because I didn’t choose to pick one of the WW lines to focus on when Onyx Path first got the WW license. That’s partly because I helped make all of these worlds back in the day, so how could I choose, but mostly because I recognized that we have a widely varied community in terms of who plays what lines, and needed to assure everyone that their favorites were coming back under Onyx Path‘s care. Whether that was the best or smartest choice, as we certainly have a lot of lines to juggle and dealing with all of them has certainly contributed to our delivery delays, we almost never hear that “White Wolf is dead” pronouncement that was a real tough PR thing to get past five years ago.

Just can’t overstate how deeply that “fact” had buried itself into the tabletop community’s brain back then, nor what a relief it is that we’ve driven that mantra away.

Check out the crazed Rage Across the Holidays! sale below in the BLURBS! section, and if you haven’t yet, the Advance PDFs for Chronicles of Darkness: Hurt Locker and Secrets of the Covenants for VtR2. They are burning up the virtual shelves as they’ll selling so fast. And for WoD I’m hoping to have V20 Dark Ages Tome of Secrets available as a PoD and PDF for everyone this week if the US Mail doesn’t get jammed up with holiday packages and delay my POD proofs.

And finally, related to that, please let me mention once again that 99.9% of our projects, and certainly anything that is a good sized book, first come out as Advance or Backer PDFs so we can allow feedback from our whole community or KS backers, respectively, then we create a final PDF based on the feedback we get from everyone who got the initial PDF. From that final PDF we build PoD files for physical copy, Print on Demand, books. In almost every case our projects will come out in PoD form, because that is a vital part of our business model. And then we also will build traditional printing files from the same PDF file, if we are getting some books printed traditionally. Our Kickstarters are the focus for the traditionally printed books.

So, while we may not traditionally print every project, we will 99.9% of the time have PDF and PoD versions of every project.

Thanks for letting me point that out again.

BLURBS!

KICKSTARTER!

We’re exploring card game Kickstarters, packaging, and components, for Prince’s Gambit. We need to get the KS video, which will also feature the example of play, done. Right now, we are scheduling doing that the week before the holidays kick in and it is looking really cool. Plane flights have been arranged so we can get Justin into the proper setting and we’ve got a group of players ready to demonstrate how the game plays. Things look good, but if we can’t pull it together for starting the KS in January, then the Monarchies of Mau KS may be our next.

The folks who are working with us on the Scion 2e LARP rules, Damocles Thread Development, are running a Kickstarter right now for their card based game of community theater drama, hijinks, and betrayal called Curtain Call. It looks to be a fun party game, with a line-up of fake plays you need to put on like Big Box Store of Horrors or Nightmare on 34th Street. (Full disclosure: the gang asked me to do the playbill cover art for Nightmare on 34th Street, a mashup of Nightmare Before Christmas and Miracle on 34th Street!) If all the crazy hijinks that go into pulling together a stage production are your thing, check it out and get your name in lights: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/205007809/curtain-call-2

ON SALE!

RAGE ACROSS THE HOLIDAYS!!!

Starting today and running until December 26th (Merry Xmas!), you can save 50% for almost all Werewolf PDFs on DriveThruRPG! We’re talking Apocalypse and Forsaken, old and new! http://www.drivethrurpg.com/sale.php

Keep an eye on our FB, Twitter, and other social media, for more sales and deals during this holiday season!!!

Looking for our Deluxe or Prestige Edition books? Here’s the link to the press release we put out about how Onyx Path is now selling through Indie Press Revolution: http://theonyxpath.com/press-release-onyx-path-limited-editions-now-available-through-indie-press-revolution/

THEY are coming! This Wednesday, the Beast: the Primordial Ready Made Characters arrive at DTRPG in PDF and physical copy PoD versions!

If the cart from the besieged Ye Olde Postal Service makes it through, we will have the PDF and PoD versions of V20 Dark Ages Tome of Secrets available for all and sundry on Wednesday at DTRPG!

The Locker is open; the Chronicles of Darkness: Hurt Locker, that is! The Advance PDF is now available on DTRPG! http://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/199275/Chronicles-of-Darkness-Hurt-Locker

Hurt Locker features:

Treatment of violence in the Chronicles of Darkness . Lasting trauma, scene framing, and other tools for making your stories hurt.

. Lasting trauma, scene framing, and other tools for making your stories hurt. Many new player options, including Merits, supernatural knacks, and even new character types like psychic vampires and sleeper cell soldiers.

Expanded equipment and equipment rules.

Hurt Locker requires the Chronicles of Darkness Rulebook or any other standalone Chronicles of Darkness rulebook such as Vampire: The Requiem, Werewolf: The Forsaken, or Beast: The Primordial to use.

Discover the long-awaited Secrets of the Covenants for Vampire: the Requiem 2nd Edition as we unearth the Advance PDF now on DTRPG! http://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/199280/Secrets-of-the-Covenants

This book includes:

A variety of stories from each of the covenants, all told in their own words.

Never-before revealed secrets, like the fate of the Prince of New Orleans.

New blood sorcery, oaths, and other hidden powers of the covenants.

And for a physical book, this week we travel all the way to the Red Planet for the Cavaliers of Mars Jumpstart: A Festival of Blades, available in PDF and PoD this Wednesday!

We have now added a B&W PoD version of the Endless Ages Vampire Anthology to the existing full color PDF and PoD choices! Celebrating 25 years of personal horror, the eighteen stories in Endless Ages range in style and aesthetics from the very first edition of Vampire released in 1991, all the way to the latest books put out for the 20th Anniversary Edition. http://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/193199/V20-The-Endless-Ages-Anthology

Seek the Cainite Conspiracies, the fiction anthology for V20 Dark Ages, in PDF and PoD physical book formats! http://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/195704/V20-The-Cainite-Conspiracies-Anthology

This collection of short stories features tales by Vampire developers such as Justin Achilli, Eddy Webb, David A. Hill, Jr., and Neall Raemonn Price along with award-winning horror authors including Maurice Broaddus, Catherine Lundoff, and Richard Dansky.

Here are the Beast Condition Cards Advance PDF version. http://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/198773/Beast-The-Primordial-Condition-Cards

Part of the Beast: the Primordial rules and a handy and elegant way to keep track of and incorporate Conditions into your Chronicle, Conditions add an additional layer of consequence and reward to certain actions in the World of Darkness. Various things within the course of a game can cause Conditions. These include exceptional successes, supernatural abilities, and really any situation where the Storyteller thinks they can be used to heighten the drama of a game.

Promethean: the Created 2nd Edition comes to life in both PDF and PoD physical book versions NOW on DTRPG! http://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/189395/Promethean-the-Created-2nd-Edition

You are a pilgrim now, one of the Created. You rose to life from dead flesh or inert matter, under the ministrations of one of your own, or a mad scientist, or perhaps just the power of the Divine Fire. You wander the world, sometimes alone, sometimes in the blessed company of your own kind, driven by memories of events and facts you never knew, all in the service of one Great Work…

…to be human.

Humans don’t make it easy, though. The Divine Fire that animates you burns too bright, blinds people, and scorches the land if you linger too long. It masks your disfigurements and makes you appear human, but that mask slips and people see your hideous, true form. The Pilgrimage is a long, difficult road, but it is yours, and you know, somehow, that the salvation of the New Dawn waits at the end.

This book contains:

The complete guide to playing a Promethean in the Chronicles of Darkness

Reimagined Lineages and Refinements, and a redesigned system for Transmutations

A more detailed approached to the Pilgrimage that presents players with more control over their characters’ path

New challenges on the road to humanity, including deranged, greedy alchemists

With a snarl, W20 Shattered Dreams is now on sale on DTRPG in both PDF and PoD versions! Grrrrrrr! http://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/194649/W20-Shattered-Dreams

The Past Laid Bare

Shattered Dreams presents an in-depth look at the prehistory of the Garou and Changing Breeds, including both the threats they had to face before circumstances drove them to war and the War of Rage itself. Rather than one answer, it showcases many time periods and many ways in which the War could start, so that players and Storytellers can make prehistory their own. It also presents the circumstances surrounding the Second War of Rage, giving players the chance to take part, either as Garou Conquistadores or as the Fera desperately trying to fight off an invasion. Finally, the included chronicle structure allows modern characters to visit these crucial moments of history in an effort to stop the Wyrm’s most powerful minions.

Shattered Dreams contains:

• The first ever look at the World of Darkness before the War of Rage.

• The ways the Wars of Rage could start, and how enterprising characters could change what happened.

• Two chronicle frameworks that bring modern characters to the past, replete with new Abilities and new Storytelling tools that make the players the center of much larger stories.

With a howl, W20 Kinfolk: A Breed Apart will be on sale on DTRPG in both PDF and PoD formats! Awooooo! http://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/194952/W20-Kinfolk-A-Breed-Apart

Born to Run

The Garou are born of two kinds: humans and wolves. These are their Kinfolk — those “of the blood.” These special people — whether of two legs or four — carry in them the hope of the Garou: the promise of future generations. Although Garou are born to Kinfolk, nobody knows they’re different until they undergo their First Change. Until such a blessed (or cursed) time, they are just like their more mundane Kin. Most live as humans, suffering the foibles of humanity, all the while hoping they’re secretly special, that they harbor the wolf within. Even though that wolf will never howl for the majority of Kin, they’ve still got a vital role in the war, aiding the effort from behind the lines.

Kinfolk: A Breed Apart contains:

Overview of the Kinfolk, both kenning and callow, including some of the Fellowships founded by Kinfolk to aid the Garou cause — and to protect themselves from their cousins’ Rage.

Character creation for playing Kinfolk, including new Skills, Backgrounds, Merits and Flaws, as well as special Kin rites, Gifts, and fetishes.

Guidelines for running Kinfolk chronicles, as well as in-depth information on the Kin-Fetches, the unique spirits used by Garou to watch over their distant cousins and warn the tribes if one of them should undergo the First Change.

NOTE: If you have already purchased the Advance PDF, you will be automatically updated to the final PDF and receive a link to enable you to purchase the PoD at a discount designed so that your total price matches our usual PDF and Print combo offer.

CONVENTIONS!

Onyx Path will be at Mid Winter Con 2017 in January in the lovely city of Milwaukee. Come brave the cold wastes to game and cavort with us! Please keep an eye out on the MidWinter site for announcements as to our very special beta test and Play With The Creator special events! http://www.midwintergamingconvention.com/

And now, the new project status updates!

DEVELOPMENT STATUS FROM ROLLICKING ROSE (projects in bold have changed status since last week):

First Draft (The first phase of a project that is about the work being done by writers, not dev prep)

Exalted 3rd Novel by Matt Forbeck (Exalted 3rd Edition)

Trinity Continuum Core Rulebook (The Trinity Continuum)

Trinity Continuum: Aeon Rulebook (The Trinity Continuum)

M20 Gods and Monsters (Mage: the Ascension 20th Anniversary Edition)

V20 Dark Ages Jumpstart (Vampire: the Masquerade 20th Anniversary Edition)

M20 Cookbook (Mage: the Ascension 20th Anniversary Edition)

M20 Book of the Fallen (Mage: the Ascension 20th Anniversary Edition)

GtS Geist 2e core (Geist: the Sin-Eaters Second Edition)

VtR Half-Damned (Vampire: the Requiem 2nd Edition)

Kithbook Boggans (Changeling: the Dreaming 20th Anniversary Edition)

WoD Ghost Hunters (World of Darkness)

CtD C20 Jumpstart (Changeling: the Dreaming 20th Anniversary Edition)

Ex Novel 2 by Aaron Rosenberg (Exalted 3rd Edition)

C20 Novel (Cassada) (Changeling: the Dreaming 20th Anniversary Edition)

Pugmire Fiction Anthology (Pugmire)

Redlines