It’s been a week since the Origins Game Fair in Columbus, Ohio. We had a fantastic time there. I ran into a lot of industry friends, a couple of old gaming friends, and met a bunch of new and wonderful people all in a whirlwind five days of gaming, dining, and shopping. In addition to some amazingly fun events, we had some quality meals at Schmidts Sausage Haus and the North Market.
D&D at Origins
First off, now that it’s out in the wild, I’m pleased to announce that I had the wonderful opportunity to write the introductory adventure for Season 7 of D&D Adventurer’s League (designated as module DDAL07-01). The module, titled A City on the Edge, is a collection of five one-hour adventures that link together to form a larger storyline introducing new adventurers to the exotic land of Chult. This season of AL compliments the upcoming Tomb of Annihilation hardcover.
At first, I didn’t even know it was being run at Origins. You can imagine my surprise when I was walking around the D&D room on a late Thursday evening and saw a group of players at a table looking over my maps and going through my scenarios. It was an even greater experience to see it run over the D&D Livestream on Twitch. The only words I can use to describe the experience was “pretty damn cool”. Hey, I’m new to a lot of this. It’s super exciting for me to take part in a hobby that has shaped a great portion of my life, creating many childhood friends, memorable experiences, and broadening the way I see things.
Lastly, it was great to finally meet a few of the D&D AL designers in person. They were all extremely friendly and welcoming. I’m looking forward to working with them again.
The Tomb of Annihilation hardcover is scheduled to be released in September 2017. It looks like it’s going to be an amazing product. I can’t wait to run it!
Esper Genesis Organized Play
During Origins, we ran the first adventures for Crucible Corps, the organized play campaign for Esper Genesis. I had the pleasure of running these scenarios for a number of awesome groups, including a few of our Kickstarter backers and some who had never heard of EG at all. It was a whole lot of fun. The adventures finalized the existing factions that will be appearing in future Esper Genesis OP adventures.
The five factions are:
- Aetheron – A League of protectorates who hunt down and defend against intergalactic threats while keeping the peace between the varied societies of the Sorium Accord.
- Children of Aria – A group attempting to form a deeper understanding of the many universal mysteries yet to be solved, as well as their connections with the Crucibles.
- Infinity Order – United military forces sworn to uphold and promote peace and prosperity within the Core Region while protecting the citizens against criminal elements within.
- Shadow Cipher – Organization of computer and tech savants who believe that knowledge is the ultimate power, and such power combined with invention is the key to the next phase of evolution.
- Vashahar – A loosely formed alliance of scholars and scientists, many of them espers. They actively search the unexplored expanse for new worlds and intelligent life that may need sanctuary and guidance toward dealing with the galaxy’s growing threats.
As these factions are all new major players in the EG universe, it’ll be interesting to see what actions the players will take in upcoming events!
Esper Genesis Basic Rules
Also at the end of Origins we finally released the first version of the Esper Genesis Basic Rules to our Kickstarter backers. This free set of rules is being continuously upgraded and will be made available for free to the public upon release of the Core Manual in December. The PDF seems to be well received so far. We’re really excited to keep on adding to the file, including the incoming art content from our extremely talented artists.
Late Pledges and Preorders are still being accepted for those that missed the EG Kickstarter campaign. Our Facebook page and mailing list have also been consistently growing. It’s honestly amazing to see how far we’ve come with this project that was originally just supposed to be some equipment rules meant for use with D&D 5E.