Finally its all come together and the first draft is done
Girls, Boys and wild things of all ages I proudly present….

The Blood of the Dragon

“Under a land shrouded in volcanic ash punctuated by rocky spires that tear at the sky they say the Great Dragon sleeps.  Tyanos the Black, Trickster god of the long dead Hu-Pi people stole their blood and bottled it for his insane delight. As drink of the gods it confers immortality to mortal man, but at what terrible price?

The very quest for this elixir is insane. A trip into a harsh and unforgiving land of the Spires, a poor and bandit ridden weird land, inhabited by the likes of Black Joop, Nigus the Headless and the Mother of Hydra. Names that should send a shiver down your spine. So pick up your sword, down the last of your ale to steady any nerves and stride off towards a great adventure amongst the rocks that defy the sky.”

What this Module contains

Blood of the Dragon is a short introductory adventure set in the ancient and ruined lands of The Spires.

• A Rough Guide to the Spires
• Adventure: The Lair of the Battle Apes
• New Monsters – The fearsome Battle Apes.
• Drunken Debauchery! – Optional rules for getting the characters into trouble and losing their hard gotten gains in-between adventures, from the poison pen of Colin Chapman (author of Atomic Highway)

Off to proof and a small amount of art commission, tentacles xed for a May/June release

Finally here’s the cover

So here I sit in the rosy glow of a not-quite-yet-spring-but-definitely-not-winter day.

C&T has now been out about three weeks, and has been selling quite nicely. Its definitely joining the ranks of the likes of OpenQuest as one of D101′s steady sellers.

Critical response to the game, especially in the light of it being released alongside Adventure Conqueror King and joining the similar (but not the same) Genre space as Lamentations of the Flame Princess, has been a good mix. From the frothy “OMG I LOVE THIS GAME SO MUCH”, to the nicely balanced “There’s bits I don’t like, but there’s bits I do like”. I’ve also had a nice stream of complementary emails and comments, which warms my jaded Game Designer heart

I’m very glad I gave C&T a very definite BRAND and a different vibe to regular D&D, especially looking at the long list of OSRIC modules which all seem to tribute AD&D of yore.

One of the most gladdening things to happen post C&T release is that Rik Kershaw Moore, author of The Company and a long time Call of Cthulhu keeper (member of the Kult of Keepers who ran the UK Cthulhu Nationals) has picked up on the game , loves it and is writing a scenario to run at Continuum 2012. I’m sure with a bit of arm twisting I should be able to get him to write it up

Blood of the Dragon is literally down to the last couple of adventure locations. Its a short, around 20 pages, but sick little module – with a short gazeeter (for those of you that want a bit more setting detail) and an adventure featuring a short weird lands trek and a mini-dungeon, which is weird and quite deadly. While short the whole thing is meant to act as an intro adventure for new players and Crypt Keepers. Also its 100% compatible with other OSR games, so if you just want to grab a butt-kicking S&S adventure to run with your favourite RetroClone go fer it.

Finally I’m immensely humbled by the positive reaction that the game has gotten. Especially some of the ongoing blog posts and mentions. There’s a lot of material on my Hard Drive that could become C&T product, and the obvious love the game is already getting pushes to make sure that becomes a reality