Pescua [title work in progress!]

[slowdive]

This is great and I love hard to find quests because I am always trying to find them and I very much appreciate them Most of the great RPGs have lots of content that many (the ones who play fast and are not thorough) never see, but the "true" RPG players appreciate Chapters 1 and 2 in first half of next year sounds great! I should have my IB and IBbasic bug/feature list done by then (side note: I'm working on my IB to IBbasic import tool and will be using Hearkenwold as a test to make sure it works well).

[Dorateen]

Yes, I like the way this adventure is shaping up. A good amount of optional content, and secrets for players to explore. The development process, working through various concepts, is also very interesting to read about. I look forward to seeing more as we get closer to the new year. Unless I'm mistaken, 2022 will mark the ten year anniversary of IceBlink.

[Pongo]

I had a good night of building yesterday - family were away, so I got to spend a good chunk of hours alternating building and slowly progressing my Hearkenwold playthrough A good Iceblink night.

I'm building chapter 2, which has three main quests and a conclusion quest:
- the lizardman camp I mentioned earlier, which now has maps but little content;
- the town of Culcheth and in particular it's graveyard, which I built ages back. The town is populated but the journey to it needs a bit of work (the maps are all there, but some content is missing or bugged), and I need to add the graveyard content;
- a journey to a new town to the south of the coast, which I haven't started at all and will probably take the most time (it's 8 new maps I think);
- the "conclusion quest", for want of a better phrase, which has been planned for ages - I've got a very clear idea of how things end up at the end of Chapter 2! There's no content yet, but it's a contained quest within an existing area so won't need new maps or anything.

This month I'm still working on the lizardmen camp for the most part I think.

[Dorateen]

Good to hear. I'm looking forward to meeting these lizardmen. And the graveyard sounds appropriately intriguing. Do you have a master world map that you use when connecting all the areas?

[Pongo]

Yes, I have a master world map on excel. It helps me keep track of things like rivers and coastlines that cross multiple maps. Each map has a grid ID - A1, B2 etc - and all the convo, encounter, and container names begin with that ID so I can find them easily. It felt like overkill when I started, but I'm very glad I did it now - I always have the spreadsheet open in the background when I'm building.

[Pongo]

Some progress over the last month. Mainly I've been developing the swamp area around the lizardmen camp. I'm aiming for it to feel unpleasant, so there are lots of creatures with poison attacks and plants that release noxious fumes etc. Its an area you can actually get to quite quickly from the start of the module if you know the way, but its aimed at a level 3/4 party really.

swamp.png (537.51 KiB) Viewed 65883 times

These swamp dragons might look like simple crocodiles (ahem!), but they have a nasty attack and breathe deadly poison gas clouds - avoiding them is sometimes an option worth taking...

swamp2.png (295.79 KiB) Viewed 65883 times

I've been tweaking the end of Chapter One a lot. Its still not quite right but its getting there. The final part of the chapter is set in the city of Bastion and more specifically its castle, and introduces characters who are going to play a key part in chapter 2. I'm still using free images from the internet (usually freeimages.com) for the portraits, so Bastion came out looking like this:

Bastion.png (388 KiB) Viewed 65883 times

Finally, this is the tileset I've pulled together for the inside of the castle - works quite well I think!

castleBastion.png (294.51 KiB) Viewed 65883 times

And finally - I think I've actually settled on a name! The module will be called Lords of Skaule. I've gotten through quite a few abandoned names in the last six months so maybe it'll change again, but this one seems to be sticking.

[slowdive]

Lords of Skaule, sounds great. I wonder if these Lords will become my friends or enemies...
The swamps sound very inviting and cozy The map tiles, portraits and UI are coming together very nicely.

I may try and clean up the way toggle buttons work, maybe have a single "settings" button that pulls up a selection box with all the toggle buttons on it (similar to how IBbasic does it now). That may make sense since you don't usually change the toggles much throughout your play session.

It is a lot of work to track down all the artwork for a cohesive module, but you have always done an excellent job in that area.

[Dorateen]

Very, very nice! I love the screenshots, I was looking forward these. Environmental hazards on a map are always a fun thing to throw at the player. And those swamp dragons should be a worthy challenge.

I'll say it again, the technique you use to give walls some depth on that map is outstanding. Everything looks solid. When can we play?

[Pongo]

Thanks! Slowdive, yeah the "settings" option would be a nice addition and would clean up the interface a bit. Dorateen, my plans for putting something out keep changing. I was going to wait until I finished chapter 2, but realistically that's going to take most of this year which feels too long. I do want to at least finish some of the interconnecting areas though so it feels less linear, and I'm enjoying building the lizardman quest as well - I'll take stock after finishing them and probably release a work in progress build. Late spring hopefully!

[Pongo]

Continuing to make good progress, but I'm going to focus now on just getting a build ready to publish. I'm cutting all the Chp2 content for the minute and focussing on making Chp1 a better experience - finishing a few side quests and unexplored areas, and expanding the ending a bit, revisiting some of the stuff that doesn't work quite how I wanted. Maybe ready for April, more likely May. Then a little break and some quality time with Hearkenwold before picking up Chp2 again!