Seems like a good time to do one of my periodic updates.

Guild Ball is back! Or at least, models are available again, this time in the form of POD. Hopefully that means SFG will avoid the supply-and-warehousing woes that did the game in back in 2020. I had already collected the whole range, less some LEs, so I haven't purchased anything yet, but I'm looking forward to seeing how this develops. Meantime, I have some painting to do - I have some general-use tokens and widgets I never got around to painting, and I'm going to finish up some Falconers pieces, and maybe some Cooks terrain for games with a friend. After that I think I'm aiming for Fish and Cogs.

Hellboy's almost done! I'd like to make some different target priority tokens for a few characters, as I found better artwork, but for the most part it's complete. Now I just need to paint it…

Other Collections! I got in the last Mage Wars item I needed for a playset - one final copy of Academy Forcemaster. Now, technically, it's not a complete playset, as I have fewer copies of Equipment and Legendary/Unique cards, though those are rarely played to full. I need to put together a list of what I'd want to get a hold of if I were aiming for literal complete. There are a couple things I might get extras of anyways, too - it'd be nice to have extra game pieces or rulebooks from a few of the sets. I also preordered some games and books for various collections, and I'm considering getting another volume or two for my Hellboy TPB run.

More Digimon! I bought EX5 and I'm still waiting on some of its slush, bankrolled by some sold Magic cards. I ordered a pair of BT15 boxes too, should be shipping out tomorrow. This one blessedly has fewer box-topper promos, so hopefully filling the slush is much less costly. I want to do a token card refesh too, we'll see how it shakes out.

Kickstarters! My Loreweaver GM screen and backpack arrived last weekend. I'm pretty happy with 'em. Don't know when I'll get to put the screen to use.

RPGs! Speaking of, I still need to knuckle down and get Iron Gods prepped to where I can start playing it again. I've been thinking of getting up extra early, to fit in an hour or two of painting or writing before starting my mornings, and this would be the first dragon I'd want to slay. I am decidedly not a morning person though…

Still waiting on a promo Yolei and a pair of MagnaAgnemon Aces, but aside from that my BT14 slush is all in. Importantly, I have everything for the new decks I wanted to build: I'm going to make Loogamon and possibly Commandramon, on top of modifications to other decks.

I have a backlog of household chores to get through, but hopefully sometime this week I can work on some of my projects. Priorities are the aforementioned Digimon deck work, Foundry prep, work on my Iron Gods campaign, and collection of Hellboy artwork for target priority. We'll see how successful I am; our Wednesday sitter isn't coming this week so I'm not super hopeful, but who knows.

I obviously haven’t been keeping to my New Year’s resolution, but I’ve cut out all the social media (aside from RPG.net) from my Internet time, so I really ought to get on the horse again. Big thing taking up personal mindspace right now is solo RPGs - I need to get back on track with polishing my PF1 content and actually play some Iron Gods and Starforged.

I recently ordered the remaining in-print Academy stuff I didn't have; two copies each of Druid, Elementalist, Monk, and Necromancer. The package arrived today and of course it's only a single copy of each. I've messaged Arcane Wonders, hopefully I'll get this addressed quickly. It's not as if I'm playing any time soon but it's still disappointing that I have to wait even longer.

Our tax return came in really quickly this year. I'm using most of my share on debt, but I did buy some computer monitors, a docking station, and attendant accessories. I'm finally going to have my perfect desk setup; plenty of screen real-estate, a clear desktop, and a quick and easy way to switch between my work and personal computers without moving a ton of cables around.

Looking forward, I'm hoping to be able to get BT11 at or near release, and I might want to get printed copies of the Academy Forcemaster and Warlord. Not committing to either, though; Joc and I are trying to hold each other responsible for nonessential purchases, so both will require a talk first. Of the two I'm more focused on Digimon.

In other games, my hobby focus for the foreseeable future is going to be on finalizing my Pathfinder house rules document, so I can move on to transcribing my Iron Gods game and actually play it for once. I'm incorporating a lot of third-party Akashic material, and a good chunk of it is revisions to Akashic Mysteries itself. Consequently I've decided to just lift over most of the book and collect it as "Ultimate Akashic", in the same vein as Dreamscarred's Ultimate Psionics. Particularly, this'll let me rename the base classes and scrub off AM's ill-advised layer of orientalist paint. I might even release it as a PWYW on DriveThru. I'm not quite solid on that yet, though. Most of it would be reprinted rules from other works, which seems rude even if permissible by OGL. For another, I'd be taking a heavy editorial hand to that content, modifying or cutting things I don't like - whether because I think they're thematically incoherent, redundant, poorly written, or excessively overdesigned. It might be Ultimate Akashic at my table, but that title might come across as a bit pretentious in the wider community. Also, putting in the work to catalog my changes and get Section 15 properly filled out doesn't seem especially rewarding. We'll see.

Managed to track down the full Iron Gods AP in physical format. This - along with some pocket editions I picked up - will make playing my solo games a little easier.

Iron Gods: Fires of Creation

Episode 5: Spooky Scary Skeletons

Last Time on Iron Gods
The party entered the ancient technological facility underneath Black Hill, and encountered a robotic drone and what appeared to be a room for housing animals. [see more]

Iron Gods: Fires of Creation

Episode 4: Unto the Breach

Last Time on Iron Gods
The party delved deeper into the caverns underneath Torch, which they found is now being used as the home of a tribe of Skulks. The skulks offered safe passage to the party in exchange for clearing some nearby caverns of gremlins. Returning to town to rest and return the body of an adventurer they found, the party was invited to a local gambling den, the Silverdisk Hall, by a messenger with a note from Garmen Ulreth. [see more]

This is the song I think of as the theme song of my Iron Gods campaign; I think it's suitably "alien ship"-ish for that purpose.

Iron Gods: Fires of Creation

Episode 3: Mischief and Monsters

Last Time on Iron Gods
The party set out to delve the caverns beneath the town, but ran into a fierce and unexpected monstrous foe. They retreated to the Foundry, where they prepare to once again brave the deeps… [see more]

Iron Gods: Fires of Creation

Episode 2: The Weeping Cavern

Last Time on Iron Gods
The party was hired to delve a series of caverns beneath the town in search of the missing councilor Khonnir Baine. First, they investigated the site of the town's namesake fire; finding no clues there, they then proceeded to the Foundry tavern, a place they had been told they could use as a base of operations. On nearing the tavern, however, they discovered Val, Khonnir's adoptive daughter, under assault by a malfunctioning robot! Barek's swift blade dispatched the metallic monstrosity, and now the group plans their next move… [see more]