Monster Man Contest II: Questions!

With the Monster Man Contest II underway, I have received some questions about the rules. Here are the answers, which I will also add to the original post when I get a moment.

Who has the publishing rights to my entry? 

You do, of course! I'm not intending to publish these, except insofar as putting them here is "publishing" them -- it's just a fun exercise in community creativity.

Can I publish my entry on another forum, blog or website and just send you a link instead of emailing you? 

Certainly; please do!

How many times can I enter?

Let's say up to three entries per person, but no one contestant can win more than once -- in the unlikely event that someone places in the top group with multiple entries, I'll just count whichever one has the highest number of votes.

Monster Man Contest II!

OK, so last time I said I would run a second Monster Man contest it ... basically didn't happen. I was too busy to promote it effectively and I only got a handful of entries, and I just let it slide. But no longer! Monster Man Contest II is in full effect, and there are fabulous prizes to be won! How would you like ... a print copy of The Hyqueous Vaults? Or a £15 gift certificate to Diplomatist Books? Maybe you'd like a collection of monsters from Spes Magna Games? Or a special monster surprise from yours truly? Well, all you have to do is make a monster!

Here are the rules:

1. Go to this article about D&D monster names created by neural networks.

2. Pick a monster such as the Slug, Spectral or the Mommy, Greater

3. Create a Monster Manual-style entry for your chosen name, with a description and stats for your favourite edition of D&D. Or your favourite RPG, whatever it might be. I'm not the boss of you! If you want to add a picture, that'd be double cool.

4. Send it to me by July 14th. You can email me (gonzohistory@gmail.com) or share it with me on Google+. 

5. I will post the entries here and ask listeners to vote on them by August 1st, choosing the top three entries. 

6. I will create an episode of Monster Man for the winning monsters. Winners will also receive a print copy of The Hyqueous Vaults (with removable cover!) and more. And everyone who reads this will get tons of fun monsters to read about and enjoy!

7. You can enter more than once if you like, but you can't win more than once.

And that's it! Go make some monsters. Share this contest with your friends; the more the merrier.

New year, new campaign: the Great Mutant Caper

My ongoing campaign of the post-apocalyptic RPG Other Dust is ... well ... ongoing! In the last few sessions, the players have been solving a murder mystery and looking for a treasure map. This culminated in a heist at the closest thing a junkyard bartertown has to a luxury hotel. I decided to set the whole thing up with miniatures, because representing multiple different things going on simultaneously is an important part of the heist genre. 

The hotel and its compound.

The caper-comedy genre is one of my comfort zones, I think, and part of that is because it's possible to introduce consistent genre elements in a way that's still surprising. I decided to just make a quick random complications table that would let me keep things moving without having to plan everything out in advance. I rolled once every so often to get things like "a vehicle arrives" or "unwanted social interaction" or "room service!" just to keep the NPCs moving around the space.

A consortium of investors try to get Jeb interested in their new product. 

The law! The red-robed junkborgs, merciless enforcers of The Perfesser's law, turn up when Jeb sets off the alarm.

Twiggs spots lizardy medical genius Patches tampering with the ingredients outside the kitchen.

Twiggs fails to talk his way past the housekeeping staff.

Our heroes(?): L to R: Jaime, Twiggs, Jeb, Reesix

The night manager is having a pretty bad day.