It's March! Slowly the deadline creeps ever closer.
Progress
Not much exciting to report. Writing on Under Mole Mountain is done, except for an editorial review. Tears of the Rainbow is close to finished (the timeline said it should be done now, so I'm lagging). Max will start layout and illustration in April next month.
Meanwhile, I've received text versions of In Troubled Waters and Crow 'n Jewels, both looking very good. Layout and illustration will follow.
Chat with me this year
I've been going to conventions as a vendor, showing off awesome work from local creators, with all the proceeds going directly to them. It's been picking up, and this year is looking to be the most STACKED year of all for conventions. You can meet me in the Netherlands or London (hopefully) on the following dates. On top of that, you can find me almost every wednesday night at the RPG Night Utrecht.
The afternoon of the fantasy book, Utrecht, The Netherlands. Last weekend I was at a local market in my home turf! My family helped out with manning the stand, which was so much fun I would love to do more of that. Photos below.
11 april, RinCon - Vikings & Myths, Ewijk, the Netherlands. where we will present a community zine filled with games using the same theme of vikings & myths.
12 & 13 september, Main Quest Con, Hilversum, the Netherlands. This started last year, when I couldn't attend. Excited to join the fray this year.
28 November, Dragonmeet, London, England. Fingers crossed that I'll be able to attend here with some fellow creators like last year.
the Fanterland stand, featuring my games and those of fellow creators.
The fantasy market was in the main hall of our library.
First monday of the month. 12 o'clock in the Netherlands. The air alarm is sounding. Time for another update!
Things have been moving along according to plan. I've been finalizing Under Mole Mountain. Although honestly, I'm still adding some touches. Max will start layout and illustration on all of it in April.
Under Mole Mountain is a more straight up creature horror adventure than what we're used to seeing in Mausritter. At times I feel like it would be a more natural fit to Mothership than Mausritter, which makes me even more happy that I'm writing it for Mausritter.
A core part of the adventure is about navigating these labyrinthian tunnels dug by the creatures below. A mouse mind is not equipped to understand them. But you will find your mind changing as you go deeper.
Maybe you've heard of depth crawls. They were popularized by Gardens of Ynn and The Stygian Library. There's at least one depth crawl for Mausritter, called Faeflower Grave by Isaac Williams. Rather than navigating a fixed map, the dungeon shifts. If you choose to go deeper, you track your depth, roll a die, add your current depth, and look up the corresponding location.
Under Mole Mountain adds a twist to the depth crawl. Rather than adding your current deth, you add how much your mind has become like that of the creatures of the deep. The more you lean into that, the deeper you can go. But what's worse, the dungeon can shift while you are in it; the tunnels getting redug all around you. That is dangerous. Very dangerous. Because just like how mice are unable to navigate these depths, the creatures below are unable to find their way up. And so you find yourself trapped, going deeper and deeper. Unless someone in your party manages to hold on to their mind and guide you back up.
That's all for now. I've been seeing some cool progress for Crow 'n Jewels as well, but more on that later.
Project spotlight
I like to highlight a cool project each update. In Zine Month, I have two recommendations you shouldn't sleep on.
Burn It All To Light the Way
I like to highlight a cool project each update. In Zine Month, my friend Michael E. Weil is launching his game I have had the pleasure of playing and GMing at our RPG Night in Utrecht.
BURN It All To Light The Way is OSR, but your character is boiled down to 4 tags that define them. Burn your tags to do the impossible, but lose a part of who you are. It's dramatic, it's intuitive and it's mixed with a megadungeon that gets more gonzo the deeper you go. Get this if you'd like to put your players in crazy danger and see how much they're willing to put on the line.
Waco Matrixo is a staple in Mothership land. But I feel like he's getting even better with each adventure he drops. With his latest adventure, the premise alone already hooked me.
"Play as the parasite, not the human - fight for control or burn beneath a dying sun."
In the Netherlands, where I live, there is a test air alarm every first monday of the month, 12 o'clock, across the country. I'm hearing it right now. It's the first one since we - meaning the backers and project team - succesfully funded Flights of Fancy. If you live in the Netherlands and hear the nationwide alarm going off, you know I'm writing you an update or have one ready for you already! I'll do my best to keep this up.
What I think you want to know is; what are we getting? When are we getting it? So let me break it down and let me know if you want to know anything else.
TLDR: everything, including the final locked adventure!
Flights of Fancy succesfully reached its funding goal, as well as two stretch goals. That means you are getting the base game as well as the additional adventures made by Emiel Boven (Electrum Archive) and Bodie H. (Mush Rush). There are some extra digital-only rewards that some backers unlocked which I won't go into here. But, there is one more thing I want to let you know. As you might be aware, we didn't reach the stretch goal for the final adventure; Crow 'n Jewels by Chloe Shepherd, formerly known as Froggy.
The way the crowdfunder ended, only one creator was left out because we didn't meet that one stretch goal. As a team, we strongly felt we did not want to single one of us out like that, so we are paying out of pocket to bring the final creator on board. This means that ALL SIX ADVENTURES ARE NOW UNLOCKED. In addition to the three base adventures, the adventure by Emiel Boven and the adventure by Bodie H, you will also receive Crow 'n Jewels by Chloe Shepherd.
TLDR: jan-mar: finish writing. Apr-may: finish layout and illustration. Jun-jul: printing and shipping to distributors. Fulfillment timelines TBA by Games Omnivorous and Exalted Funeral.
All guest creators will develop their adventures on their own timelines and we'll let you know when they're done. Max and I however have more specific timelines that I want to be fully transparent about.
Right now, Flights of Fancy has been playtested at the RPG Night Utrecht; the content of the campaign booklet, the adventure Under Mole Mountain and the adventure Tears of the Rainbow have all passed the revue. We have not tested the adventure Rock & Barrel Roll yet.
I will finalize the writing from January to March. My goal is to finalize the writing of one adventure each month and update the campaign booklet as I go;
January: Under Mole Mountain
February: Tears of the Rainbow
March: Rock & Barrel Roll
I don't plan to share the text-only versions unless you get in the comments. My experience with previous crowdfunders is that people prefer to wait for the shiny version with Max' gorgeous layout and illustrations.
Speaking of the devil; Max will finalize layout and illustration from April to May. So expect digital rewards to start coming through at the end or shortly after that period.
So yeah, after a break in December to enjoy the holidays with my family, it's full steam ahead!
In June and July we will get everything ready for print. This includes the content from guest creators. From there, fulfillment of physical rewards is handled by Exalted Funeral for US and Games Omnivorous for non-US if I'm not mistaken. They will ship Flights of Fancy along with the physical rewards of all other Mausritter Month projects participating in mass fulfillment, so from that point on the timelines are out of our hands. I don't think they have shared any definitive shipping timelines with backers yet, but I'll let you know once they do.
Fulfillment of your digital rewards will by handled through the Backerkit mass pledge manager, which handles all Mausritter Month projects participating in mass fulfillment. I expect I'll be able to deliver these to you as digital rewards are completed. But bear with me as I await further instructions on how the mass pledge manager works.
That's it for now. I love that I get to make more Mausritter adventures and pay my collaborators fairly, all thanks to you.
If there is anything you would like to see in these updates, do let me know.
Mausritter Month was a wonderful experience; so much creative joy by and for the entire Mausritter community.
And now, we get to make Flights of Fancy for real; a new story and new adventures in Feathertail Forest, a place I have grown to love dearly.
And what's more, thanks to your amazing support, we get to bring fantastic friends on board to help bring this new chapter to life, and pay them fairly.
We will return with a more elaborate update - although you will probably see your payment being processed soon - and tell you all about what will happen next. But for now;
We did it; we unlocked In Troubled Waters by Emiel Boven! THAT'S FIVE ADVENTURES! What started as a smaller addition to our previous adventure collection has now matched it in size. We are beyond excited to bring you this fully flegded Mausritter campaign with new factions and connected adventures in the Feathertail Forest.
Reaching for the canopies! Will we reach our last adventure stretch goal?
So. Here's the thing. The last adventure is still waiting. Crow 'n Jewels by Froggy. If we get that goal, we've unlocked every single adventure there is to unlock, and Flights of Fancy will be our biggest adventure collection yet. But we need to push for it go get there! We'll be spreading the word to get that end-of-project push and hopefully bring this fantastic adventure into the fold.
What would you like to know more about regarding Flights of Fancy? Let us know in the comments!
Project spotlight: Islands of Weirdhope
This is the bit where I rave about other cool projects happening right now. This time: Islands of Weirdhope. It's Nausicaa and Windwaker meet Waterworld on the psychedelic future seas. If you haven't given ECO MOFOS a try yet; I've ran it, and love how the GM tools for generating the map on the fly feels effortless and blends in the weird hope themes of the game. There's also a Mausritter crossover for those who also backed Rolling Coast! It's in its last days of crowdfunding. They are pushing for extra art to have all 12 Monsters (Kaiju) and Mecha illustrated in full colour if theyreach their next goal.
Meanwhile, Mausolympics, our cross-collab project that will bring you the Feathertail Triathlon if you back both projects, has reached double their funding goal, and are aiming for their next stretch goal right now:
Meet the champions
Each rival team gets a full page with a description and an illustration of their champions. Art by Elena Morgado. Available in physical & digital editions.
