Happy Arbitrary Time Increment everyone!

I'm just here to give you a heads up on what the plans are for Postmortem Studios in this forthcoming 2009.

• Redesign: Expect this blog/site to get a facelift and redesign in the early part of this year, something a bit more slick and professional and I think I'll be retiring the old Postmortem Studios logo for something a bit more 'chic'.
• Cthentacle: This is my first priority this year, to get Cthentacle out of the door. I have, somewhat controversially, decided to go with the simplified, faster, Vs rules for this iteration of the game.
• All These Worlds: Mongoose's Traveller is going a storm and there's really no point me reinventing the wheel, so this is being revised for a second time and will become a series of expansions and materials for Traveller, most likely released - somewhat - via Mongoose's Flaming Cobra line.
• 100 Series: 100 Conspiracies and 100 Conspirators, 100 Supervillain Plots and 100 Supervillain Lairs will be the next few 100 Series books. I'm also cooking up a similar concept for players, something akin to the old Central Casting 'lifepath' books.
• Neverwhere: When I get time the third edition of this free RPG will be made available. This will also have more 'proper' rules for those who like such things.
• D&D4: I hope to be writing for Axe Initiative and I also hope to be releasing a complete adventure line, piecemeal, for D&D 4th Edition, a 'super campaign' that takes character from starting out to maximum level while also spinning out a complete game world. I also hope to begin work on my world-city setting.
• Gumshoe: Expect a Gumshoe version of @ctiv8 at some point during the year.
• Blood!: If there's time I hope to get Hell on Earth out of the door this year. That's the Renaissance/Enlightenment/Witch Burning era version of Blood!
• Fiction: I WILL complete a book of short-mid length stories this year and self publish, this is my promise to myself.
• Fanbooks: I hope to complete a Fallout fanbook for the Xpress system, again, depending on time.
• Getting Paid: Fingers crossed I get paid for work I've done over the last 2-3 years that I haven't yet been paid for :P
• Other: Agents of Swing (Xpress) and Unnamed Barbarian Fantasy Game (Xpress), The Pretentious Game.

If you're looking for work this year and you're a writer or an artist I need the following things:

• Someone with knowledge of d20 Modern, RuneQuest and my game, Blood!, willing to do some system conversions/creations for all three systems at about ten dollars a shot.
• A map-maker, preferably using the newer versions of campaign cartographer, willing to do play-mat style grid-work (nothing too fancy required) at about the same payment as above, per map.
• A map maker/illustrator willing to do larger, more freehand maps at about 25-100 per shot, depending on the size and intricacy required. CC maps also acceptable here.
• If anyone wants to release clipart through my established channel, they're welcome to, the profit split is about 50/50.
• I'm also willing to take on, produce and publish games that you'd like to and have no time to put out yourself at a similar profit split (after my costs are recouped.

Watch this space!

ACTUAL Line
The Actual line couldn't be done under the 4th Edition license since it depends on the redefinition of existing classes to make them  fit better and depict what they profess to be better. We could create alternate core classes that better reflect what they're supposed to be but the restriction on naming terminology and the necessity to terminate the entire line presents problems. Creating a new line called REAL wouldn't fool anyone and since the license says it's Wizard's say so on what constitutes the same line or not it wouldn't matter how much effort I put into differentiating them from each other if they didn't buy it. One way out might be to provide an 'Alternative Basic Classes' book, with alternative versions of all the core classes, and perhaps a couple of extra ones. These would have to be given new names though, EG: Hospitaller, Soldier, Templar, Warden, Scoundrel, Infernalist, Captain and Mage (And Berserker and Martial Artist).

Bloodsucker: The Angst
Bloodsucker falls afoul of the 'decency' clause, since it rips the piss out of goth/emo subculture and includes themes of sex and drugs. So this will have to continue to be published under the OGL.

Feast of Crows
Publishing a 4th Edition version of this would mean ceasing the sale of the OGL version. This is one of my strongest OGL/3rd Edition products so it is the best candidate for a revision to 4th Edition. To do so I'd fold it all together, Army Books and Main Books but I really dislike the lack of ability to continue to support the old edition. Nonetheless I think this will likely be my first/main foray into 4th Edition territory in order to test the waters.

Cloak of Steel
Thanks to the publication of the French version, Mantel D'Acer, I am no longer free to convert this to 4th Edition, though 4th Edition's mechanics may have been a better fit for the frenetic, anime style thematics of Cloak of Steel. I think the second edition is more likely to be developed either for Xpress (my house system) or for Mongoose RuneQuest, or both. There WILL be a new edition late 2008-2009.

Live System
Doing a 'fix' on the 4th Edition system as a whole simply isn't possible under the new license, so converting it to a classless, levelless version simply can't be done.

New Products
The main things that can be done with 4th Edition are setting books and adventure books.

I am hesitant to release setting books because the license restricts me from also/later publishing under the OGL. While this only applies to the Wizards OGL and wouldn't apply to, for example, the RuneQuest _logo_ license, the RuneQuest logo license is too restrictive to release a full and complete game and the open version used the Wizards OGL - which is what the GSL supercedes.

In my experience, adventures never sell that well and I don't like writing particularly structured adventures. I can do it, and I believe I can do it well - as people will hopefully find out when Cross City Race finally graces Dungeon Magazine - but they're not, normally, a fantastic amount of fun to write or to play, since they're hedged in and too structured.

One way might be to compound the two in a gazeteer type structure. A line of adventures taking characters from beginners to near-godhood travelling around a world describing it and expanding on it as one goes, with side quests and sub missions all along the way.

Class expansions are possible, so a series of toolkit books for the various classes might be a possibility, the threat is though that Wizards will release something similar/identical and demand that you stop publishing it, if, for example one did something on colour wizards replicating the various schools in new power selection tables that might bone you further down the line.

Lots to think about.