Slowly plodding away, like a...well, a snail. If snails can be said to plod.

Poetry, or a poor attempt of...

I sometimes write geeky poems for my settings because I read too much Tolkien and George Macdonald when I was young.

And I think poetry goes a long way in cementing(?) a world in the imaginations of readers.

Not that I think my poetry is any good, but I enjoy writing it and I think it minimizes the harm setting it free on my little read blog.

the first one is Rumble City related.

The other two are much older and other setting related.

There is a poisonous green glow,

Where it’s from we don’t know,

It flickers across the night in Rumble City.

The rat rods all go screaming,

Down streets that lay a gleaming

With a petrol sheen at night in Rumble City.

And she left me for a Fink,

A Bambi or a shrink,

But it doesn’t really matter to the sour looking waitress

As to why I nurse my tips and my drink.

So I leer down at her tits,

But she doesn’t take the compliment,

And I really can’t blame her,

As I never really meant it.

When I shuffle out the door,

Kicking my eyes across the floor,

I see a poisonous green glare,

Where it’s from I don’t care,

It flickers in the night in Rumble City.

Morgothia

Morgothia the jewel

Lies wounded

It's blood like rubies

Scattered like dew

In the morning light

Like dew on a web

A lair encrusted with gems

Is Morgothia

Those that enter

Swing in the breeze, empty.

Morgothia

Your oceans have retreated

Have fled your withered flesh

The roar of your name

Floats away on the foam

Their gentle caress is no more.

Written during the Great Calamity.

Translated from the original by Omaz the scribe.

Haze

Nox, city of perpetual haze and a winos alcohol fumed daze, sits at the mouth of the river, a canker on the lips of the nation, a spotted liver.

Nox is the city of hard knocks, of hard silicone knockers. She pointed her chest at me like a double barreled bazooka said a poet describing Nox and her plastic hookers.

Chinatown is The Chinatown, where sailors still get shanghaied and children end up in crockpots next to their pets, soon to be gulped down.

Down at the docks the cops fish for bodies, the bloated bug eyed burly of a cold hearted city.

Down at the docks, the whores fish for bodies, live ones, warm on a cold night.

Down at the docks the sailors fish for whores, hands in pocket jangling their coins, golden bait on a small hook. The sailors always boast about the one that got away.

In the sewers below roam the shadow people, lost to the city and lost to themselves. Forgotten cults practice forgotten rituals detailed in moldy books pulled from rotten shelves.

Above it all soar the cloaks, the skin tight gods and goddesses, between the towers of the super rich. And sometimes we remember that they too climbed from the gutter, their need for wealth or power a constant itch.

Nox, city of night, and of the eternally flickering neon light.

Nox...

Lobster chick (lobsters are the bomb throwing maniacs)

Sniping Away

Some drawings for Rumble City I just found after tidying up my studio

Berserker

A Rat on his steed

A Rumble City biker, not too eager to get out and battle when riding a plank and a couple of wheels. And a random giant.

Some Rumble City Drawings

In case you* think I have stopped working on Rumble City, well, here are some drawings I did, hugely inspired by the medieval one shown first. I am rewriting the game at the moment, but that always takes me a long time.

*you being maybe that one person who might have read the game or played it.

In an attempt to get back into posting I have decided to put some of my art work on here that isn't Rumble City related. Have been doing some logo work for Jack Mack. These two don't quite meet the brief but I do like them.

1 page dungeon contest submission

I have decided to enter this dungeon into this contest http://www.onepagedungeon.info/entrance

https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B1OvTelCoUJ-OGJ2TlJpVFpqSms/edit

Hopefully it is playable for someone.

How to jump a cow

I spotted the ramp in Jose's picture and asked what ruling he had made regarding jumps.

His response...

I made up that you need to move at least 3 hexes in a straight line in order to make the jump. Otherwise you don't get enough momentum, fall to the next hex and take damage as crashing. If you make it, the car flies over half the hexes you moved without turning before (round down). That way, if you move 4 hexes in a straight line (included the one the ramp is in), you fly two hexes from it (no risk of crashes with other cars, of course) and land on the third. So the idea is that it can improve your movement if you can pull it.

It makes sense.

Balance is overrated

I've been thinking about balancing the different crew, and if it is needed. Berserker appears too powerful when at ace rank, grease monkeys might prolong the game too much, range of snipers is too high, and so on.

I think that if you spend points on one crew member to make them extra efficient you can't spend points elsewhere and therefore it sort of equals out.

But some options are: snipers have a limited amount of bullets, depending on rank, and bombers get to start with more bombs as they go up in rank.

Or, points can be spent on more bullets and bombs, so you can have a high ranking sniper but with less bullets, or low ranking sniper but with more bullets. I prefer this option myself. So a sniper might start with 3 bullets for his high powered rifle. Spend a point on ammo and get another three bullets.
Do the same with bombers (start with 3 bombs, spend a point and get another bomb, or another three?). Every crew member has a revolver with 6 bullets in it as well.

House rule it to pieces. It's kinda designed that way.

Someone else plays it, yay!

Jose Carlos Domínguez has played Rumble City and sent me this photo of a game in action.

Thanks Jose

No Art...

I have decided not to do art for the Rumble city document. I am going to keep it as a word document so that people can change their copies of it, mutate the game to their liking. People can add their own art, format it to A5 or whatever size they like, change rules, add a role-playing supplement, and just do whatever the heck they want to to it.

I will do art for this site, show photos of cars i have built, and so on. Just not for the document.

Have played two games of rumble city so far.

First game: simple race around the block scenario, first one around wins. First corner and we all bunched up, crashed into each other, shot the crap out of each other, crashed into walls, blew up, and only one car made it through. That car and crew won by default.

it took roughly two hours to play, we got nowhere, and yet it was immense fun.

Second game: two teams of four cars each, with crew. My team won, yay! One of my team had a car with four snipers for crew. Car was shit, but they did a lot of damage, and called down the wrath of the other team upon themselves, allowing us to pick of the stragglers.

it was fun.

Mechanics: I don't know how to implement the mechanics or grease monkeys into the game fairly. They are either too weak, and a waste of points, or too strong, prolonging the game needlessly.

Snipers: maybe need a limited amount of bullets.

Bombers: each rank should allow a bomber to carry more bombs.