New Release: Shields Up! from Gaming Ballistic; Nightmare Fuel launches Oct 13

[DouglasCole]

Gaming Ballistic is pleased to announce a new release for the Dungeon Fantasy RPG.

Shields Up!

Shields Up!*expands on defensive shield use and also details the often-neglected roles of shields as offensive weapons and active tools of engagement.

Building off of the Dungeon Fantasy RPG and Fantastic Dungeon Grappling, Shields Up! enhances and expands your shield-using experience. Both books are required for play; both came in the Boxed Set reprint.

• Leverage the "shield bind" to open lines of attack, or protect yourself
• New explicit options for treating the shield as cover in combat. Hide from a rain of arrows, or crouch behind your shield to shelter from dragon's breath!
• Use a shield actively to hold a foe at bay, or prevent them from coming into weapons range
• Details on shield damage, overpenetration, and all the goodies you'd expect when the right answer to "shield wall!" is "Thog SMASH!"

Also includes rules for shields as gear, modifying them for particular use, how to treat shields relative to creatures of different size, and more.

This 24-page book in 8x10 format*presents fight-tested rules that give new options for shield-using warriors, while preserving existing rules: You can introduce this to an*ongoing*campaign easily.

Preliminary Backorder Notice:

This product is available in both Print and PDF, but the print version is currently back-ordered. Stock is expected on or before October 19. Shipping times will be "time it takes to get inventory" plus normal shipping.

International Backers may wish to wait until the*Nightmare Fuel crowdfunding*on Backerkit and pick it up as an add-on...it will be printed and shipped from the UK for that project, which is less expensive than USPS.

Nightmare Fuel: Launches Next Week!

On October 13, three new bestiary volumes launch for the Dungeon Fantasy RPG*on Backerkit Crowdfunding!

Gaming Ballistic is pleased to announce the*Nightmare Fuel*crowdfunding campaign launching next week. Read more about it on the Daily Illuminator, or just jump to the landing page.

This is a very art-heavy book, requiring solid support to fund. I'd appreciate it if you'd sign up to be notified on campaign launch, and ideally jump on board opening weekend.

These monsters are fight-tested and tuned against opposition from 62 to 250 points in fantasy games, but are easily portable to horror, sci-fi, or regular GURPS Fantasy.

[Kalzazz]

So I was a playtester on this one, so I have a bit of a jump on it, and lots of thoughts

It is a really neat book, and despite being Targeted at DFRPG should work fine outside of that context

My current quandary is what parts of it belong in my game and how best to employ it, alongside the stew of options from Pyramid, Martial Arts, Low Tech, DF, and previous GB stuff

The fun with new options type stuff like Cover, new AOD options , Fast Draw Shield etc is definitely a win, putting more player choices on the table always fun and players can use them or not so no fuss

I like the WM shield stuff, so add all that to the stew from MA and Pyramid, personally I don't think I will add costs though, I think like Gunslinger new books should add new stuff to WM, not costs, though I must give due credit to the new costs for their exceptionally penta pleasing nature

I am not sure whether I want to go with light shields, and shield damage, and if I do I think I need to invent a 'hide shield' rule

The new rules for shield ST are neat, but to me feel a bridge to far for folding into a preexisting campaign, they I might use in a ' from scratch campaign'

The new defensive options were fun in playtesr, and some of the new snakes coming up in Nightmare Fuel interact with shields in fun ways

[Varyon]

GB always makes quality products, so I'll be adding this one to my collection. You guys clearly always have fun with the art as well, what with the Norse "Captain America" expy in the preview (right near the rules for throwing shields, naturally).

A question to Doug - for domestic buyers, will it work out better on your end for us to purchase the physical copy from your shopify page, or wait and toss it in as an add-on for Nightmare Fuel?

[johndallman]

Looks promising, and it's already got me to read FDG more carefully, and make notes on things to buy.

[Antiquation!]

I just wanted to chime in as the author and say that I'm really excited to see this out in the wild and for people to sink their teeth in! We had great playtesters and feedback, and I'm very happy with how it turned out.

I'm just as curious as Kalzazz to see how people integrate SU! into their games!

[DouglasCole]

Originally Posted by Varyon

GB always makes quality products, so I'll be adding this one to my collection. You guys clearly always have fun with the art as well, what with the Norse "Captain America" expy in the preview (right near the rules for throwing shields, naturally).

Captain who? Oh, Captain Vinland. Or as we fondly nicknamed him, "Captain Legally Distinct."

A question to Doug - for domestic buyers, will it work out better on your end for us to purchase the physical copy from your shopify page, or wait and toss it in as an add-on for Nightmare Fuel?

So, if I can be a horrible capitalist running dog, (with a dose of whinging over internal costs that are mine to manage):

It would be best for me overall to get it now...mostly because the art budget for Nightmare Fuel is really, really large and I'm basically looking to fund about half the art on NF with the expected proceeds from Shields Up.

In fact...I really ought to look at how well this does in preliminary sales and reduce the cost-to-fund for Nightmare Fuel accordingly.

As it is, the goal for NF is an accurate $34,000 to simply break even. If the only thing I sell, and the only thing folks buy, is the usual 60-40 mix of Print+PDF vs PDF on the three NF books, I'll need fully as many backers to fund as came on board for the Nordlond Bestiary (680).

That's a LOT. I don't like requiring matching my best-ever DFRPG Kickstarter to barely break even here...but when every single monster gets unique bespoke art, and I'm not doing the writing myself...things get "spendy." As they say in my home state.

[DouglasCole]

Originally Posted by johndallman

Looks promising, and it's already got me to read FDG more carefully, and make notes on things to buy.

FDG hangs a lot on a thorough reading, because there's one or two one-line tidbits that are never repeated. That's the trade-off from stuffing like a 50-page book into 8 pages, after having learned my lesson on "the art is too dang small" with my D&D-based version of the book, "Dungeon Grappling."

[Varyon]

Originally Posted by DouglasCole

Captain who? Oh, Captain Vinland. Or as we fondly nicknamed him, "Captain Legally Distinct."

Thane Vinland it is.

Originally Posted by DouglasCole

It would be best for me overall to get it now...mostly because the art budget for Nightmare Fuel is really, really large and I'm basically looking to fund about half the art on NF with the expected proceeds from Shields Up.

Works for me, thanks. I'll likely grab it when I get home for work. Once I renew the registration on my car, anyway, which I've been forgetting to do all week...

[Varyon]

I've now given the book a quick read-through, and very much like it. I am strongly inclined to utilize it to create a "Captain Hyrule" character - a mixture between Captain America and Link (from The Legend of Zelda). Of course, one of Link's signature traits is being able to rapidly stow and ready his shield. I note the book allows a character with a guige to stow the shield with a single Ready (which I assume could be reduced to a free action with a successful Fast-Draw), regardless of DB - might it be appropriate to allow a character to treat any shield as though it had a guige for this purpose as a Perk?

[DouglasCole]

Originally Posted by Varyon

I've now given the book a quick read-through, and very much like it. I am strongly inclined to utilize it to create a "Captain Hyrule" character - a mixture between Captain America and Link (from The Legend of Zelda). Of course, one of Link's signature traits is being able to rapidly stow and ready his shield. I note the book allows a character with a guige to stow the shield with a single Ready (which I assume could be reduced to a free action with a successful Fast-Draw), regardless of DB - might it be appropriate to allow a character to treat any shield as though it had a guige for this purpose as a Perk?

Seems fun given the source material