Bundle for Ukraine

Just a quick post to say that the itcho.io Bundle for Ukraine sale ends in under 24 hours. It contains an amazing 998 games, for both tabletop and computer, covering every genre imaginable, and worth over $6,500 at their normal price. You can bag the lot for a minimum donation of a ridiculously low $10. Funds go to two carefully vetted charities who already have experience of working in Ukraine, International Medical Corps and Voices of Children.

My system-neutral supplement Mostly Harmless Meetings is in there as a PDF. To demonstrate the amazing quality of some of the other stuff in there, this tweet highlighting my contribution also contains works by two of the greatest names in TTRPG: Nate Treme, whose Haunted Almanac I recently purchased; and Isaac Williams, whose Kickstarter for Mausritter I recently backed. There are many, many other games of similar high quality in the bundle.

- Mausritter: The Estate Adventure Collection, @isaacwilliams.
- Mostly Harmless Meetings, @PeakrillPress.
- Phanta, @Keganexe.
- PROLE, @NateTreme. pic.twitter.com/l9sFwi7dTZ

— A Shark For Trouble (@SarkSweet) March 16, 2022

And if you find yourself really liking Mostly Harmless Meetings... I still have a few physical copies left for sale, grab one before they're all gone! 

Mostly Harmless Meetings - now available to buy

Mostly Harmless Meetings has been sent out to Kickstarter backers, so I am selling both printed zines and PDF copies via the eye-catching buttons at the top of the page 

My physical products shop on Shopify also contains a number of non-gaming related titles I've produced in the past, including the last few packs of the Pilgrims' Tarot produced to accompany the Cerne2CERN pilgrimage. These will one day be treasured as magical artifacts of the highest order (fun fact: Alan Moore did a tarot reading for the pilgrimage in which he pulled nine major arcana, from The Magician to The Hermit, in deck order. Sure, that can happen at random, although the chances  area less than one in a universe; what are the chances of it happening when England's greatest living magus is divining what will happen when 69 happy fools decide to immanentise the Eschaton?)

The PDF can be purchase via my itch.io account, where you'll also find my pay-as-you-feel contribution to the One-Page RPG Jam 2021, In My End Is My Beginning.

As a special treat for anyone who has read this far, you can get a whopping 23% off the PDF by following this link, and an even more whopping off 23% off all physical products (and free postage to the UK) by entering the code BLOG23 at the checkout on my online store (also: free postage to the UK). Both discounts run until the end of March 2022.

Interview with Write Radio

Write Radio

I was interviewed recently for Write Radio on Sheffield Live. I talked to host Jane Armstrong about writing for roleplaying games, and how it differs from the sort of short story writing I'd been doing before. We also talk about the differences between TTRPGs now vs. those I grew up with in the 80s, and about my various current projects: Mostly Harmless Meetings, King Arthur vs. Devil Kitteh, and Learning to Draw Trees.

Here is the interview. I've added comments at various points to indicate which topics we talk about: 

dansumption · Write Radio interview with Dan Sumption - 18th February 2022 - Sheffield Live

Learning to Draw Trees - and other news

 

While Mostly Harmless Meetings is nearly ready to go to print, I have launched a pre-launch page for my next Kickstarter project, Learning to Draw Trees, which will be part of ZiMo - #ZineMonth222.

In other news, Peakrill Press now has a Twitter account. Also, the more eagle-eyed of you may have noticed that the address of this site has now changed from peakrill.blogspot.com to blog.peakrill.com. Hopefully it all works exactly as it used to though - if not, please let me know via the comments.

Mostly Harmless Meetings: we're nearly there

I've finished writing and designing Mostly Harmless Meetings, "a zine of countryside encounters" - above is a sample spread. Kickstarter backers should already have an email telling them how to download the PDF.

After the inevitable last-minute edits, this will be going off to print in around a week. Once all of the Kickstarter backers have got their copies, I will be making it available to buy, as PDF or print copy, for anyone who missed out on the Kickstarter.

In the meantime, happy rest-of-2021, and have a great 2022!

Future Peakrill Projects

Although I’m now full-steam ahead working on Mostly Harmless Meetings, I’ve also been thinking about future projects. The success of my SideQuest project has given me the confidence and inspiration to devote a large amount of my time to publishing my work (regular visitors may notice that the title and design of this blog have changed to reflect this).

At the beginning of 2021, friends of mine at Liverpool Arts Lab launched a monthly magazine called Bodge. A number of us “claimed” pages in the magazine, and were then each expected to produce a page per month, containing anything we wanted to put on it. My page was called “learning to draw trees”, and was exactly that. One tree per month, with no expectations other than to see how much my drawing (and looking, and appreciation of trees) progressed over the course of a year. It went far better than I’d ever imagined, and I’m now thinking of adding “professional tree illustrator” to my CV. This month’s tree is still under wraps, and will be the cover of the final Bodge (due out on 23rd December) but here are my first tree from January, and my November tree (ink smears and all: imperfections are very much a part of the learning process):

January...

...November

For February’s ZineQuest I will be making a Learning to Draw Trees zine, containing all of my tree drawings from 2021 (plus a few extras), some thoughts and insight into the process, plus (to keep the project gaming-adjacent) the rules for the game “You Are a Tree”, kindly donated by Côme Martin.

After that, I will produce an illustrated hardback adaptation of one of the earliest stories of King Arthur, which I call King Arthur and the Deville Kitteh. This features in a 15th Century English text, The Prose Merlin, translated from a 13th Century French source. It tells the story of how Arthur defeated a terrifying kitten. I’m not making this up.

I firmly believe that this tale was the inspiration behind at least two scenes the film Monty Python and the Holy Grail. I’m adpting it as an alliterative poem, in the style of Gawain and the Green Knight, but with added Monty Python and Lewis Carroll references. Because it feels like they belong there. I’ll see if I can’t squeeze some Edward Lear in there too.

Spoiler alert

This is a pretty big undertaking, and I don’t envisage it seeing the light of day before Summer 2022 at the very earliest.  But I’ve made some first steps...

Adapting middle English into modern-ish English

Next up will be a zine full of (very) minor gods - gods so minor that they may not have any worshippers - complete with backstories and stats for RPGs. This project is inspired by Terry Pratchett's book Small Gods, and the gods will be generated by my Twitter bot Deity Galaxy.

I’m also thinking of doing another gaming zine, insired by the Combat system of Chris McDowall’s games Electric Basionland and Into The Odd. Here is an early impression of the cover.

Trauma - cover concept

Finally, a while back I posted the first installment of a Mörk Borg adventure, Ship of Theseus. It’s taken me longer than planned to get the second part up, but a large part of the rest of the adventure is already written. At some point I plan on producing a print version of that too.

A few people have asked whether Mostly Harmless Meetings will be available to purchase after the Kickstarter. Absolutely! Obviously I will be making sure that all of my KickStarter backers get their rewards first, but once that’s all done and dusted then I’ll set up an online shop to sell the remainder. I envisage it costing around £10 for the zine, or £5 for the PDF version, though I will have to do some Big Sums before I can confirm that.

In the meantime, back to work on  Mostly Harmless Meetings…

Backgrounds & decorations for Mostly Harmless Meetings

Encounter titles for Mostly Harmless Meetings

Peakrill on Facebook

 Just a quick post to say (a) I'm still alive (b) Peakrill now has a Facebook page - please give us a like - and (c) the Kickstarter for Mostly Harmless Meetings has just over a week left to run, please check it out and, if you like it, share it.

Got any questions about Mostly Harmless Meetings? Leave me a comment here.

Look Mum, I'm on Kickstarter!

 

Who's afraid of a toad?

I have just launched my first ever Kickstarter project, Mostly Harnless Meetings. It's a zine full of whimsical random encounters in the countryside, inspired by English flora, fauna and folklore. Here's a an example:

Oak: A circle of twisted, ancient oaks. The ground inside the circle, and the bottom halves of the tree, are covered in soft, thick moss an almost unnaturally bright green. This place has a good feeling about it, and would be an ideal spot to camp for the night. Anyone doing so sleeps very deeply, as will anyone who tries to stay awake and keep watch. They will awake feeling more invigorated than they have in years. However, in the night, fairies have been playing practical jokes, a different one on each person who slept here. They may find their shoelaces tied together; their hair plaited with nettles or braided together with somebody else's; clothes may be swapped around, or altered with incredibly fine needlework: perhaps sleeve-ends are sewn up, gussets are removed or tightened, or the words "KICK ME" embroidered upon somebody's back. A very detailed search may reveal the fairies sleeping in acorn cups scattered among the trees.

For more examples, and to pledge me your money, head over to the Kickstarter page:   https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/dansumption/mostly-harmless-meetings-a-zine-of-countryside-encounters