Winter Winds Blow; Darkness Looms Ever Sooner . . . The Dungeon's Gates Rattle!

Warm greetings, my long-time friends and Gorefest Dungeon comrades! Though October has came and went, it brought with it no evidence of autumn—not even the slightest hint of cold winds nor vibrant fall colors. The calendar date was the only metric by which one could consider the season any other than summer. The weather misbehaved terribly, impersonating its hotter seasonal sibling in every way. Last week, I walked around the farm shirtless. Two weeks ago, I ran the air conditioner upstairs and I'm loath to ever do so. Having lost my summer to the mountains of Colorado, I never complained. In fact, this has been the warmest, most beautiful autumn I ever recall. I can't say it's been the best, though.  Darkness comes in many forms, unfortunately. After losing my father in a car wreck in April, 2014, my mother received news of what could have potentially been just as devastating: breast cancer. I think we're through that woods now, though. I'll let that topic rest. Neither will I stir my own personal demons with more than a mention beyond saying I've become more withdrawn from society. All things considered, I've not had even the slightest desire to return to long stints at the computer desk. I've not laid one plan for Gorefest Dungeon since we last met, but instead have spent more time in the saddle than in any previous year of my life. Losing my summer made me want to regain lost time, and that's what I've done. The changing colors this year have been breathtaking and it's been warm and dry; perfect conditions for riding horses!  It's my favorite season, and this year, it's never given me an excuse to remain indoors.  If you're missing Gorefest Dungeon just as I am, then the good news is that today is the first day I felt the sting of a chill wind. The sun sets sooner and sooner, and nights are growing colder, much colder. Though we've not had our first frost(!), it's not long coming. The bad news, though, is that I have no home Internet connection other than the satellite, which has far too high of a latency for real-time conversation. Belay you fears, though! I do believe I have a solution, even two, perhaps. Part of the time we played, I think, I worked and lived on a nearby Standardbred ranch and it has a great Internet connection. I'm considering asking if they need help once again.  The other possible solution is my cell phone. It most certainly is fast enough to support our real-time conversation—but it comes with an expensive price tag. If GfD uses too much data, I can't afford using it.  So, there is hope for a return, albeit a distant one. I'm not yet in the mood and my life and schedule remains volatile at this time. In a couple of weeks, perhaps I'll have a more definitive update.  I'm missing everyone and looking forward to spending time together around the virtual table again!  With hope, — Richard Sharpe

greate to hear from you mate :) and dont worry, real life before online life ;) also if y aneed to talk about what ever you can always hit me up. we can keep things going on are side now that we know whats up you just do you and take the time needed :)

G ood seeing everyone yesterday for the impromptu gladiator fights! Those were some great duels! I'm happily surprised to see how far Luke has come in his knowledge of the rules system! Looking forward to seeing the 1-1 tie breaker between he and Mark. Hope to see you all again soon. Naryar, hate that you missed it, man! Dang! I know you've been around. We all just so happened to have been online at once without planning it, around noon to around 4 p.m. We'll do it again soon, I'm sure.  S tarted texturing the dungeon today. Its layout is mainly finito. Next will be "decorations" and coloring/shadowing.  Boss is basically done save for some details and tweaking. There will be some nasty mechanical traps, if that's what you consider 5d cutting to the throat on a failed hearing and dodge roll, both with significant penalties. Pit traps, falling rocks, swinging blades, arrows with "save or die" poison . . . Yeah, good luck with those. General population and treasure is still far from complete. Nearly all-new compendium of monsters will be used, though there will be all the usual suspects as well: orcs, goblins, zombies, skeletons, ogres, etc. Flying gargoyles will make the cut as well. My "spellwights" will return (low-level undead casters), as will the warthog men, "gourouni." Still need to write the intro story, which will be window dressing about how GfD is all a video game. S o, there's still a lot of work to be done, BUT there's a really cool puzzle, if I do say so myself! All old-school hack-and-slash dungeon crawls need to break for sinister and insidious puzzles (cue ambient maniacal laughter echoing in the distance), and out of all my many shortcomings as a GM, I am the worst about adding puzzles. It's a real brain teaser. I think it will be fun. Part of the reason I'm able to add a puzzle is because I think I have finally broken myself down into making a true old-school dungeon, one fit for a 90's video game. I think I'm actually ready to run a real dungeon crawl. I am seriously—honestly this time—adding monsters to rooms that are doing nothing— nothing —other than standing in a room staring at the walls with weapons ready to attack any delvers that walk through the door. No other reason they are there at all. Their back story is that they are computer-generated AI adversaries, so there is literally no logistics to this dungeon. I might just have broken my self-imposed shackles of more than 20 years of training myself that combat and the rules system is a distant second place to role playing and story.  Damn, it's going to hurt putting a room with red brick walls and a bright blue tile floor right against another with a green metal floor covered with glowing purple slime and a lava fountain in its corner. But, I'm going to do it! For Gorefest Dungeon! 

Radical. How do you feel about random encounter tables?

Hey, nice to see GfD picking up again! Glad to hear from you guys again and that you are getting through the challenges of life. By the way, those are some cool pictures you posted. Nice ambient lighting, great field of view, top textures on the vegetation and that PoV from horseback is so awesome it more than makes up for the vanilla sky textures. What game is that? I definitely need to check it out! =) Side note: have you seen DF 19 Incantation Magic?

Carnwennan said: Radical. How do you feel about random encounter tables? They literally make me horny. I keep them in my porn folder right beside "midget amputee ladyboys." Funny I never considered using them for this dungeon level.  Valter said: Hey, nice to see GfD picking up again! Glad to hear from you guys again and that you are getting through the challenges of life. By the way, those are some cool pictures you posted. Nice ambient lighting, great field of view, top textures on the vegetation and that PoV from horseback is so awesome it more than makes up for the vanilla sky textures. What game is that? I definitely need to check it out! =) Side note: have you seen DF 19 Incantation Magic? The game is called  Outside . It's a pay-to-play MMORPG with 7 billion+ active players. I've not opened DF19 yet. Didn't know DF went all the way to 19, actually. In fact, I'm quite rusty on the rules. I'm re-learning how to create dungeon maps and even use Roll20. Had to ask Chris how to "whisper" in chat! You should stop by on regular occasion, Valter! We'd love to have you around, even if it's just for visits and arena duels. Glad to hear you're surviving the . . . civil unrest, if that's what it's called. Probably on a white-sand beach surrounded by topless Brazilian babes in g-stings, I know. 

Outside? Touché. Hehehe. Babes got a bit agitated during the protests, but I managed to calm them down... I know a few "relaxation" techniques that work well. Now, since you invited, I'll se about leaving them unattended for a while to drop by and get some gore and a bit of fest. Welcome back to the Roll20 saddle!