16 September 2013

Scene Contest Candidates

We got a bunch of great entries in the Scene Contest, and now it’s time for you to pick your favorite!

As I told Pocket Tactics, it was hard picking just a few for voting.
Let’s play duelist!

“Let’s Pretend” had a great image, which reminded me of the cover of Cults of Prax and our own R59. This meant I was willing to think of ways around one of the possible problems with the scene (if heroquests are so hard to start that you often cannot when you have the backing of the clan, how could some kids start one by accident?).

I am a sucker for politics, perhaps because I enjoyed writing my political scene so much. I like emphasizing that the playing pieces have minds of their own. So “While You Were Away” appealed to me.

For some reason, “Tag-Along” wasn’t in my original list of candidates, but our tester Liana Kerr had it in hers. And taking another look, I had to agree. (This is just an example of how hard it was picking.)

Have some porridge — in your face!
I’m a sucker for the Icelandic sagas, and “The Porridge Fiend” seemed to come right out of one (though the author suggested he had a more indirect inspiration). And we already had a porridge illustration inspired by the sagas.

Liana and I liked some other ideas, but she pointed out that in one, the action took place off-screen. So maybe we’ll still work it up, but it wasn’t quite worthy of being a contest winner. And others were fun but seemed exceptionally difficult to work into the Gloranthan mythology.

Special mention to one funny scene that riffed off a throw-away line of advice I wrote for one of Elise Bowditch’s scenes. I’d prefer that the contest winning scene stand alone, so it’s more likely to occur.

Voting ends soon, so please cast yours!

06 September 2013

Still Judging Scene Contest

Various factors conspire to delay the next phase of the scene contest, but the biggest is that we received 22 entries, over half of which could easily be in the game. Thanks to everyone who entered, we will surely be inspired to add something thanks to your ideas.

So we’re still discussing which ones are funniest, don’t require too much stretching of the setting, etc. Some are good scenes, but are they special enough? Or does the action happen in distant lands rather than on-screen?

It doesn’t look like we’ll have a decision before I have to get on a plane today. So look for it next week.