Silverarm RPG Newsletter: #1 (Redux)

New Blog Post, Mothership Panel Interview, Sneak Peak of Cover Art for Upcoming 300+ page Extraplanar Pointcrawl Sandbox.

Howdy,

The Silverarm Newsletter has lain fallow and now arises in new form on Substack! For those of you subscribed elsewhere for the previous 13 newsletters, thanks for sticking around for the ride. I’ll post more often with interesting Silverarm RPG updates going forward.

This month I’ve got:

• A Fresh blog post with two wacky classes,

• A Mothership Creator Panel Interview I was on at GameHole Con

• A very exciting sneak peak of the cover for the 300+ extraplanar pointcrawl sandbox book that Leo Hunt (of Vaults of Vaarn) has written for Silverarm- The Shrike.

Silverarm Blog Posts

Two New Classes- Handyman And Lamp Host

I got goofy and made some classes that I find very fun. They’re written on a minimal chassis of abilities that should make them broadly compatible with most OSR type systems or you can just steal them for monster ideas.

The Handyman- Sews hands from corpses onto their body to form new arms. They can also eat hands to regain a tiny bit of HP instead but they hate doing this. As they develop

Lamp Host- Has a parasitic lamp growing out of their shoulder, casting them in a white green glow that grows as they level. Can see magical affects, magically gaslight people, and spread the lamp parasites to become a hivemind.

Mothership Third Party Creator Panel

World of Game Design invited me to be on a panel of Mothership Third Party creators along with Eric Alsandor, Marco Serrano, and Gregory Harris. I think there’s some solid advice here as we talk about how you design Mothership module, how to overcome some roadbumps, and why you would want to write Mothership stuff. It was also a bunch of fun! Here’s the podcast version.

The Shrike Cover Art Reveal

I’m very excited to announce The Shrike, an over 300 page pointcrawl sandbox through a derelict prison demiplane by Leo Hunt. This cover and the black and white interior art was created by the excellent Jantiff Illustrations. Here’s an excerpt of the book’s intro:

”Hell does not retain a consistent size: it waxes and wanes in response to unknowable stimuli. When Hell recedes, entire provinces are shed like refuse abandoned on the beach by a retreating tide. The Shrike is one of these lost fragments of Hell, a neglected corner of the afterlife abandoned by the greater vista of torment that once gave it purpose.

The Shrike itself is a colossal blade, dedicated to the punishment of a nameless God. From afar, the edifice resembles a sharpened mountain of black iron and volcanic stone, a cathedral of pain buttressed by serrated spires. The Shrike is a heaven-harrowing thorn, ever-burgeoning and burrowing into sacred flesh, piercing the Nameless God's heart and bearing them aloft in undying agony. Divine blood flows through the inner structures of the Shrike and nourishes life where it pools. 

The Shrike is a world of rusted iron, crumbling stone, saltwater, blood, and fog. Around the structure lies the roiling ocean and a grey archipelago upon which no healthy plant has ever grown and no wholesome creature stirs. Above are pewter-hued clouds, seabirds, and the pitiless stars.”

Newsletter Poll:

What do you think about system neutral content for fantasy gaming? I’ve been reading some books I enjoy lately like The Monster Overhaul and Into the Wyrd and Wild lately that have a generic OSR type stat blocks (like- Armor: As Chain, HD:2 (12 hp), Attack: 2d6 dripping scythe Save or Stunned for 1 Round, Morale: 10) instead of written for a particular system in that family of systems. Some pros and cons to both.