Wing Commander RPG

Alright, until I can get the file fixed and up on Lulu, here's the PDF version of the full game with bookmarks. That should take care of all the outstanding issues in the short term.

On with Vespus!!

EDIT: Link killed, use the earlier one.
 
Urg...no, no, no, stupid PDF program. I want both ALL the fonts AND the ruttin' bookmarks...... #bangs_head_against_wall.

#thinks_a_second

#bangs_the_programmer-s_head_against_the_wall_instead
 
Alright, we're finally in business. To the eight of you who have downloaded the game to this point: go back to Lulu and pick up the new version of the file same way you got the original; it should have the bookmarks now. For those of you who have yet to download the game, it's at the same link I posted earlier.

So at this point everything should be cool and froody. We'll see how the covers turn out as soon as the proofs arrive. I suspect they might need a little more work...
 
In the distant future, mankind is locked in a deadly war...

It is the Twenty-Seventh Century, mankind's darkest hour. For nearly thirty years, the military forces of the Terran Confederation have been locked in a desperate struggle against the Kilrathi, a cat-like warrior race whose thirst for conquest knows no bounds. Despite horrific losses, humanity fights on; to surrender to the Kilrathi means enslavement, or worse yet, extinction.

Will you stand with Earth or with the Kilrathi? Will you join the military, choose the life of an independent privateer or perhaps seek a life of piracy? Will you pilot a fighter, command a mighty capital ship, explore the universe, or sit around all day high on Brilliance? The potential for adventure is limited only by the bounds of your imagination; your destiny is entirely in your hands.

The Wing Commander Role-Playing Game brings the wonder and grandeur of the ground-breaking video game series to the gaming table. Compiled using information gathered over two decades by fans of the original series, WCRPG has everything you need to create your own adventures in the Wing Commander Universe.

Now available at Lulu.com:
Volume 1: Player's Guide ($40.34)
Volume 2: Gamemaster's Guide ($32.98)
PDF (Free Download)

Relinked for new forum page.
 
Not at the moment. I had a temporary Dropbox link up when Lulu was having a fit over the font embedding but it's fixed now. I had intended to host the file at the Wikia site but it was barfing over the file size.

I tell you what, I'll set the file back up on Dropbox and PM you a link. Lemme know when you get it.

PM Sent.
 
Might have to; didn't know that Lulu had started requiring folks to register to download their free e-books. That was probably necessary so they could start telling me in what parts of the world folks were buying my games; still gonna hack off a lot of folks.
 
Greetings, Wingnuts and Citizens!! Time for the weekly WCRPG Update.

I'm not quite sure how to begin this one. I guess I'll say that I intend to give regular updates until work is finished on Vespus, since (in case you missed the announcement) all work on WCRPG is now complete and the game is now available from Lulu.com. Most of the early part of this week I spent working on first getting materials to the publisher and then updating them when various problems arose; this included problems with the cover images (which I resolved for good over the weekend) and with getting the Chapter PDF files to merge with A) fonts fully embedded and B) intact bookmarks; that effort reached a conclusion on Tuesday (and it's been brought to my attention that Lulu is now requiring folks to register before they can download PDF files; it wasn't like that three years ago). At this point all the other last minute issues with the game have been addressed and I'm waiting for my hard-copy proofs to arrive; I received word on Friday evening that the order had shipped, so I expect to see them before the week is out. They shipped before I could get the covers fixed, so I imagine they'll be slightly off, but not significantly so (by a tenth of an inch on the sides, tops; the first copy is also going to have some visual artifacts).

I picked up work on Vespus on Wednesday, beginning with a review of the project's status. I went ahead and completed the "What's Next" section and set callsigns for the two outstanding pilots who still didn't have them; even came up with one for Bhopal's chief tech. I also fixed an outstanding issue with a few of the places of birth of the pilots (some of them were indicated to be born in Gemini prior to the colonization of the Sector). I completed two stat blocks on Thursday and ended the day by adding registry numbers to the ships of the Confederation Task Group. Friday was the big day, when I finally knuckled down and started forming mission structures; I got through all of them except for the two Mission #5 scenarios. I wasn't particularly happy with the way Mission #2 was looking but Whistler gave me some sound advice that I intend to act upon.

Short term plans: finish Vespus, release it, go back and do a proper proofreading of Prelude and Enyo, then proofread Vespus and re-release all three at Lulu. After that...I've had another Wing Commander-based project idea in the pipe for a while, and it may be time to start working on that. I'll still keep the specifics of that project under my hat for the time being...

That's it for this week; next update will as normal, next Monday (May 20) at some time between 11-14Z.
 
Off topic: Just saw the news regarding Norman, Oklahoma...watching your town on the news. Hope all is well despite the devastation. Godspeed.
 
I appreciate the concern. Me, my wife and my kids are all okay (one of the advantages of working two stories below ground) and Norman itself was not hit, but the town of Moore, which is about five miles to the north/northwest, was hit hard. I've got a number of friends who live up that way; I'm not entirely sure that one of them wasn't a teacher at that elementary school that got leveled.

And believe me I am still alive. I'm doing science and I am still alive. I feel FANTASTIC and I am still alive......
 
Got the news that the proof has arrived at the OKC UPS office. Means it might arrive as early as tomorrow; going to depend on if the trucks have problems getting through the storm damage. Bunch of stupid folks out rubbernecking storm damage on I-35...
 
Notice anything about my bookshelf?

DSC04594a.jpg


I'll give you a hint...

DSC04597a.jpg


Yep. The proofs have arrived.

DSC04598a.jpg


Now, these were the first copies, the ones I ordered before I had all the kinks worked out with the covers. You can see a bit of border on volume one; while that's been corrected with volume two, some of the image got cut off. Volume one still has a visual artifact too that you really can't see in these pics. Trust me it's there. Problems aside, they look beautiful.

DSC04600a.jpg


I had been worried about the interior pictures too - this same picture of Thrakhath turned out pretty dreadful in Prelude. I'm happy to report the interiors look fine. The books are beautiful, a nice addition to my collection. Hefty, though; the two volumes combined weigh about 7.5 pounds (as much as my younger son did when he was born - fitting then that the game's dedicated to him...)
 
Seeing things like this in print is always pretty extraordinary! However, you should consider going back and cropping the black bars out of any screenshots that had them. They don't look good in print, not to mention that they're totally unnecessary.
 
I might at some point. Given how hard it was to put together the PDFs, though, I'm not sure this is something that will happen very soon; we are talking about maybe half-a-dozen images at the most.
 
Good Monday, Wingnuts and Citizens!! Time for the weekly WCRPG Update. I hope y'all are having a pleasant Memorial Day here in the states and get an opportunity to eat a rib or two in memory of our veterans.

I have to apologize for the lateness of this update; it was an exceptionally busy week in these parts and with all the hubbub going on I forgot to compose the update over the weekend like I ordinarily do. Both my children were being exceptionally evil overnight and it's Memorial Day; these are also contributing factors.

So this week was all on Vespus. I made some progress on the campaign, though RL intruded a great deal (Monday's tornado in nearby Moore was the most prominent event of the week). I was also involved in a few playtests of the Privateer board game project. I managed to get the basic structures for all remaining missions in place on Monday before it was time to duck and cover. Tuesday I worked on the stat blocks for the Kilrathi pilots, finishing up most of them by day's end. I completed the Kilrathi stat blocks on Wednesday and added fighter specializations to the Confederation group, finishing up another pilot's stat block. I have yet to finish any of the pilot bios and there are still a good number of Confederation personnel who still need work on their stat blocks. Thursday was spent working on the text of Mission 1, including work on the briefing and encounters texts and the calculation of the distances and times between the nav points. Friday saw significant work on Mission 2, including the calculations of all encounter tables and nav distances, the listing of force dispositions and introductory text for all nav points; most of that mission's nav points just need encounter notes to complete. I've also been working on dialog for the character of "Mot", Bhopal's communications officer. There's something appealing about having an Irish-descent Landreicher flight controller, but working through all the available slang is a bit daunting.

Alright: so this week my intent is to continue pretty much the way I've been going (i.e. haphazardly). I don't expect a great deal of progress in the next few weeks; I'll be travelling to spend time with my in-laws this week and next, which means a lot of family time/almost no time to sneak off and work on projects without getting an earful about it.

That's it for this week; next update will as normal, next Monday (June 3) at some time between 11-14Z.
 
Greetings, Wingnuts and Citizens!! Time for the weekly WCRPG Update.

Not much to report this week, unfortunately. Took Memorial Day off and I've been on out of town visiting family since Wednesday (missed Friday's fun with mother nature completely), so the only day I had to work last week was Tuesday, which was spent working on Mission 1. I can report that I completed the briefing text, the mission start section and one of the two mission encounter points. Mission 1 is actually fairly close to completion at this point; I still need to add notes for the other encounter point, the interlude text (which will in this case help set up the campaign), and add the mission ending texts (you know, Rollins either congratulating you or telling you that you suck, except in this case the comm officer is an Irish-descent Landreicher). I also still need to do some calculations for the disposition of the task unit after mission 1. I'm still not at home yet and I hope to have some time to work on Vespus this week; going to depend on whether or not my wife continues to insist I do no work while I'm doing absolutely nothing else with my in-laws...

I haven't got anything done other than notes on six of the missions, with eight missions planned. Mission 1 is fairly far along, as is mission 2 - I think I could finish up both fairly rapidly. Most of the characters still haven't got finished stat blocks, let alone bios. So, there's still a lot of work left to do. The CIC's 15th birthday is coming up in August and at this point I'm hoping to have Vespus ready for that. I'm a little further along at this point than I was with Enyo last year, so I think finishing it - even to the point of having it proofread - is within the realm of possibilities. That was definitely not the plan when I got started with that project, but I might as well do it at this point. I definitely need to get my act together if that's going to happen, though.

That's it for this week; next update will hopefully be on time for once, sometime between 11-14Z on June 10.

capi
 
Greetings, Wingnuts and Citizens!! Time for the weekly WCRPG Update.

Another short update this week, unfortunately, I wasn't able to get much done this last week with Vespus aside from finishing out a few stat blocks. I can report that the next two hardcopies - the ones for Games HQ in the Oklahoma City area and the copy I intend to send to Chris Roberts - have arrived. These are the first batch with the corrected covers; they look pretty snazzy. If you've been waiting to pick up hardcopies, I can finally go ahead and give you the green light. This coming Saturday is Free RPG Day; while I won't be doing a big nationwide spread, I would like to encourage all of y'all who are into tabletop roleplaying to go to your closest game store and see what's being offered this year. I will be doing a display at Games HQ; I'll be sure to post some pics from that.

So, not much new to report. Mission 1 and 2 are on the cusp of completion and I could probably knock out the remaining character stat blocks with a little effort. I do have some catchup work to do in RL but that shouldn't take all that long. Hopefully I'll have a lot more to report next week. Going to need to if Vespus is going to be ready for the CIC's birthday - just over a month from today, unless I'm mistaken...

That's it for this week; next update will be sometime between 11-14Z on June 17.

capi
 
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