Aaaaaaand…we’re back. Or getting back, anyway. January is almost gone, and we’re finally getting out heads together here at the AOP offices. Rather than announce our plans for 2010 in one big posting, I think we’re probably better announcing them as we get them nailed down.

So today, we begin with our upcoming plans for Kenneth Hite’s The Day After Ragnarok. We have some really interesting stuff lined up for it up through the Summertime. Lengths and formats may very, so we’re just talking titles for now. Without further adieu…

Memphis: Gateway to the Poisoned Lands
(Winter 2010)

A City Pack for the Bluff City at the dawn of the new barbarism. Memphis makes a great jumping-off point for a “Wolves Across the Border” game of mercenary action and intrigue in the ruins of eastern America.

Capetown: Diesel and Venom (Spring 2010)

A dieselpunk City Pack for the dark side of the British Empire, where industrial ophi-tech spreads gloom — but doesn’t spread the wealth. Fight the power on the gritty streets with Nelson Mandela, or grit your teeth and double down for Crown and country.

The Belly of the Beast: The Speleo-Herpetologist’s Handbook (Summer 2010)

Get the inside story on the Royal Society’s elite band of dragon-delvers — and lots and lots of horrible things to kill and flee from. You think it’s bad outside? You ain’t seen inside, yet.

Behind the Serpent Curtain: The Soviet Sourcebook
(GenCon 2010)

Everything you need to adventure in Stalin’s dark empire, including details on the NKVD, the Jotun, and the Red Army. Will include a Moscow City Pack, and a Plot Point campaign: “Objective: Science City 14!

Serpent Scales: Fragments from
the World After the Serpentfall (ongoing)

Don’t want to wait for just one release per season for your favorite post-Ragnarok game setting? We’ve got you covered. Serpent Scales is an ongoing series of smaller releases, covering a wide variety of characters, organizations, items and monsters in the world after the Serpentfall. Watch for the first one debuting on February 15th!

So spread the word, there’s much more Ragnarok to come!

Atomic Overmind News, The Day After Ragnarok - 8 Comments »

The holiday season is past, and we’re soldiering into a new year here at Atomic Overmind Press. We’re getting our plans in place for 2010, so expectto see some cool announcements here next week.

In the meantime, Tehran: Nest of Spies can now be purchased at E23, DriveThruRPG, Paizo.com, and from our friends over at Studio 2 Publishing.

Check back next week for new of upcoming AOP projects!

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Kenneth Hite’s Cthulhu 101 is out in the wild now…and, of course, subject to the judgment of others. Fortunately, the judgments so far have been positive! Here are a couple of cool mentions the book has gotten out on “teh Intarwebs”.

Reviewer Bill Bodden was kind enough to give Cthulhu 101 a review over at FlamesRising.com. Check it out here.

We’re also thrilled that Cthulhu 101 has made OgreCave.com’s 2009 Christmas Guide, ending up in the Twelve Stock Stuffer Games list. Thanks, guys! You can check out the full list of great gift ideas here.

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…hope you survive your time here. At long last, Tehran: Nest of Spies is here, and available for purchase in the Atomic Overmind Press store! 35 pages of Persian City Sourcebook for the Savage Worlds game system can be yours for just $7.95. This book is literally hot from the digital forge, so watch for it to arrive at our other sales partners in the next few days!

As another preview of the contents, take a look at the map of Tehran in the wake of the Serpentfall. Click the image below for a larger look!

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It’s a proven fact, jury duty ruins everything! However, that duty is now complete, and we can get back down to business. We’re spending today putting the finishing touches on Tehran: Nest of Spies, but it will probably be later in the day before we finally get all the bugs ironed out. In the meantime, here’s another glimpse of what lies in store. Behold, the Ganj!

Ganj

Awakened by the Serpentfall, the ganj crawled out of the earth’s fissures and caves and back into Persia’s nightmares. The dreaded “jewel serpent” resembles an enormous cobra, with its scales studded with faceted encrustations: sapphires, emeralds, rubies … and always one great diamond in the beast’s forehead. The ganj can sniff out large concentrations (or even a few carats) of crystallized carbon–jewels and gems, in other words. Tehrani banks and jewelry stores have to hire monster-killing parties every so often, to clear out the qanats or sub-cellars underneath them as the ganj draw closer. Fortunately, ganj are solitary creatures: where one ganj is “hunting,” others stay away. The exception, of course, is mating season, when any female ganj that has discovered and “nested” a sizable hoard attracts predatory males by the dozen.

Attributes: Agility d8, Smarts d6(A), Spirit d8, Strength d12, Vigor d8
Skills: Climbing d8, Fighting d8, Guts d6, Notice d8, Stealth d6
Pace: 9   Parry: 5   Toughness: 8 (14 on head)

Special Abilities

• Bite: Str+d4
• Fear: Seeing a ganj requires a Guts roll.
• Glittering Shield: The gem-like coruscations of the ganj’s head scales attract the eye: attackers must make a Smarts test to avoid aiming for the ganj’s jeweled armor (Armor 6). Only attackers who succeed at this Smarts test can reap the benefit of the ganj’s Large size (+2 to human-sized attackers).
• Mineral Sense: The ganj can detect crystallized carbon within 200 yards; it receives +2 to all relevant Notice checks and ignores darkness or similar penalties.
• Quick: Discard action cards of 5 or lower.
• Resin Spit: The ganj spits quick-hardening resin at its prey, at ranges up to 20”. Treat the resin as an entangle, aimed at a single target. Each round after it hits, the penalty to Agility or Strength attempts to break free increases by -1. Use the Drowning rules for the long-term effects of being trapped in ganj resin.
• Size +2: The ganj can get up to 40’ long.

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…and that, my friends, is JURY DUTY. The City of Alexandria, VA is putting its demands on key members of the Atomic Overmind Press staff today, so we are regrettably forced to push the release for Tehran: Nest of Spies off until Wednesday, Dec, 2nd (there are a few remaining touches that are necessary). We apologize for the delay…blame The Man!

However, to whet your appetite for Tehran: Nest of Spies, we’ll give you a little taste of what’s in store. Meet the head of the Iranian Gendarmerie…and it’s not who you’d expect.

Col. H. Norman Schwarzkopf, Sr.

Colonel Schwarzkopf (b. 1895) may be best-known to Americans as the chief investigator in the Lindbergh baby kidnapping, or possibly as the voice of the Gang Busters radio program in the late 1930s, but in Persia he is the trusted commander of the National Gendarmerie, and has been since 1942. Put in charge of Persia’s only national police force during the Allied occupation, he brought the same dedication, honesty, and organizational skills to the task that he’d used as Superintendent of the New Jersey State Police. With his wife and son (back in New Jersey) presumed dead after the Serpentfall, Schwarzkopf has re-dedicated himself to his men and his adopted country, an attitude that gains him enemies and grudging respect in equal measure in the corridors of power.

He speaks German, Persian, and Russian in a raspy voice, a consequence of a gas attack during WWI.

Attributes: Agility d8, Smarts d8, Spirit d8, Strength d6, Vigor d10

Skills: Driving d6, Fighting d6, Guts d10, Intimidation d10, Investigation d8, Knowledge (Criminology) d8, Knowledge (Logistics) d10, Notice d8, Persuasion d8, Riding d10, Shooting d8, Stealth d6, Streetwise d8, Survival d6, Tracking d6.

Charisma: 0     Pace: 6     Parry: 5     Toughness: 8

Edges: Brawny, Command, Connections, Danger Sense, Investigator, Nerves of Steel, Quick Draw.

Hindrances: Anemic, Callous, Code of Honor, Loyal

Special Abilities

Gendarmes: As head of the Gendarmerie, Col. Schwarzkopf can call on a squad of Gendarmes (2d6 available) anywhere in Persia. (Use Police stats, DAR p. 81; replace Driving with Riding d6, increase Shooting to d6.)

Atomic Overmind News, Savage Worlds, The Day After Ragnarok - 4 Comments »

Well, it’s taken a bit longer to put together than we would have thought, but it’s finally coming together….Tehran: Nest of Spies is finally in a state that we can announce a firm release date. The PDF will be available for sale on Monday, November 30th!

In the wake of the Serpentfall, Persia lies balanced between the desperate British Empire and the malevolent Soviet Union. Both powers have toyed with Persia in the past; both would gladly swallow it whole in the present. Their machinations reach a fever pitch in Persia’s historic capital …Tehran: Nest of Spies!

The Savage Worlds version of the book is actually on the cusp of completion. However, we’re going to hold off for one more week so we can get past Thanksgiving, and also prepare the HERO 6th Edition version of it for simultaneous release.

We’ll be posting a little preview after the weekend, as well as some details about length, price, and where it will be available for sale. Watch for the news!

Atomic Overmind News, HERO System, Savage Worlds, The Day After Ragnarok - 5 Comments »

Just a few links of interest for this Monday morning.

Kenneth Hite Hits the Podcast Scene (again)

Kenneth Hite was a guest on Chris Lackey and Chad Fifer’s H.P.Lovecraft Literary Podcast last week. Ken He shares his thoughts on Nyarlathotep, books and good old fashion fun! Check the podcast out for yourself here: Episode 18 – Nyarlathotep and The Crawling Chaos

A Week to Remember

Kenneth Newquist over at Nuketown is apparently beginning The Week After Ragnarok, a week long series of posts about his upcoming Ruins of New York scenario that he’ll be debuting at MEPACon Fall 2009. Head on over and check it out: The Week After Ragnarok

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Cthulhu 101 is now available in hoby game and bookstores nationwide, and just in time for Halloween! Keep an eye out for it at your local bookstore, and ask for it if you don’t see it. If you really can’t get a hold of it there, you should be sure to head on over to the Atomic Overmind Press Webstore, or check out our newly available products over at Paizo.com!

In other awesome news, Cthulhu 101 author Kenneth Hite has two exciting events coming up this Wednesday. First of all, we have this:

Kenneth Hite on Vocalo.org, 89.5 FM Chicago

Wednesday, October 28, 4 to 5 p.m.

Author Kenneth Hite will be in the studio to talk with us about the mysterious Cthulhu. From wikipedia,”Cthulhu is a fictional cosmic entity created by horror author H. P. Lovecraft in 1926. It is often cited for the extreme descriptions given of its hideous appearance, its gargantuan size, and the abject terror that it evokes. Cthulhu is often referred to in science fiction and fantasy circles as a tongue-in-cheek shorthand for extreme horror or evil.”

You can tune into Ken at www.vocalo.org, broadcasting on 89.5 FM in the Chicago area, and streaming world wide at Vocalo.org. Addtionally, that very same day (take from the Third Coast Comics website)…

Ken Hite and Scott Larson signing at Third Coast Comics, Chicago, IL

Wednesday, October 28, 6 p.m.

“The most merciful thing in the world, I think, is the inability of the human mind to correlate all its contents.” – The Call of Cthulhu

“RAAAAAAAARGGGGHHH” – King Kong

Author and indie RPG designer Ken Hite is signing copies of Cthulhu 101 and talking HP Lovecraft to to get us in the Halloween spirit!

If you’re a fan of Lovecraft’s Cthulhu Mythos then spending a few hours talking about Deep Ones and Time Vampires could be just what you were looking for.

Artist, Scott Larson is signing copies of KONG: King of Skull Island! Scott has a unique talent for drawing 2 things; Women and Giant Apes. It’s probably a good thing he’s also the regular artist for Fem Force, which is, as the title would suggest, a comic book about a world populated by pretty much nothing but female super people and the villains who must see their own dastardly plans wrecked by them.

We think this is a perfect way to start Halloween! Scott will actually be on hand Starting at 2:00 pm just to make sure you’re all in the right mood for the Giant Monster Throwdown to come!

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Rising out of the rain soaked mud here in the Metro DC area, The Overmind returns! Some external obligations took us a little off track in the last few weeks, but we’re back now and ready to publish! (or…something.)

Ragnarok Unleashed!

The Day After Ragnarok: Hero 6th Version is available in hobby stores NOW, and just in time…because HERO SYSTEM 6th Edition is shipping! That’s right, the two volume, full-color magnum opus from Steve Long and the Hero Games crew is finally wending its way your FLGS…and we’re proud to have one of the first Hero 6th products in The Day After Ragnarok!

Our friends over at Studio 2 Publishing also inform us the the Savage Setting version of The Day After Ragnarok is also available, so hopefully sightings in the wild will begin to crop up. If you see it out there in your FLGS, please do let us know.

Both versions are, of course, also available in the Atomic Overmind Press webstore!

Tehran Update

So, obviously getting together the first DAR supplement has taken a bit longer than we intended. Ken has been beavering away finishing the words, and the map is taking shape as well. I do believe we’ll be able to set a concrete release date in the next few days, but theoretically it should be out sometime next week. Theoretically. We are as yet unsure if they will release simultaneously, but Tehran: Nest of Spies will definitely be available in both Savage Worlds and Hero 6th Edition flavors. Say tuned for more concrete details later this week!

Atomic Overmind News, HERO System, Savage Worlds, The Day After Ragnarok - 3 Comments »