Well, Skortched Urf’ Studios has had our best month ever. We aren’t raking in cash so I can leave my job and write game stuff full-time, but enough that I can use the sales from this month to pay the artists and writers to keep on providing us with material. (And maybe buy myself a few RPG Books if I want!)

Not sure if I’ll finish the Tech Update today, so I may lump it in with February’s releases. We have a full line-up of PDF’s for Feb….still working on the two products I am writing myself, the Tech Update, Mob Family for Modern, a Fantasy Prestige class, and two more Adventurer Essentials; so far that’s seven PDF’s on deck. (Plus some stock art!)

Played Gears of War last night with my friends online. My buddy with the new 360 was there, so that was fun. I am not sure if I am supposed to feel bad about this or not; but the graphic depictions of characters being killed in that game are hilarious! (Even when its my death I think its funny!) Ahhh…good times.

Internet Quote of the day I came across while checking my daily Blogs:

Basically, I figure guns are like gays: They seem a lot more sinister and threatening until you get to know a few; and once you have one in the house, you can get downright defensive about them.

- Teresa Neilson Hayden, quoted in an article about “The Pink Pistols”, a national Gay & Lesbian Gun rights organization.

A staff review posted at RPGNow gives the dept. 7 Advanced Class Update: The Unbound Soul a FIVE STAR review!  Found HERE.

Released the Prince of Doggs; a Dept. 7 Advanced Class Update covering a modern-day Werewolf crossed with a Rap Star. Another one of the classes done by Chris Field. Remeber that name, he’s gonna be big in our little industry one day soon.

Working on the layout for the Nano-Robotic PAN’s Technology Update; I hope to get that out before the end of the month. I got some artwork back from Anthony…he is breaking speed records on the Mob Family illustrations. He also sent me a Purple Worm getting ready to chow down on a pair of unfortunate adventurers. (That picture is my new desktop background image!) The Worm and the Mob Family will make up the first releases of our new “Adventure Blocks” line. (One for Modern, another for Fantasy.) Both will see publication in February.

“Fear the Worm!”

My buddy in Canada just purchased an XBox 360! (He had to wear down his wife, who had forstalled him ever spending any money on anything remotely fun.) Welcome to the club! He’s been a core player in our Halo II sessions, and can now join us for Gears of War online. (And the Halo III Beta of course.)

I have a new writer working on the Adventurer Essentials line. I am pretty excited to start fleshing out the line a bit more.  I have the manuscript for the second release in my posession, and the artwork has been assigned; so once the art is back I can do the layout and have it published.  I anticipate a February release for that, with the third installment following later in Feb or March.

Got more artwork in from Anthony for the Mob Family he’s working on.  With the pace he’s going that should see a February release as well.  Back here in January we have the NeoWitch Guardian coming later today, as well as the next Technology Update and another advanced class the Prince of Doggs.  All three of those will be released between now and the end of the month.

I will try to get the NeoWitch out tonight before my regular Halo II session on XBox live.  My brother has been notified he was accepted for the Halo III beta test.  That bum!  He’s the only one of us that got accepted. (So far.)

RPGNow has been down all day…I heard on the publisher forum they are having a DoS attack. Right after the credit card info hack hit the street. This can’t be good. DriveThruRPG is up, but half of the products have missing thumbnails so it might as well be down.

Had a server crash here at work, so that has taken most of my time yesterday and today. Got it fixed now, but need to re-install a bunch of stuff. Fun Fun.

Got a new piece of artwork back from Anthony. he’s hard at work on the long-awaited mob family for D20 Modern. The underboss:

Worked on the layout last night for the NeoWitch Guardian. That should be released either tonight or tomorow. I like that class; it has a lot of character to it, and the artwork nails it also.

Posted the Mega-Feats PDF; and it has gotten some positive reviews thus far which I am happy about. A five-star ENWorld review can be found HERE.
Got a new FTP Client; FileZilla. Open Source, gets the job done. I like it.

Internet issues at home have resolved themselves. Played Gears of War til 2:00am Saturday on XBox live Co-Op with my buddy in Maryland. The graphics on that game are OUTSTANDING! Took FOREVER to get past the metal ore-hauling carts. Exploding Genestealers Wretches kept falling into the cart after I shotgunned them and blew me to smithereens. Very frustrating. Oh, and if Games Workshop is listening; you need to make a game just like GoW with Space Marines, Orks, Chaos, and Necrons etc.! (I’ll even let you throw in those panzy Eldar!) Seriously; someone needs to get a REAL game out there using the GW IP. Dawn of War is a great game; I have no complaints about it whatsoever…but those of us into First Person Shooters need a game. (No Fire Warrior DOES NOT count!) Just sayin.

Included in this fifty page PDF are:

-127 New Feats.*
-27 ForgeBlood Feats, allowing you to meld flesh and machine in a fantasy setting!
-House Rules, Published at Last! A collection of House Rules and updates tweaking the
D20 SRD for Chris Field’s campaing setting Aldura.
-A FREE copy of the OGL included with every purchase!

From the Author:

*OK, sixteen of them are variant PHP feats, so sue me.

Just got a batch of artwork back from Anthony, and as always he has done a masterfull job!  I put together several of the covers for some of our upcoming releases; and here is a quick pre-view!

The Mega-Feats book has over 120 new Feats, plus almost 30 ForgeBlood feats that allow you to create a brand new race of flesh and machine, plus some house rules.

The Neo-Witch is the Modern take on Witches.

The Prince of Doggs is your basic Werewolf-Rap star.

And the Tech. Update covers Nano-Robotic PAN’s than characters can have installed at higher tech levels.

My internet was working last night (So I did get to play Gears of War and Halo II!) but my FTP client is acting up..having trouble connecting from home and from here at work.  That is why the Lightweaver isn’t up on YourGamesNow; I haven’t been able to upload the file!  I’ll get that sorted out this weekend.

Today Skortched Urf’ Studios relases another Advanced Class following our “Hero” theme.

The Light Weaver sees the world differently than other people, even other psions. They perceive the universe as a place of indescribable beauty, of interlaced quantum strings and cascades of photons, of waves of energy and howling solar winds. They wield incredible power, including the innate ability to fire laser blasts more powerful and more accurate than anything the military’s ever dreamed of. In addition to raw fire power, a Light Weaver is an artist, capable of warping light to bring their dreams to life as cunningly created holograms. They are skilled illusionists and excellent infiltrators, artists and soldiers.

Written By Chris A. Field.
Artwork by Anthony Cournoyer.

UPDATE: My internet access at home has been really slow and screwy. Some sites I can reach, others I can’t. Cable TV works and the network shows good through-put. Not sure what the deal is. Otherwise this would have been released yesterday. (This had better not affect my XBox Live connectivity; will be on tonight playing Halo II and possibly Gears of War!)

I just got some artwork back for three more projects, and expect a fourth to be done later today. Additionally, I finished putting the Bookmarks into a 50+ page PDF that will be out once I put the cover together. So that’s five that should see a January release; with two more “possibles” if I get up off my lazy @$$ and finish writing them. One already has artwork, the other can use stock art so there is no delay other than me making the time to finish them. Looks like we are starting the new year off right!

Additionally, I am going to post here more actively; up until now it has mainly been a place to post our press releases and other “news” like our joining the YGN Co-Op. But some other publishers (Phil Reed, Louis Porter Jr. etc.) post regular updates on their Blogs which I know I enjoy reading. And since stealing the idea imitation is the sincerest form of flattery…look for more posts about what I am working on, future projects etc.

In the pipeline:

Dept. 7 Adv. Class Updates:

Lightweaver (Part of our Heroes lineup.)
Neo-Witch (Arcana take on the Modern Witch.)
Prince of Doggs (The Snoop-Dawg of Werewolves.)
Technology Update: Nano-Robotics (Very small robotic Networks.)
Mega-Feats: Feats to Change the World (130+ Mid to High level Feats!)

Look for all of these in the next few weeks!