Saturday Crowdfunding Roundup - Fantasy Gaming Coins, Tiny Epic Galaxies, & Conan

Some pretty cool Kickstarters are coming to a head in the next week or so.  The first of which could use a bit of a boost in their last week.  It's "Fantasy Gaming Coins LARPing, Cosplay, Board Games, RPG more" by Never Stop Tops & Coins.  check out the cool coins here.

Also, "Tiny Epic Galaxies - The Universe In Your Pocket!" by Gamelyn Games is kicking butt and taking names here.

Finally, "Conan" by Monolith Board Games LLC is doing even better yet here!

Saturday Crowdfunding Roundup on CreativeMountainGames.com 

Keeping an eye on those Kickstarter & IndieGoGo
projects plus other crowdfunding efforts.

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The Friday Grab Bag - Beautiful Library, Hobbit Home, & Predator Film House

Over on bookriot.com, they tell us about "America’s Most Beautiful Public Library" here.

Also, the Nerdist website shares an opportunity to rent a beautiful Hobbit-inspired home in Thailand here.

Finally, over on imgur.com, wisnik shares a bunch of images telling us, "So this Swedish dude put out his house for sale."  See more here.

The Friday Grab Bag on CreativeMountainGames.com 

Essentially, a clearinghouse for topics not covered
elsewhere or needing a particular focus.

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Throwback Thursday - Old TSR Adverts

For a little trip down memory lane (for older gamers), try a Google image search with "TSR Hobbies advertisements" as the search parameters.  Here are a few from a tumblr page here had some cool stuff like an old Tom Wham piece . . .

And a Star Frontiers color ad . . .

Finally, over on 2 Warps to Neptune, where there are a ton more ads here, this one suggesting folks should try D&D instead of "The Old Standby Game" gave me a chuckle.

Throwback Thursday on CreativeMountainGames.com 

A look back at early tabletop hobby gaming

 or gaming-adjacent topics of the past.

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Events & Play Wednesday - Conventions, Gamedays, and Misc Gaming, Feb Plus

Some events locally include . . .

Once again, Kris Herzog is organizing a gameday for Sunday, February 8th at 11 am to be held at Gregs Catering 3120 Roberts St, Franksville, Wisconsin 53126.  It's a short trip from the Milwaukee, Lake Geneva, and Kenosha areas, so stop on by for free gaming a great, reasonably-priced eats.  Join the event on its Facebook page here.

Be sure to make your plans for February 19th, the "Thor'd Thors'day" of January, since it is the monthly Game Like a Viking Day!  It's a chance, no matter where you are, to break out your Viking-themed tabletop games and have at it.  See more of this ongoing monthly day of fun on the Facebook page here.

The third Saturday and Sunday of February, and indeed almost every month, includes the Burlington Gameday on Saturday, February 21st which sets up events through the Burlington UCC Game Day group on Facebook here and A Gathering of Gamers on Sunday, January 15th, set up by the South Lakes Area Gamers here.  The former is in Burlington, WI at the Plymouth UCC space and is free taking place from approximately 11 am to 5 pm.  The latter takes place at the Pizza Ranch in Elkhorn, WI, and requires a $12 fee for the all you can eat pizza and fried chicken buffet (salad bar, soft-serve ice cream machine, etc.) plus unlimited soft drinks and coffee from 11 am to 8 pm.

Don't forget that Winter Fantasy 2015 takes place February 5th to 8th at the Grand Wayne Convention Center 120 W Jefferson Blvd, Fort Wayne, Indiana 46802.  More information can be had on their Facebook page here and on Bald Man Games here.

You can also find a whole list of gaming events all around the country on Warhorn.net here and they include:

Feb 7-8 Swampcon Gainesville, FL, US
Feb 8 Castle Perilous Games X-Wing Minis Carbondale, IL, US
Feb 13-15 Pathfinder Society @ RadCon 6C Pasco, WA, US
Feb 13-16 DunDraCon 39  San Ramon, CA, US
Feb 13-16 OrcCon 2015 Los Angeles, CA, US
Feb 13-16 PFS ORCCON 2015 Los Angeles, CA, US
Feb 18-22 Cayden's Crawl 2: Drinking Games Jacksonville, FL, US
Feb 19-22 Dreamation 2015 Morristown, NJ, US
Feb 19-22 PFS at TotalCon 2015 Mansfield, MA, US
Feb 20-22 Gamicon Iowa City, IA, US
Feb 21 RHoG X-Wing Minis Sacramento, CA, US
Feb 27 - Mar 1  Con Nooga 2015 PFS Chattanooga, TN, US
Feb 27 - Mar 1 Pensacon Pensacola, FL, US
Feb 27 - Mar 1  GottaCon 2015 Victoria, BC, CA
Feb 28 Charm City Gameday, Winter 2015 Glen Burnie, MD, US

Coming up in near months, New England's Largest Game Convention, Total Confusion, runs February 19th to 22nd, 2015.  More info can be found here.

Later, February 27th thru March 1st, check out the information here on the Fire & Ice game convention.  It's also their 15th anniversary.

And coming in March . . .

Online Registration will open Jan. 10 and run through Feb. 13 for Cold Wars which takes place March 5th thru 8th.  This year's theme is Civil War 1865 commemorating "150 Years" since that conflict began.  This is easily one of the top events held by the Historical Miniatures Gaming Society in the US, so if you want to get some wargaming in, head to the  Lancaster Host Resort & Conference Center in Lancaster, PA  Get more information here.

Lake Geneva Games is hosting a gameday this second Saturday, March 14th.  You can donate five dollars to the kitty if you want to partake of the pizza and snacks, soda machine on premises, or bring your own feast from the many restaurants right down the street.  check out more information on the Lake Geneva Games Facebook page here and the events page here.

The third Saturday, March 21st at Games Plus in Mount Prospect, IL, the first Chicago EN World Gameday of 2015.  The event is organized on Warhorn.net here and features two game slots, the morning slot from 9:30 am to 2:30 pm, followed by a one hour break, then an afternoon slot from 3:30 pom to 8:30 pm (and sometimes later).  There are three of these events each year and this is the fortieth one of its kind, so join in for all the RPGing (and some times other games) they have to offer!

And lest we forget, Gary Con VII takes place March 26th to 29th in Lake Geneva, WI, and celebrates gaming old and new.  Four days with some of the finest gamer/designers in the business from all eras.  See more on their website here.

Some of this information is from the excellent lists on upcomingcons.com/gaming-conventions, GameConventionCentral.com, HMGS (the Historical Miniatures Gaming Society), and  as well as many, many gamers on Facebook and Google Plus, to whom I am grateful for the help in this compilation.  Thanks so much and have a great game!

Events & Play Wednesday on CreativeMountainGames.com 

News of Conventions and Gamedays as well as pictures

from those I have attended and games I have played.

Please Like, Share, Plus, Tweet, Follow, and Comment!

Tech Tuesday - Mario AI, SPIDER in Antarctica, & Rabbit Poop Flamethrower

Over on the AAAI Video Competition YouTube channel, they recently uploaded a video titled "Mario Lives! An Adaptive Learning AI Approach for Generating a Living and Conversing Mario Agent."  Enjoy.

Finally, NASA tells how the "SPIDER Experiment Touches Down in Antarctica" here.

Also, on neatorama.com, they explain "How to Build a Flamethrower with Rabbit Poop" here.

Tech Tuesday on CreativeMountainGames.com 

News focused on Technology
as it might interest gamers.

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Media News Monday - Thrones Theft, Guardians Backstage, & Shannara in Auckland

Over on bbc.com, they tell us that the "Game of Thrones sculptor's sea god statue stolen from mountain" here.

Also, on worldofoddballs.com, they explain why "10 “Guardians of the Galaxy” Backstage Facts Will Give You A Double Whammy!" here.

Finally, on stuff.co.nz, there is news that a "US fantasy TV series [is] to be shot in Auckland."  Of course they mean the upcoming Shannara series starring Austin Butler.  Find out more here.

Media News Monday on CreativeMountainGames.com 

News for Movies, Television, and more
of gamer-relevant Media.

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Sunday Funnies - IDing Spiders, Rebuilding Lairs, & Laughing at the Middle Ages

Over on stillcracking.com they've shared an extensive chart on spider identification here.

Also, Doc Mastermind has started a GoFundMe project tempting you to help him rebuild his lair here.

Finally, the Medievalists.net website examines "Laughing at the Middle Ages: The Ethics of Historicist Humour" here.

Sunday Funnies on CreativeMountainGames.com

Humor, often gaming-related,
to start the week with a chuckle.

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Saturday Crowdfunding Roundup - Tabletop Props, Deluxe Orléans, & Wilderness Terrain

With less than five days left to fund, the Tabletop Props: Tent Kickstarter project by Jonathan Wilson is very close and looks pretty damned cool.  See more here.

Also, Deluxe Orléans - Best of Essen 2014 by Michael Mindes has about the same time left, well over 125K and is going strong.  See more here.

Finally, Wilderness Adventures  28mm Scale Fantasy Gaming Terrain by Tom Tullis has just started up and Fat Dragon has a great track record for fulfillment and high quality.  Learn more here.

Saturday Crowdfunding Roundup on CreativeMountainGames.com 

Keeping an eye on those Kickstarter & IndieGoGo
projects plus other crowdfunding efforts.

Please Like, Share, Plus, Tweet, Follow, and Comment!

The Friday Grab Bag - Blog Carnival: A New Year, A New World

This month's Blog Carnival is being shepherded by enderra.com here and the topic is "A New Year, A New World."  Folks can keep track of each new month and visit the archives for the Blog Carnival on roleplayingtips.com here.

In my regular RPG campaign, the players, through their characters, have been exploring the Trackless Moors, an expanse of wilderness that bisects a major kingdom named Jals in the far southeast of a large, established empire.  It's the frontier as it is but this wilderness has always been problematic and too wild to tame in any economically feasible sense for the ruling family in the area.  The players have had at this kingdom, its political seat of power, Jalston, and much of the northern end of the Trackless Moors for months as part of their exploration.  However, aside from some minor subterranean forays into tombs and basements, they had yet to explore anything resembling an underworld until just this month.  Now they are in an extensive series of caverns that are only a fraction of the vastness of Tartarus.  For them, this is a whole new world beneath the world in which they were beginning to become comfortable.

This image is a composite of a background (colored by me) from

The Forge Studios - Environments Ruins by artist Maciej Zagorski

with two overlayed lizardfolk images by Jeff Ward.

Keep in mind, my own campaign world has been around for 40 years.  I started RPGing when D&D first came on the scene in 1974 and added it to the rotation of wargames and minis wargames I had been playing with my friends.  Our first GM (we played more than just D&D) had dibs on the TSR, Judges Guild, and other professional products to seed his own campaign world, including any magazine offerings, so it really left me having to work up a setting whole cloth.  Of course, I follow the advice in the booklets, starting with a town and local "dungeon" with progressively more difficult levels to explore.  It wasn't long, though, before I determined that for the underworld to make sense it needed to have many far-flung points of entry: mines dug too deep (thanks, Tolkien!), cave ins down into caverns, chutes discovered while building tombs, etc.  Over four decades, this has grown and grown even as had the surface world of the Grymvald setting.

So, now this group of players, aged from mid-twenties to mid-fifties, are delving into areas where no other players have gone but which were always there.  They explored some areas of a series of towers on the Trackless Moors known as the Dragon's Teeth, some of which have been lightly explored in campaigns past, but what they found beneath is for them, and in some ways for me, a whole new world.

The Friday Grab Bag on CreativeMountainGames.com 

Essentially, a clearinghouse for topics not covered
elsewhere or needing a particular focus.

Please Like, Share, Plus, Tweet, Follow, and Comment!

Throwback Thursday - How Gaming Got Its Dice by Jon Peterson

This article is almost a couple of years old but I haven't shared it on the blog before, so here's "How Gaming Got Its Dice" by Jon Peterson from his blog, Playing at the World here.

Throwback Thursday on CreativeMountainGames.com 

A look back at early tabletop hobby gaming

 or gaming-adjacent topics of the past.

Please Like, Share, Plus, Tweet, Follow, and Comment!

Events & Play Wednesday - Lake Geneva Area Gaming, Early January through Late January

Aside from the trip to the Gamehole the day after Christmas, which I detailed here, the end of December was quiet and gameless.  However, January kicked off strong and rolled right along.  With several gamedays and lots of lunchtime fun at Taco Bell and Culver's, it was a surprisingly busy month for the dead of winter.  Here are some highlight photos but the bulk of them can be found in a Facebook album here and on Google Plus here.

Events & Play Wednesday on CreativeMountainGames.com 

News of Conventions and Gamedays as well as pictures

from those I have attended and games I have played.

Please Like, Share, Plus, Tweet, Follow, and Comment!

Tech Tuesday - The Hyperloop, Tumor 3D Printed, & Japanese Wood Joinery

Car and Driver has a new article on "Elon Musk: Test Track for 760-mph Hyperloop on the Way" here.

Also, on makezine.com, they tell the story of a "Man [who] Saves [his] Wife’s Sight by 3D Printing Her Tumor" here.

Finally, there is a YouTube video showing off traditional Japanese Wood Joinery.  Enjoy.

Tech Tuesday on CreativeMountainGames.com 

News focused on Technology
as it might interest gamers.

Please Like, Share, Plus, Tweet, Follow, and Comment!

Media News Monday - Walking Dead, Continuum, & Martin Freeman's Perfect Day

Over on amctv.com, folks can watch full episodes of The Walking Dead here.

Also, good news for cans of Continuum since it will get a final fourth season.  Read more here.

Finally, on the Lonely Planet YouTube channel, Martin Freemandescribes his perfect day in Middle Earth, though he's really talking about New Zealand in code.  Enjoy.

Media News Monday on CreativeMountainGames.com 

News for Movies, Television, and more
of gamer-relevant Media.

Please Like, Share, Plus, Tweet, Follow, and Comment!

Sunday Funnies - Out-of-Context RPG Quotes, Harry Potter Quotes, & Weirdest Sleeping Bags

The first two funnies this week are of Out-of-Context quotes, the first batch from RPGs here.

Also, the second batch come to us from the Harry Potter franchise here.

Finally, Distractify shares "The 20 Weirdest Sleeping Bags You Never Knew You Couldn't Live Without" here.

Sunday Funnies on CreativeMountainGames.com

Humor, often gaming-related,
to start the week with a chuckle.

Please Like, Share, Plus, Tweet, Follow, and Comment!