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Dispatches:
News from Atlas Games
Special Ops Drawing Winner!
Atlas Games is pleased to announce that Daniele Corrado of Forli, Italy is the winner of this quarter's Special Ops prize drawing. Daniele will get to choose a prize from among the rare and and one-of-a-kind Atlas Games items reserved for the Special Ops drawing.
Special Ops is Atlas Games' corps of loyal fans who organize and run demos and tournaments at retail stores and conventions across the country and around the world. At the end of each quarter, Special Ops demo team members who have run a game in the last three months are entered into a prize drawing for special Atlas items. The next drawing will be April 3rd, and will feature a choice of prizes such as press sheets and original art from our popular Ars Magica, Feng Shui, Penumbra D20, and Unknown Armies RPGs, and from card game favorites like Dungeoneer, Lunch Money, and Once Upon a Time.
Atlas is also happy to announce that the following Special Ops members have gone up in rank this quarter:
Timothy McDowell (Avatar, 200 HP)
Bill Korsak (Avatar, 200 HP)
Tim Mullins, Jr. (Avatar, 200 HP)
Daniele Corrado (Companion, 100 HP)
Erik Lee (Companion, 100 HP)
Craig Carf (Grog, 50 HP)
Neil Taylor (Grog, 50 HP)
Congratulations to all of you, and keep up the great work!
Also, we'd like to welcome the following new recruits:
Christian Jensen-Romer
Corey Trimmer
Barry Figgins
Neil O'Rourke
Mike Sarno
Conor Skelly
Oscar Valcarcel
Jeffrey Whealton
Thanks for being a part of Special Ops!
If you're interested in joining Atlas Games' Special Ops demo team, just fill out and send in the application form at www.atlas-games.com/specialops .
To request a demo at your convention or retail store, send in the demo request form located at www.atlas-games.com/pdf_storage/SOdemorequestform.rtf .
Michelle Nephew
Special Ops Coordinator
Atlas Games
Nyambe & One Shots in PDF
We're welcoming the new year with two new PDFs, available now for download from RPGNow.com:
Nyambe: African Adventures and
One Shots, the
Unknown Armies adventure anthology.
Nyambe is still available in print, if you prefer your reading material in that form;
One Shots, however, is long sold out...so if you spy a print copy in your local game store, grab it while you can.
Ars Magica Review
Matthew Pook just let us know that his long-awaited Ars Magica review went up on Pyramid last Friday as a "Pyramid Pick." If you have an account, you can read it at
www.sjgames.com/pyramid/login/article.html?id=5731
Covenants to Press
Just a quick note:
Covenants is off to the printer. It's possible the book may be back in our warehouse in January, but my guess is that early February is more likely, since printing a hardcover is usually a 5-week turnaround.
Christmas Present
Your Christmas present from Atlas Games is the very last of the classic PDF articles that I rescued from obscurity a little less than a year ago. You may remember that when we changed over to the current design of the web site, I did a major house cleaning of the server and came up with a bunch of PDFs that had lost their links, and also culled my layout files to find PDFs of articles that had appeared in magazines and such over the last few years but that we or the author still owned the copyright to. I've been posting these "lost" PDFs every few weeks, but we've finally reached the end of them. As the final installment, I give you
Chris Jones' Herbs article, which first appeared in Gaming Frontiers in 2002. It's an add-on to the
Occult Lore sourcebook of magical traditions, in our
Penumbra D20 line, and includes herbalism info on Broom, Bog Fan, Rowan, Sage, and Zucher. Enjoy, and happy holidays!
Ars Magica New Products
I just put up the mockup of the cover for
Covenants, and a new product page for
Mystery Cults. As always, you can right click on the cover image and select "view image in new window" to see a larger version. Enjoy!
New Title Announcement
Houses of Hermes:
Mystery Cults
A Player's Sourcebook for Ars Magica 5th Edition
by Erik Dahl, Timothy Ferguson, Matt Ryan and Mark Shirley
There are those within the Order of Hermes who transmit secrets of magic incomprehensible to outsiders. Pre-eminent among them are the four Mystery Cult Houses, gatherings of magi Initiated into the same Mysteries. This book details the Mystery Cults, including full details of their Inner Mysteries.
House Bjornaer venerates animal ancestors, and strives to perfect the form. Their Mysteries enhance the heartbeast, ultimately allowing the magus to unlock mythic forms.
House Criamon follow ancient teachings and seek escape from time itself. The many paths that they walk to this end grant powers that can include immortality.
House Merinita move among the faeries, ultimately joining them. Their spells can draw on faerie glamour, awaken the fay slumbering around them, or inflict curses on those who break their promises.
House Verditius crafts the greatest items, putting a little of themselves into their finest creations. Pride in their creations is often their downfall, and these magi are terribly prone to the most deadly sin.
Description: 144 pages, hardcover
Stock Number: AG0281
ISBN: 1-58978-086-8
Suggested Retail Price: $29.95
Shipping to Distributors in April 2006
Have Games Mentions Atlas Games
Freelance writer, editor, and gamer Paul Tevis mentions
Let's Kill,
Lunch Money and Beer Money in podcast #21 on "beer and pretzels" games. Check it out at
havegameswilltravel.libsyn.com
Mysteries Cover Art
This isn't the full cover mock-up, but since I have the artwork at hand, I thought I'd post it to the blog since folks were asking. The artist (as with the covers of
Guardians of the Forests and
True Lineages) is
Grey Thornberry.
Mysteries Delayed
You may have noticed that
The Mysteries Revised Edition has slipped off the "coming soon" list in the left sidebar here on our front page. I am sorry to report that the project has indeed encountered further delays. We were facing the question of whether to forge ahead with both TMRE and January's
Covenants book simultaneously (the plan being to print them together), or move
Covenants ahead on its original schedule (it's on time and going smooth so far...knock on wood) and let TMRE slip again. In the end, we decided to go with one on-time book and one late, rather than two late books.
So the long and the short of it is...
Covenants is expected to go to press very soon (as in, within the next week) and should be printed and in our warehouse before the end of January;
The Mysteries Revised Edition is tentatively expected to go to press along with
Houses of Hermes: Mystery Cults, for release in April.
Vote now! Gloom for InQuest Gamer Fan Award
We're happy to announce that
Gloom is a nominee for the 2005 InQuest Gamer Fan Award in the Best Card Game category! Take a moment now an vote for it at
http://www.wizarduniverse.com/magazines/inquest.cfm#inside
Reprint: Once Upon A Time
Later today we should be receiving the latest reprint of
Once Upon A Time. You probably didn't notice it was out of stock (it's only been gone for a few weeks, and many distributors had stocked up in anticipation of the holidays), but if your favorite supplier hasn't had copies available, now's the time to ping them and place an order. I'll be packing and shipping orders as fast as I can, to help get this into peoples' hands in time for Christmas shopping.
Dork20 InQuest's Ultimate Gift for Gamers
John Kovalic was nice enough to pass along the news that
Dork20 made InQuest's list of Ultimate Gifts for Gamers in issue 128!
Dork20 is Dork Tower-themed gaming aid that you can use during any D20 session. The GM awards cards to players for good roleplaying, and they can discard them to fudge the rules just a bit -- like to reroll a die, score an automatic crit, or get a one-time +4 bonus to Init -- depending on what the card says. Dork20 adds just a little more power to the game, and a lot of humor!
Here's what InQuest has to say:
"Part Dork Tower comic, part roleplaying accessory, Atlas games' Dork20 Deck offers players spectacular maneuvers, twists of fate and plain ol' magical weirdness that take the game from weekend recreation to the stuff of legendary tales. If 'All Your Dice Are Belong To Us!' makes you snicker, you won't want to pass this up. You'll laugh so hard, ale wil shoot out of your nose."
Gloom TDmonthly's Most Wanted Stocking Stuffer
We've just been notified by TDmonthly that
Gloom has been named to their
"10 Most Wanted Stocking Stuffer" list, based on retailer recommendations. There are some nifty quotes about Gloom in the article, too.
Recess Cover Premiere!
The cover for our upcoming board game Recess is now up on the
Recess web page. Take a look! We think artist
Alexander Bradley did a fantastic job!
Birthday Presents Retrospective
Thanks to everyone who sent an envelope/mailer for the "
John's Birthday Presents" special event last month. I especially enjoyed all the personal notes and cards from so many of you, and I'm sorry I didn't have time to write everyone personal responses. (I figured I should prioritize actually sending everyone their games!) Now I've finished stuffing and sealing all the self-addressed mailers, so if you haven't gotten your goodies yet, they are on the way (or will be when this morning's mailman arrives and picks them up).
Final tally: I gave away 532 game books, with a total retail value of $9,458.44. Whee!
Goodies for Our Upcoming Board Games
I just put up the product pages for
Recess and
Grand Tribunal. Check them out for an early look at the Grand Tribunal cover, and the full rules for Recess (available in French, German, and Spanish, as well as English). We're hoping to reveal the cover for Recess next week, so check back soon!
New Board Games: Grand Tribunal and Recess
We have two upcoming new products to announce. Both are board games that are planned for release in March, 2006:
Grand TribunalImagine a world where myth is real -- where wizards wield magic beyond
the ken of other mortals. Imagine yourself as one of these mages,
dwelling in a mystical bastion with your allies and servants, unlocking
secret powers and creating wonders. Every thirty-three years the Grand
Tribunal is held, attracting other wizards from far and wide to show off
their magical creations for the inspection and approval of the
archmages. These powerful judges vote on the best, and invite the winner
to join their ranks as a new archmage -- a true master of the art of magic!
Grand Tribunal is a board game for three to five players, inspired by
the
Ars Magica roleplaying game. In
Grand Tribunal, players use Vis
tokens to activate cards representing magic item types, spell
categories, and resources, which they then assemble into powerful magic
items. Each round, players place their votes for the item types and
spell categories they're most likely to be able to play. Three times
during the game -- at the periodic Tribunals -- players are presented
with 1st-, 2nd-, and 3rd-place awards for creating magic items with item
types and spell categories that match those with the most votes. The
player at the end of the game with the most points based on those awards
wins!
Inside the Box: game board (8" x 20"), rules sheet, 6-sided die, 110
cards, 99 game pieces (24 Voting tokens, 60 Vis tokens, 1 Praeco token,
2 Tracker tokens, 4 1st-Place tokens, 4 2nd-Place tokens, 4 3rd-Place
tokens)
Stock No. AG1280, ISBN 1-58978-084-1, MSRP $24.95
Designed by P.R. Chase
Illustrated by Alexander Bradley
Shipping to Distributors in March 2006RecessGrowing up is never easy . . . especially in a rough parochial school where scores are settled on the playground. Between bullies stealing your lunch money, fights breaking out left and right, and schoolmates tattling to the ever-present nuns, a kid just can't catch a break . . . or a kiss, as the case may be. Because you're a lover as well as a fighter, and all you really want is to steal a kiss from your sweetheart across the blacktop before the school bell rings and recess is over. The fact that you've bet the last of your lunch money on being the first do it makes it all the more risky. Of course, might makes right here on the playground. If you can't win your money back from the other kids, you can always beat it out of them.
Recess is a strategy board game for three to five players. Players each start with two boy figures and two girl figures on opposite sides of the grid-marked modular board, which is dotted with playground-themed obstacles. Children move like a rook in chess, while nuns move like a queen. A child that lands on a space occupied by another child starts a fight and takes a coin from him. Other children can break up a fight by landing on that same space, or tattle by landing on a nun's space. If a nun moves onto the fight space, the attacker is sent back to the entrance for detention. Finishing thirty of the minute-long turns marks the end of the game, or it ends immediately when one player's boy and girl figures meet on the same space while out of sight of the nuns. The resulting kiss earns two coins from each player, but to win you still have to end up with the most coins.
Inside the Box: multilanguage rulebook (English, French, German, Spanish), circular clock board with pointer, sand timer, four modular game boards (6” x 6” each), two L-shaped entrances (2” x 2” each), two safety squares (2” x 2” each), 72 game pieces (20 boy and girl figures, 2 nun pawns, and 50 coin tokens)
Stock No. AG1290, ISBN 1-58978-085-X, MSRP $24.95
Designed by Morgan Dontanville
Illustrated by Alexander Bradley
Shipping to Distributors in March 2006
Product Info | Official Forums | Contact Atlas | Retailer Support
This isn't the full cover mock-up, but since I have the artwork at hand, I thought I'd post it to the blog since folks were asking. The artist (as with the covers of Guardians of the Forests and True Lineages) is Grey Thornberry.
