Board/Card Games

View Schweig's Credentials

Continued....

Q: Can you let us in on some of your future plans for Griffon Publishing, specifically future releases?

A: I always have a few projects in mind vying for my enthusiasm and time, though ultimately I focus on one to push toward publication and let the others drive me as goodies I can work on when I complete the current project.

Right now I’m focusing on writing The Infinite Cathedral, a medieval fantasy setting in an endless cathedral whose naves and transepts stretch on forever without a break, with cloisters sheltering isolated settlements in between. It’s turning into a vast limbo with some interesting themes running throughout the entire setting (a prison dimension, struggle of good against evil, sacred architecture abandoned by the gods) and potential for all kinds of fantasy stories. It might seem like a very limited environment for campaign play, but I’m constantly delving into new ideas and embellishments that make it a rich campaign setting.

I’m also developing two pulp projects. Right now Heroes of Rura-Tonga looks like a basic pulp adventure book with a common setting -- the South Pacific in the 1930s -- reminiscent of the old “Tales of the Gold Monkey” television series with some Indiana Jones and supernatural weirdness thrown in for good measure. (I’ve already run one of the adventures, “Island of the Damned,” at several area conventions, with good response from players and some interesting playtest ideas.) I’d also like to write a short sourcebook for running fighter squadron-based campaigns, both in the 1930s and 40s as well as modern times and futuristic settings. Aces High would distill some of the common tropes from this genre into an easily digestible toolkit for creating interesting pilot characters, base settings, challenges, and campaigns. My World War II interests have focused primarily on North Africa and espionage, but I’ve also read up on the Battle of Britain; that’s what's been fueling this urge to do Aces High.

The Infinite Cathedral and both the pulp projects have some development done on them; I’m already writing the former, have a campaign outline, setting, and a few adventures for Rura-Tonga, and have a solid outline for Aces High. I have a few project concepts in the back of my head, though they haven’t reached any concrete stage of development. I’d like to do a giant monsters book (kaiju to fans of the Japanese films) akin to Aces High, with common tropes gamers can use in creating their own campaigns in this genre. I’ve always wanted to do an ultimate World War II espionage sourcebook enabling gamers to run everything from straightforward, historical spy scenarios to over-the-top James Bond-style missions and supernatural, weird-science campaigns. That’s a long way off, though.

I also have a few ideas for board, card, and tile games I’d like to develop, but I’m not sure how viable they’d be as PDF releases.

I can’t offer specific release dates, since my work on these projects depends on my own personal schedule and my ability to create all aspects of a project (from artwork and maps to layout and promotions). The more sales current products like Pulp Egypt receive the more incentive I have to develop new material. The Griffon Publishing Studio website is a good place to hear about progress on upcoming releases.

Q: Do you remember what first turned  you onto the pulp influences we see on the work you are inspired to do for your studio?

A: It’s funny that my earlier gaming material hasn’t really touched on the pulp genre much. I’ve always maintained an interest in ancient Egypt and World War II, though history in general intrigues me. The comic books I liked never really touched on the pulp genre. I suppose my interest in pulp comes from oblique sources. Three early “pulp” influences I can recall were two television shows, “Baa Baa Black Sheep” and “Tales of the Gold Monkey” -- both tied into elements of World War II -- and, of course, the films Raiders of the Lost Ark and Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. All featured interesting and likeable characters, technology of yesteryear (airplanes, submarines, zeppelins, tanks), and gritty action set against the backdrop of (in some cases imminent) world war against easily identifiable villains. Although I enjoyed those entertainments, I never really incorporated them into my personal or professional gaming projects until I wrote the Raiders of the Lost Ark sourcebook for West End Games.

My comic book tastes never really included any pulp. Of course I've followed Star Wars comics for many years and went through a Conan/Red Sonja comic book phase. About the closest series to pulp I can recall is the incredibly campy and well-drawn Danger Girl series.

Pulp slowly worked its way into my gaming life when I more intensely pursued my interest in World War II and espionage. I started reading period spy novels and particularly enjoyed the Men at War series by W.E.B. Griffin (The Last Heroes, The Secret Warriors, The Soldier Spies, et. al.). My work on the Weird War II supplement Afrika Korpse combined my interest with Egypt. Working backward from that I began exploring the hotbed of international intrigue in Egypt before World War II, particularly as demonstrated in the film The English Patient.

I still don’t consider myself a fan of the extremely over-the-top pulp genre with super-science, overplayed villains, and masked heroes. My work tends more toward historical accuracy with character and setting elements adjusted for interesting roleplaying possibilities with a good number of threats (secret societies, spies, magical artifacts, relatively realistic technological developments) all lurking just beneath the surface.

Q: What was your first big break into professional writing, and was it for the gaming industry?

A: My first break into professional writing came in September 1990 shortly after I graduated from Hamilton College. My local, hometown newspaper, the weekly Ridgefield Press, hired me as a reporter. I like to think the newspaper valued me more because I was a longtime Ridgefielder than because I’d just received a bachelors degree with a major in Creative Writing. My first professionally published piece of writing was a news article about a civic group seeking to renovate a playground in the town park.

My first professionally published game material was a Star Wars roleplaying game adventure called “The Limping Lady.” It ran in Challenge Magazine #64 in September 1992, published by the late Game Designer’s Workshop.

For the record, my first professionally published short story (non-game-related, unlike the ones that ran in the Star Wars Adventure Journal) didn’t appear until 1998; “Memnon Revived” ran in DAW’s short story anthology Legends: Tales from the Eternal Archives.

Q: Having written both fiction and RPG material, can you compare and contrast the challenges and rewards of writing them?

A: Good but complex question, so I’ll take it in small stages....

Both roleplaying game writing and short story/fiction writing require the same command of the language, attention to grammar and style, and overall application of imagination in the development stages. Both offer the satisfaction of creating something and, in most cases, sharing it with others through publication.

Writing fiction -- and particularly short stories, where I get most of my fiction-writing work -- takes a good deal of planning, forethought, and development. It’s a much “tighter” form of writing than roleplaying games because you’re merging character, plot, setting, and usually numerous themes that all “fold into” one another to create a satisfying story. In the four to six weeks it takes me to write a short story (usually on assignment), I spend most of that time exploring ideas in my head, doing research, jotting down notes about characters, dialogue, setting, etc., and letting all the elements percolate in my mind. The actual writing takes about one week, with some time refining the finished product. By the time I sit down to write fiction, given all that mental development time, I’m pretty certain what I want to put on paper.

For most of the short fiction I write, intended for anthologies, I have a basic theme to follow. For instance, I recently completed a short story called “Seebohm’s Cap” for a DAW anthology called Pandora’s Closet (due for publication sometime in 2007); each story centers on an object of clothing with historical, magical, or supernatural significance. Some might find this limiting, but I find it helps focus my efforts into something not only saleable but entertaining.

Fiction has many benefits. In college I focused on writing short fiction as a craft and profession, so it’s one of the deepest-embedded skills in my head. It’s a welcome break for me from roleplaying game writing. It pays a fair amount upon completion of the final draft, and sometimes includes royalties (though sales rarely reach that level). Many people view fiction as a more legitimate form of publishing than roleplaying game material, though I personally see it as yet one more forum in which I can publish material I enjoy writing. I regret that opportunities for me to write and publish fiction are few and far between these days.

Roleplaying games offer a different form in which one creates. They usually require standard sections that cover characters, settings, monsters, magic and relics, and other subjects gamers need developed. Game writers are always looking for innovations in rules, scenario designs, locations, and other methods of presentation that compliment the setting. Roleplaying game writing caters to a very select audience far smaller than readers of novels and short stories, even when limited to the fantasy and science fiction literary genres. Freelancing for roleplaying game companies has its own layer of difficulties, from adapting to different game systems and settings to the complexities of contracts and payments.

Game writing offers many rewards. Designers can roam around to develop interesting ideas even if they’re a tangent to the main subject. Assuming you’re working on your own creation, you have no limits on the kinds of sidebars, charts, scenarios, and even short fiction you can include. Game writers get the satisfaction of seeing their material not only read, but having it involved in someone else’s creative process of actually playing the game.

In working on The Infinite Cathedral I decided to include short fiction vignettes. While they all link to tell the larger story of a trio of adventurers trapped in the cathedral, each one serves to illustrate an aspect of the game setting. I’ll see how it comes along and decide later whether to run it on the Griffon Publishing Studio website as an introductory serial before the sourcebook’s release.

Q: Not that any material is strictly one or the other, but do you enjoy writing role playing game adventures or “source material” like Pulp Egypt more?

A: I think the two go hand in hand; what I prefer writing at the time depends on how I’m doing on a project and what inspires me. There were times when I was extremely fired up to work on source material and other times when an adventure idea hit me and I just dropped everything to develop that. Case in point: I thought I’d set Pulp Egypt aside once it went online for sale, but I suddenly had this inspiration to do another free, promotional PDF adventure. I was fiddling with the outline and early materials for The Infinite Cathedral (my next project) at the time and needed a break, so I set that aside and developed the adventure. Conversely, I know I need a promotional PDF scenario for The Infinite Cathedral at some point; although I have a general idea and a few encounter outlines, it’s just not coming together right now, so I’m focusing on creating setting material.

Writing source material allows me to roam around a bit in many different senses. Sure, I have an outline, but if I’m inspired to work on something in chapter five, I don’t feel too bad leaving off chapter two for a while. This proves especially useful when I hit a snag or just can’t find the motivation to write something interesting on my current section. Writing out of order also forces me to think about and develop other concepts that can enhance earlier sections. Source material also gives me a chance to dive into research, a ready source of inspiration.

Adventures tap more into one’s ability to string along a loose storyline, drop in some compelling motivations, develop some intriguing or action-packed encounters, and infuse it with a sense of an already designed setting. It’s an exercise in proving that setting material I’m writing works by providing everything I need to run an interesting scenario.

I find the scenario structure very comforting; I know I need to develop an interesting title and teaser paragraph, an introduction, a few episodes, an epilogue, and then pepper it with goodies like player handouts, maps, and additional adventure possibilities. Of course the linear nature of a plot means I can’t usually jump around and write episode five before episode two; if I reach a snag I can’t just work on something else while my mind mulls over a solution.

I find I do my best work when writing about something I enjoy; I steer toward that material -- whether a scenario or source material -- and veer away from snags and obstacles, confident that, after a short break or exposure to new material, I can find a solution and cruise ahead on a project.

Shawn Lockard currently works on the Grey Ghost Games website, and has had work published by Grey Ghost Games, Steve Jackson Games and Humanoids/West End Games. He lives in Dayton, Ohio, with his wife Marsha, his daughter, and more than the minimum requirement of feline company. Shawn’s other hobbies include computers, science fiction, and movies.
 

   "This is called a Griffin because it is a winged quadruped. This kind of wild animal is born in Hyperborean parts, or in mountains. All its bodily members are like a lion's, but its wings and mask are like an eagle's. It is vehemently hostile to horses. But it will also tear to pieces any human beings which it happens to come across."