The State of the Blog (and the Tim)

In the process of looking up something that I had shared here a couple of years ago, I realized that I had not posted anything new since August. I've been meaning to post a few things during that time, but lacked the motivation to make it happen. So here's a very quick update of where things stand in the many lands of Studded Plate. (Warning: There's a bit about a friend I lost very recently at the end of this column. I'm still figuring out how to talk about it online...or in general) 

Freeport and 5E: The 5E and Fantasy AGE versions of Death in Freeport were released just as I was finishing up that last post in August. I intend to run one version or the other sometime this year. I also have a few items to compose "Freeport and..." articles about at some point: the latest Unearthed Arcana articles (only two since August), Ghosts of Saltmarsh, and possibly Kobold Press's Tome of Beasts (which I'm slowly making my way through). And whenever I acquire Tasha's Cauldron of Everything, I will almost certainly have something to say about using that book with Freeport.

Time of the Tarrasque: This Pathfinder campaign went on hiatus back in 2019, and to be very honest, I'm not sure if it will ever restart at this point. 

The Kynthiad: The solo Greek myth BESM game that I run for my wife Erika is still going, though the end of the campaign is finally approaching. In our last few sessions, Kynthia has been instrumental in definitively ending the Trojan War--with Troy emerging victorious, and many Greek going home without their kings. Now we just have to figure out how she's going to stop Typhon's return, which will make a fitting conclusion to the story--and free up some headspace for me to run other games. 

Building the Bestiary: I would almost certainly have added another installment or two of this series by now, except that the pandemic has forced us to go online for most of our gaming, which means I'm producing far fewer LEGO minis for games. (We do play occasional games in person within our "bubble," but I've been GMing far fewer of those than I used to.)

On a related note, I have not purchased any of the new Minifigures series that have been released since the pandemic started. If and when I do, I will post reviews, but I don't know if that will happen before the end of mandatory social distancing.

Pathfinder Society and Starfinder Society: Erika and I are still heavily involved in organized play for Pathfinder (1E & 2E) and Starfinder. All of these games have been strictly online since March or so, except for occasional games within our "bubble" (such as the Starfinder AP we started recently). I earned my third GM Star for Pathfinder Society 1E just before the end of 2020, but Erika has shot way ahead of me there, and is closing in on her fifth (and final!) GM Star. She became a Venture Officer for our local store about a year ago, so has been running a lot of games for that venue, as well as for several online conventions. We're both playing a lot more PFS 2E and Starfinder now than we have in the past, because it's easier to find games to play in now that we're online. Erika has GMed a couple of 2E scenarios so far, and her first Starfinder game this past month. I haven't tried GMing 2E yet, but have a few Starfinder games under my belt, and intend to run more as I get more familiar with the system. (I still have a ways to go before my first GM Nova, though.)

Grey Angels: I have been intending to write more about the (new and old) adventures of Trick Tillinghast, one of my characters in the long-running "Grey Angels" campaign (using Buffy/Angel Unisystem) that revived for a "reunion arc" at the end of 2019. Sadly, our main GM, Cassandra Lease, died rather suddenly at the beginning of this month. All of us in the game have been close friends with her for upwards of 15 years, so we're all still reeling from this loss. At some future date, we may try to find some way to continue playing in the world that she invited us to help her create, because it would be a damn shame to never again revisit those characters. But we're nowhere near ready to contemplate how to do that yet, apart from agreeing that some day, when we're ready, we very much want to have a long, involved discussion about it. Sharing stories about Cass among her circle of friends has been very helpful to us, and very necessary. When I'm ready to, I will probably share some more stories from the game here, in her memory. She would have liked that. 

I received this Abe Sapien figure as a gift from Cass early on in the Grey Angels game. She used the movie version of Abe as the visual reference for the Tritons, the sea demon race from which my very first GA character, the mage Baz Olmstead, was descended.