Integrator Preview
over 3 years ago – Tue, Sep 01, 2020 at 01:19:34 AM

August winds to a close and we have a preview of the new Integrator class! We know this class in particular people have been waiting to see, so below is the first two pages of the class section. I'm still tweaking a few things in the layout format (stamina points, ability names), but I'm working to get all 4 classes into the work-in-progress document.

Once the full classes chapter has been set up, I will update the download at DriveThruRPG with the update.

More to come as we progress!

Pandemic Strikes!
almost 4 years ago – Mon, Aug 03, 2020 at 01:10:45 AM

We hope you all are safe and healthy with the craziness that is happening throughout the world over these past months. Here in Texas, we've been on different forms of lockdown for nearly five months now with no real end in sight.

And while that certainly threw things for a loop - that seems to be the norm every time we seem to be getting things under control - that does not mean progress has not been made.

Be on the lookout for an email from DriveThruRPG for a download of the Psionics Guide Work In Progress. While I'm dealing with some technical issues in getting that delivered, here's a direct link to the Races chapter as a work-in-progress. You'll note a couple races where the text goes too far - we're going to edit that down to fit on the page and move what gets cut to the worldbuilding section so nothing gets left on the cutting room floor.

For the project, here's where things stand:

Psionics Guide

• Races: Done, layout underway
• Classes: Done, layout begun
• Skills & Feats: Done, editing underway
• Psionics Rules & Power Lists: Done, editing underway
• Worldbuilding: In Progress
• Psionic Items: In Progress
• Motifs: In progress

Adventure

We have brought on Eric Hindley to handle the introductory adventure for psionics for Starfinder. You may remember Eric from his excellent work taking our Opened Mind project from Ultimate Psionics and turning it into a fantastic introductory adventure. We've given Eric the initial adventure that we playtested during GenCon 2018 and received positive feedback and have no doubt he'll be able to deliver a fantastic psionic Starfinder adventure!

The rest of the project (ships, bestiary, etc.) will be handled once the Psionics Guide is sent to the printers - getting it complete is our top priority.

February Update
about 4 years ago – Thu, Feb 13, 2020 at 01:43:04 AM

Greetings, backers! My apologies for the extended absence - in early November, my mother-in-law fell and had a severe injury. It is only within the past weeks that she has returned home from the hospital. As I mentioned in a previous update, my mother-in-law is a septuagenarian and lives with me, my wife, and my kids. Since we are effectively her only family, handling all aspects of her recovery fell onto my wife and myself. It made for a very difficult holiday season, as she was in the hospital for Thanksgiving, her birthday, my daughter's birthday, my wife's birthday, Christmas, and New Year's. 

Thankfully, she is home now and things are getting back to a semblance of normal. And with that semblance of normal comes updates! Joe Shawcross, who has done the other racial artwork, is working on the final four pieces of racial art and has provided sketches that I can share with you. I have already provided him feedback to incorporate, so the final versions will be out hopefully in the next few days! I'd hoped to have the final pieces in time for this update, but will go with what I have on hand since this update is already long overdue.

Additionally, given that things have not settled down for me nearly as much as Andreas and I would have liked, and we are short-staffed at my day job resulting in more work falling on me than usual, we have decided to bring on an additional person to the team to help us get the book finished. He will be specifically working on getting the book layout completed, something that I would normally handle. Given my life's consistent chaos, it seemed to be the right choice to bring in some more help, specifically on tasks that otherwise I would have kept from getting done.

Given this, our plan to get the book into your digital hands as quickly as possible is to get a work-in-progress digital download available as soon as preliminary layout can be completed, while we continue to work on other aspects like the artwork. We'll have placeholder spots within the book for these planned pieces to minimize any changes needed in layout. This digital download will have the added benefit of allowing extra eyes to be on the book before we're ready to say it's complete.

Once we are confident that the book is ready, we will send it off to the printer. Since the hardcover book will be printed using a traditional print run, we only get one chance and want to make sure we do it right.

Finally, going forward, the plan is a minimum of an update a month, if not more frequently, especially as layout progresses and the digital downloads become available. With as much of the content is completed and ready to be put into final form, having someone help with layout should drastically speed things along.

More to come once the final versions of the racial art pieces are in.

Quick Update with stuff to look at!
over 4 years ago – Thu, Sep 05, 2019 at 03:26:23 AM

I had intended a longer update - and for it to be last week. But with school having started, my daughter brought home her first cold from Kindergarten that took me out of commission for a few days and today my back is flaring up. However, I wanted to get SOMETHING posted.

So, I've got stuff to show off!

First, I've been working on tweaking the layout template. Here's how the first page of a class's entry is going to look with our resident aegis. Artwork by Joe Shawcross, layout design by Erin Heck.

Next, new racial artwork from Joe Shawcross for the Maenad and the Half-Giants. The half-giants are finished, I unfortunately am having technical difficulties with the image, so I've included the sketch for now while I work on the rest. 

More artwork to come! And I realize there are some messages I need to respond to - I have not forgotten them!

Edit: managed to get a low-res version of the half-giant final working!

We Hear You
over 4 years ago – Thu, Aug 15, 2019 at 01:29:43 AM

 I want to first say I realize we're late. We're really late. I realize we've been terrible at updates. And I realize you deserve better. I also realize I've already said something similar to this. But, I want to make sure it's stated anyway because it needs to be said.

This project has taken a lot longer than expected. Partly for reasons that were expected: we added a bunch of new content and we realized it was going to add time to the project. But also partly for some significant reasons that were not expected: namely, major life issues for both me and Andreas. 

Late last year, I went and talked to my doctor after a series of panic attacks had me about ready to break down. He put me on some medicine that helped with those panic attacks. Unfortunately, while it stopped the panic attacks, what it didn't help with was the depression.

Now, a little (okay a lot of) backstory. I know lots of people who deal with various mental illnesses. Family, friends, business acquaintances. Yet for some reason, it never occurred to me that I might be depressed until last month. That's when my wife mentioned she thought I might be depressed and I should talk to my doctor. This was after her watching my behavior for a few months, just to make sure it wasn't an off day or life being overwhelming (more on that later). 

You know those anxiety/depression screening tools? I took it the next morning. As I started through it, it was kind of eye-opening. By the time I got through it, I realized there was a problem. And when I got the results, they only confirmed what I'd finally realized - I was seriously depressed. I got an appointment with my doctor for the next week (the soonest available), talked to him, and he switched me over to new medication that I've now been on for a couple of weeks and the change has been significant, at least for me. I can recall days in the past where, after getting home from work and then handling the kids / pets / family in the evening, I would just want to go to sleep. Mind you, this was at 8 pm at night.

The truth is, my life in general is crazy. So it's not unusual after another crazy day to just be completely drained. But this was happening over and over, week after week.

When I told my doctor about what's going on, he was surprised it took me so long to come in. 

Going back a bit to give some context, over a six month period, my father went into a coma, my father-in-law died while my wife and I were across the country visiting my father in the hospital, and then my father died a few months later. The last significant conversation I'd had with my dad was that he was worried about me (this was a few weeks before he went into the coma). He was worried that I was working too hard, "burning the candle at both ends", and that I needed to take care of myself. That conversation haunts me to this day.

After both of them died so close together, my life initially was about six months of just trying to hold things together. My mother-in-law is a septuagenarian that my wife and I have to care for. That's not to say she's an invalid, but she has arthritis, bad eyes, bad knee, bad hip, uses a walker, can't really drive herself except to the grocery store and even that she shouldn't do according to her optometrist, and has LOTS of doctor appointments. In the past six months, she's had her HVAC break (a hole rubbed through the copper tube and all the coolant leaked out...), her water heater died, her septic pump broke (disconnected from the float switch so it burned the engine out), her house flooded (twice...), and she fell down (also twice). While I didn't fix all those things (I am not a licensed HVAC tech or plumber...), I got to handle most of them (including digging out the septic pump, which to date is the most disgusting thing I've ever had to do in my life. I let the plumber handle unhooking it and installing the new one.)

In December, my day job announced they'd be letting folks go (voluntary severances). Now, this I figured would be a blessing! I'd been there a long time, so the severance package would be significant and it would allow me to just take time off and focus on Dreamscarred projects and getting some breathing room. I jumped at the opportunity. Four months(!) later, I was told my request to be one of the volunteers was rejected. It was like getting sucker-punched in the gut. I'd already started talking to recruiters, planning to time things to take most of this summer off and already had several companies interested in interviews. I'd been planning what I'd work on during the hiatus and getting my home office ready just for it.

I ended up leaving my job in June anyway, but didn't have the luxury of time off that I had been expecting. In addition, just before my final week, on my drive home from work, I was in a car accident. Thankfully, it was not my fault - a young driver pulled his truck with trailer out through 3 lanes of traffic on a 50 mph road. My poor car was able to make it home, but it was pretty banged up. The lady in the car next to me wasn't so lucky - her car was totaled and she had to go to the hospital. I thought I was OK, but that back problem I mentioned that had been treated... yeah, it was pretty bad for a few weeks and my previous doctor refused to see me because I was in a car accident. Seriously. I've mostly been able to treat it now between stretching, IcyHot (the roll-on kind), heating pads, and ice packs. But even typing that makes me realize it's really not doing GREAT, but it's not terrible anymore.

Of course, that happened between me leaving my job (with health care...) and starting a new one (with 60 days before health care coverage started...). It took over a month of arguing with insurance companies, waiting for police reports, and sending in photos, paperwork, and speaking to supervisors to finally get the other driver's insurance to pay for the damages. I ended up buying a side-view mirror and installed it myself just so I could safely drive my car while it awaited repairs. In the end, we took what the insurance company paid and sold the pooi car (thanks CarMax!)

In addition, my wife and I have two kids - 5 and 8. Those of you with kids know, they're a handful. My 5-year old in particular is the wild child. Did you know "dry erase marker" doesn't clean very well off a TV screen? I do now! While my kids are an endless supply of joy, they are an almost-equal supply of stress. My daughter is just as clumsy as I am but she is that mixed with the Energizer bunny. And whenever I'm home, she wants to be wherever I am. And of course, the times they actually get along are as rare as seeing a double rainbow all the way across.

To top it all off, last month my wife had major surgery. She's doing fine and recovering, thankfully, but it was just one more thing to add to the list. And this isn't even the full list of everything that's happened! In December, our van was hit while my wife and her mother were in the car. It spent a month in the shop getting repairs. Last month, I had to put down my 19-year old cat. It's the first pet that I've ever put down and I'm not ashamed to say I cried my eyes out that day. I got a minor bout of cellulitis during my stint with no health insurance and discovered that, in addition to the antibiotics I already know I'm allergic to, this new one gives me nausea.

This is not a list of excuses. What it is is an attempt at an explanation. 

We are incredibly late on delivering this project and I have continued to do a terrible job in communicating. I have been terrible at letting people know what's going on in general (up to and including my wife. Thank God she has an uncanny ability to know what I'm thinking).

I know how it feels to back a Kickstarter that doesn't deliver. I've backed several that never delivered any rewards. I contacted one creator when he offered a refund, but I never got one. I assume that he simply got overwhelmed. Since it was for a gift that I'd already replaced for a birthday that had long-since passed, I wrote it off. The guy just didn't expect the amount of work coming his way.

However, I have continued to work at this project and will continue to work on this project. I have artwork (some finished, some sketches) to show off with more on the way, a layout sample to show off, and have continued to plug away at finishing up the content. 

Mostly, I just want to say I'm sorry. Part of this downward spiral is knowing how much I've let everyone down. Thank you to those who have been so supportive. My sincere apologies to those who are rightfully disappointed and frustrated. I won't promise that it's all going to be smooth sailing from here on out, but I will promise that I'm working to fix things.

Dreamscarred has suffered tremendously in the past year and most of the responsibility for that has been on me. I hate seeing where it is and hope to do what I can to repair that damage.