221 Posts Celebration! Top 5 Posts We Didn’t Write

Written by Jeff Carlsen on 2010/08/24 – 20:42 -

Today is a great celebration here at Apathy, our 221st post!  It’s amazing to see how far we’ve come since our 73rd.  Instead of giving you great new content, we’ve decided to let you know what content we could have given you, but didn’t.  So, here are the top five posts we didn’t write:

My Pantheon could Beat Up Your Pantheon

Every rose has it’s thorns, and every fantasy setting has it’s pantheon.  In the war of the made up gods, who would win?  Tonight on Pay Per View, Hextor versus Thamar.

Top 10 Gaming Hats of All Time

Wherein we debate the virtues of the fedora and lement the state of current gaming fashion.  Also, we discover that the size of ones brain is proportionally to the height of his hat.

Two Adventurers Walk into A Bar

We tell jokes.  Since we’re not really very funny people, we’ve spared you this pain.  Though there is one about a Gazebo that’s pretty good.

Confessions of a Lazy Gamer

We place a spotlight on the advantages of not doing any game prep.  Particularly on the amount of extra time you can spend watching Star Trek reruns.

Oh Crap! The Post is Due in 10 Minutes

The real life telling of an emergency post.  Did we forget?  Were we busy fighting thirty-mouthed Chicago-spawn?  You’ll never know, of course, because we don’t make excuses for our failures.

We’d like to thank you for sticking with us this far, and we hope to still see you when we reach 316.  Now, I have to go.  Scotty is about to give the tribbles to the Klingons.

Your Comments: What other posts should we never write?  Let us know in the comments.


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Savage Worlds Chat Event

Written by Jeff Carlsen on 2010/08/03 – 19:34 -

We will be holding a chat event tomorrow, 8/4/2010, over at the IRC channel.  It will begin at 8 p.m. EST/5 p.m. PST.  Please let interested people know.

The subjects will include:

  • Converting a reluctant D&D player to Savage Worlds
  • Designing an epic Boss Fight
  • Anything else that comes up

You can find the channel on irc.slashnet.org in #savageworlds.

If you don’t have an IRC client, or you don’t even know what one is but want to chat, you can simply join the chat through this web client. Additionally, if you are running Firefox, you can install the Chatzilla extension, and then follow this link.


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Savage Worlds IRC Chat

Written by Jeff Carlsen on 2010/06/30 – 20:40 -

I wish I could say that it was my idea, but it wasn’t. It was deep with the dark recesses of the PEGInc forums that user jnborawski mentioned the idea of creating a forum chat room.  We just decided to make it happen.

Savage Worlds now has an IRC channel. You can find it on irc.slashnet.org in #savageworlds. It’s not strictly official, but it’s rooted in the offical forum community.

If you don’t have an IRC client, or you don’t even know what one is but want to chat, you can simply join the chat through this web client. Additionally, if you are running Firefox, you can install the Chatzilla extension, and then follow this link.

Why We Did This

The Savage Worlds community is one of the greatest I’ve ever seen. I think it has something to do with the type of person who enjoys Savage Worlds. Whatever the cause, they’re friendly, helpful, knowledgeable, and love to talk about games. If you have a question, they’ll answer it. Have an idea? They’ll critique it respectfully. You probably already know this, because you are one of them.

One of our goals at Apathy is to bring this community into the foreground. More specifically, to bring it’s value forward as if it were a professional product. The community creates things. We want to showcase them, and eventually let them have the tools and guidance to wow and impress with their creations. The help people, and we want their advice to be bound and distributed to the people who need it. And they build connections and friendships, and we want that to be readily available to any gamer.

So the IRC is part of that. It just makes sense. Tyson and I are both on regularly, and we hope you’ll join us.


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Big Announcement! Shoes: The Roleplaying Game

Written by Jeff Carlsen on 2010/04/01 – 00:00 -

Three girls.  Three weapons.  Only one pair of perfect shoes.

After many months of secretive work and multiple attempts by our arch rival to destroy us, we are proud to present our flagship product:  Shoes:  The Roleplaying Game.

This has been the culmination of much sweat and many tears here at Apathy Games.  Seeing it finally launch is like seeing your child go off to college.  We’ve been dying having to keep this secret, and now that we can talk, we want to tell you everything.  First, here’s a bit of fiction from the game.

Stiletto saw her from across the room.  Miss Perfect Hair.  Miss Little Black Dress And Nylons That Never Run.  And those little black pumps with the white bow on them.  They were stunning.  It was clear to Stiletto.  This woman must die.

But how to do it?  That was the tricky part.  Stiletto was wearing her armored skirt, and her Slippers of Speed, but it probably wasn’t enough.  Her enemy would have to be led into a trap.  If only she could find some help.

Shoes is a dangerous world of wars, fortune, and footwear.   Mighty kingdoms have risen and fallen, crushed under stylish boots.  Mighty heroes, dressed in the most powerful of fashion, duel eternally for power.  Even as you rise to the top, you must always be ready for the next challenger.  Stopping to rest could destroy you and all that you’ve worked for.

For a bit of an inside look at Shoes:  The Roleplaying Game, we’ve conducted an interview with the project lead, Captain Apathy:

Jeff Carlsen: So, what was the inspiration for Shoes?

Captain Apathy: We’ve been thinking for a long time about what kind of game could appeal to women.  It was a difficult task until we realized that they aren’t so different from men, just the trappings are different.

JC: How so?

CA: Well, when men play a roleplaying game, they strap on weapons, delve deep into dank and ugly dungeons, kill slobbery, disgusting monsters, and steal their treasure.  Treasure they use to buy new weapons.  We realized that women do the same thing, only for shoes.  But they strap on shoes, go into stores, fight with one another, and leave in more shoes.  From there it was merely a matter of translation.

JC: So magical shoes give women the power to destroy other women, in order to take their yet more powerful shoes?

CA: Essentially, yes.

JC: That seems so circular and pointless.

CA: That’s what my wife says about D&D.

So, what amazing material can you expect to find in Shoes:  The Roleplaying Game when it releases?

  • Dozens of new fashion edges.
  • Hundreds of magic shoes like the Sorceress Sandles and the Flip-Flops of Fate.
  • Five artifacts, including the mysterious Elder Pump.
  • A complete plot point campaign taking place in a local outlet mall.

Shoes:  The Roleplaying Game is due out in stores on April 31st, 2010.  Don’t wait!  Reserve your copy today!


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One Hundred Posts and We are MIGHTY! (plus free stuff)

Written by Jeff Carlsen on 2010/03/12 – 00:00 -

Some men can break bricks with their hands.  Wimps.

Some men have stared down lions.  Cowards.

For we have achieved the impossible:  one hundred posts without missing a day. We take Zero Compromise very seriously here, and this is just some small evidence of it.

What have we done with these posts?  We’ve brought you all the Savage Worlds news you can eat, and then written a primer to teach you how to digest it.  We’ve taught you how to build a character by lashing him to a wheel.  We’ve given you a massive nine post guide to introducing a new player to your game.  We’ve even confided in you our deepest, darkest secrets.

A clever reader, and our readers are the smartest in the industry, will notice that I’ve only linked to posts I’ve written.  Tyson J. Hayes has his own pile of fantastic posts.  In fact, he’s been spearheading this blog for weeks now while we work in the background on our secret and profound roleplaying products.  The work he does is phenomenal, but that doesn’t mean he gets a free ride.  He is currently being crushed under the weight of his own grand experiment–writing about the cruel subjects that you have foisted upon him.

What’s in it for you?

The next one hundred posts must be better than the last.  Thus far, we have explicitly avoided discussing the games we’re currently playing in or writing any sort of fiction, because we don’t believe you care.  But at the same time, while we’ve provided thoughts and advice, we have yet to give you any game content. Nothing you can use today.  That will change.  Right now.

Apathy Games Savage Worlds Character Sheet 1.0 (.pdf)

This seven page, black and white, and very printer friendly character sheet is for those of you who put serious detail into your characters.  Print as much of it as you need.  If you’re not playing Savage Worlds, everything but the first page is system agnostic.

I hope you enjoy this sheet.  If you have any comments or criticisms, let me know in the comments.

In the meantime, here’s to the next twenty-seven posts!  Tonight, we celebrate with BEER! (we swear, they’re not paying us, we just love this beer.  If you love beer too, check out Tyson J. Hayes’s side project, The Snooty Drunks).


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State of Apathy – Goals Going Forward

Written by Tyson J. Hayes on 2010/01/13 – 00:00 -

Apathy Games dreams big. We have goals so grand that we’d sound insane for uttering them. But to get there, we have a number of short term goals for the next year that we must accomplish first, and we want you to know about some of them.

Savage Setting – Foremost, we’re developing a Savage Worlds setting. By itself, it’s fairly simple, but we have high standards. In the meantime, there are resources that we want available when the flood of new and adoring fans hits our pretty new site.

New Website – Yeah. It’s something special. No peaking.

Savage Worlds One-Sheets – Within the next couple of months we plan on releasing our own one sheet adventures and begin to show you what zero compromise roleplaying really means.

Savage Worlds Primer – We want to have the best and an almost all-inclusive guide to Savage Worlds and the SW community. The kind of guide that only a company with time, resources, and deadlines can ever get done. It will not only introduce new players to the game, but will also show them where to find resources in the community. There’s a lot of great stuff out there, and it deserves some spotlight.

Evangelize Savage Worlds – Sure, it might sound a little cult-ish, but we will continue talking about and creating buzz about the game. This great community and game should be shared by all, and we are planning strategies for press ganging more recruits… err. introducing new players.

Embrace the Community – Savage Worlds is not only Fast, Furious, and Fun. It has the best, more creative and understanding community in the gaming world (the studies are still out, but we know it’s true). We will shout this fact from the mountaintop. We will find the best and share the best. We will let the D&D community know who’s boss. So say we all.

Branch into Other Media – Blogs don’t work for everybody, so we’re looking into other forms of media to bring this information to people. While we can’t say exactly which media we plan on breaking into, we do want your help. You can watch our page for new exciting ways to get involved with our projects, or for new forms of receiving news, information, and community projects.

Partnering with Tabletop Armory – We are excited to announce that we will be working with Tabletop Armory on some future projects that will be coming out this year. They will be intimately involved in our branching into other mediums and we look forward to the exciting work we’ll be doing with them.

More useful Advice – With all of this talk of branching into other mediums and developing Savage Worlds settings you didn’t think we’d forget about you, our dear readers?

For our players we’ll be hitting you hard with articles discussing:

  • Building a character
  • Being a good player at the table
  • Roleplaying Skills
  • Table Standards

Game Masters will continue receiving the fountain of information on:

  • Session Planning
  • Encounter Design
  • Adventure Design

2010 will be a busy year for us here at Apathy Games and we thank you for joining us while we begin it. We’ll be letting you know more details as they come out so hang on tight! And remember–zero compromise!


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