Paizo Publishing, LLC® today announced the six RPG Superstar contestants who were selected by the voting public to move on to RPG Superstar's penultimate Round Five. Round Four focused on the creation and design of three thematically linked monsters.

"There's no more fat to trim," said Erik Mona, Paizo's Publisher and one of three RPG Superstar judges. "Every single submission contained at least one publishable monster. But one isn't enough, and the unt for the true RPG Superstar continues! All of the remaining six contestants have a legitimate shot at claiming the final prize."

For the initial open call, more than 850 entrants submitted a wondrous item using the 3.5 SRD. Each entry needed to be 200 words or less and had to include proper mechanics and flavor. Entries were eliminated for ignoring the entry requirements, for using non-Paizo intellectual property, or for simply not being creative enough to fit the mold of an RPG Superstar.

Round Two asked the Top 32 finalists to write a 1,000-word description of a fantasy nation covering that nation's people, history, geography, government and hidden secrets. No entries were eliminated this round on technicalities, though the judges often derided an entry for being too stereotypical or too mundane.

Round Three sought a 500-word description and a stat block for a fantasy villain from the Top 16. Eight very strong candidates were selected by the voting public to move to Round Four. Several potential RPG Superstars were eliminated this round by not creating a character that fully matched the judge's expectations of villainy. "The pitfall [in Round Three] was not finding the villain seed and getting sucked into the stat block," said Clark Peterson, Publisher of Necromancer Games and one of the RPG Superstar Judges.

Round Four called for the Top 8 to design three thematically linked monsters. Six RPG Superstar contestants were selected by the voting public to move on to the penultimate round of RPG Superstar. The voting public seemed willing to follow the lead of the judges this round and voted out the two contestants that received the lowest overall scores from Erik Mona, Clark Peterson, and Wolfgang Baur.

The winners of RPG Superstar's Round Four are:

Christine Schneider
Neu-Isenburg, Hessen (Germany)
"Mind the Machine"

Clinton Boomer
Macomb, IL (USA)
"Kakuen-Taka, the Hunger that Moves"

Jason Nelson
Seattle, WA (USA)
"In the Bleak Midwinter"

Joe Outzen
Saint Louis Park, MN (USA)
"Born of Lightning"

Rob McCreary
Prague (Czech Republic)
"The Ooze Imperium"

Russell Taylor
Eugene, OR (USA)
"The Darkblight"

The RPG Superstar Top 6 are now required to create an encounter of publishable quality that is part of a larger adventure that is both usable and memorable and keyed to a specific location, as would appear in an actual published adventure. There is no word limit for the encounter submission, but it is strongly encouraged that submissions be 2000 words or less excluding stat block content.

Submissions are due by Monday, January 21 at 12:00 P.M. (noon) Pacific Time. Fan voting for Round Five submissions begins January 24 and ends January 29. The four contestants advancing to the final round of RPG Superstar will be announced January 30.

For a complete RPG Superstar schedule, including rules and a FAQ, visit paizo.com/rpgsuperstar.

The winner of the first RPG Superstar contest will be announced on February 20, 2008. The Grand Prize is a paid commission to write a 32-page adventure for Paizo Publishing's GameMastery Modules line.

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Paizo Publishing, LLC is a leading publisher of fantasy roleplaying games, accessories, board games, and novels. Paizo's GameMastery™ line offers Game Masters fun and useful tools to improve their fantasy roleplaying experience. Titanic Games™, Paizo's board game division, unites the greatest game designers to create compelling, challenging games like Stonehenge and Key Largo™. Paizo.com is the leading online hobby retail store, offering tens of thousands of products from a variety of publishers to customers all over the world. Paizo's Planet Stories™ line of science fiction and fantasy novel reprints promises a master class in the genre aimed at building the greatest fantasy and science fiction library ever assembled. In the five years since its founding, Paizo Publishing has received more than a dozen major awards and has grown to become one of the most influential companies in the hobby games industry.

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