Scott LaBarge's page

Bless you, Garrett Guillotte, for making dashes fun. Who knew?

This is just the sort of thing that makes my little pedant's heart quicken.

Mikko, I for one would like to see the full account, though it's giving me flashbacks to learning how to use diacritical marks in Ancient Greek. (Shudder).

Just wanted to say, I'm really digging on people's monsters. Whatever the outcome of the round, from my point of view, we collectively rock!

Thanks for the time and care you put into your assessment! I appreciate the feedback, and also look forward to what others have to say.

Good news - my dad is out of his procedure, he is fine and will be coming home later this afternoon.

Thank you everyone, you've been awesome. It's nice to have support when you need it for any reason.

Hurray for healthy dads!

fret fret worry worry....

Also, you can see some pictures of a 3D build I did with cardstock buildings and tiles here, and it includes a fair bit of dressing as well. Players go ape for this sort of thing.

Pigraven, just take a look at Dwarven Forge's website, and you'll quickly get an idea of what's possible. But hide your wallet first :-p

So Owen, I don't know if you can tell us this or not, but what is the total number of votes submitted in the map round, i.e. the number of actual voters? I don't want/need to know how many votes specific maps got, I'm just curious about how large the electorate actually is.

I'm going to throw this out there. Competing in RPGSS makes it dang hard to GM your regular games.

I hear that! Though I have to admit it's just only one of several drains on my time these days. Still, my players are getting restless :-p

And one more thing: If you need doors, there are free pdf's you can download at places like onemonk.com which you can print on cardstock as many times as you like, and with a little cutting and gluing, you very quickly have as many doors as you could ever need.

Wizkids has released a non-random dungeon dressing pack before, for their Mage Knight line. I don't know how it did then, but they still sell for a good price on Ebay, which suggests there are in fact people out there willing to pay for such a thing. But if they got stung on that last time, they might be wary of doing it again. On the other hand, my own view is that the stuff they put in the 2 packs they did before was often stuff you'd only want 1 of, and some of it was pretty peculiar (the second set more so than the first.) If they did a non-random set where everything in it was stuff people want multiples of (braziers, pillars, tables, chairs, chests, doors, stairs, coffins/sarcophagi, etc., and I'd add non-man-made stuff like stalagmites, mushrooms, and crystals -- which Paizo could make a gazillion different promo repaints of, btw), I think they'd make a killing.

I just found out that my father will be having an angiogram on Tuesday at 1pm EST and possibly surgery. So, Tuesday just got a lot more exciting for me and not in a good way.

Sorry to hear that, sincerely. I hope everything goes well. I'm sure the monster round seems relatively insignificant by comparison.

Scott LaBarge wrote:

David Higaki wrote:

Scott LaBarge wrote:

Besides, I'm expecting a giant shipment of Reaper Kickstarter Bones any day now, so that's something less anxious to obsess over. :-)

/jealous

Wave 1, baby!!!

Yup, we're in Wave 1 as well, but given their last update it doesn't look like that's going to be as exciting as I had originally hoped since the longshoremen went on strike.

As Russ said, they're sorting at the warehouse now, and when they got to this stage during their laat Kickstarter, they were kicking stuff out the door in no time. I think those of us in the early waves will be seeing our stuff within a week or two. (And I'd bet the difference between Waves 1 and 2 will be maybe a couple days.) Reaper's a tight operation.

David Higaki wrote:

I'm glad it's not the +2 vorpal keen red pen.

That's what I'm using tomorrow. ;-)

Safe to assume that Disarm maneuvers are out of the question?

I'd think then the issue should be the freelance work, not having made the Round of 8. They've already got eligibility rules for freelancers, regardless of previous RPGSS competitions.

Chris Shaeffer wrote:

I really don't know how well this round is going to go for me. I'm worried! :|

But hey, let's remember: the worst case scenario for this round is that we lose now and enter again next year older and wiser. Right? :)

Actually, I kind of feel like the worst-case scenario is making the top 8 but not the top 4, because then you can't enter again.

I had the same thought. But hey, it is what it is. Curious, though: why is the cut-off for eligibility the round of 8? Owen or other illuminati, what's the rationale for drawing the line there, rather than at round of 4 or even Champion?

Scott LaBarge wrote:

Besides, I'm expecting a giant shipment of Reaper Kickstarter Bones any day now, so that's something less anxious to obsess over. :-)

/jealous

Wave 1, baby!!!

Comments like that are as welcome late as early! :-) Thanks!

Besides, I'm expecting a giant shipment of Reaper Kickstarter Bones any day now, so that's something less anxious to obsess over. :-)

Monica Marlowe wrote:

Scott LaBarge wrote:

So, any guesses about how long it will take for the judges and associated Paizo characters to start dropping vague comments and hints about the incredible quality of the Round 3 competition to torment us? Me, I'm betting on Sunday.

Pishaw, my money is on 15 minutes after the close time for entries.

After the contest closes?

Oh heck no, I have strong feelings about some of these NOW.

I'm sorry to have underestimated the depths of your cruelty :p Ah well, torment is inevitable in this case anyway. Do your worst!

Glad you're enjoying your vacation, and thanks for making time for us junkies nonetheless!

Both great picks. I figured that a chest was inevitable, and while I already have more than enough chests for my needs (between the Lords of Madness chest, Dwarven Forge, and Mage Knight), I'm sure there will be lots of people out there who will need these. And the Mimic! That's awesome. It's really kind of remarkable that no one has done a prepainted mimic till now. Overdue.

Of course, now you need the Bed mimic, the Door mimic, the Birdcage mimic.....

So, any guesses about how long it will take for the judges and associated Paizo characters to start dropping vague comments and hints about the incredible quality of the Round 3 competition to torment us? Me, I'm betting on Sunday.

Really beautiful work!

Just got mine in, but there was really no alternative; tomorrow's looking pretty full, so it was now or never.
Good luck to all in getting your submissions in! I hope this round is as competitive as last round was.

Ooo! Zumba is one of my favorite things! :D

Yes, the non-dread version is much less scary. Still sweaty, though.

Ah, the dread zumba! That was a fearsome horror.

That's awesome! Looking forward to your monster.

I'm not saying *I* think the judges *should* change how a round like this gets decided, I'm just curious what *they* think. On my view, the points you make are quite reasonable. And I too wondered how many votes were made by people who were voting for friends and family. For instance, how many votes were made by people who had just created a forum account, and who have never done anything on the forums except submit a vote in this round? I know that in my own case I had some students who knew about this contest and suggested to me that they could drum up a big vote for me, and I told them please not to do it because I didn't want to get through the round that way. But I can easily imagine that these things happen nonetheless.

This is a very thoughtful and helpful post, Taylor!
Something else that was obvious to me: The judges' goal may be that this round be about what maps are cartographer-ready, but I don't think that's what was reliably on the voters' minds. Given the maps that made it through the round, it seems clear to me at least that for a lot of the voters it might as well have been the Location round as the Map round, and maybe the Art round too. (I think I myself benefited from this, since I think my map was pretty strong location-wise and top-of-the-middle art-wise, but clearly the judges didn't think it was cartographer ready.) I don't know how the judges feel about my map getting advanced despite their unanimous down-vote, but if they want to make sure that next time they do a map round it has the sort of outcome they want, they might want to reconsider how the round is getting decided. Or they could just make it a Location round in fact, although I think that would test very different abilities. It would be interesting to hear the judges' take on this (even if they end up saying "that LaBarge, he never should have made it to Round 3! Let's make sure that never happens again!")

Oh, man! What a bummer! I really admired your stuff so far, and I wish we were going to see more of it. Good luck with the move, though!

Hear hear! That was a wonderfully competitive round, and I admire everybody's work. Wish we got to see 32 cool monsters too.

Now that the results are in, I just wanted to say to everyone who voted for me:
Thank you for the timely breath of life!
I thought I was dead and buried when I saw the judges' comments, and didn't think I had a prayer at moving on. Thanks for keeping me alive, and I'll try to make my monster worthy of the opportunity!

*runs off to think monster thoughts*

I have a soft spot for trickster monsters that aren't so much about eating your face as they are about playing pranks -- stuff like the faerie dragon and some other small fey. With a bit of creativity they can make for some great gaming sessions.

On a different note: I cast commune last night seeking information from Cayden Cailean concerning the parameters of the Monster round. Only response: "Hic!"

I really liked this map too, and I'm thinking your odds look pretty good to see Round 3. Best of luck!

The only thing I'm not fond of is the Smoldering Gorge. I agree with others that it feels sort of squeezed in at the top and doesn't feel the right size for a dragon. I would add that the shape is maybe a little too reminiscent of something that I don't really want to see in my RPG maps (but since no one else has seen it, maybe I'm just especially sensitive to seeing such things). Changing it the gorge be at an angle would give you more room, and making it less linear/more rounded would give the dragon/encounter more space and solve the shape issue.

Overall great work. :)

Now that the gag is off, can I just say that this post was for me the single hardest moment to keep my mouth shut this whole round? Once I read it, I scrolled back up the page to see what you meant, and when I saw it, I laughed out loud. And then couldn't UN-see it. :-p

Ok, now that we're green-lit to talk about our maps...

Let me start by saying how grateful I am for people's appreciation and support. When the maps first went public, and the very first posts underneath it were rejections from the judges....Well, I'm pretty thick-skinned, and I can totally see where they were coming from, but that was pretty dispiriting. I basically just said, well, that's that! But the voters' comments that followed have helped me feel a lot better about the map itself, and about my chances in the contest; I've been living in hope all week that I might sneak into Round 3, and even that hope wouldn't have been possible without people's encouragement. So sincerely, thanks.

That said, let me emphasize that I also understand why the judges gave the verdict that they did, and why some voters were also not thrilled with the map. It was an ambitious project that I probably shouldn't have tried at this stage (and with such time pressure), but I decided I wanted to go big or go home, and there you go. So, some notes to explain how the map came to be in the shape you see before you:

-- The original inspiration was to do something vertical. I've always thought there should be more "vertical adventure" in 3.x gaming, and that it would be nice if there were more maps to support that. (I'd even like to see a Cliffside flipmat, but I don't know if that would ever happen.) So I knew I wanted to do a cliff, and then went looking for a good place in Golarion to set it. A search of the wiki turned up the Shadde-Quah tribe, and that seemed to provide a really evocative set of materials for a location, so that's where things started.
-- Once I knew I was dealing with the Shoanti, I thought to myself that nobody (to my knowledge) has ever done anything in PF or D&D using the Pueblo cliff-dwellings as an inspiration, and those are such beautiful and unusual structures, I figured they'd help set an interesting look. I largely used the Cliff Palace at Mesa Verde as my focus, and tried to imagine how such a space might change if it were set on the seaside. So the folks who made the connection, you were right on, and I was pleased that my map was close enough to push those buttons. (Jacob, for me it was pure bonus that the village conjured up Cinque Terre for you; I hadn't been thinking of that site, though it would also be a great inspiration for a city.)
-- As for some of the problems with the map, for me the original map was supposed to be the big side view that dominates my submission. I made that first, intending that to *be* the map, and then realized that it would be easier to interpret if it was accompanied by a top down view. So my map is a case of the tail coming to wag the dog. I see now that I should have expected that, but I guess it was so firmly the other way around in my head that I didn't see it coming until it was too late.
-- Lots of people commented on the fact that there's no obvious way to get to the buildings to the right of the waterfall. My intention was that it would be a sort of test of new initiates to the tribe's upper ranks to get from the left side to the Cave of the Dripping Spirit, and then from there to the ledge on the other side, and I tried to signal something like that with the "Place of Trial". But in retrospect, it would have been a lot smarter to just put in a retractable rope bridge.
-- People also commented a lot on the small size of the buildings and their essential sameness, but again, I was going for the Pueblo style, and that's how they look (though they would have been plastered in different colors, which I tried to capture.) Cthulhudrew, you really nailed what I was after, and I was grateful for your commentary.
-- A couple people noticed that the buildings higher up the cliffside look like they're hanging in space a bit; that's because they were a late addition that weren't drawn on the map with everything else; I drew them separately, scanned them, and then added them in digitally (which obviously is not my strength :-P ) I was actually more worried that people were going to say that there was no obvious way to access them, since I didn't draw in routes inside the cliff with broken lines or anything.

So, to sum up, I know it has warts, and I'd certainly have done it differently if I were doing it again. But I'm deeply grateful for the support I've received, and glad that some of you found it an exciting location to explore.

I think I speak for many when I say thanks for your efforts, Pedro! It'll be interesting to see how the sample matches up with the actual outcomes.

I just wish I knew whether I could talk yet.

Just say it in Lizardfolk. Nobody ever takes Lizardfolk.

Hoping for the best, and mostly wondering at this point whether the monster I've been working on will cover the challenge, or if I'll need to whip something up in a hurry o.O

I wondered about that too....

I read this and I think, "Of course, this is why every party needs a wizard with dimension door ."

Scott LaBarge wrote:

Here's a random PF question, since I figure we've got a lot of collective PF expertise here: is adamantine magnetic?

Pathfinder magnets: How do they work? (A: Yes, it is, as is mithral.)

And now, to complicate things, in his "Ask James Jacobs" thread, James just announced that adamantine is in fact *not* magnetic on Golarion, so humph. I guess it's a question of which source you believe.

I think I just spotted a few more minis from this set....

Scott LaBarge wrote:

Here's a random PF question, since I figure we've got a lot of collective PF expertise here: is adamantine magnetic?

Pathfinder magnets: How do they work? (A: Yes, it is, as is mithral.)

That's what I needed! Thanks for the help.

Scott LaBarge wrote:

Here's a random PF question, since I figure we've got a lot of collective PF expertise here: is adamantine magnetic?

EDIT: And I know about Magneto and Wolverine's magnetic adamantium, but I'm assuming we can't just identify adamantium in the Marvel universe with adamantine in Golarion.

If you'll excuse the intrusion, failing regular sources, you could always try the 'Ask James Jacobs' thread down in off-topic.

That...is a good idea! My thanks to the helpful destroyer of souls. (And so sorry my stiletto didn't meet your idea of useful!)

Hi James,

Is adamantine magnetic?

Steven Helt wrote:

I wanna be in that glacier with time running out, background music spiked very high, and ice walls collapsing as I fight my way out.

Now I'm convinced they need to add a challenge that takes place between Rounds 2 and 3: every finalist has to submit a background music playlist for someone else's map.

You joke, but how I would love that round, considering the amount of soundtrack music I've collected for *exactly* that purpose.

Here's a random PF question, since I figure we've got a lot of collective PF expertise here: is adamantine magnetic?

EDIT: And I know about Magneto and Wolverine's magnetic adamantium, but I'm assuming we can't just identify adamantium in the Marvel universe with adamantine in Golarion.

Oooo, I want to see his stats!