I keep seeing references to people being from Australia popping up all over these boards recently, so I thought it would be a good idea to start a thread where we can all meet one another, (and complain about the high cost of getting gaming products in Australia).
I grew up in Wagga, in South West NSW (Where Geoff Lawson, Mark Taylor and Michael Slater grew up), and now live in Sydney (from wollongong where I was at Uni).
I hope the Aussie Dollar stays strong at least until I have a few issues of Pathfinder under my belt.
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Hey mate, good to hear from you. I'm in Sydney too, buy most of my gaming products from one of my two FLGS, Tin Soldier or Games Paradise in the city. And yes, they're expensive!
I know of at least a few other Aussies on the boards, Kahoolin, Delvesdeep, Olaf, Ash Walker, probably a lot more than that.
Wow, I was going to start a thread to do the same when I saw Mothman and another aussie talking on another thread too.
I am from rural northwest Victoria. (Went to uni in Ballarat). Have a good gaming group in our small town.
If I get to Melbourne I buy stuff at Mind Games (Swanston st), but I mostly order oover the internet through Military Simulations. very reasonable and they have lots of good specials, but yes, in general we are paying way to much for books :(
Looking forward to the Pathfinder and the hope of AUS dollar remaining strong too ;)
What games are you guys playing? Gaming backgrounds?
C
Yep I live in Canberra (most hated of all Australian cities!) but I grew up in Armidale in northern NSW. I get my stuff from the only FLGS in Canberra, Logical Choice which just recently changed into a Mind Games. When I was a kid in Armidale I mail ordered from Mil Sims all the way :)
I play D&D, and I used to play Warhammer but it was just too much of a rip off. I love painitng minis and modelling but you can only push a man and his wallet so far...
Hey Mothman Tin Soldier rules, it was the highlight of my childhood trips to Sydney. One of the cool things about living in Canberra (it's actually an awesome place once you get used to it) is CanCon. Any of you guys ever go?
I'm another Australian albeit living in Singapore for the past eight years. I'm probably also the person who travels farthest to game: all my D&D games are played in Brisbane in person. Fortunately I'm in Oz semi-regularly on business so I still get my gaming in.
Not an Aussi, but just wondering if "Eremite" is anything like "vegemite."
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I mail ordered from Mil Sims all the way :)
Me too, before I was old enough to head into the city on my own and browse the Tin Soldier.
Oh guys, Mil Sims has a crazy special on at the moment, you can pick up some v3.0 D&D books (Song and Silence etc) as well as a whole bunch of d20 Modern books for $10 each!
Hey Mothman Tin Soldier rules.
It does indeed...
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What games are you guys playing? Gaming backgrounds?
C
I play mostly D&D nowadays (and far too little of that if you ask me!), but in the past have also been into some of the Gamesworkshop games, Vampire, Alternity...
Been playing D&D for almost twenty years now, although my current group is a bit irregular.
I'm usually the DM.
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One of the cool things about living in Canberra (it's actually an awesome place once you get used to it) is CanCon. Any of you guys ever go?
I never made it to CanCon, but for some reason I've always had the impression that it was more focused on tabletop gaming (warhammer etc) than RPGs ... is that an incorrect assumption?
Actually I havent been to a con in a long time (not since 2Ed days), but I used to go to MacquarieCon and NecronomiCon in Sydney a few times.
I never made it to CanCon, but for some reason I've always had the impression that it was more focused on tabletop gaming (warhammer etc) than RPGs ... is that an incorrect assumption?
Yeah, its mostly tabletop wargames but they have a growing RPG section. Last time there was a D&D toruney for 4th level PCs, and they also have computer games and card battles. Plus they have Vampire LARPers and stuff (in the other building so they don't freak out the parents of the Yu-Gi-Oh kids!)
I like to just walk around and look at the awesome armies. The Mil Sims auction on sunday is why many people go too. Good thing about CanCon is it's free to enter if you aren't playing anything.
I wouldn't drive from Sydney to Canberra unless I was playing in something, but if you're a local its a good weekend if you have nothing to do.
Can't say I have made it up to CanCon. It's about an 8 hr trip :(
The Mil Sims special is quite good. The Miniatures Handbook is a good buy.
I only play dnd. No time for branching out. Frankly I have never really wanted too except for a foray into Star Wars which I enjoyed, though I really like the look of the new saga version rules (anything to make it easier on the GM (which I usually am and have been for around 20 years also).
I spend a lot of my spare time writing dnd. Have had a couple of submissions accepted. Fisrt piece published in the 1st 3.5 Dragon I think. It was a 4 page doc squeezed down to fit the paramenters and really didn't make much sense in the end, but I give the full doc to my players for character creation.
I am currently writing up a massive amount of docs that make a series on creating and running realms like characters. So far feedback has been good, though I don't know what to do with it as far as submissions go now :(
Have also worked on a CS that borrows heavily from others, probably most like Greyhawk in feel. The History of Kage has been published in Worldforge E Mag. Anyone interested here is a link:
http://home.austarnet.com.au/connors1/
Feedback welcome ;)
Only ever made it to a couple of Arcanacons in Melbourne. They were fun, though some condescending longtime attendees weren't to welcoming to new people at the second one. Strange, given I thought such a function would strive to attract everyone they could. Still games were mostly fun except for one where DM just told us a story. Big bad creature...grab the dice....no need. "You all deal with the creature easily..." What?
Don't get me wrong I love roleplaying, but this was just listening....oh well, rambling now.
Great to see some Aussies on here. :)
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Have had a couple of submissions accepted.
Have also worked on a CS that borrows heavily from others, probably most like Greyhawk in feel. The History of Kage has been published in Worldforge E Mag. Anyone interested here is a link:
http://home.austarnet.com.au/connors1/
Feedback welcome ;)
Hey, kudos on that Connors! I'll have to check it out.
Hey that's awesome Connors. I was getting some good feedback earlier in the year for a reworking of the Samurai from Complete Warrior, which I was hoping would be my first Dragon publication. Then they made "the announcement." So that was the end of that. I too hope submissions re-open soon.
Yeah, I have another thread that asks what happens with submissions.
i was not happy about that either. I reckon I submitted 2 articles around 2 years ago. Both were very similar concepts (other barbarian totems and extra mnk fighting styles). Bbn was accepted. After MANY months I asked how it was going and due to change of editor he no longer wanted it. After mentioning I wasn't happy regaridng being accepted and then rejected the new editor asked for my monk article and wanted that. So that was then in and bbn out??
Anyway that was SOME time ago and whilst I have been awaiting publication and having received assurance that it was to be published i heard the news. Now I am unsure what is happening to it???
Kinda frustrating knowing it was sent in so long ago :(
Anyway, I have DM charts in the GM's Perspective over at d20zines.com.
Also have a couple of player advice articles on ENWORLD.
But, yeah, my pride and joy is the campaign setting I have worked on over many years. A few years ago myself and two other players decided to combine our CS's. Given mine was by far the most developed and contained the biggest 'hook' it was the base and we tacked on the best areas of the others'.
Since we have worked on it together, though I would like to see more writing from other contributors ;) Another writer has recently joined us, but stuff is going slow.
So in the meantime (as well as running campaing) I have written up a full Realm creation and development series, that could fill a small book ;) Was hoping to post it to Dungeon as a DM series...not so sure now. My original angle is that the realm can be developed much like a character. And the system is for any sized civilised area from a hamlet to empire...including woodlands, desert etc.
Had some great fb from those that have read it and been told to make a PDF and sell, but I am waiting to see what happens. Still editing and wish to playtest a little more. Besides the skill system in it could do with simplifying (like dnd in my mind) and the new system coming out with Star Wars Saga edition looks perfect. I am almost certain I will be rewriting the docs to incorporate that type of skills system.
What campaigns/games are you guys running?
Anyone do their own CS?
Ah, I don't blame them really - who would have expected Dragon to fold suddenly after 30 years? I've pretty much just chalked it up to bad luck for me.
I do have a campaign setting we've been playing in for a few years, but my players were new when we started so it's nothing too outrageous (PH gods etc).
I'm writing another setting on my blog as a sort of fun exercise, if you want to check it out it's here.
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I tend to chop and change my campaign settings almost everytime I start a new campaign - ideas I have with one just might not gel with another, and I have a tendancy to start again from scratch rather than expanding my existing campaign world into new areas...
Still, you can check out some deatils of my "Dark Ages" campaign setting in the "Age of Darkness" and "Age of Darkness Discussion" threads in the pbp section on the boards here.
Currently Im using that setting for one game, and a sort of bastardised version of greyhawk for another. I originally used the Dark Ages setting for a couple of 2nd Ed campaigns I ran, and also had two other "worlds", my Arken campaign (which expanded to become a planet in a Spelljammer crystal sphere) and my Inner Sea campaign setting.
I've got ideas for campaigns in Eberron, 3E Planescape, and a campaign setting I am (slowly) developing based on the world created by Hugh Cook.
I am always debating with myself to start a new campaign setting (just for that campaign) or using the one I and others have put so much work into.
I reckon I may develop Kage, but start doing a similar thing Mothman. Just have so many cool ideas that don't fit Kage. Kind of becomes 'non-Kage' if you add too much.
I ran a Dark Age England game once. It was awesome. Used the stuff from when Dungeon and Dragon both went 3e. Alos there is an old Dragon that was on the Dark Ages and that was an AWESOME issue. I have a copy of the article on Dark Ages and use if for inspiration a lot.
I reckon next campaign I play I will let players roll wht they want, THEN do a map, etc and tie them in. (All the charts on my Realm creation & development will help with details).
I am ready for a change, despite the amount of time invested in one setting ;)
I will check out you Dark Age stuff.
Oh, and Kahoolin, I have only had a quick look at the deity section of your blog CS. Looked great. Cool story/myth. I will certainly check out more when i get time ;)
I'm also an Aussie. You guys might know me from some of the articles I've done for DRAGON and DUNGEON (such as Shadow's City in DRAGON 322 and The Hive in DUNGEON 127). I also have a module coming out with Goodman Games in July, and have done one for Necromancer Games in the past.
I live in sydney and buy my stuff from Tin Soldier too, but I get my stuff from the Penrith store.
I run an Ice Age D&D campaign and a Call of Cthulhu campaign.
When I'm not writing or playing I teach high school kids.
That pretty much sums it up.
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but I get my stuff from the Penrith store.
Not only an aussie and a sydney-sider, but a Westie too? Cool! I don't mean westie in a bad way... I grew up in Liverpool, so...
You invented Balefire? Cool man. It was that article which largely inspired my planescape type campaign idea. Very, very cool city.
Oh, and Kahoolin, I have only had a quick look at the deity section of your blog CS. Looked great. Cool story/myth. I will certainly check out more when i get time ;)
Hey thanks! I've slacked off a bit lately with it (busy at work etc) but I'm having fun with it.
Hey, welcome Phil.
Kudos on the work published. I would love to write adventures (and will one day). Just need to find the time and there are so many out there these days I never find myself writing one for a campaign.
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Another Aussie here. Live in Sydney, but grew up in Tamworth, yep, the country music capital....I blame my parents.
I play a bit, ok, quite a bit, of D&D, and a smattering of other games. Currently having a hiatus from DMing, I have a 2 and 4 year olds and they take all the energy I have after the working week.
Do most of my shopping at Tinnies in the city, though occasionally Penrith, unless Mil Sims has a good special on something. I am very lucky that my husband also plays and paints, so is very supportive of me and my hobbies. I read on these boards all the time having to justify something, like buying Pathfinder, to the significant other and don't know how I would cope.
I must admit that I very rarely buy the books at full price...they are just so expensive. I normally wait, not so patiently, til one of the stores has them on special....like Tinnies having 25% off two weekends ago.
I must admit, I was feeling a bit awed by you guys....all the published works etc...I don't know how you do it.
Brisbanite here. D&D is my main fare (as DM), but I dabble in quite a few other games. I feel a bit honoured to be in the presence of you guys!
Despite the prohibitive cost of gaming books I still manage to pick up more new releases than I probably should.
Another Aussie here. Live in Sydney, but grew up in Tamworth, yep, the country music capital....I blame my parents.
Heh, I'm from Armidale, just down the road. Amd now I'm in Canberra, also just down the road :)
Great to see some more Aussies on board...I wonder how may others are out there lurking?
Did anyone pick up anything from the Mils Sims big sale?
I had all the dnd stuff, and that is all I play, though looking forward to the new Star Wars Saga ed. Esp the new and much easier skill system (can you tell I am a DM and want to save prep time?). It looks much more appropriate for the Realms as characters stuff I have written. Still awaiting to see what Paizo & WotC are doing in regards to this seeing the light of day...or may just have to release as a PDF ?
Actually, if there are any of you Aussies that want to have a look at this for me (and yourselves ;)) drop and email and I will send you some. As I only have my players and fellow CS writers (but don't receive a lot of feedback from them). Before getting the stuff published it would be best for several people to see the stuff. Always open to suggestions and fb too.
Another player of mine has just started to DM and he has found it very good. The system I have written (and writing) is about realm creation & development. Basically you create a realm much like a character. realms are ANY area, from wild forest near town, to the town itelf, to the kingdom in which the town is in. So far has worked well, but I need to playtest out some realms over time to see how sustainable the system is.
But hey, if you want to check out what I have and help out drop and email on here ;)
Too much about that, sorry.
back to Mil Sims: I was thinking of purchasing d20 Modern for a change, but I don;t play dnd enough and love the game. has anyone else got Modern and do you like it?
C
Melbourne represent.
It's all about picking up swag from mind games then heading ducking into Section 8 (a back alley cafe) to read through it. :)
Been quiet for a while here.
I was wondering what everyone has been up to.
Turns out I LOVE the Star Wars Saga and have currently dropped all dnd (until 4E) and am running a Saga campaign.
We are having a ball of fun. First ran an adventure posted on the Star Wars boards by 'Grubman' I think. I was VERY good for a freebie. Then played the 'Rebel Breakout' from the d6 Sourcebook and have now moved onto 'Tatooine Manhunt' - another d6 adventure, but amongst my favourite adventures ever written.
I have converted everything from NPCs to mooks, to droids and vehicles for the d6 adventures.
Nearing the end of 'Tatooine Manhunt' which is great b/c I have used it 3 times before and never finished it. On unfortunate player of mine has been involved each of those times...so he, more than I, is looking forward to see how it concludes ;)
Absolutely love the Saga system and its fun and ease of use for creating and converting. If 4E goes this way I will be very happy.
Developed a word template for vehicles and NPCs too. Added an extra idea. Put picture on top of page upside down. Then GM can fold this sheet over screen and picture faces players with stats facing GM. Works a treat and I have MANY of these.
If interested in anything drop me an email. Address on our Kage website (mentioned above).
So, everyone else?
C
Hello?
C'mon Aussies.
I am not an Aussie but I have recently tried Vegemite. ANd what the hell are you supposed to do with it ?
Yes, it seems Vegemite is an acquired taste. One that starts from a very early age. Give it to babies and they will forever eat it. Apparently not if you start too late ;)
No funnelwebs where I am, only red backs and white tails... Nothing too dangerous.
So are any Aussies (or others) going to the OZ Gencon in July? Looks like a couple of us are making the trip...even though I am a long way from Brisbane.
Anyone in Vic going to Arcanacon. Doesn't look like there is any RPG going on from what I could see :(
C
Hmmmm...seems to have eaten my previous post... oh well here is what I wrote!
Hi Guys,
I am from Townsville in Queensland!
I get all my Pathfinder stuff from paizo and half my D&D from the local flags and the other half from Milsims. depends on what is on special and how much of it I want to buy at the time (ie how much of a bank balance I have at the time :-)
Good to hear from you all!
Cheers!
Wow necro thread i can post in, hey all, how ya goin? Another Sydney sider here, and another Westie, not sure if people still check this thread at all, but meh...
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Born in Adelaide (visit "home" occasionally), but living in Melbourne for the last 10 years.
I've been running Pathfinder Society at local Melbourne conventions for the last two years:
- Arcanacon (4 days in January, Australia Day long weekend);
- Conquest (4 days over the Easter long weekend); and
- Unicon (3 days in October).
I also brought Pathfinder Society to GenConOz in Brisbane last year, it was a great event, and we're looking forward to doing it all again at GenConOz this year - Thursday 23rd to Sunday 26th September.
GenConOz attracts players from all over Australia, but we often see interstate visitors at our local cons too.
So Google these events on your convention calendar, do an Event search, or keep an eye on the Pathfinder Society boards for announcements.
Cheers,
DarkWhite