So for well over two years now, Clinton Boomer and Jason Sonia have been brainstorming and designing (in their free time) a dark, new modern campaign setting for the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game. They call it, Bloodlines & Black Magic. If you've been itching for some modern Pathfinder, you should really check out what they're building!
Bloodlines & Black Magic is a campaign setting based on our modern world that pits rich political elites, desperate cultists, supernatural horrors, celestial powers, secret magical orders, and ancient bloodlines in a clandestine war against one another over a reality which nearly all of humanity can neither see, nor comprehend.
Hidden from the mundane world, only a rare few individuals ever gain a glimpse of this dimension of horrors, this realm of human tragedy and desperation, learning secrets that – if spoken in public – would mark most of them as insane (or worse). Aligned with secret organizations or working as individual agents, Bloodlines & Black Magic gives these modern heroes a dark universe to explore, painting the canvas of the modern world an even dimmer, decaying grey than it already is.
Bloodlines & Black Magic draws liberally from the lore of our modern world, weaving historical facts, modern myths, and secret conspiracies into a supernatural world that could be, if only we had the eyes and patience to pierce the neon-stained billboards which hides it from our view. Steeped in esoteric lore, popular culture, current events, and a connected, global culture, Bloodlines & Black Magic pushes the boundaries of what we think we know, delving through the mirror and into the deeper parts of the human abyss.
Want to learn more? Check out the Bloodlines & Black Magic KS page!
Bloodlines & Black Magic has an excellent team that includes:
Matt Banach has been a freelance writer and game designer ever since he entered the fray by making the Top 16 in Paizo's RPG Superstar 2009. Over the years Matt has also contributed to Darkness Without Form: Secrets of the Mimic, Kobold Ecologies, Adventure Quarterly, multiple short works of fiction, and some soon-to-be-released stuff for Rogue Genius Games.
Clinton Boomer is a playwright, screenwriter, short-story author, novelist and ENnie-award-winning game-designer who began writing professionally after placing in the Top 4 of Paizo Publishing’s inaugural RPG Superstar competition in 2008. He's worked on the Pathfinder Chronicles Campaign Setting, Horror Adventures, Ultimate Intrigue, Splintered Godhood (from Legendary Games), and his the author of his own novel, The Hole Behind Midnight.
Stephen M. DiPesa has been working on RPGs and game-related fiction for close to 20 years, now, having written (and periodically developed and play tested) for such lines as Mage: The Ascension, Mage: The Awakening, Vampire: The Requiem, Werewolf: The Forsaken, Changeling: The Lost, Hunter: The Vigil, Mummy: The Curse, Dark Ages, Aberrant, Curse the Darkness, as well as several others that he’s not allowed to talk about, just yet.
Erik Frankhouse has been a freelance game designer since 2003. He started in the video game industry with THQ and later became lead designer and art director at Forever Interactive. He went on to start his own video game company, Sunder Studios. In 2011 his heart brought him back to tabletop as a designer and cartographer. You can find his work within the pages of TPK games, five time ENnie nominated and silver awarded Razor Coast, and now here with Bloodlines & Black Magic.
Ben McFarland is a multiple ENnie award winning designer. Ben cut his teeth on Open Design and has since gone on to design material for Paizo Publishing, Wizards of the Coast, Kobold Press, Rite Publishing, Atlas Games, Storm Bunny Studios, and many others. Ben has worked on three Kickstarter projects for Kobold Press -- Deep Magic (2014 Judge's Choice Ennie), Midgard Tales, and Southlands (2016 Silver Ennie for Best Setting). He led the project design for Streets of Zobeck (2012 Gold Ennie for Best Adventure) and contributed to Tales of Zobeck (2009 Gold Ennie for Best Adventure)
Jaye Sonia is the owner of Storm Bunny Studios, the creator of Rhune: Dawn of Twilight, and the co-creator of Bloodlines & Black Magic (with lots of help from his friend, Clinton Boomer). While Jaye focuses primarily on his own campaign settings, he has worked on numerous other products since he started designing RPG material well over a decade ago.
Brian Suskind A professional screenwriter in his day job, Brian Suskind is the ENnie award winning designer of numerous RPG projects. His work has appeared under the banners of Kobold Press, Zombie Sky Press, Storm Bunny Studios and Legendary Games.
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It looks like a really awesome project and I hope it smashes all of the stretch goals, but I have 2 questions before I pledge:
1. Will there be a BackerKit for backers to expand their pledge?
2. Will there be a compatability license, at least for the O7 if not for the setting?
Hey Chance,
Two things:
1) Backers looking to expand their pledges shouldn't need BackerKit, as we're not selling additional digital assets separately. At the $28 pledge level, for instance, you get all the digital add ons. Backers seeking the physical copies should back at that level. If we hit additional stretch goals that potentially introduce additional physical products, we'll likely use BackerKit at that point to aid us in fulfillment.
2) Bloodlines & Black Magic is designed to be compatible with the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game, which means we won't be generating our own compatibility license or OGL. If we were ever to go that route, we'd essentially be building a new, stand-alone game. If we did, we would likely introduce both an OGL and a compatibility license.
This is at 74% of the way there! Cruising to greenlight!
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@Chance - First, thanks for asking this very important question. I'm going to reply as if this were two questions, because our IP and the O7 rules are two different issues.
Because Bloodlines & Black Magic is our IP (intellectual property), you would need to work directly with us (Storm Bunny Studios) to create content set in the setting. This is true of nearly all settings and IP - you need to either have a pre-existing agreement (generally a license) or be willing to sign one.
The design team has been toying with the idea of a compatibility license for the setting, but that's still in development. Once it's done, we'll need to run it by our lawyers before releasing it. So, the short answer is, likely yes, but not immediately.
As for the o7 rules, which are a modification of the core rules used by the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game, you absolutely can use those rules without permission - because they already adhere to present Pathfinder Compatibility license. Were we to launch these as a fully new set of rules, they would not be Pathfinder Compatible and then, like all d20-based systems produced by other companies (like the Cypher System or Shadow of the Demon Lord rules), you'd need explicit permission (unless we released them under their own, modified OGL - like Starjammer).
@Charlie - This is a Pathfinder compatible product. You'll still need to reference some of the material that is presented in the Pathfinder Core Rulebook (like skills), although all of our new, custom rules (like modern skills) will be included in the book. So while it is not a standalone product, playing it should not be a major issue (all of the custom classes and races/bloodlines) are included in Bloodlines & Black Magic.
Cheers!
Jaye
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We are really close to funding this-- at $9500 of $10K as of this note and there's plenty of room for more. If you're digging the idea of an occult modern setting, this project is your animal!
-Ben.
Congratulations. What I've seen of the project seems great and I might be purchasing it.
It's something original and new, and I really like the thematics.
I hope you have a lot of success with it.
I really like the style of the art, by the way.