Category: Gaming

05/03/2024 Updates, Announcements, and Bad Habits

Guess who fell asleep at their desk while handling back-and-forth’s between four individual players, arranging new projects, reformatting site pages, and agonizing over an outline?

If you groaned audibly with the phrase “Dammit, Swift”, don’t worry. You’re not alone. I’m waiting for the day my kids use that line; they hear me say it often enough.

But it was a very creative evening, for all that it was cut short by circadian rhythms. Players are coming forward with not just session requests but stories of their own, with project requests and questions for their plots.

It wasn’t until after helping one player with establishing a story background that I had a moment of self-realization: this has become a fan-fiction franchise.

… awesome, but daunting.

One big thing that’s occurred will be jump-starting my drive to update and organize the ‘wiki-style’ pages for the campaign: we have an artist! In due time, we’ll be giving these characters their own visuals. I’m going to set up a page dedicated to the artist so they’ll be able to be contacted for commissions and otherwise show their work, so expect that announcement soon.

You damn right I promote the artists I work with.

Along with that, it’s been editing established site pages and attempts to push my stories further along. At which point, exhaustion hits.

Sigh. Welp, we’ll keep trying.

Stay safe out there, folks.

-JB Swift

04/27/2024 Return to Game Day!

After a month of delays, depressions, and schedule mishaps, we’re finally gathering around the metaphorical game table for an evening of dice and shenanigans!

Sigh. It feels good to be ‘home’.

Now, with the damaged vocal cords (yes, I’ve been through the ringer lately) and my voice being that of Batman on a time limit, I don’t know how well I will be able to act.

But damn if I don’t try.

Stay safe out there, folks!

-JB Swift

04/01/24 New Month, Old Routines, Gamer News!

Starting the day with an event I wish was more of a routine and a more visually-inspiring moment: greeting the dawn on my property.

There’s a slight worry about the dead branches way up there.

It’s slightly frustrating to know that there’s a gorgeous sunrise in the distance, but you live in a sparsely wooded area.

The biphasic sleep pattern konked me out before 10 and back in at 2, so I managed to get a bit of writing work done. Part of that was wrestling with the ever-present self doubt of writing a sci-fi story, wanting to provide a “hard” science for that story, but unable to present that science as plausible.

I could’ve written some great stories back in the 60’s.

Following up on that desire to get back into old routines, I’ve made it back home from the mail route, tumbled the kids into their beds, did the ‘responsible adult’ thing of paying a few bills (I still mail out my payments and work through a ledger…I know, but it’s comfortable), and now I have time to write!

Which means I’ll be shutting off social media for a couple hours and fighting my executive dysfunction to get at least five pages!

Since the main project for tonight is the SWRPG story, I thought it’d be appropriate to list upcoming sessions, campaign news, and story news!

We have four(!) upcoming sessions: focusing on Zino’s further delving into making a Star Wars version of James Bond (“Secrets of Csilla: From Here to Yaga Minor” will be written up shortly), hopefully followed up this Thursday (I’m really hoping I didn’t mess up my calendar); Beak learning more about his enigmatic past with his new companion, Sion; a first-time session with a new character, the Wookiee’s take on Druidism named Li (Liakdrrl); and the Main Arc session that (unfortunately) was put on hold due to adulting (third time rescheduling’s the charm, or so my fellow insane GameMasters say).

Yes, my performance anxiety as a ‘professional’ DM is ramping up just thinking about it.

Personal Note: I really want to work on the Orada Novella, which would be a great standalone story, but I’m trying to be responsible with my writing time.

We also now have a Campaign Artist! I’ll be releasing more information on them soon, especially when I can show off their artwork here and help promote their work (expect a link to their social profiles soon), but expect a few changes to the SWRPG section of the website it becomes more and more personalized as a fan-fiction writing.

With that, it’s time I turned off social media, plugged in my headphones, and whittle away at the keyboard until I either accomplish my goal or wake up in the middle of the night with a crick in my neck.

Stay safe out there, readers.

-JB Swift

08/11/2023 I’m Alive! I’m here!

I’m still alive!

Apologies for not posting in so long, everyone. I’ve been exhausted from the day job and haven’t thought to put up anything in a while.

But I do have a ton of photos to add to my albums, and I have been writing!

Here and there, when I’m lucid enough to do so.

So, some news!

My SWRPG group are way too wonderful of group of people and pooled their money together to help me get a mesh router system, so I now have a steady internet connection! This has allowed me to switch my gaming over to Discord! It only took me ten years!

(Considering how I am with taking up new things, that’s actually pretty quick)

I’ll be updating everything when time (and endurance) allows, but for some players who may be out of the loop, especially my Solo Arc players, I’ll be messaging you to bring you up to speed. (If it hasn’t happened by next Monday, tell me and I’ll try to wake up)

I’m going to try to write a bit before the heat of the day catches up with me.

Stay safe out there, readers!

-JB Swift

07/24/2023 New Page!

Decided to use the early half of the morning to publish a couple pages that, in all honesty, I keep forgetting to make Public.

But since we’re getting back into D&D (not so much that it interferes with my writing), I should start putting up the info that players will be wanting!

Go peruse! It’s not much at the moment, I’m afraid. I have a writing sprint to jump into.

Stay safe out there, readers!

-JB Swift

07/15/2023 GameNight Contingencies! Plus a Story Distraction.

We had to reschedule the Star Wars RPG session to tonight, as attendance proved to be a problem. I have a feeling that the summer is proving to be exhausting for everyone, not just this government-issued letter monkey.

Just in case this occurs tonight, I have a contingency plan!

I broke the adventure down into three separate side-quests, allowing the players to choose which aspect of the adventure they want to go through. This works out when we have, say, a Pilot who is unable to use their ship until everyone is finished with the ground mission, so they stick with the ground forces, or a droid designed for stealth operations unable to do so because everyone picks the noisiest methods to finish a mission.

This is what I normally do when I see players saying they might not be able to attend the Main Arc sessions, but still want to be involved somehow. After the session tonight, I’ll be going to those players who could not attend and give them the chance to go about their own side-quest.

It should be fun! I’ve been planning this out for months.

Along with that, I’ve been giving some thought to finishing the novella that a player asked me to write up. He rarely gets to play, but put a ton of work into the design and background. I think after I finish Chapter 4 in “Peregrine: Rising”, I’ll set up a couple weeks to knock that out.

Stay safe out there, readers!

-JB Swift

07/05/2023 Forgotten Day Off! Plus, a cat!

I woke up this morning in a mild panic. It was twenty minutes before my clock-in time and my son was asking me Mariokart questions while I blearily opened my eyes.

I was halfway through getting my uniform on before I remembered: it’s my day off!

This is what happens when you work back-to-back 11 or 12 hour shifts for weeks at a time. So, I’m back in civilian clothes and lining up my morning chores before I can sit down for writing. Apparently, I also need to do some site maintenance. One of my players messaged me about not being able to open the most recent Sidewinder chapter.

Of course, if there’s one problem, there’s bound to be another, hidden and waiting for me to move on to the next project before rearing up to mock me. With the Dungeon Crawl about to pick up steam (eyeing the players who haven’t checked in with their schedules), I’ll be wanting to change up the RPG tab at the top of the site.

In case I get lost in house-spousing and forget to update here: Penelope stole the dog bed and you should ‘awww’ at her.

She has her own pillow, though…

Stay safe out there, readers!

-JB Swift

06/25/2023 Session Aftermath

It’s almost become a tradition that, just as the Party is logging on and everyone is chiming in that they’re ready to play, there’s a tech problem.

Usually, it’s just an internet connection problem. That’s par for the course, as rural Louisiana isn’t a bustling hub of high-speed connectivity. Yesterday’s session, however, also plagued me with required updates for the headset, the program, and the computer all at once.

…and I thought I had already done all of those. Joy…

So, the party was informed that I wouldn’t be able to talk. There was a worry that the session would’ve been canceled (the phone has a camera, but out here it lags too badly for a gaming session) when I remembered something.

I can type really fast when I need to.

So, we switched to a text-based session while my systems updated.

So much of this.

Haven’t ran a game like that since I was a teenager and internet chat programs were hitting their stride. One of the players chimes in afterward to ask if they could continue playing in this medium, in fact.

A solid 2 hour session, player engagement and RP, plot development, and a satisfyingly suspenseful cliff-hanger for the next session. All in all, a good night.

Now, to fix my tech problems. Time I looked into mesh routers.

Stay safe out there, readers! Writing sprints this evening!

-JB Swift