Oerth Journal #27 is Here!

Good things come to those who wait! You may or may not remember but the Greyhawk fan community has this little fanzine called Oerth Journal. It rises from the ashes every so often to surprise us with some excellent new content. Yours truly did a some interior art as well! Download the latest issue and check it out:

Oerth Journal #27

Want to read previous Oerth Journals and its sister publication Canonfire Chronicles? Go HERE

Castle Greyhawk: Helms and Hidden Things

Welcome back Greyhawk mavens! I'm once again behind in promoting a new page in the third chapter of our ongoing Castle Greyhawk graphic novel. Check out page-eighteen and read some scintillating scrivenings by intrepid author Scott Casper. On our site you can also check the archives and follow the entire Castle Greyhawk story from the very beginning.

Artist's Commentary: I had a lot of fun with this page. Tenser cannot leave his helm behind it seems. I don't think it's magical but the gem must be worth a lot. Haha.
Anyhow, this page had some great textures that I got to work with. First was the charred metal surface of Tenser's usually gleaming helmet. I'm sure a cantrip will have that fixed in the future. Then there is the very charred violet fungi which are now brittle at the merest touch. I researched burnt wood pics to get the exact feel we were looking for. Of course there is the rope, pretty easy stuff until we get to a close up shot of one; and Tensers ever-torn garb. I try to keep the rips consistent across the pages. And lastly there is the cracked pit wall and secret door button. I've been doing randomly cracked, stacked and pitted stone walls consistently since the start of Castle Greyhawk, yet here I felt a certain satisfaction by trying to intentionally make the cracks go in a certain pattern. I can't to see where this leads our protagonists!

500th Blog Post!

I can never pass up a good milestone, so I thought I'd reflect on all the good times I've had and things I've learned in producing posts for this labor of love called Greyhawkery. Ever since I dove head first into the Greyhawk community ten years ago, I've entertained people with comics about deities and wrote articles on places in Greyhawk where no one else ventured. In hindsight I'm surprised that it was only five years ago that I decided to shift a lot of my energy and content to a blog format. I really wish I had done so sooner. Five hundred posts later Greyhawkery has been well worth the effort and has brought me closer to many other fans in the gaming community that I acknowledge today:

Who could not lead off without their own gaming group? I've been blessed to play Greyhawk and innumerable other games with not just one but often 2-3 entirely different table-top groups. The oldest and best of these groups is comprised of the cast of Gamerstable our very own RPG podcast. If you haven't listened to the show before you should, because Gamerstable really is in a class of its own. All the gaming related things we have done as a group from conventions to actual-play dramas and more are there for your amusement. Though separate, Greyhawkery has been running alongside our game groups and podcast all this time, serving as my outlet for in-game content like the Sea Princes Campaign or the Mines of Hokar.

Of course what first got me into building a reputation in the gaming community was the fansite Canonfire! and freelance author Gary Holian. In those years I've made countless friends in the community through the CF forums or the weekly Greytalk chats and more recently at gatherings during GenCon. Though Canonfire is where I hang my hat, most of the community contacts I've made and maintained through blogging can be found around the net on other fantastic groups and sites like ENWorld, Paizo Publishing, Greyhawk Reborn, Flanaess Cartographic Society, Dragonsfoot, The Piazza and of course Anna Meyer's cartography site. Blogging is an outlet for my creativity, but the social media side keeps evolving from chat rooms and forums to things like G+ and Twitter. (@GreyhawkMike)

The creative projects that I display weekly on Greyhawkery are also thanks to many other fans of Greyhawk who supported and collaborated with me over the years. Foremost is Denis Tetreault and his fan site, Maldin's Greyhawk which has been a champion of my blog and comic work for a long time. There's an impossibly huge list of friends and colleagues who I've worked with on projects like the fanzine Oerth Journal or featured their solo writing and art on Greyhawkery. The Greyhawk community is an inspired bunch that never runs out of ideas.

RPG blogging itself is a community and there is a ton of them to keep track of (luckily good old Charles Akins at Dyvers does the hard work) but the ones that inspired me the most to get into blogging is (for obvious reasons) Joe Bloch's Greyhawk Grognard. Though our theme is much the same our content has always been complimentary rather than competitive. I encourage anyone who has dreamt of blogging about their campaign or favorite setting to follow our example and stick with it. You won't always have new content to upload or a hot topic to discuss, but even a small post (or one referring from another blog) to let people know you're still active goes a long way to holding an audiences' attention.

Speaking of which, ongoing content has always been a main feature of Greyhawkery. My old Greyhawk Comic and home campaign serials were heavily featured in my early years and now the last couple years I have been collaborating on the webcomic Castle Greyhawk with published author Scott Casper. If you ever have a chance to work on a special project or a blog with another person I highly recommend it because sharing the workload can only benefit your blog's longevity.

To close out I'd like to say working on Greyhawkery has given me ample opportunities to meet gaming industry professionals in person at conventions or through interviews done online. My #1 goal for next GenCon is to run into Chris Perkins with Wizards of the Coast. I got some questions for him concerning the future of Greyhawk ;)

More next time!

Update 06/07/2021: Wow, it's fun to see where I was half way to 1000. I had to fix alot of links, people moving URLs and stuff. I also updated my Twitter handle. Lastly, Google+ no longer exists. Ah well.

A Few Cool Items

Summer is winding down at last, but panning for nuggets of Greyhawk news is still yielding results. This week I have a few items of various interest to the community.

Over at our gaming podcast, Gamerstable we discuss creating characters and NPCs as a group. The episode is sponsored by Chamber Band a music group that has released a new D&D themed album called Deities. There are songs such as Yeenoghu and Lawful Neutral that should pique your interest. Be sure to check out their work!

My good friend and all around creative guy, Argon from Canonfire! is already trying to get me geared up for next GenCon with this Canonfire shirt and Canonfire Chronicles tote bag. I certainly have my work cut out for me!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Lastly, is a tidbit I noticed in the upcoming article notes for Wizard's next issue of Dragon:

 

 

Channel Divinity: Nerull

by Jon Green

 

"Compared to most dead gods, Nerull still has a surprisingly large following, though those followers are still rarely encountered. Worship of the dead god typically involves leading a double life, as public adulation of Nerull would likely lead to death or exile."

 

I can't wait to see where Mr. Green goes with this article. Nerull hasn't been mentioned in a D&D publication in some time I wager. The closer to D&DNext we come, the more Greyhawk starts to leak back into the public eye. Hang on for more on Nerull.

Mortellan's Gencon Recap

 

Crosslinked from the Canonfire Crier blog, here is a summary of some items from Gencon 2013 that may be of interest to the Greyhawk community. Enjoy!

New Greyhawk Ezine: Canonfire! Chronicles

It's always a good week for the Greyhawk community when an article comes out on the setting, but when a Greyhawk ezine is made, that's a huge event! Following in the foot steps of the venerable Oerth Journal comes Canonfire! Chronicles. This collection of hawkcentric adventures promises to be the Dungeon to OJ's Dragon Magazine. The staff of CC (who will also be the force behind future Oerth Journals as well) is a cast of capable authors and artists from of course, the fansite Canonfire! (where I hang my own hat). To aid in the promotion of their very first issue, there is also a new blog dedicated to both publications.

Congrats to all involved in this project and those to come. Now go and download this issue and enjoy!

05/23/2021: The download link to this issue is broken and removed. Go to Canonfire at the link above and inquire about CC if you're interested in a download of the project.