Carnel News

Website back up and Paypal buttons now available

2010-02-22T14:52:00.000-08:00

So the website is available and the server seems to have been restored more or less fully. I was working on an alternative if there continues to be issues but for now it seems like everything is good.

I have updated the buying page with some PayPal buttons if you want to buy the latest issue. For the moment I am only interested in taking payments via PayPal for my own convenience.

Look at the website!

Carnel Website down/Issue 39

2010-02-14T16:02:00.000-08:00

So I finally get time to update the front page and find I can't login to server hosting the site, and in fact the site itself is down... Apparently the server is being shipped to the US for repair so I don't know when it will be back up.

In the meantime, Issue 39 is out, hurrah! You can check out the details at http://info.carnel.org.

This outage might be an incentive to transfer some more of the old site to the new wiki.

Carnel Email

2009-05-31T10:47:00.000-07:00

Right now the Carnel email box has more spam than valid mail and I am not checking it that regularly. I am wondering what the best replacement service is going to be. I fancy something that mixes a forum with Twitter.

Cleaning up the website

2009-05-31T10:36:00.000-07:00

I have been cleaning up some of the neglect over at the Carnel Website. The site had been in a bit of a bad way recently, becoming more and more out of date as I struggled to find time to update it and have been splitting my time between many different interests.

At the moment what I really wanted to do was get the news out that there is a new bundle of issues representing everything I did in 2008. You can now buy it via PayPal (the addresses for cheques and money etc. are out of date).

I have been in the zine writers classic dilemma recently. Given less time to dedicate to the zine I have been preferring to spend time working on new articles and pieces when I do have time available. Also the infrastructure of the zine has been boring me more and more. The exciting thing for me is writing the articles and preparing them. Selling, publicising and getting them "out there" has been less and less interesting.

Recently I have taken to handing out the issues for free whenever I go to a convention or a gathering of gamers. They are starting to be more like letters to friends about what I am interested in at the moment.

As such I am wondering about simply putting the content onto the website a year after they come out. I was opposed to doing this for a long time as I do not get any feedback or conversation from the online stuff. However right now the simplicity of distributing via the web seems attractive. I might even start producing paper copies from the online pieces.

Republish those goddamn back issues!

2008-08-26T15:26:00.000-07:00

A politely forceful letter from the Deposit Office points out that I have failed in my legal duty to provide copies of some of the old Carnel issues.

Most of them are fine but issues 23, 24, 28, 29, 31 are all out of print and I didn't really envisage reprinting them in the same form. 28 and 31 are interesting because they are the two Lustria specials. I am thinking of seeing if anyone on Strike to Stun wants them if I print more than the legally required copy.

It's quite interesting going back to these issues and having a look at what stands up. 23 and 29 pretty much deserve a second outing in original form. Issue 24 is good visually (although I would probably do different fonts now) but is one of the issues where I was pissed off with the rpg containment of the zine and therefore is really diverse.

I am much more sanguine about the single subject zine ghetto now and tend to use the internet to try and match articles with audience.

Carnel 37 will be along presently

2008-08-26T09:11:00.000-07:00

I have finished Issue 37 and I gave it to subscribers who were at TimCon on the weekend. Issue 36 has a page and half to go but will be done soon. Both issues will be sent out to subs as soon as I get the chance.

These are smaller size issues (12 and 16 pages) and the content will be going on the website soon.

Pet Peeves: Burning Oil

2008-06-07T04:10:00.001-07:00

During the D&D game at the Launch Night last night I was struck by one of my personal bugbears, particularly with people who then talk about any kind of "realism" in D&D.

Medieval lamp oil is not kerosene. Please think about this. When was oil discovered and refined? Are there oil derricks in your world? If not please don't have people going up in flames just because someone threw something that is nominally flammable at them. You can use olive oil in a lamp, if you douse me in olive oil and then try to torch me I am going to be angry but I'm unlikely to be wreathed in fire. The best oil you can hope for is whale oil if you want to be a realist.

So if you have burning oil traps in your game, please allow me to vault over obstructions, kick people over castle crenelations and generally have a high old time because it is no more unrealistic than your inability to grasp what was invented when.

And before anyone mention's Greek Fire, did the Byzantines put that rare, battlefield weapon in lamps and wander round their cellars with it?

UK Dungeons and Dragons 4e Launch Night

2008-06-07T03:25:00.000-07:00

A less than stellar effort by Leisure Games and WotC that required standing outside the London Dungeon on a rainy London Evening for 45 minutes after the posted kick off time, just to get some poor food and a demo of the new game by someone who hated it, had control issues and read the box out text in the halting manner of a nine year old.

Despite this the new game is excitingly different but the design team have created a monster. Rob Heinsoo declared that the team's goal had been to "create the game that we thought D&D was as kids before we played it". He may well have succeeded but for the people who have come to love the game as it was written the new version is anathema as it throws away a lot of the conventions that emerged from the rules rather than being part of the setting. At the same time it isn't an action game that is as fast and free-flowing as Exalted, d6 or the "fu" games.

The biggest example of the problems is that grinding tactical combat against monsters really doesn't fit with the new game. The streamlined D&D minis rules allow that but the RPG has more complexity that isn't justified without greater acceptance of genre conventions. If as a GM you can't say "that's cool, it should work" you shouldn't be playing edition.

Carnel Google Apps

2008-05-18T15:53:00.000-07:00

I have bought the carnel.org domain for use with Google Apps. As my life has been much more hectic recently I have had less time to maintain the website in the old long-hand style.

I will be shifting some of the existing material on the site to the Google Sites wiki.

Carnel 35 heading to subscribers soon

2008-03-09T15:35:00.001-07:00

Thank god that's done, proof-reading seems to take an age. Subscriber paper copies will be heading out this week and I'm hoping to start work on the PDF edition at some point this week too.

Gary Gygax dead

2008-03-05T13:30:00.000-08:00

He had had health problems for quite a while but it is still a sad moment for gaming. Regardless of what you thought of his idiosyncratic style of games and backgrounds Gygax defined a lot of the framework that roleplaying still works within.

It's a big moment for roleplayers but naturally thoughts and sympathies are with his family and their loss.

OpenOffice pleaze?!

2008-02-11T13:57:00.000-08:00

How proud I was to hit forty pages dead on last night and print out an issue for proof reading... How upset I was to discover that while I had hit 4o pages one of them was blank because of the page breaking on an odd-numbered page OpenOffice issue.

It's a bit frustrating but it does mean that I can shoehorn something into that newly empty page. I'm having a rummage through the notebooks now...

Another issue out of control

2008-02-09T14:24:00.001-08:00

So with one piece of character detail and a sheet to go I am already on 36 pages and facing an inevitable page count of 40. Not only what I didn't want to do but far bigger than I had planned.

Hopefully the additional pages might allow to sneak in a Pirates of the Spanish Main character.

Issue 35 Dragonmeet Edition

2007-11-29T01:16:00.001-08:00

Last night I was in a familiar place. Pre-Dragonmeet issue editing. Firstly there was the usual battle with getting the cover image to try and be the right size. Then there was the removal of the blank pages that OpenOffice adds if you have temerity to put a Contents page on an even-numbered page.

Even with re-arranging the pieces into an unusual order (but one I might keep) I decided in the end I decided to do a 28 page Dragonmeet edition and then later a 32 or 36 page Subscriber Edition. Even though I swore I didn't want a big issue.

The trouble is that I really had to truncate one of the articles and completely exclude another to get it to be 26 pages but adding both pieces does not current expand the page content to land on a higher 4 page limit.

I'm sure that after Dragonmeet I will have enough additional material to hit the right page length. Not only that but after battling last night with the blank page issue I found out that there is now an option to supress the blank pages in both the PDF and the print output. It's not clearly available but it is there and I could have saved a lot of time.

Printing Booklets

2007-10-16T15:15:00.000-07:00

My PC is out of action and awaiting a rebuild, these days I am doing most of my zine writing on the Mac. After all isn't the Mac all about these kind of arty, creative things?

Not when it comes to booklet printing however. I have an expensive laser printer (prices on the kind I have are about a third what I paid for years ago, I note, crazy!) that is perfectly capable of printing a booklet: using the Windows driver.

On OSX though, no chance of trying such craziness. Well at least I can turn to OpenOffice's in-built booklet printing can't I? Nope, the NeoOffice version I am using doesn't have that either.

Is there some kind of crazy booklet printing hatred at Apple?

To top it all off NeoOffice cannot handle the OpenType fonts I just bought and is doing some crazy kerning that is making the whole thing look terrible. Looks like this might be a PDF issue at this rate.

Flagship 123

2007-10-07T15:10:00.000-07:00

Carol has assured me that the magazine hasn't folded and I've contributed another two pages of material on top of what was there before (presumably two columns worth of stuff).

Let's hope that this means that the next issue will be with us with a month.

The end of issue 35 is in sight

2007-10-06T11:50:00.000-07:00

Okay so I have had a chance to do some work on issue 35 and we are now on eighteen pages. Given an anticipated final issue size of 26 pages that means the end is now in sight (by that I mean that I need to finish what is there rather starting anything new). This is also a good time to send in any letters, emails or comments you may have had about the issue.

The issue focuses on creating characters for first time with various systems I have been looking at. Some of the pieces may be moved out to their own issues (particularly the Mage and Conspiracy of Shadows pieces as they are going to have their own issues later).

In other news most of the house move is done now and there is a little lacuna while new furniture arrives. Hopefully I can make the most of this to get this issue done and the next underway.

Moving House

2007-05-11T08:46:00.000-07:00

If there's a fair wind I hope to be moving house at the start of the June. More information on contact details as and when. However I will likely be dropping my address from the website and rely on email contact (since that is what most people use now anyway).

As part of the move though I would like to shift some of my old carnel stock that is taking up space. Therefore I have halved the prices of the carnel collection, please purchase it if you've been holding off before now, it's only a fiver!

I'll also be having a look through what else I have a lot of and trying to get rid of those as well. More to come on that.

Nervous Exhaustion

2007-05-11T08:26:00.000-07:00

Okay, so finally I decided that I was never going to be totally happy with Issue 34 and as if to mock me further when I printed the issues, addressed the envelopes and sealed them I realised that I had forgotten to include the two rather important inserts.

Aaargh! Cue some frantic reopening and restuffing. Apologies subs for the roughed up envelopes.

Anyway good riddance to a good but troublesome issue. I'm promising to do something light and short for Issue 35 to give myself a break. After that I'll be back into to doing the "big" concept issues. Amongst the ideas that are already green lighted in my head is the completion of the Mage Campaign issues; two issues of TimCon ideas (one for this year, the other for Get Slaughtered) and two issues for the Conspiracy of Shadows campaign.

As single theme issues tend to be harder to write than more general issues I will also be having a parallel issue into which I can dump stuff that is not directly relevant to the current theme issue. This issue will just come out if it gets to the right size (about twenty pages).

Right, hope you enjoy the new issues.

Issue 34 Update

2007-04-23T14:59:00.001-07:00

I have, quite rightly, been given a kick up the arse about what I am doing at the moment. Well the short answer is that I thought the version of issue 34 I produced for Dragonmeet wasn't quite right and needed some rework.
It is still not up to the standard I would like but I do have a new rough copy that I will be showing to a few people this week to get some early feedback. If that isn't too negative then I will probably push the issue out to subscribers early next month.
I have started collecting my notes for issue 35 but more about that later.

New Issue

2007-01-07T14:36:00.000-08:00

I had a version of the next issue done for Dragonmeet but after taking a look at it I am not happy and want to add a bit more content and rework the covers.

It is probably going to be at least three weeks for the next issue to get done.

Issue 34 Update 1

2006-10-27T16:10:00.000-07:00

Just a quick note on Issue 34, in writing terms it is about 30% done. It looks like it is going to contain two one-hour scenarios. Tennessee Smith and the Kasbah Kaper and Survivors, both for d20 Modern.

I'm hoping there is going to be room for a mini-article and some letters if there are any but a lot depends on whether it is going to be a 28 or 32 page issue.

Lordy Me It's the New Issue

2006-10-27T16:06:00.000-07:00

Hallejah! Finally Issue 33 is done and the new issues are rolling off the printer in the next room as I type. Once they are printed out then it's time to do the fiddly and time consuming task of folding, stapling and shoving them into envelopes. Subs should expect their copies some time during the next week. Subscribers Internationale probably sometime in the next fortnight.

If you have let your sub lapse recently then now might be a good time to PayPal over a subscription renewal.

If you want to have a look at the new issue before you buy then a PDF preview will be on the site in the week along with the specific issue page.

To the long armed stapler Batman!

Writing Done on Issue 33

2006-10-16T15:32:00.000-07:00

So tonight the last edits went onto Issue 33. There's a small amount of new material that was added and which needs a new proof read, other than that I just need to complete the front and back cover designs and the job is done.

I've started working on 34 already and I have a lot of choice as to what 35 should be so I need to look at revising the schedule once 33 is out the door.

The Announcement

2006-09-18T14:13:00.000-07:00

Okay, so finally I can say what has been going on for the last month and a half and the answer is... guaranteed to be an anti-climax probably.

The truth is that I have been going through a rather complex process of changing jobs from something I never really enjoyed and which ate free time like Pringles to something that I hope is going to be a lot more enjoyable and with a shorter commute that will free up time to spend on the zine.

Hurrah!

In fact I have the first proof copy of issue 33 next to me and I am hoping to be able to get something out to the proof readers for next month.

After 33 gets done I am going to update the schedule and give an idea of what is going to come out hopefully before, or in time for, Dragonmeet in December.

Apologies for the lack of activity in recent months but all the circumstances have been very complicated and it probably wasn't wise to publish anything about it publicly.

TimCon and Flagship Column

2006-08-22T00:15:00.000-07:00

I am working on a new scenario for TimCon which is happening on the first weekend in September. I'd link to it but I think its all booked up so there doesn't seem a lot of point right now. If you're going I'll see you there!

The other news is that my first RP column was published in Flagship 119 and the second column was emailed off this weekend. The column is a kind of gossip/news affair and currently lacks a decent name so any suggestions gratefully received. I mention it just because it is proof that I'm not completely inactive. There is stuff happening!

Quick Update

2006-08-21T15:32:00.000-07:00

I had a little play around with the website tonight to introduce the new preview blog and also fix some of the Javascript that was behaving a bit inconsitently between browsers.

I know things have been very quite on the carnel front recently but I can tell you the zine isn't dead and I hope to have some good news to share next month. One thing I can say is that I have been studying for some professional qualifications and I have now passed! This is good news career-wise but it also means I have more free time again.

No Progress Report

2006-07-23T14:40:00.000-07:00

I am happy to report that there has been virtually no progress since the last post due to work situations I can't go into here just yet. However I will be sure to update you on the latest lack of progress as soon as there is no news to report.

However just to prove that I'm not a complete waster I have managed to complete a whole two columns for Flagship. Why not give it a go? I'm certainly curious to see what they use from what I sent them.

I have also started posting to the reviews column so there may be something there to tide you over.

Back to my usual tricks

2006-04-02T04:08:00.000-07:00

I have now managed to start writing two issues of carnel simultaneously. This has been an annoying feature of the last couple of issues and I had hoped to kick it this year. However the cause is exactly the same. Issue 33 is meant to be a special issue with a writeup of my Mage London campaign. In general I don't like to have letters and the little regular columns of the normal issues in a special or single topic issue as I think that they distract from the main subject.

However that means that all the regular stuff that normally goes into the issue gets put in the following issue (in this case issue 34 which is meant to be some one-off scenario write ups). Often writing the little bits is easier and more enjoyable so the later issue tends to be completed more quickly than the preceeding one. This means that the issues tend to get released at the same time.

I am also having another one of my classic problems with Issue 33 and that is writing too much. In general an issue is best when it is no more than 40 pages and preferably 36 for reasons of cost. For the last couple of issues I have allowed the issue to get a bit fatter but I don't think I can afford to do that this time so instead I think the special issue may have to be chopped into two parts.

Issue 31 and 32 have been finished

2005-12-15T09:36:00.000-08:00

Okay, so before Dragonmeet I worked frantically to complete issues 31 and 32. The night before the convention I was up at 2am still printing and stapling.

Despite having finished the issues I wanted to hold off announcing them until I had the subscriber issues done. Most of those have been sent off this week so I was going to make the announcement this weekend.

Except... last night I gave Tim Eccles a complimentary pair of issues and today he posted a message on the Strike to Stun forums about the issues so everything is going to have to be brought forward a bit.

Issue 31 first draft complete

2005-10-24T14:30:00.000-07:00

So the first complete draft of issue 31 is complete and weighing in at 40 pages. After a quick print out though there is a problem... it looks awful.

There is something to be done with the Dover Press press books but I think I need to have a look at my sections. They seem a bit numerous and a bit small.

Work on issues 31, 32 and 33 is now going at fair pace because to be honest time is running out and Dragonmeet is round the corner.

Dragonmeet 2005

2005-10-12T14:08:00.000-07:00

It's happening on the 3rd of December and the zines are going to be there along with Flagship and IRM.

That basically sets a deadline for the next couple of carnel issues. Issue 31 is over 20 pages at the moment and 32 is 12 pages.

Work creaks to a start

2005-08-14T11:36:00.000-07:00

A rainy weekend in Hampstead means that work can once again begin on the zine. I am now working on issues 31 and 32 in parallel. Issue 31 is the second Lustria special and has a letters page, first article and editorial more or less in place. Issue 32 is sketchier but I want to try a new format for the zine so it might take a while to get the stuff that has already been written into place.

Or I could do some work on my zine...

2005-04-17T09:41:00.000-07:00

So a broadband outage has finally stopped my World of Warcraft "problem" and allowed me to do some work on the zine. Issue 31 is going to contain the remaining material from Richard Iorio's Lustria article (mostly to do with rules for using Lizardmen as potential PCs/NPCs). After that 32 is going to be a general issue again.

Carnel #30 Winding down

2005-02-05T10:30:00.000-08:00

Issue 30 has now been sent out to the subscribers and most of the complimentary copies have gone out. I need to get the webpage updated for the new issue and then do the announcement on the Metazine mailing list/blog.

Starting the blog

2005-02-05T10:28:00.000-08:00

Since I already have a Blogger account for Metazine (here) I just had a "moment of clarity" as I prepared to go and edit the news file for the new year.