Recently in Book 3 Category

I'm in the doghouse, and I deserve to be. I'm not sure I'll make the dog collar a permanent fashion accessory (we're pretty casual around here for such elaborate bling), but it is appropriate in the short term. When clients ask me why I'm wearing a dog collar with a tag labeled "Providence," I'll explain to them that some really important people wanted to remind me that my clients are taking me away from what I'm supposed to be doing.

One day, I'll tell you the story about how the Poet snagged the Puppetmaster, the Sculptor and the Cultist up into a mad scientist project, all while Sploit got sucked into some kind of psychological testing project. Lesson: even a deep team bench can be devestated by the realities of people chasing a living (the flip side being, of course, it is so much easier if someone is paying you a wage and telling you it is your job.)

Solutions: an even deeper team bench and a recontemplation of what it means to provision them. Armchair quarterbacking yourself mid-recovery is gauche, though, and I'm already in the Lovecraftian doghouse. Why bring a knife to a rocket propelled grenade launcher fight?

Your outpouring of friendly support is amazing, and has barely felt like stalking at all! I'm humbled by it and don't take any of you for granted. I've missed you too. The pre-production wheels are already in motion of making sure we earned that support, although the proof will be in the pudding.

When I saw the full moon in the sky during the pre-dawn drive to work, I knew it was time to shutter up Schmeldritch. Otherwise, people might wonder if Book Three has started or not, and you might as well say it has: once the interludes are over, we tend to get pretty quiet here in favor of EldritchErrors.com to help new players jump in. It is always so hard to avoid indulging in one brief William Castle moment before shuttering this place up, though. It will be the first Schmeldritch post new participants stumble into for a while. This time, I might even indulge and give myself two brief moments to set that stage.

It goes without saying that the Eldritch crew thinks I'm insane, they've grown used to the mad scientist cackle coming from my office from time to time. My expectations for "Red Moon Rising" are obviously higher than they were even for "Scream in the Mountains," and after that many of us were going "holy crap!" May I recommend that experienced participants change their tin foil hats daily during Book Three and leave it at that?

For new participants, welcome to the party, you're still fashionably early. Don't worry that Eldritch Errors has been going since last April, Book Three was developed with you in mind. It was also developed with Book One participants in mind, as well, so you'll have lots to discover together. You might even argue that new participants only missed the confusing, complicated setup to the real action.

Until we see each other again, I leave you with a quote from Lovecraft: "I hate the moon - I am afraid of it - for when it shines on certain scenes familiar and loved it sometimes makes them unfamiliar and hideous."

As the capper on a romp of a chat with participants last night, I couldn't resist kinda-answering some of the questions about Book 3: When will it start? What will it be about? Will you be doing live events in my town finally? The short answer was: "Book 3 is called Red Moon Rising: you already know when the peak of that story is, and the duration will be shorter than Book 1 but longer than Book 2." People who have been participating in the story have been pondering the implications of that for a while.

While we never want to spoil where the story is headed for people, there are certain goals for the series that I also hinted at. I want you to get to meet all of the characters in the story so that they breathe beyond just text -- some of those are so special, that it is worth doing it right rather than doing it quick. I want Book 3 to tie up most of the loose ends dangling from Book 1 into a rough "first trilogy," but we have alot more story planned for you than that. If we can accomplish 75% of that in the first trilogy I'll be satisfied, as long as each Book continues to top the previous Book in every important way (without putting us in a position where we can't top ourselves again in the Book that follows.)