Sunday, June 6, 2021

Stay Frosty Resources

Stay Frosty is a fun, fast, and rules-light RPG for playing soldiers on a sci-fi point crawl, bug hunt like the movies Aliens and Predator and the video games Doom and Quake. Rules are based off of The Black Hack and written by Casey Garske.


I'm having a blast running Stay Frosty for our group and thought I'd pull together the various resources and info for the game to help others enjoy. I’ll post updates to this page when I find them.


STAY FROSTY OFFICIAL

  • Stay Frosty on itch.io/

  • Stay Frosty on DriveThruRPG

  • Stay Frosty paperback copy of the rules thru Lulu

  • Slipgate Chokepoint is a supplement for Stay Frosty based on First Person Shooter videogames on DriveThruRPG


STAY FROSTY ADVENTURES


STAY FROSTY CONVERSIONS


STAY FROSTY REVIEWS

Saturday, April 18, 2020

Updated Index Card Character Sheets

I updated my Index Card Character Sheets. They're now a little more in line with the new edition of Savage Worlds. These are 2-sided "front and back" cards with weapons and gear moved from the front to the back.
Cards printed and cut out next to an ordinary 3x5 index card.

When printing the cards make sure to print them "Actual Size" and double sided.
Print this sheet double sided and "Actual Size" to get the cards front and back.

Download here - https://drive.google.com/open?id=1uUYtnqanzyvV7AHPGV4CFSt8wSSf4yXc



Sunday, December 31, 2017

Index Card Character Sheets

I made some 3"x5" index card Character Sheets. They print up 4 to a page. Perfect for those times when you need a mini character sheet for NPCs, backup character sheet for your GM, etc.





Grab the PDF file here - https://goo.gl/6lEqCN

And if you want to tinker with the cards, the original Powerpoint file is here - https://goo.gl/APSNMm

Wednesday, August 17, 2016

My New Planner

 I’m pretty happy with my new planner and how it’s working out. Since I always seem to be striving to “work smarter, not harder” I end up frequently experimenting with better ways to stay organized.

 Right now I’m using a Rite in the Rain ½” ring binder and it seems to be dog-gone perfect for me and my needs.
1/2" Rite in the Rain binder with my custom made calendar paper.
The binder has replaced large Moleskine Squared Classic Notebooks that I’ve been using for about a year. Those large Moleskines replaced small Moleskines which I’d been using for over 6 years.

 Back in 2009 I was looking for a system to help better organize information, thoughts, and tasks for home and work. I wanted something small and pocket sized that had a calendar and room to take notes.  In an article from Mike Rohde I found where he detailed hacking a small Moleskine as a planner.  This was exactly what I was looking for.  I tried out a version of Mike’s planner and his information management system.  My planner had a calendar up front, a section for To Do items, and an area for general notes.
This is a picture of Mike Rohde's planner.  Mine looked the same - minus the iPod.
 Last year I decided to move up from a small Moleskine to a large one because I realized I could afford the size increase (I usually carry my planner in my uniform cargo pocket) and it would give me larger sized pages for my calendar and notes.  The large Moleskine was working fine but I was getting frustrated with bound notebooks.  These notebooks have a limitation that binders don’t.  You're stuck with the pages that are in there.  This limitation had me carrying two Moleskines for a month twice a year as I was starting to finish one out and start the other.  I also had to transpose notes over from notebook to notebook on transition.

 Obviously a binder was what I was looking for - a system that would let me swap pages in and out.  I’d looked at several different binders trying to find one that was about the same size as a large Moleskine.  The Staples Arc notebook system is pretty neat and super customizable but the rings are too thick and hard.  They were uncomfortable in my pocket.  I looked at Day Runner type planners.  These were THE planners for many years.  I remember my dad used one.  There are different sizes and I found one that was close to what I wanted - the Personal.  Alas, I couldn’t find a minimalist binder in this size.  They all seem to be padded with many assorted pockets in the covers as I don’t think anyone puts them in cargo pockets.

 Looking around for other binder options in this size I stumbled upon those from Rite in the Rain.  I’ve used their bound notebooks before.  Their products are big in the Army for obvious reasons.  The thinner ½” binder is almost the exact same dimensions as a large Moleskine (binder is 3/4" x 5 5/8" x 7 7/8" - large Moleskine 1/2" x 5" x 8 1/4").  This binder is completely no-frills.  It’s a folded piece of thick plastic.  I’d found what I was looking for.  This was exactly what I wanted.  Rite in the Rain even makes a weekly planner in the same format at the hack I had been doing with my Moleskines - one week spread across two facing pages starting on Monday.

 What I don’t love about the Rite in the Rain paper is that it’s coated.  Of course this is how the company differentiates themselves - paper that you can use in the rain - so I’m not going to see any non-coated paper from them.  I can write on the coated paper but it doesn't feel great for me so I did what I do - I hacked it!  I created a Powerpoint template that was the same size as the binder paper and ran graph paper thru my printer.  A couple of chops with a paper cutter, punches with a $18 Day Runner hole-punch off of Amazon, and BAM!  I had a perfect planner for MR OCD!
Paper for my planner in various stages.
 I’ve experimented with a couple of different weights of paper and grid sizes on the graph paper.  I like what I’ve got now, ending up with the same paper weight and grid size as the squared Moleskines.

 At about the same time I was looking for a binder I discovered the Strikethru productivity system from Chris Kyle. (Don't get scared by the .ru URL. I'm not linking to a scam website. Chris did that 'cause it would let him use the last 2 letters as part of the URL.) This system is basically what I’ve been doing but it adds the Vault which is a powerful tool I was missing.  Chris' system uses a Calendar, To Do, Dump, and Vault.  I was using a Calendar successfully.  I tried to run a To Do list but it wasn’t working because I was slamming too many things in there.  His To Do is focused on just that day.  You do a review of all 4 areas at the end of each day to build your next day’s To Do.  The Dump is just what is sounds like.  Free text notes go here.  Sort them into Calendar appointments, To Do’s, or move across to the Vault.  The Vault is where you store lists and similar things.  I put items like Vacation Plans here along with Project Task Lists as I’m building them.  I’ve taken Chris' system in a slightly different direction because of my type of work and my lifestyle.  I’ve split the Dump and Vault into Work and Home so my planner has 6 tabs - Calendar, To Do, Work Dump, Work Vault, Home Dump, and Home Vault.

 Overall I’m quite content with this new binder and system.  It is exactly what I want. I feel more productive and effective.

  In the off chance someone wants to give my particular solution a try, here are the templates I made for my calendar (this is a Powerpoint file) : https://goo.gl/hmDVLj

Sunday, May 29, 2016

Savage Star Wars Gear Cards - UPDATED!

UPDATED - Now added the Powerpoint file as well as the PDF.

I love using gear cards for RPG games.  Holding a card for a particular piece of equipment speeds up game play by having the stats in your hand but also makes the game that much more fun to have visual representations of what your character’s using.  I made gear cards for our Star Wars games.


 Grab them here as PDF -
 https://www.dropbox.com/s/q24gajlbtjamiqc/Savage_Star_Wars_Gear_151208.pdf?dl=0

And here's the Powerpoint file I used to make them -
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/4463870/Savage_Star_Wars_Gear_151208.pptx 

Let me know how these cards work out for you - and if you make news ones please let me know!

Savage Star Wars Conversion Notes

I've run 4 adventures so far using my Savage Star Wars conversion and we’ve had a great time.  I wanted to make sure our games felt cinematic and that these notes had enough crunch to give it a Star Wars flavor while still remaining Fast, Furious, and Fun.  I think I’ve got that with this short (7 pages - with pictures) conversion.



You can grab my "Another Savage Worlds Star Wars Conversion" here -  https://www.dropbox.com/s/5bjeo1zmvr0djq2/Another_Savage_Star_Wars_160122.pdf?dl=0

Tuesday, February 9, 2016

Savage Worlds Star Wars Bennies

I made some Star Wars bennies for our current campaign and wanted to share how easy they were to make.  I think the process would be great to make bennies or status markers for other genres.


I created a sheet of Star Wars themed images in Powerpoint and sized each to about 1" wide. I used a 1" hole punch on the sheet and stuck the images to 1" epoxy stickers. I glued 2 epoxy stickers with the images together using Elmer's PVA glue and they turned out just like I wanted! My first batch wasn't as great. I used UHU glue which is really sticky with a low water content. This was too much and made the images darken. Good lesson learned - don't always use the stickiest glue you can find.

Here's a pic of a sheet of epoxy stickers. You will sometimes find them listed as bottle cap stickers as crafters use them to make pendants with soda bottle caps.



We're famous!

My Savage Worlds Star Wars adventure - Aboard the Grinning Gundark - was featured on Pinnacle Entertainment's main web page last week as a news article!  That felt so awesome to see my adventure featured.  I was already proud of my work but this was icing on the cake.


Here's a link to the feature on their website: https://www.peginc.com/savage-fan-star-wars-adventure-available/


Friday, January 15, 2016

Aboard the Grinning Gundark! Adventure

I thought it might be fun to share our first Savage Worlds Star Wars adventure, “Aboard the Grinning Gundark” so I wrote it up as a One-Sheet - which ended up being 3 pages.  Let me know what you think. Aboard the Grinning Gundark! adventure

Another shot of the chase to capture Bura Melan.

Here’s a PDF of the Wanted Poster I used for the game minus the digital tablet frame.  The frame image is from Dave Graffam Models if you want to get it.  He doesn't have it listed on his website but you can find it over at RPGNOW.com.

Thursday, December 31, 2015

My CD case GM screen

Earlier this year I made a GM screen out of CD cases that's served me well for several months.


Here's the Google+ post I wrote with pics and some notes about construction: https://plus.google.com/111339988892948840968/posts/DgeinLyLTao

Savage Worlds Star Wars!

We kicked off our Savage Worlds Star Wars campaign earlier this month with two Fast, Furious, and Fun sessions so far.

Since July I’ve been playing a regular every-other-Wednesday night RPG session with two of my friends.  We started off playing thru the new Dungeons and Dragons 5th Edition Starter Set Campaign.  That campaign wrapped up in November and I convinced the guys to let me run a Savage Worlds campaign next. 

Our first Savage Star Wars game started off In Media Res as our Heroes (Heroes might be too strong a word since they’re playing Bounty Hunters) chased the wanted Bith leader of the nefarious Krayt Dragons swoop gang thru the streets of the planet Rifrinis.

Imperial Wanted poster for Bura Melan
Imperial Wanted poster for Bura Melan - leader of the Krayt Dragon Swoop Gang

Sissk, the Trandoshan driver, won the initiative and swung their speeder car sideways in an attempt to hit the 3 swoop bikes.  He missed 2 but succeeded in hitting the bike of the gang leader, Bura Melan.  Melan lost control of his bike and slammed into a wall getting 3 wounds in the process.  Vengar, the Ubese bounty hunter, gunned the gang leader down with a well placed stun shot from his blaster rifle.

The PCs chase Bura Melan and 2 of his gangers.



Bura takes 3 wounds after losing control of his bike and hitting a wall.

After turning Bura Melan in to the authorities and collecting the bounty the PCs followed up on a job opening found by their fixer.  A starship - The Grinning Gundark - is looking to round out its crew for a delivery run.

The players meet up with the crew - Dace the Human Captain and Doda the Arconan First Mate - and the ship lifted off to jump to Hyperspace.  As the Captain pulled the levers to activate the Hyperdrive the entire ship shuttered and a “boom” was heard from the engine room!  The Grinning Gundark’s Hyperdrive Containment Coil had failed.  Captain Dace turned the ship around and sent the players off to a local scrap yard to pickup a replacement part.  As the players were leaving the scrap yard, 3 speeder bikes pulled up carrying - of course - members of the Krayt Dragons.  Recognition was made by both groups and - after a bit of blaster fire - our heroes left the scrap yard with a new Coil and a speeder bike.

Krayt Dragons arrive at the Scrap Yard looking for a fight!

As the Grinning Gundark traveled thru Hyperspace the players experienced a Cut Scene where a Star Destroyer arrived to Keshinbak, the players’ destination, and established an Imperial Blockade.  Cut Scenes were a staple in the old d6 Star Wars RPG and I really thought they added to the Star Wars feeling of the adventures.

Coming back from the Cut Scene the Grinning Gundark lands on Keshinbak, a forested world where a rare mineral is mined.  Captain Dace chooses to land outside of town in the forest to stay “out of the way” from the Imperials and their blockade.  He sends the players into town along with Doda the First Mate to find their contact and get their cargo.

The meeting location for the contact is The Cave - a cantina in an exhausted mine.  As they’re searching for their contact the players have a couple of colorful encounters with other bar patrons.  Eventually they find Aloren, the contact, who instructs them to meet her at a nearby warehouse.     

The players and Doda arrive at the warehouse with their cargo skiff and begin loading the cargo - huge crates with Imperial markings.  A lookout tells everyone that Stormtrooper patrols are in the area.  As the group leaves the warehouse a patrol rounds the corner and orders them to halt.  Blaster fire is exchanged.  The group escapes but Doda the First Mate is killed in the blaster battle.

The heroes dodge several other patrols as they make it out of the city into the forest on their way back to the Grinning Gundark.  As they approach the Gundark the path is blocked by an AT-ST which fires a shot into the ground in front of them!  Vengar stops the cargo skiff.  Sissk scrambles off his speeder bike onto the skiff.  Both players quickly start opening cargo containers until Vengar finds a PLX-2 missile launcher!  A great shot with the missile launcher sends the AT-ST up in a giant explosion.

Cargo Skiff is stopped short by an AT-ST!
 
The players arrive back to the Gundark and barely have enough time to tell Dace the bad news about his First Mate before they liftoff. 

As the Gundark lifts off the surface of Keshinbak the sensors pick up 3 signals - a Star Destroyer and two TIE fighters.  Dace says he can outrun the Star Destroyer but they’re going to have to fight their way past the TIE fighters.  The players man the Gundark’s blaster turrets and make short work of the TIEs as the ship jumps to Hyperspace to deliver their cargo.

The Grinning Gundark faces off against two TIE fighters.

The Grinning Gundark comes out of Hyperspace near an asteroid belt on the edge of the Gulsen Nebula.  The rendezvous with the client is inside the asteroid belt.

As the Gundark carefully maneuver thru the asteroids, sensors pick up 2 ships closing fast.  They quickly make visual contact with the ships - a pair of X-Wings.  The X-Wings challenge the Grinning Gundark and then escort them deeper into the asteroid field to dock with The Liberator - a Rebel Blockade Runner.  Yes - their client is the Rebellion and they are selling them stolen Imperial weapons.  As payment the Rebels give the players a datapad with an encrypted account code.  This ensures they can’t cheat their Patron.  As soon as the transfer of cargo is complete the Rebel ship announces Red Alert because a Star Destroyer has just jumped into the system.

The Grinning Gundark docked with a Rebel Blockade Runner on the edge of the Gulsen Nebula (it's amazing what you can do with paper towels!).

The Rebel X-Wings move to engage 4 TIE fighters as the Blockade Runner evades and escapes.  The heroes have two choices - fight their way past the TIE fighters and the Star Destroyer or go into the Gulsen Nebula.  They choose the Nebula.  Visibility within the gas and dust of the Nebula is reduced to just 6”.  Our players make several Piloting rolls to avoid asteroids in the Nebula.  One roll misses and they strike an asteroid.  The Gundark impacts the asteroid near the bridge killing Captain Dace!  Vengar rushes forward to the bridge and regains control of the ship.  They emerge from the Nebula and jump to the Hyperspace coordinates already programmed into the computer - Tatooine.

Upon arriving to Tatooine they learn that the Patron is Tesso the Hutt who gladly accepts the datapad and pays the players for successfully delivering the cargo.  Tesso laughs when the players tell him of the fate of Dace and Doda.  “Looks like you have your own ship now!  Well done!”

The players now have a ship and a patron who’s ready to send them on a new delivery mission.

Friday, May 22, 2015

Another Star Wars Hero Kids Game

Our son and I played another Star Wars Hero Kids adventure recently - this time with his friend who was spending the night.  + Justin Halliday has released a sci-fi mod to his awesome game.  I used those templates and skills as a starting point for this adventure.

The boys were Rebels tasked by General Dodonna to get a vaccine to help heal the many Rebels who had fallen ill at another Rebel base.  They were to meet a Rodian contact on Tatooine to pickup the medicine.

Watch out for the asteroids - and pancakes!
The 4 Rebels (each boy controlled two characters) were a Wookie, a droid, a pilot, and an alien Soldier.  After getting their instructions from the General the Rebels piled into their starship and blasted off for Tatooine.  As their ship neared the planet they encountered an asteroid field!

One boy flew avoiding the asteroids (rolling Ability Tests against his Dexterity with an plus for his Pilot skill) while the other used his Gunnery skill to try and blast them out of the way of their ship.  The ship made it thru the asteroid field with only a few bumps and scratches.

Moving to their Rodian contact.
 The Rebels landed and began the search for their contact.  General Dodonna told them they were looking for a Rodian.  They would know they'd met the right alien by using a code phrase to which their contact would respond with a different code phrase.  There were 3 Rodians on the map.  The Rebels successfully found their contact on the third try after fighting their way past a nosy Stormtrooper squad.  Their contact led them to a quiet place away from the roving patrols and laid out the conditions for him handing over the medicine.  The Rodian had a driver who was going to race in a speeder bike race this afternoon but had gotten hurt and couldn't race.  The Rebels would have to race in his place!

Racing around the ruins.
Two of the Rebels (1 for each boy) raced two other speeder bikers around ruins in the desert.  I was going to make it 2 laps around but saw that the boys were losing focus so partway thru the first lap the race organizer made an announcement (I cupped my hands in front of my mouth and used a funny voice) that the race was being cut down to only 1 lap due to Stormtrooper patrols approaching.  The boys bought my cheat and perked up a bit.   

The speeder bikes were a fan made product for the old Star Wars Miniatures game.  I printed them on cardstock and cut them out.

Let the Wookie win!
The speeders could Go Slow (move 6 squares and make 90 degree turns with no difficulty) or Go Fast (move 6 squares plus 1d6 more squares).  In order to have his speeder bike Go Fast the player had to successfully pass an Easy (Target 4) ability check (plus for Pilot skill).  Failure meant the speeder didn't move that turn.  While Going Fast the speeder could move straight or diagonally forward but could only make a 90 degree turn by passing another Easy ability check.  Failure on this ability check would stop the speeder on the square where the check was taken.

The Wookie Rebel won the race and the Rodian made good on his promise to hand over the medicine.  Our heroes blasted off from Tatooine, rushing to the Rebels who were in distress.

When our heroes landed near the Rebel Base with the sick troopers they found it under attack by Stormtroopers.  Our heroes snuck thru the woods (Easy Dexterity ability test) behind the Stormtroopers and blasted them when they got close enough.  After a couple of exchanges of blaster fire our heroes were past the remaining Stormtroopers and safely inside the base where they could go about healing their allies.

Both boys had a good time (as well as this Dad) and asked that I run them another game some time soon.

Here are their Rebel character sheets along with the minis they used.

Tuesday, February 11, 2014

Star Wars Hero Kids Game

This post is a re-hash, twice over, of a post I had on my old blog which I took down.   I'm putting it here since I had folks asking about the game.  Below is most of a COPY and PASTE from a reply to a thread on the Google+ RPGs for Kids group.

I ran a game of Hero Kids for my son, Nathan.  I've got tons of Star Wars minis that he loves playing with so I thought this would be a great way to introduce the little guy to gaming. 

Obi Wan Hero Kids character cardI tweaked the Hero Kids fantasy setting to the Star Wars sci-fi setting.  I created character cards for our game in Powerpoint using images of the minis grabbed from the WOTC website.  The border on my cards is the Digital Tablet Handout Graphic from Dave Graffam Models.

For our game I created characters for Obi Wan, Chewbacca, Count Dooku, Commander Rex, and two types of Battle Droids.  I had to cheat the Force-using characters a bit using 5 dice to build the heroes instead of 4 as recommended in the Hero Kids rulebook.

Star Wars Hero Kids game setupWe played on a Star Wars minis map.   Nathan had his three heroes - Obi Wan, Chewbacca, and Commander Rex - board the space station to rescue Princess Leia from Count Dooku.  I didn't tell him where she was so his heroes had to start searching the station.  After a couple of fights with Battle Droids he encountered some mundane droids - Gonk and R5D4.  I coaxed him into roleplaying his heroes asking the droids if they knew where the princess was being held captive.  This lead him to the Conference Room with the final battle between the heroes and Count Dooku.  We both had a great time and more games are planned.

I've uploaded a PDF of the Star Wars Hero Kids character cards here: https://www.dropbox.com/s/8l5lpugjji7zcaa/Star_Wars_Hero_Kids_Cards.pdf

Here's the Powerpoint file I used if you want to make your own character cards - but I dropped the digital tablet image since it's not fair to share that.  It's only $1 from rpgnow.com :
https://www.dropbox.com/s/msyjdhjz4hh01ze/Hero_Kids_Cards_borderless.pptx


Here I Go Again ...

I really like the idea of having a blog - so I started ANOTHER one.  I guess the third time (ninth time, whatever) will be the charm.

I took down my heathenmonkeys.com blog because I was feeling guilty paying for a domain and hosting with few posts.  We'll see how I do with a blogger.com site.