Tales From The Smoking Wyrm issue 5

 

The Kickstarter for Tales Of The Smoking Wyrm issue 5 has launched. Featuring art by myself and others throughout it.  And I did the cover as well. 

Cover to #5

I write a bit more extensively about the cover on my art blog, as well as show all of the color variants; go check it out! 

This issue my comic, Onward Retainer!, is three pages long.  In this one the party gets itself into a rather big scrap while the retainers watch on. It was a fun one to draw.

 

The Legion charges!

So if you haven't already done so, and you have an interest in old school style fantasy RPGS, (DCC particularly) go to the Kickstarter and get yourself a copy! I think you'll be pleased. 

Tales From The Smoking Wyrm #4 Kickstarter

 

Snippet of #4's cover, art by Brian Maikisch.

Tales From The Smoking Wyrm issue 4 Kickstarter is now live. Check it out, and hopefully you'll see something there that might entice you to support it.

For those of you that regularly check out this blog, you likely do it because it is primarily a Warhammer 40,000 or miniatures blog. However I definitely played a lot of fantasy roleplaying games back "in the day"*. These included Basic D&D, AD&D (1st and 2nd), Rolemaster, Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay and MERP. And I did so alongside Warhammer 40,000 and other taple top games. Tales From The Smoking Wyrm, while set up primarily in support of Dungeon Crawl Classics (DCC) is written in such a way that the content could be moved to one of those OSR games (or even the more modern versions) with little fuss. 

I am once again doing art for this zine. I have some spot illustrations within it and I am contracted to do more. However I am not able to show any of that here at this time. Yet. However if you keep an eye of the Kickstarter campaign, our website, and our Facebook Group** you might see more.

Well, I did draw this gnome...

Onward Retainer! is my regular comic strip-thing that I am happy to say is returning in this issue as well. I get a kick out of these characters and their misadventures and writing and drawing them has been a highlight of the year for me. At this time I have scripts written through issue 10 and the story for #5 is already done. (It's nice to get ahead!)

*My definition of which is the late '80s and early '90s. Cuz I'm old. 

**I can't seem to be able to make a link for it. If you're on FB, just search for Tales Of The Smoking Wyrm. 

Tales From The Smoking Wyrm #3

Hello! I am happy, nay, THRILLED to announce that the Kickstarter for Tales From The Smoking Wyrm #3 is now live! And before I had the chance to share that news with you folks here, it has already funded! It funded in less than 2 hours and is still going strong. 

Join us!

If you missed my posts in the past regarding the two previous issues, here is a descriptive summary from the Kickstarter: "Tales from the Smoking Wyrm is a fanzine inspired not just by the roleplaying game Dungeon Crawl Classics (DCC), but also by the wondrous fanzines of the past 40 years! While we focus on DCC, the material produced can be easily translated into any Old School Renaissance (OSR) system, or even 5th edition D&D—something several of our reviewers have noticed as well!"

Archomental fun!

I have been looking at a lot of Fighting Fantasy and old (very old) Warhammer art as well as classic John Buscema Conan for inspiration for some the art that did for this issue. I am not sure how well that stuff shines through in my art per se, but I'm talking about the vibe that those early pieces inspired me. Anyway, I hope you check it out and thank you ahead of time if you decide to support us.

A snippet from my comic feature, Onward Retainer!

Here's the link again: .kickstarter Tales From The Smoking Wyrm-issue-3. There are pretty tasty add-ons this time around also. We hope you get it and we hope you love it! 

As usual, TK Rats are hiding within... 

-Joel

Tales from the Smoking Wyrm #2

Hello.
 Blind Visionary launched the Kickstarter for Tales from the Smoking Wyrm #2 a few days ago. And I'm happy to report that it has already funded!
 Yay!
And if you were one of the contributors for this or the previous issue, then I humbly thank you.

Cover snip of Tales From The Smoking Wyrm #2.

An old ('cuz we're old) art school classmate of mine did the cover for this one.  But I have some pieces in this one also, including a Shoggoth piece that I am particularly keen on.

WIP snippet from Onward Retainer #2. 

And my comic, Onward Retainer! has it's second installment. It's wordy as hell, but I like this one more than the first one. It's been a lot of fun working on this and getting my art groove back on, and this comic has been an important part of that. I still don't think I'm quite at the confidence level I was at the turn of the century when I stopped doing this type of art, but I feel that I am improving with each work I do.

A colorized version of the zine's host, Niarb. 

If you play Dungeon Crawl Classics (or know someone who does) and you're interested in it, check it out on Kickstarter, we would appreciate it and I think you will be pleased with it also. One person declared it,  upon holding the first issue in his hands for the first time, "The Fanciest Fanzine Ever". And I do think he is right; it's a nice product we managed to produce and I look forward to getting more people to experience it and to making more!

I am holding the limited edition printing of #1 for the first time.

Onward Retainer! (c) Joel R Phillips. 
Tales From The Smoking Wyrm (c) Blind Visionary. 

Telekinetic Rats go 3-D

Hey, the Kickstarter for Tales from the Smoking Wyrm-issue-1 is ending in just three days! And I have quite a bit of art in this issue, that I'm very happy with, and I hope all the work I have been doing is well received in the end, and I would like anyone who might be interested in it to get an opportunity to obtain a copy for themselves.

The Telekinetic Rat. My Dad it looks like it's getting shot...

One of stretch goals is that all backers will get a file to 3-D print a TK Rat based off of my art, which I think is just cool as heck. To have a 2-D piece of art of mine inspire something like this is just mind-blowing to me, and I am thrilled to see this happen.

Telepathic Rat mini sculpt by Mudpuppy Games and Fat Dragon Games.

Also, five people pledged to receive colorized versions of my copy-free cover. This is special as these are not prints but unique individualized hand painted pieces by me. And it's taking more time than I thought it would (a phrase I seem to repeat a lot on the site) particularly as I scrutinize just what colors to paint what. When I do black and white illustrations I never think about what color something I will be, I am more interested is balancing out the blacks vs. whites so that the images 'read' clearly to the beholder. So this has been a fun, though time consuming, exercise.

Snip of the WIP of the hand coloring.

Anyway, if you're interested in owning 'Neverness' art, or just like old school style fantasy RPGs or you are a player of DCC, than act now, there are only 3 days left on the tales-from-the-smoking-wyrm-issue-1 Kickstarter!

Tales from the Smoking Wyrm #1 (DCC)

After a few months of getting my art groove back, I finished my art contributions for Tales-from-the-smoking-wyrm-issue-1, which is now live on Kickstarter. A lot of my hobby time was sacrificed for this project but I feel that it was very much worth it. For those of you who play Dungeon Crawl Classics I hope you'll check it out and back our project. There is more of my art throughout the Kickstarter pages so I hope you at least go look at it.

Snippet of the front cover. 

This will be my first printed art in about 20 years when I last drew some Squats for Armorcast's Inquisitor Magazine.

A Squat Ancestor from about 20 years ago.

I have a number of pieces presented inside, including a comic strip that I am writing and drawing as well as the front cover.

Lettering and pencils from Onward Retainer!

The comic strip was created, written and drawn by me. It was a fun challenge reteaching myself how to do all of this again, but most importantly I think the characters are fun and I look forward to doing more with them.

Abby and Megan, the Retainers. 

Also, the actual finished product will look better than these cropped photos, trust me. I have seen the proofs!

Anyway, I hope you enjoy this stuff and can accept the justification for why I have slowed down on the posting on the Hobby Chronicle. Fear not, I will continue to knock out paint jobs between art tasks...





All art work (c) Joel R Phillips.