"Kick Ass!" 5th birthday blogparty #3. First prize draw winners!

Who are this week's lucky readers?
The entries for last week's draw have been counted and the draw has been made, using my shiny Conpulsion 2010 random number generator. I am pleased to announce the winners in the first RD/KA! 5th anniversary bumper prize draw bonanza. My congratulations to all the lucky winners; my commiserations to everyone else. Don't give up yet though: there are still three more draws to go and you can all (previous winners included remember) enter those too.

A Bill King Gotrek and Felix omnibus
Trollslayer.net.
I am delighted to be able to announce that, fresh from the trials and tribulations of flitting, Bill has been able to unearth 2 English-language copies of Gotrek and Felix: the First Omnibus which he has generously donated to the spoil heap. One of these will go to Chazz Kellner. The remaining copy will be added to a subsequent draw.

"Kick Ass!" 5th birthday blogparty#2. Draw the first

Four, weekly prize draws

-#The spoil heap#-

The RD/KA! 5th anniversary bumper prize-draw bonanza will consist of four, weekly draws. This week's draw runs until midnight (BST) on Sunday 22nd August. The draws are all open to all of my readers (yes, that includes friends and family).

Draw the first's prizes
There are 5 prizes up for grabs this week.

A Bill King novel.
Trollslayer.net.
Choose any one.

"Kick Ass!" 5th birthday blogparty#1. Prizes! Prizes! Prizes!

"Lights... Cameras... Action!"
Alighting on this page as you have dear reader, be welcome to the 5th anniversary of "Roll dice and kick ass!". Yes, it's been 5 years to the day since I launched myself into the geek blogosphere with a report on Interaction, the 63rd Worldcon. I took to blogging a hobbyist wanting to write. What I didn't bargain on were the technicalities of creating an illustrated webzine: hunting down links and references, image work, layout; all suprisingly labourious and time-consuming. Enough already with my blood, sweat, toil and tears. Feast your eyes, dear readers, on the booty below...

Matt Forbeck
Hot off the presses, Ghosts of Ascalon — "the first original Guild Wars novel" — is Matt's and Jeff Grubb's spin on the popular fantasy MMO Tyria. I am told that Guild Wars- soon to see its first reboot, disposes of that WoW-grind by the simple expedients of a level cap and rapid character progression; which reads to me like a recipie for playing more characters having more adventures which play out more quickly. That sounds thrilling and action packed. Expect no less from messieurs Forbeck and Grubb.

Prize #1
Signed author's copy courtesy of Matt.

-#!#-

Meeting Richard Williams

The best laid plans
Unfortunately last Saturday's planned trip to Claymore fell through. I'm in a bit of a downswing just now and my main symptom is sleep disturbance, typical phase 1 for me. And so Friday night dragged on into Saturday morning leaving me facing 2 hours sleep before I was supposed to get up to catch an early bus to Edinburgh. The result was inevitable. Ah well, c'est la vie.

But still...
I did manage to make it to GW Glasgow on Friday afternoon to meet Black Library author Richard Williams. Richard proved friendly and easy-going as you'd expect and I passed a pleasant hour or so sharing his company with the other fans who'd turned out to meet him.

The inevitable signage
I'd taken along my copy of Liber Chaotica as planned. I'd thought that'd be all but Steve- the local manager, had managed to rustle up some copies of the currently out of print Reiksguard, in search of which I'd visited the store only the previous day and which had then been strangely absent from the shelves; so I bought that. As William and I prepared to pose for a couple of photos I figured that it'd be churlish not also to pick up a copy of the latest- and current, BL book in which Richard's writing has seen print: the anthology Legends of the Space Marines.

Of GW, the lure of Chaos, gribblies, and stuff

Space Hulk wins 2 Golden Geek Awards
My recent visits to the pages of Black Library novels: Graham McNeill's Heldenhammer- which I picked up at Conflict 2010, and Nathan Long's Bloodborn- which I reviewed last month; these visits to the world of the book have revived my interest in tie-in fiction set in two of my favourite gaming universes. And so it was that last Saturday saw me dropping in to my local GW in search of new reading matter. Also available was the new issue of White Dwarf. I confess I'm in the camp who finds GW's house magazine to be of limited utility in terms of adding value to my GW gaming interests- namely 40K, but I always like to read interviews with the creative types at the Design Studio. White Dwarf #368 features two, so I bought it.

One mighty game; two well-deserved awards

Skimming through the pages of news and new releases, as you do, I was pleasantly surprised to read Jervis Johnson's grateful acknowledgement of the two 2009 Golden Geek Awards the BGG community had awarded Space Hulk, whose 3rd edition was released amid great fanfare last year. The awards were:

• Best 2-player game.
• Best artwork/presentation.

Pleasant: because it was good to see that Space Hulk had received these accolades from the BGG community, and because it was nice to read Jervis' appreciation of this in the pages of White Dwarf. Surprising: because, regular BGG user that I am, I had no idea of these awards- the official awards ceremony was in November last year, until I read of Space Hulk's 2009 success in White Dwarf.

Q-workshop STRIKE!!!!

Journey to the unknown land of dice manufacturing
Remember that mention I gave back in June to Q-Workshop, the novelty dice company? I thought I was just honouring my side of a bargain made at UK Games Expo 2010, when I wangled a small discount on some dicecups in return for a promised mention here at RD/KA!. Little did I know then the ancient emnities- as long as beards and as sharp as ears, with which I had become involved for the sake of those two quid. What am I talking about? Watch this video and you'll see.



It seems then that the introduction of new design and manufacturing technology means that big changes are afoot at Q-Workshop, including:

• New cheap classic RPG dice sets.
• New premium 3D dice.
• New deluxe metal dice.
• New box packaging.
• New lower prices for older dice sets.

"New" and "lower prices": phrases which are bound to delight dice geeks everywhere, especially those who are already fans of Q-Workshops' wide range. But is this really good news all round?