AGC #441 is done, without much delay from sneaking in the one I skipped (#438). And now, I have to go to work because today's probably the busiest day of the month... fun.

Like the subject line says, here's AGC #437; back to the D&D campaign (more or less).

In AGC #424, the Universal Justicars see their first combat of the adventure.

I'm doing well at planning and getting the comics ready, and I'm thinking I might try cranking them out a little faster, like every 4 or 5 days for a while, as long as I don't see any signs of burning out. I do need to keep a little ways ahead though, in case I can't get any work done when I'm moving and stuff. That said, it's going to be a long lonnnnnnng week at work...

The other day I watched The Dark Knight again. It's funny all the things they did with that movie: the Joker is disturbingly violent, yet there's virtually no blood in the film; there's never any real challenge for Batman in hand-to-hand combat, yet despite that there is no shortage of conflict, drama or suspense. The weakest parts of the movie by far are the places where Batman uses his superior technology (derived from immense wealth) to solve a problem, often resulting in some really dumb 'movie magic' tech that makes it harder to suspend disbelief, but overall it's a great movie, and a makes me wonder again where the franchise is going next - will Heath Ledger's tragic death kill off his incomparable Joker? How can that character not be a prominent part of the film(s) to come?

Unrelated... I will have to find some time to try out D&D Online when it goes free tomorrow (Sept 9) though.

That's right, I have so much crap going on now that you wouldn't think I'd have any time to update, but in some kind of perverse twist, I'm ahead of myself enough to be overconfident and put up AGC #422 after only four days (whereas I've been pretty faithful to the six-day schedule for like half a year).

It'll probably be every six days most of the time, especially as things get busier, but I'm just in a good mood today (somehow).

Other good news, dad is giving us a hand with the house-buying process, which is really taking some of the stress off, and that's greatly appreciated. Of course, we're fully capable of inventing our own new and varied forms of stress, but still. I hope to have all the main stuff sorted out in the next couple days. Then other things will become the main things. Yay.

I just found out the other day from quill18, but I thought I'd repeat it here because I'm sure some of my comic readers will be interested to know that...

Later this summer, D&D Online is going to be adding a free version of their service. It sounds like free accounts have the same level cap as paid accounts and access to a lot of the content. It seems like you have access to most of the races and classes, but would have to pay a bit to 'unlock' Warforged, Monks, and perhaps some others.

All in all though, www.ddo.com was pretty fun when I tried the open beta, and when it goes free, I'm definitely going to want to at least try it out.

Slightly overdue, but here's Here's AGC #414. If you've read "season 1" of my Real D&D Excerpts you know that players will go waaaaaaay farther than this if they get an idea into their heads on what to do...

Anyway, I blame the late on working 7+13+9 hours between 2pm Friday and 6:30pm Sunday. There was not a whole lot of time to write stuff, especially with hour-plus internet tech support issues coming up while I was home.

Gotta go...

There are webcomics, and then there are webcomics.

The sad thing is that I get 2x to 5x as many hits as normal whenever somebody links an AGC in the Order of the Stick forums.

Sure, 95% of people who follow the link will take a look at one of my ugly texty comics out of context and immediately hit their back button...

Still good for my (generally trivial) ad revenue though.

Very very busy lately. Not only am I working more days than I'm used to each week, but medical appointments have been piling and piling up, filling in most of the time before my late shifts and after my early shifts until there's nothing left. So I don't think there's much chance of pushing out the next AGC for today...

In the hopes of appeasing anyone who hasn't heard these yet, or who just really liked my D&D excerpts, there are some great podcasts I found on the Wizards on the Coast website. These are from a 4th edition pre-release gaming session where the players are the guys from the PvP and Penny Arcade webcomics, with a game Dev as GM, showing off the new version in a premade adventure which may be familiar to anyone who played the first 4th-Edition module.

So if you're interested (and have a few hours to devote your speakers or headsets to audio-awesome while you work or play), and you don't mind some spoilers for Keep on the Shadowfell, check out PvP/Penny Arcade Podcast Episode 1.

If that gets you hooked, the archives are here, and you can work through all of them. I'm only up to number 3 or 4, but it's pretty sweet :)

Oh, and did I mention that for the second series, they were joined by Wil Wheaton?

List of Projects I have recently embarked on, considered re-opening, or at least concieved and tried to plan:

• Novel set in the Star Wars universe (set in the time of Episode V) but using original characters. About 58000 words so far.
• Novel set in a custom high fantasy setting (orcs, trolls and lots and lots of magic). About 53000 words in the current draft.
• Script for comic/manga or animated cartoon in a custom scifi setting (interstellar travel is common and fast but expensive). Got stuck around the fifth episode... I mean, I have the whole series plotted out in framework, but Episode 5 isn't working the way it's supposed to.
• Script for comic/manga or animated cartoon in a custom steampunk/alchemy setting (superpowered gunfighters on combat drugs, clockwork automatons and steampowered everything). No actual script written yet, but I've been working on the framework and key scenes, and the 'project' has been very much on my mind for weeks and weeks.
• A 4.0 D&D adventure (I've planned a lot in my head, but only written out the beginning and setting/description). I have about a month if I want to get it done in time to be useful (though the story ideas will undoubtedly show up in AGC eventually, minus the 4.0 stuff).
• A print-on-demand merchandise shop on Cafepress. I have about 45 designs in there so far, I still want to fill out a couple of my categories a bit more, but I'm about ready to start advertising.
• An actionscript 2.0 Flash game which is a top-down view arena-style shooter. I think it's theme would have some appeal, and the controls are a little unusual (and hopefully fun). This one has sort of fallen by the wayside though.
• And of course I'm still putting out an AGC strip every six-or-seven days. And, you know, working. And in a committed relationship. You can see how some of the other stuff doesn't get done... the problem is I'm at a high risk of starting something else and letting one of the above drop out of the rotation, instead of getting something done.

That's right, I've just hit my 350th AGC comic (woo), and since it isn't especially exciting, I also posted their brand new 3.5 character sheets in .rtf format for your perusal (download here).

This is also the thread for comments on the characters and generally complaining about how disappointed you are with my character-building and how too much detail ruins the fantasy :P

GM produces a pair of paper handouts, giving one to Tree, and another to Rohan.

GM: [to Rohan] You may find something useful in this.
Rohan: [reading] Cool.
Tree: [pleasantly surprised] Oh my god... are you serious? Oh my god..
3-eyes: Oh ya, when leaving the temple we should have brought down the guards we had tied up.
Lakshana: Didn't I say that?
GM: Oh, did you?

Did they? And what the heck else is going on as the heroes return to the temple? Find out HERE!