Don't miss your golden opportunity to experience tabletop gaming like never before! Anansi's Tapestry of Lives is packed with unparalleled tools and resources that will take your Dungeons & Dragons 5E (or other TTRPG) gaming sessions to the next level. Backed by over 1,300 players, DMs, and GMs, our Kickstarter campaign was a smashing success. Now, it's your chance to reap the benefits at a remarkable discount! Anansi's Tapestry of Lives: Immerse yourself and your players in a universe brimming with 110 unique and indispensable NPCs to enliven your world. That's not all, it also features a treasure trove of magical items, side quests and more. While compatible with 5E, this resource is a remarkable addition to any tabletop roleplaying game. Anansi's Journal of Common Places: Step into 70 meticulously detailed locations, each harboring their own concealed secrets waiting to be discovered. These are the overlooked places your regular adventure books don't cover. Whether your players stumble into the castle kitchen or want to know what the inside of their rented carriage look like, these location description help you easily add another level of immersion. VoxStoria Web App: So much of an NPCs mood and personality is communicated by voice. With our app, you don't just read about the NPC's, you listen to them too! Featuring professionally voice acted introductory monologues, these loveable misfits help bring your world to life. Choose from a plethora of bundles to find the one that fits your gaming needs and your budget. Act swiftly as the pre-order store won't be open for long. Grab this opportunity and prepare yourself for an unforgettable gaming experience at a great discount. Once these limited-time bundles vanish, they're gone for good! Happy gaming!
This post is for backers only. Please visit Kickstarter.com and log in to read.
This post is for backers only. Please visit Kickstarter.com and log in to read.
This post is for backers only. Please visit Kickstarter.com and log in to read.
In the good news column, Tales of Adventure is 99% finalized. We’re missing a couple of stat blocks, and the proofing/edits I provided haven’t been implemented by layout yet, but once those are done this week, we’ll share through DriveThruRPG. Tales of Adventure has about 140 pages of content. It’s big.
When I upload Tales of Adventure to DriveThru I’ll also be uploading print friendly versions of Gifts of Magic and Journal of Common Places.
A couple? (few?) weeks ago I missed sharing that we uploaded 15 more voices to VoxStoria, bringing the total to 65, I believe. I have 27 that need some light editing/EQ and about 4 that need more love for one reason or another. I have to recast about 14 voices because the VO actors never turned in their files.
That said, more progress on Anansi's and the physical rewards will be delayed as I provide end of life care for my mom. More details below.
This has been a challenging 6 months, and these next few or several weeks will be more so. In spite of our best efforts, or resulting from some poor decisions by her healthcare team, my mom is has developed progressive liver failure, which has led to kidney failure.
If you’ve followed my updates, she’s experienced multiple hospitalizations since the end of July, with November being the beginning of things really going catastrophically downhill. Because she's intellectually disabled, I’ve had to be on top of her care as her advocate. In spite of this, we’ve had issues too numerous to detail – from them not getting her fed, to missing medications, to not running certain tests, to “forgetting” to order pre-medications before blood transfusions.
Most recently she went into the hospital on Feb 8 for C. Diff. While there her kidneys began failing. Her number one repeated request to me the last couple of weeks in the hospital was that she wanted to come home to die. So, my mom was discharged Feb 29 for home hospice. I’m committed to providing her the best comfort and care I can during these last few weeks of her life.
If you want more specifics, I’ve given some more detailed information on her GoFundMe page - https://www.gofundme.com/f/candace-fritz. That’s where I’ll be posting updates. I recommend checking it out just for the couple of cute videos of my mom from when she was healthier.
Thursday evening was my mom's first evening home with me. Since then I’ve gotten maybe 4 hours of sleep per night. She’s incontinent now and has extremely limited mobility (basically bed bound), and so she calls me to be change, or sometimes just because she’s confused, or had a bad dream. It’s been less than a week since she's been at my home, and I’m already exhausted.
Hospice provides only about 3 – 4 hours of nursing/nurses aid support per week. It’s not enough. My mom can only stomach 2 – 4 ounces of food at a time, so I have to feed her every 1 to 2 hours. She’s lost over 40 pounds since November 1, and now weight less than 80 pounds. I want to give her the best chance she has of feeling as comfortable as possible, and having as much life as she wants to have, so making sure she gets good nutrition is important. I’m also managing her various pain, nausea, and other medications, along with changing her, and everything else. It leaves me very little time to work (or sleep). Thus the GoFundMe to help pay for private nursing care, so I have time to try and bring in enough of a paycheck to keep a roof over her head. Mine too, I guess.
I also have to stay on top of the hospice nurses/doctors. Example: today the doctor attempted to prescribe her Keflex to treat a possible infection she has at her drain site (she has ascites (fluid buildup in the abdomen) and a drain has been permanently placed). Keflex is cleared by the kidneys and is high risk for patients with renal failure, like my mom. After they told me what was prescribed, I had to remind the doctor she has kidney failure and request a different antibiotic. Anyway, I’m grateful for the hard work of the doctors and nurses, but these failures of the med system are too prevalent and require constant vigilance. I’m hopeful I can get some nursing help soon. I’ve reached out to some services, and am waiting for eval meetings to get setup.
The TL/DR of this is that my mom has to have all my time right now, and I can’t promise to provide much in the way of updates here, until she dies. I just don’t have the bandwidth.
I'll still be working on your rewards as I can, and I am going to continue my Patreon until at least April (because, frankly, I need the money), but if no one is interested in the content, I won’t keep doing it. For March in the Patreon I'm releasing 2 NPCs, Sylvia Heathrow (a lady of the court) and Old Man Bartholomew (older gentleman about town). Neither NPC is as helpful as they appear, so they have stat blocks in case players catch on. There’s also 4 magic items (Ring of Poison, Ring of Sleep, Wolf Lord’s Cane, and Magic Missile Dagger), as well as two locations (the Garden Veranda and The Gentleman’s Club). We're also offering art commissions through the Patreon, so you can get art of your characters or as gifts for players.
As I said, I will still work on Anansi’s and move the book forward as much as I can. You will get all the physical rewards you are owed – that hasn’t changed (and won’t). I just wanted to let you know that, for the time being, I’ve pretty much hit my limit, while I provide end of life care for my mom. I’m the only child, and I don’t have other family here. We’re expecting 3 – 6 weeks. We’ll see what happens. She has really amazing days, where I almost feel like she can (impossibly) recover. Then there are days like today, when she’s more confused, in pain, and feels like she can’t breathe regardless of how much oxygen she’s getting. Days like today, her diagnosis is self-evident.
I will read any words of support you share, and I’m grateful for them. I will try to respond, but if I’m not timely, it doesn’t mean I didn’t see what you wrote and that I’m not appreciative. It just means I ran out of hours.
This sucks. I’m sorry. Just bear with me.
Jamie
I'm reaching out to offer a free gift to say “Happy Valentine's Day!” and thank you again for backing Anansi’s Tapestry of Lives.
On my newly launched Patreon page you can download our Matchmaker NPC block (D&D 5E Compatible) FREE, to add a sprinkle of romance and intrigue to your campaigns. Just a heartfelt thanks for your incredible support and a little token of my appreciation.
As my team and I continue creating more enriching and immersive TTRPG content, we're excited to invite you to join us on our newly launched Patreon page. It's a cozy corner we've crafted to share our latest creations, and where your support can help us keep the lights on and bring even more adventures to life.
This isn't a call to open your wallet, but an invitation to help us create new content for you and explore new people, new lands, and new stories together. If you're curious, enchanted, or simply in the mood for more magic, I'd personally be overjoyed and grateful to have you with us on Patreon.
Your support means the world, not just in keeping the lights on, but in fueling the forge that helps us transform imagination into reality. Regardless of you sign up for our Patreon or not, I hope you grab the free Matchmaker NPC. And I hope you know, I sincerely thank you, from the bottom of my heart, for being part of this journey.
With all my gratitude,
Jamie Van Doren
P.S. Whether you join us on Patreon or continue to cheer us on from afar, know that you're cherished. Happy adventuring!