Just 1 Day Left for 13 Fantasy Worlds!

Best-seller Kevin J. Anderson and award-winner Cat Rambo headline the Myths & Legends Fantasy Bundle on StoryBundle.com, a huge bundle of 13 fantasy books!

That's the good news.

The bad news is that there's only one day left!

Go there NOW and grab this incredible deal before it's gone! Get a summer's worth of reading, give to charity, and support indie authors all with one small purchase.

NOW IS YOUR LAST CHANCE. 

Warhammer 40K: 5th Edition

Guess what I found?!

It’s been about two weeks now that we finally got all our stuff that was stored in California (coming from Japan) and Texas (left there in 2014). Holy poop do I have a lot of boxes! And books! And Warhammer guys! Finally see it all accumulated in one place honestly makes me feel a little ashamed of myself...

But I’ve learned that if you ever get rid of any of your Warhammer models, you later wish you hadn’t, and maybe even go so far as to buy more to replace the ones you sold! So I won’t get rid of any. But the books, I can do without some of those.

But back to the topic at hand: 5^thEdition Warhammer 40K.

I miss this edition! This was the game I came back to in 2008 when I also came back to the Navy and, as a single ensign finally making a decent income, I could actually afford to buy the toys I always wanted. And, boy, did I! Way too many. I can now easily field forces of chaos marines, daemons, eldar, loyalist marines (mostly crimson fists), and space wolves, plus some allied orks, dark angels, whatever! 

Flipping through this book makes me really want to go back to it. (No shit, I intend to find someone who wants to play. I probably still have all the codices too!) Some of the things I miss:

·      The Universal Special Rules only take up 3 pages of this mini-sized book, and one-half a page is a picture!

·      Vehicles don’t have hull points. Tanks and dreadnoughts take a beating like they should!

·      A power weapon cuts armor, period. No APs, just make your save or don’t.

·      Only three turns: Move, Shoot, Fight.

·      There’s offensive and defensive grenades, just general classifications. I like that. Offensive grenades allowed you to charge through cover without losing your Initiative (do they still have Initiative at all anymore?!). Defensive grenades denied assaulters the +1 attack for charging. (Okay, maybe the grenade rules weren’t the best ever… What fun are they if you can’t throw them at people and blow them up?)

·      I always liked that there were model types, like infantry, bikes, etc, that all functioned the same way for the most part. So you know the move rate, special rules, etc. 

·      You can charge out of reserve and assault vehicles! 6^thed, I believe, took away the main function of units like striking scorpions and genestealers by having them walk onto the board and then pause to be shot at. 5^thed knew better!

Today we kind of praise 8^thedition (which I still haven’t played, but would like to try it) for it being “simplified.” But 5^thedition was much more simplified than anything after it. It was easy to play, uncomplicated, and a hell of a lot of fun! 

Don’t get me wrong, I like some aspects of the further incarnations, but it sure seems like the adage of “If a little is good, a lot must be great!” was applied over and over again. 

Now that I have my toys, I’ll (eventually) try to get me some 8^thed games to try it out. But I’d go back to 5^thedition in a heartbeat! 

A few more of my unsolicited opinions:

FORCE ORG

I do like the new puzzle-piece 8^thforce org system. You can basically take whatever you want, but there’s a logic to it, a way to fit pieces together that make it more legit. I always enjoyed that aspect of list-building: that there is some structure you must follow, minimums to meet that keep everyone on an even keel. 

But those formations or whatever they were… Basically, the more money you spend the more special powers you get. That crap was unfair. Too much.

For a hybrid version of 40K, maybe you start with the original FO chart, but can purchase extra slots for points. So you can have that 4^thHeavy or 3^rdHQ choice, but it costs a little extra. (Personally, I think there should be a 3^rdHQ slot anyway—those guys are the superheroes of the war, after all!)

OVERWATCH

I don’t think there was Overwatch in 5^thed. I both like it and don’t. I think in 8^thyou can fire it at EVERY unit that charges you, can’t you? That’s way too much.

 I’d almost like to make Overwatch kind of like this: 

You get one use per turn of it. If you don’t think the first unit charging is going to make it, hold your fire, save it for that other, closer unit that you think it coming. 

Also, you need to make an Initiative test in order to pull it off. If you’re not quick enough, you don’t get your weapons up in time. The trade-off to that could be that you get to fire at your regular BS rather than only hitting on 6s. 

And I can already hear Tau players hating this idea! Especially since they generally have Inits of 2. Tau could then have an army special rule like “Disciplined Firing Line” or something to that effect, that gives them a +1 to Init for Overwatch checks.

PSYKERS:

I believe in 5^thpsykers can only use one power per turn too. (I don’t have the rule book in front of me right now.) I’d say that can be expanded by the psyker’s level. 

I did kind of like the Warhammer Fantasy “Winds of Magic” rules that came over to 40K (was that 6^thed?). A random number of dice where you have to use some resource management. 

But no, I’d say psyker tests are back to Leadership tests and that they can use a number of powers equal to their level: elite or unit-based models would be level 1, HQ psykers level 2, special characters level 3. They can use that many powers per turn, once each (no repeating powers in the same turn). And they would know that number of powers as well, unless otherwise stated in their special rules (like superhero characters who know all in their discipline.)

“Deny the Witch” I think was a newer development…  We could keep that, but maybe like this: Only a psyker can attempt a Deny the Witch. The “spell” would have to either originate or target a model within 18” of the Denier for them to be in range. They would make their own Leadership test. If it beats (is lower than) the caster’s roll, they deny it. A power that went off on double 1s can’t be denied. 

Psychic Hoods extend that range to 24” and give them a +1 (well, -1 really) to their Deny roll.

Okay, that’s enough nostalgia and day dreaming for me for now. Just know that discovering that little lost rule book deep inside a box stored away for 4 years really brought me back. 

And speaking of bringing back, BRING BACK 5^THEDITION! 

Or, as I tell my friend Josh all the time, you can play any damn version you want if you and your buds agree on doing so. So, who wants to play some 5^th…?

* * * 

P.S. - I don't blog much here anymore. Join me at https://BrinksChaosTheory.com from now on!

Dragons, Swords, Magic, and Wizards!

The Myths and Legends Fantasy Storybundle



Kevin J. Anderson (of Dunefame, among many others) has curated a new superpack of fantasy ebooks over on storybundle, and he's invited me to take part!

These thirteen books cover a range of classic fantasy types, from epic quests, to modern retellings of classic myths, to humorous encounters with Little Folk, to lit-RPG adventures, to sea monsters, ancient curses, and saving the world. These indie-published authors include Cat Rambo, Kevin J. Anderson, Rebecca Moesta, Jody Lynn Nye, M.L. Buchman, J.T. Evans, Christopher Katava, Stefon Mears, Alex Singer, Meyari McFarland, Linda Nagata, and, yes, J. D. Brink!  There’s also the Undercurrents anthology edited by Lisa Mangum, stories of “what lies beneath” (proceeds from this anthology benefit the Don Hodge Memorial Scholarship Fund for the Superstars Writing Seminar).

If you’re not familiar with how Storybundle works, you name your own price and get the whole batch instantly delivered to your e-reader. For as little as $5 you get the base bundle of five novels, or for $15 or more you will receive all 13 books, enough to keep your reading life filled with magic all through the summer and beyond.

As always with storybundle, a portion of the proceeds goes directly to benefit a charity, in this case the Challenger Learning Centers for Space Science Education. When you pick up a copy of the Myths and Legends storybundle, you’ll receive a lot of great books for around a dollar apiece, you’ll support indie authors, and contribute to a very worthwhile cause. Everybody wins!

But this bundle will be available for only a limited time. In 8 days, it goes away.

Go to https://storybundle.com/fantasy to grab this fantastic deal while it lasts!

40K Eldar Fire Dragons: Finished Painting the Squad

I don't generally blog on here much anymore — moved the whole operation (and then some) to http://BrinksChaosTheory.com — but I thought I'd repost my dragons here.  This was my hobby blog for a very long time, after all.

After starting them in July, I finally wrapped up my "Black Phoenix" Aeldari Fire Dragons.  And I'm pleasantly surprised at how well they turned out!

This probably doesn't look like 3 months of work.  Because it isn't.  I stuck to a very basic concept: base colors, wash, highlight, DONE.  And I decided not to get bogged down in the fine details, like painting every little gadget on their belts a different color or whatever.  Kept it simple.  It just took forever because I went weeks between painting sessions.  Still spent plenty of hours on them, but as I did a whole squad, one color at a time, I made pretty good progress.

Still didn't master dry brushing, which I seem to think would make all this way easier, but hitting the highlights very deliberately instead still worked out well.

I also considered trying to lay some green plasma looking stuff into the grills of their fusion gun muzzles to match their eyes and give the guns a cool look.  (And tie in another color to bring them together.)  It's still tempting to try, but I'm also afraid of screwing them up in the process…

It's funny that they're done now, because I swam laps yesterday and had a flashback to 2009 or 2010 when I used to think about "How am I going to paint those fire dragons?" to keep my mind occupied while I swam.  And now, like 8 years (!) later, they're done!  (Actually, I don't think I had my "dark" aspect warriors built then—it was classic Eldar dragon models at that time.)
Almost finished with my custom Fuegan.  I hollowed out a cloak for him that I have to paint and attach.  His sword I might just keep simple too rather than try to pull off some great magical effect that doesn't turn out how I want.  We'll see.

New 8th Edition Warhammer 40K Books: Quest for the Tomes

Not too long ago, I received an email from Games Workshop (via the general mailing list) saying, “Get these codices while you can,” because a new edition was about to come out.  Get these expiring and about to be useless $50 books before we take them off the shelves because they won’t be valid anymore. 

I thought, “You sons-a-bitches.”

I wanted to fax them a picture of my middle finger.  Or my pale, hairy ass.

The cycle of new 40K editions over the last several years has come across to me (and others) as greedy ways to boost short-term sales.  Kind of like all those terribly pricy text books you had to buy in college.  “We changed 3 things and rearranged some tables, come buy all our books all over again.”

So when the new rumors went to flying, I was naturally skeptical.  Very skeptical.
I’ve been stationed in Japan for nearly 3 years now and in that time have only played once.  So I wasn’t too worried about a new edition.  Haven’t been playing, and now not planning on playing.  Screw those greedy corporate bastards.

But then I started actually reading the rumors and leaks.  That this edition wasn’t just bolting on a few new rules to the clunky old machine, haphazardly spraying on an uneven coat of paint, and charging $200 for a new go.

This was “the edition you asked for.”

No, really.

So between getting actual gamer feedback and simplifying the rules to look more like their well-received Age Of Sigmar redesign of WH Fantasy, the game was starting to sound pretty good.  (I was also skeptical of the Age of Sigmar reboot of WH Fantasy, btw, though I was never a huge fan of the Fantasy system anyway: even more complex than 40,000 Rules and seemed to require a calculator to even play the game!)

If they could thin 40,000 Rules down to 8 to 12 pages, that was an amazing revelation to me.  I was now interested.  And the more I saw, despite my own hardened pessimism, the more I liked the way it was looking.

Within a week, I was actually excited.

Getting the books themselves, then, proved to be a worthy quest.  (Relatively speaking.)
I had to find locales in Japan, and books in English.  There are 3 or 4 GW stores in Tokyo, but that’s a ways to go for me.  In my store search, I also got a few other pings for non-GW stores, one much closer to my base.  Long story short, I ended up journeying to a city I’d never been to before, in a foreign land, using a paper map as a guide (I’m not into the whole cellphone omniscience thing).  I’d called the day before and spoken to a woman who kind of spoke English and reserved me some books.  Namely, the Rule Book, the Marines Index, Eldar Index, and Chaos Index.  A hefty, blind purchase.  But I figured that I hadn’t spent any hobby money for a long time, so why not?
I was pleasantly surprised to find that the new datasheets were being combined into affordable softbacks with multiple related armies all in one book.  Given the easy of access, I figured I had to buy those books.  With three affordable tomes, I had all colors of Space Marines, Eldar, and Chaos Marines and demons all covered, plus Necrons for good measure.  Easy peasy.
But I ended up paying more than the listed market price for everything.  I don’t know if the markup was simply because we are in Japan or if my shop owners charged a little more, but I honestly didn’t mind.

This was a very small little hobby shop owned and operated by a very nice elderly couple.  The husband didn’t speak English and the wife just barely enough.  The shop was more about model airplanes and trains and modeling supplies than it was a gaming shop, though they did have a rather impressive selection of Warhammer stuff, as well as a rack full of Citadel paints.  There were a couple small displays of painted models too, most of which had been painted by the owner.  His wife bragged that he was a beginner, but, damn, did they look nice!  Way nicer than my meager, atrophied painting skills could manage, and I made sure he knew as much.

I spent about half an hour on the trains getting there, and a little more time walking the streets, so I took my time to check out all the nice toys on their shelves.  Saw some cool new stuff I wouldn’t mind having (like the 30K style termie models), but I’m not in a hurry to buy more.  Not using all the stuff I have now.  When it came time to pay, I found out they only took cash.  Darn it.  So then it was a quest to find an ATM that would take my American card.  The two bigger banks with whole lobbies full of ATM machines didn’t work.  It looked grim, my long quest cross country for naught.  Then I found a little booth with a single machine and that one worked out.

So my mighty quest was a success.  I might have paid a bit more, but it went to the mom and pop shop of a really nice elderly couple, so money well spent.   In fact, the venerable Papa-san rounded down the total price for me, threw in a couple of (no doubt expensive) Citadel-brand paint brushes (after I told him about my waning painting skills), and a few odd sprues to boot!  I didn’t even find out about the sprues until I got home and opened up the tiny plastic bonus bag.  Three marines and one of the cool Age of Sigmar space marine wannabe guys with a hammer and shield.  (Which I think could make cool special space marine units too—especially the winged guys for angelic vanguard vets.)

So there’s my long-winded story about how I fell back into love (obsession) with the new 40K and made the perilous journey of a lifetime to score the new books on opening day in a strange land.
I’m sure I’ll be blogging further about my impressions as I get into the books.  I’m actually about to take 2 weeks of leave to relax with the family and supposedly to get some writing projects done.  So much for all that…  I’m sure this new distraction will impede those lines of progress.  But at least I’ll enjoy being delayed!

As I get acquainted with the new rules and datasheets, I'll be posting about my impressions.  So, more to come…

On my new blog site, that is.  Click here to go there (or just remove the "blogspot" from this URL).  This may well be the last post that goes to this blog site.  Please find my newest exploits at my new wesbite: BrinksChaosTheory.com

JDBrink Patreon vid-show

Patreon video, take two!  Much improved.  This time, no me, no sound, just the important parts...

Cool Book Covers

I've done a lot of work to get my Patreon page up over the last couple of weeks.  One of the items I was tooling with in the wee hours of the morning was this composite image of some of my book covers.  And I just think it's a cool ensemble and wanted to post it.  So...  there it is. :)

Now I have to get to bed and try to get some sleep.  Tomorrow is my first day back on day shifts and I expect my body is going to be thoroughly confused...

BTW, not really using this blogspot website much anymore (as you may have noticed).  Catch me now at my new cyber-den: BrinksChaosTheory.com

Sexy Superhero 5-Day Freebie

Need a date for Valentine’s Day?

Well, I can’t really help you there.  But you could curl up with a free ebook featuring a femme fatale superheroine in high-heeled boots and a corset!

Friday, February 10^th through Tuesday, February 14^th, Silk Spider: Behind the Eight-Ball will be free to download on Amazon, no strings (or webs) attached.

Click here to go there right now.

Book #2 in Sci-Fi Series

This feels like a Two-Face reference already.  But on this day, 2/2 (2017) I have Book #2 in the Cold Stars sci-fi series of stories up and ready to roll.

(In ebook form, anyway; paperback coming in the next couple weeks.)

     A naval scientist leads the expedition to explore a ghost ship in space. Only he can unlock its secrets. And once he does, the universe will never be the same.
     A young sniper in training faces his final exam. And now he’ll find out whether he’s predator or prey.
     A sarcastic bounty hunter and beautiful assassin join forces, but their quarry is far more dangerous than either imagined.
     Three tales of military science fiction, mysterious space opera, and daring pulp adventure, delivered to you from between the Cold Stars and the Endless Dark.     

Three exciting stories--about 100 pages in the forth-coming print version--for three bucks.  (Well, $2.99.)

Find it on Amazon, B&N, iBooks, Kobo, Smashwords, and more, right now.

Book #1, by the way, was the novelette The Thorne Legacy… (Only two bucks!)

Urban Fantasy Giveaway: One-Eyed Jacks are Wild

Click this very line to enter an Amazon giveaway!

I've got TEN ebook copies of One-Eyed Jacks lined up to go.  Simply follow the link, click the button to follow me on Amazon (meaning you'll get an email from Amazon when I have new releases, stuff like that), and then sit back and relax.

Ten winners will be drawn from all entrants on February 1st.  And then, well... if you're one of the lucky ten, you'll have yourself a free ebook.  Easy as that!

Clock's ticking.  Draw your lucky card right now.  You've got nothing to lose!

BTW, anyone notice this blog doesn't do much anymore?  That's 'cuz I've move all the action to another place: new website here!

Black Friday: Sci-Fi, Fantasy, & Superhero EBooks

I considered calling this the "Blackest Friday" sale, just to put some over-the-top dramatic spin on it, but decided that was too much.  (We get enough exaggerated crap fed to us as it is, don't we?)  But I do keep changing the name of this sale.

That's because it's good for all seasons!  Election building, victories and woes, and now Christmas shopping season.  Which itself gets more and more exaggerated and out of control every year.  Now they say Black Friday is leaking into Thursday, Wednesday, all over the damn place.  Pretty soon it'll be Black November!  And the All-Hallows-Eve Discount Zombie-a-Thon!  And then Non-Denominational Shopping Frenzy September!

Makes me tired just thinking about it.  But the point is:

For a limited time

(and already there, you don't have to wait till Friday),

EVERY J. D. BRINK TITLE IS $0.99. 

(Unless it’s free, and some of them are!)

You can find them all on Amazon and anywhere else you find books!  Try these links, and if you’re fave spot is not one of these big ones, try the Fugitive Fiction button farm or your favorite web-dimension directly.  (Be aware that some websites may be slower to catch up to the price change than others.)

Amazon

B&N

iBooks

Kobo

Smashwords

Fugitive Fiction button farm

Treat them like Christmas presents: grab as many as you can, then forget about half of them by New Years!

And once you've read these books, if you don't mind, spend a couple of minutes tracing back where you found it and leave a quick review.  Or you could drop one on Goodreads.  Good or bad, a review is great for your fellow readers, and for your author too!

Thanks and Happy Holidays!