Green Ronin has placed the Quickstart Rules for the A Song of Ice and Fire roleplaying game online in PDF format. They’ve also announced that due to GRRM’s continuing work on A Dance with Dragons, they have revised their publication date for the game to October.
From Subterranean Press’s latest update, it seems that the limited edition of A Feast for Crows remains in a holding pattern. Everything is ready for printing, except the color art by Tom Canty. Problems such as a hard drive crash have significantly delayed the progress of the work, and Subterranean extends their apologies to those who are waiting for the book. In brighter news, March Fishman has already begun work on his illustrations for the limited edition of A Dance with Dragons.
Although the speculated date for release of A Dance with Dragons is now proven incorrect in this article from Publisher’s Weekly, Bantam’s confidence in the series is made plain by their planning an initial print run of 350,000 copies, which is an overall increase compared to A Feast for Crows.
Via “Not a Blog, George R. R. Martin reports that he’s landed safely in Europe, but was unable to complete A Dance with Dragons before taking his trip. Beginning July 1st, he will make a series of appearances in the Iberian peninsula, beginning with three dates in Lisbon before travelling across Spain. More details about specific events may be found in the July event calendar.
More license-related news today, as Valyrin Steel reports that they have received final approval for their Longclaw replica sword design and production has begun. Pre-ordering should be an option in July. Concept art for Needle has also been approved, and technical work will begin to realize it.
Valyrian Resin has posted a sneak peek at the work-in-progress sculpt for the Arya resin, with some notes regarding George’s comments. They reiterate that the first line of busts (Sandor, Ned, and Dany) will be available for sale at the San Diego Comic Con.
One of the designers on Green Ronin’s A Song of Ice and Fire roleplaying game has posted a new diary describing the basic ability scale as well as some of the various available skills and abilities.
After the recent mentions from David Benioff of his actively working on the proposed HBO adaption of A Song of Ice and Fire, George R. R. Martin has posted a new update. The primary news is that a second draft of the pilot script has been submitted to HBO, and that the BBC has agreed to partner with HBO in producing the series if it goes forward. If this pans out, A Song of Ice and Fire will be following in the footsteps of Rome, which was also co-produced in its first season.
A major part of GRRM’s post was devoted to requesting that fans not mail him about the series, whether to ask for news (which he will post whenever he can) or to get hired to work on the film (no one is currently being hired, and even if they were, GRRM would have no say).
Green Ronin’s team of designers for the A Song of Ice and Fire Roleplaying Game have made their first post discussing mechanics at the Designer Journal. The die mechanics are relatively straightforward, assigning six-sided dice according to the level of an ability or skill, and then totalling them up to see if the number surpasses a set difficulty. Bonus dice, penalty dice, and modifiers are also discussed.
Dark Sword Miniatures has posted a new image of one of the miniatures Tom Meier is creating for the second wave of A Song of Ice and Fire miniatures. Just as the first wave had a few generic members of the Night’s Watch, this one will feature a few generic characters, and this green (Lannister Lady #1) is one of them.
Subterranean Press has released more information regarding the Jack Vance tribute anthology, Songs of the Dying Earth, which is conceived and edited by George R. R. Martin and Gardner Dozois. The list of contributors include Tanith Lee, Neil Gaiman, Dan Simmons, Mike Resnick, Robert Silverberg, Tad Williams, Lucius Shepherd, and many more. Pricing information and cover art for the book can be seen at the order page. Although GRRM originally planned to contribute a story to the anthology, it now appears that it will depend on his schedule as to whether he will have time to do so.
GRRM’s official site has been updated with a new sample chapter, Tyrion’s first chapter in A Dance with Dragons. This chapter has been previously posted.
The first of several promised designer journal entries has now been posted at Green Ronin’s A Song of Ice and Fire roleplaying game site. In it, they promise more information will be forthcoming in the journal regarding various systems they’ve created from scratch for the game.
Thanks to a board member, we’ve been pointed to this blog post by Damien G. Walter of the Guardian recommending various works of fantasy (and a bit of science fiction sneaking in) to read over the summer. A Song of Ice and Fire gets a paragraph to itself, in the course of which Westeros.org is linked.
Green Ronin has now opened an official webpage for their forthcoming A Song of Ice and Fire Roleplaying Game. They mention that a quick-start preview of the system will be made available on Free RPG Day (June 21st), and that afterwards they will also release it as a free PDF. They also link to their on-line store’s pages, which lists prices for the game itself, an adventure module, and a campaign guide.